More Bipartisan Pressure is Heaped on Bushies

We noted in a post yesterday that one of the biggest misconceptions about the Bush Justice Department scandal is that it is being driven by partisan liberals.

In fact, the first known victims of the Bush DOJ were Republicans--nine U.S. attorneys who were fired apparently for refusing to practice political prosecution. In fact, the effort to get to the bottom of the Bush DOJ swamp has been bipartisan in nature from the outset. And in fact, the single most heroic figure in the whole story, north Alabama attorney and whistleblower Jill Simpson, is a Republican.

More news comes today of a bipartisan effort to get at the truth. Adam Nossiter, of The New York Times, reports that 54 former state attorneys general have filed a brief supporting the appeal of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.

Robert Abrams, a former New York attorney general, wrote the brief. He says the document is unprecedented in bringing together a large number of former state top judicial officers, both Democrats and Republicans, to express a "strong feeling" that an injustice had been done to Siegelman.

The brief was filed in the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta. The brief states: "Completely absent from the trial record is any evidence that Gov. Siegelman and Mr. (Richard) Scrushy entered into an explicit agreement whereby Mr. Scrushy's appointment to the CON board was conditioned upon Mr. Scrushy making the political contributions in question."

Inside a Selective Prosecution, Part II

It's been a newsy week for Alice Martin, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama.

First, she went on the defense against charges from Birmingham attorney Doug Jones that her office is practicing partisan politics with its handling of the Alabama two-year colleges scandal.

Then came news that Martin was handing down another indictment in the two-year case. This time the target was E.B. McClain, a state Senator and Democrat from the Birmingham suburb of Midfield.

Throughout the week came reports that the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is investigating several U.S. attorneys for practicing exactly what Jones alleges--the selection of prosecutions based on politics. The probe reportedly is focusing on cases in Alabama (Don Siegelman), Mississippi (Paul Minor), and Wisconsin (Georgia Thompson).

Counsel H. Marshall Jarrett is leading the OPR investigation, and if it is legitimate, Martin surely will be in the crosshairs. After all, she instigated the first Siegelman prosecution, which a federal judge kicked out of court before it could even get started.

(For those wondering about Jarrett's credentials, whether he will be a dogged and nonpartisan sleuth, there is reason to hope. He was appointed to head OPR in 1998, by then Attorney General Janet Reno. At least he doesn't appear to be a "loyal Bushie.")

With all this news swirling around Alice Martin, what better time to launch a series of posts about our experiences with one of Alabama's notorious Bush appointees. When our series is completed, you will have a clear answer to this question: "Does Alice Martin take political considerations into account when determining which cases to pursue and which cases to ignore?"

And the answer is--a resounding "yes!"

In part I of our series, we presented background about both Alice Martin and the issue of selective prosecution.

Now, we invite you to join us on a brief travelogue of my experiences in trying to inform the Bush Justice Department about clear criminal conduct by Republican judges and Republican-connected attorneys in Alabama:

* Contact the FBI--The bureau claims that public corruption cases are its No. 1 priority, so I was expecting prompt action when I went to its special Web site for reporting such cases. After filling out a lengthy complaint and transmitting it, I waited . . . and waited . . . and waited . . .

And let's just say the wait is ongoing. I believe I filed the complaint in spring 2006.

* Contact the FBI again--A few months went by without hearing anything regarding my e-complaint, so I decided to call the Birmingham FBI office. A gentleman answering the intake calls that day listened to a short version of my story and showed little interest. I asked him for the name of the person in charge of white-collar crimes. I left several voice messages with that person. Still waiting for a reply.

* Contact the Birmingham U.S. Attorney's Office--Somehow, I came up with an e-mail address for Matt Hart, director of the white-collar crime unit. I sent him an e-mail and never received a reply. I decided to take a shot at calling his office, and by some miracle, managed to get him on the phone. First, Hart told me I didn't have a clue about the applicable law--honest services mail fraud. When I made it clear that I certainly did know about both the statutory and case law behind honest services mail fraud, Hart changed his tune. Whether I had been the victim of a crime or not, Hart was "kicking" my case. "I kick cases all the time," he said. I found it interesting that he could "kick" a case he hadn't even looked at yet.

* Send snail mail to the Queen herself--On January 14, 2007, I fired off a letter to Queen Alice Martin, her ownself. Since Matt Hart had questioned my knowledge of the law, I decided to focus more on the law and less on the facts.

* Queen Alice responds!--In a letter dated January 22, 2007, Queen Alice Her Ownself (QAHO) informed me that she already was familiar with the applicable law, but she needed more in the way of facts. She needed allegations that were in "focused detail," she said. "Be careful what you ask for, Queen," I thought to myself.

* A Schnauzer rises to the challenge!--By now, I had read enough about QAHO in the press to think she almost certainly would not take my allegations seriously. So I let her response sit for a while. Finally, in a letter dated June 14, 2007, I loaded up the guns and fired everything I had in the Queen's direction. In a six-page letter, I laid out in "focused detail" the allegations of federal crimes I had witnessed. After sending the letter via snail mail, I waited . . . and waited . . .
* A Schnauzer doesn't like being ignored--More than a month went by, and I began to think, "You know, I don't think QAHO is taking this seriously." What to do? I had Matt Hart's e-mail address, and under the assumption that the Queen used a similar construction, I took a shot at e-mailing her. And what do you know, I guessed right. She responded.

And that was the beginning of an e-mail exchange that we are about to present here at Legal Schnauzer. We think you will find it highly educational.

By the way, the Queen's e-mail address is alice.martin@usdoj.gov.

(To be continued)

A Victory for Victims of Workplace Retaliation

I recently became personally acquainted with what it is like to face retaliation in the workplace. (More details on that coming soon.) So it was heartening, and surprising, to learn of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that strengthens protections for workers who face retaliation after making complaints about discrimination.

Most observers probably did not expect a worker-friendly decision from the Roberts Supreme Court. But a combination of conservative and liberal justices gave workers enhanced leeway to sue when they are the victims of retaliation after making discrimination claims.

In two employment cases, one involving race and the other age, the court took an expansive view of workers' rights and avoided the narrow, ideology-based decisions that marked its previous term:

The justices read parts of an 1860s civil rights act and the main anti-age bias law to include the right to sue over reprisals even though neither provision expressly prohibits retaliation.

Justice Stephen Breyer, writing for the court in a case involving a black employee at a Cracker Barrel restaurant who was fired, said that previous Supreme Court decisions and congressional action make clear that retaliation is covered.

The idea that a provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, known as section 1981, "encompasses retaliation claims is indeed well-embedded in the law," Breyer said in the 7-2 ruling.

The outcomes contrasted with rulings last term in which conservative majorities insisted on literal readings of federal laws over the objections of liberal dissenters who favored more expansive interpretations.

On Tuesday, Justices Samuel Alito and Anthony Kennedy joined their more liberal colleagues in both rulings. Indeed, Alito wrote the court's opinion allowing a federal employee to pursue retaliation claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act. The vote in that case was 6-3.

Here's a shocker: Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented in both cases. "Retaliation is not discrimination based on race," Thomas wrote in the Cracker Barrel case.

Wow, that's profound.

Naturally, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce wasn't happy with the outcome.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce vice president Robin Conrad said she has been puzzled by the court's repeated rulings against employers, particularly after last term's string of victories for business interests.

Conrad said Roberts, in particular, may be reacting to the criticism of the court after the 5-4 decision last year against Lilly Ledbetter, a longtime Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. employee. In an opinion written by Alito, the court threw out Ledbetter's pay discrimination claim because she missed a strict deadline in civil rights law.

"I would have to think there is some connection there because our batting average this term is pretty bad in labor and employment cases," Conrad said.

Interesting that a Chamber representative would accuse a Bush appointee of making judicial decisions based on perceptions or politics, rather than sound legal reasoning. Maybe the Chamber spent so much money on buying the state courts in Alabama and Mississippi that it didn't have enough left over to buy the entire U.S. Supreme Court.

William L. Taylor, a veteran civil rights lawyer in Washington, said the Cracker Barrel decision shows that the Roberts court will not engage in "an across-the-board decimation of civil rights. . . . I think it's cause for at least a small celebration."

Bushies Face Bipartisan Pressure

One of the biggest misconceptions about the evolving Bush Justice Department scandal is that it is driven by partisan liberals.

In fact, the scandal was initiated by, and partially driven by, Republicans--the kind that are honest, bipartisan servants of the American people. Yes, they do exist.

Remember, the first victims of the Bush DOJ were nine fired U.S. attorneys--all Republicans. The hero of the effort to shine light on the political prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman is north Alabama attorney Jill Simpson, a longstanding Republican. One of the most eloquent spokesmen on issues related to the Siegelman case has been former Arizona Attorney General Grant Woods, a Republican. And the primary chronicler of Bush DOJ sleaze, Scott Horton of Harper's, has gone out of his way to point out that he is a former corporate lawyer and hardly a "whacky liberal." (Whatever that is.)

Now we have a new example of bipartisanship in the effort to drain the murky swamp Bushies have created at Justice. Twenty former U.S. attorneys, both Democrats and Republicans, have urged a federal judge to intervene in a constitutional battle over whether former White House officials Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolten should testify before Congress about the firings of the nine U.S. attorneys.

This comes on the heels of 50-some former state attorneys general, of both parties, stepping up to raise questions about the apparent political nature of the Siegelman prosecution.

So honest Republicans, noble people who are concerned about justice, do exist. And they are making their voices heard. My guess is that they will play a critical role in the process of unveiling the corruption that permeates the Bush Justice Department.

The George W. Bush Administration should be an embarrassment to all Americans. And no one knows that like honest Republicans.

Why All the Fuss Over McClellan Book?

Former Bush White House press secretary Scott McClellan is all over the networks, discussing his just-released book. But Larisa Alexandrovna, of at-Largely, asks this question: What's the big deal?

It's mostly old news for folks who have followed the reporting of Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel of McClatchy Newspapers.

Landay and Strobel have a retort for folks who have gone gaga over McClellan's "revelations."

Until now, we've resisted the temptation to post on former White House press secretary Scott McClellan's new book, which accuses the Bush White House of launching a propaganda campaign to sell the war in Iraq.

Why? It's not news. At least not to some of us who've covered the story from the start.
(Click here, here and here to get just a taste of what we mean).

Second, we find it a wee bit preposterous -- and we are being diplomatic here -- that a man who slavishly - no, robotically! -- defended President Bush's policies in Iraq and elsewhere is trying to "set the record straight" (and sell a few books) five years and more after the invasion, with U.S. troops still bravely fighting and dying to stabilize that country.

But the responses to McClellan from the Bush administration and media bigwigs, history-bending as they are, compel us to jump in. As we like to say around here, it's truth to power time, not just for the politicians but also for some folks in our own business.

Alexandrovna provides background on the strong credentials of the "McClatchy Boys."

And when it comes truth to power, these two did not partake of the pre-war propaganda. Quite the contrary, they were in the tiny minority who reported aggressively about the lies issuing forth out of the White House. So let the ass kicking begin:

Bush loyalists have responded in three ways:
1) Scott, how could you? This conveniently ignores the issue of what Bush did or didn't know and do about intelligence on Iraq, converting the story line into that of wounded leader and treasonous former aide. (That canard was the sole focus of a CBS news radio report Wednesday night).
2) Invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Okay. When do Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, et al *not* say that? Dog bites man.
3) It was an intelligence failure. The CIA gave us bad dope on WMD and, well, they're the experts.

What About the Prosecutor in the Two-Year College Probe?

It's been a busy week for news on the investigation of alleged corruption in the Alabama two-year colleges system.

Alabama's corporate press focuses exclusively on the alleged wrongdoers. But I would suggest that the public pay close attention to the prosecutor, U.S. Attorney Alice Martin. And I will tell you why in a series of upcoming posts.

As for the accused, word comes today that state Senator E.B. McClain, a Democrat from Midfield, is the latest to be indicted. McClain is charged with taking about $300,000 for himself from money he had helped obtain for a nonprofit organization.

The most high-profile case so far involves north Alabama legislator Sue Schmitz. Doc's Political Parlor provides a valuable update today on the Schmitz case. The Birmingham News reported on Wednesday that U.S. Chief Magistrate Judge Paul Greene had rejected Schmitz' claims of prosecutorial misconduct and selective prosecution.

What to make of McClain, Schmitz, and others (mostly Democrats) who are accused of wrongdoing? It's too early to tell, but the issue of selective prosecution should not be swept under the carpet in this case.

Judge Greene might not have found Schmitz' arguments compelling. But your humble blogger has had personal interaction with Alice Martin, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama and chief prosecutor on the two-year colleges case.

Experience tells me that any claim of selective prosecution regarding Martin's office should be taken with the utmost seriousness.

Details on our interactions with Alice Martin are coming soon.

Hope for Justice in Mississippi--and Beyond

The Jackson Free Press, an alternative weekly in Jackson, Mississippi, has an excellent piece on recent signs that the Justice Department might be conducting a serious investigation of possible political prosecutions around the country, particularly in the Deep South.

The article, by writer Adam Lynch, brings to mind a number of questions--both about justice and the press:

* Does the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) have the kind of independent, tough-minded investigators needed to get to the bottom of the Paul Minor case in Mississippi, the Don Siegelman case in Alabama, and other suspect prosecutions around the country?

* Is OPR Counsel H. Marshal Jarrett the kind of guy who really can further the cause of justice? Or is he just another "cover" guy for the Bush administration?

* Were the Minor and Siegelman cases connected, and just how corrupt were the federal judges who handled the cases?

* Why does Jackson, Mississippi, have a feisty, inquisitive alternative weekly and Birmingham does not?

As for the first two questions, answers are varied. Lynch says Siegelman is not expecting much from the OPR folks. One of Siegelman's lawyers is more hopeful:

Siegelman told the JFP that he believed prosecutors pursued his case with Rove nipping at their heels all the way. He said the OPR office, which is an arm of the U.S. Department of Justice, investigating the issue could be compared to “asking the chickens if they feel comfortable with the fox guarding the hen house.”

“Karl Rove has had eight years to get his people embedded in the office. I have no reason to have anything other than high regard for H. Marshall Jarrett, but I don’t know him. I don’t know anybody’s background, so I can’t really speak on them,” Siegelman said.

One of Siegelman’s lawyers, Vince Kilborn of Alabama, said he had met with the Judiciary Committee’s lawyers and Chairman Conyers, and felt Jarrett could be an independent party to the investigation. “The Judiciary Committee has faith in him. He’s a career guy. He’s been there a while,” Kilborn said.

As for the third question, possible connections between the Minor and Siegelman cases remain unclear. But Lynch shines light on judicial corruption in the Minor case, giving a scathing review of U.S. Judge Henry Wingate. Evidence strongly suggests that U.S. Judge Mark Fuller was every bit as corrupt in his handling of the Siegelman case:

The prosecution had an easier time convincing a jury of Minor’s wrongdoing in 2006 after Judge Henry Wingate ruled out the necessity of quid pro quo—proof of bribery—in Minor’s case. Wingate also allowed prosecutors to tell the jury that the allegedly “purchased” rulings could be perfectly “legal and correct.”

As for the final question, I don't know why Birmingham's two alternative weeklies are so lame, when it comes to real news, compared to the Jackson Free Press.

Here's the lowdown on Birmingham's "alternative press." One of the papers, Black & White, actually has a clear conservative bent. What in the heck is alternative about that? The corporate press in Alabama isn't already conservative enough? Black & White bills itself as Birmingham's "city paper," and I guess it is if you happen to be a corporate chieftain or a member of a suburban megachurch. But don't we already have The Birmingham News for those folks? I have no idea what purpose Black & White serves, other than selling advertising.

The other paper, Birmingham Weekly, isn't much better. The Weekly does some nice arts stuff, and I invariably enjoy Courtney Haden's column. But the paper is pretty much worthless when it comes to news. The Weekly seems to have a somewhat progressive tone, but it doesn't do much with it. The Bush Justice Department scandal is one of the nation's most important domestic stories over the past year or so, and its roots clearly are in Alabama. Has the Weekly done anything of substance on the story? If it has, I've sure missed it.

From a personal perspective, I've contacted managing editor Phillip Jordan and writer Kyle Whitmire about the gross corruption I've witnessed in Alabama state courts, going all the way to the Alabama Supreme Court. I've made it clear that my experience has ties to regional and national issues. You would think such a story might be worth at least an inquiry from the Weekly's intrepid reporters. I've never received the first word in reply.

Was that because I pointed out that the corrupt judges in my case were all Republicans? If so, it appears that Jordan and Whitmire are more interested in covering up news than they are unearthing news. Again, don't we already have The Birmingham News for that.

The "Family Values" of Briarwood Christian

I haven't written in a while about the curious connections that Briarwood Presbyterian Church has to my legal woes. But let's return to that subject for a moment.

I noted in a post a while back that I had evidence strongly suggesting that officials at Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham know that Shelby County judges cheat on their behalf. And my evidence suggests that Briarwood officials try their best to take advantage of this.

What am I talking about? Well, it's a 2003 lawsuit filed in Jefferson County Circuit Court styled Dr. Charles Mayfield v. Briarwood Christian School. It contains some most interesting information that pertains to our Legal Schnauzer case.

First, a little background. In a number of earlier posts, I have noted the curious fact that my legal woes can be dated to a peculiar real-estate transaction in which Briarwood Christian football coach Fred Yancey (my former neighbor) moved to a house on school property where he evidently lived pretty much free of charge. This transaction resulted in me having a new neighbor named Mike McGarity, who came complete with an extensive criminal record and quickly proceeded to trample on my property rights in a variety of ways.

The problems with McGarity escalated to the point that, when my wife and I fought to protect our property rights, he filed a bogus lawsuit against us. And Republican judges in Shelby County repeatedly made unlawful rulings, benefitting McGarity and his sleazy attorney, William E. Swatek.

I have noted that both Swatek and Circuit Judge J. Michael Joiner have ties to Briarwood school. And I have speculated that McGarity's lawsuit against me might have been a way to divert his attention from a legitimate case he might have had against someone connected to Briarwood as a result of the hastily done real-estate deal.

Some readers have scoffed at the notion that Shelby County judges would act in ways that would protect the interests of Briarwood. But those readers might want to reconsider when they learn about the Mayfield case.

The Mayfield case is a classic personal-injury case. Dr. Charles Mayfield, who lived at the time in Jefferson County, was attending a youth soccer game on the Briarwood campus when he tripped over a wire and injured himself. Mayfield filed a lawsuit, stating that Briarwood was negligent in not removing the wire and had contributed to his injury.

Mayfield was represented by Craig Lowell, an attorney from the Birmingham firm of Wiggins, Childs, Quinn & Pantazis. Briarwood was represented by Jennifer T. Dewees, who also is based in Jefferson County.

The lawsuit initially was filed against Briarwood Christian School. But the Briarwood side quickly filed a motion stating that the proper party for purposes of the lawsuit was Briarwood Presbyterian Church. For legal purposes, the school is a ministry of the church, so the case was restyled Mayfield vs. Briarwood Presbyterian Church.

While the school is in Shelby County, and the accident took place in Shelby County, Briarwood's own lawyer noted that the suit properly was against Briarwood Presbyterian Church, which is in Jefferson County.

Now here's where it gets interesting: I don't pretend to be an expert on jurisdictional law. A number of factors can come into play when deciding where a case should be heard. But the overriding factors seems to be this: The proper jurisdiction for a case usually is the county where the defendant is based.

In this case, that issue is easy: Briarwood Presbyterian Church, the defendant, is based in Jefferson County.

But what did the Briarwood attorney do? She filed a motion seeking to have the case moved to Shelby County.

Now why would she do that? My guess is that she was told to do it by someone in the Briarwood chain of command, someone who knew the school would get favorable treatment in Shelby County. And had the case gone to Shelby County, who would it have wound up before? My guess is J. Michael Joiner, but it probably wouldn't matter. My experience suggests that Joiner would ramrod the case according to his desires, regardless of the judge.

Here's another guess from your humble blogger: I suspect all of the lawyers, and the judge, in the Mayfield case knew what was going on with the motion to move the case. It's a poorly held secret in Birmingham legal circles that Shelby County judges favor certain attorneys and interests.

Had the case been moved to Shelby County, Dr. Mayfield almost certainly would have gotten the shaft. His case would have been unlawfully dismissed, and had he chosen to appeal it, the Republican-packed appellate courts in Alabama would have affirmed the trial-court finding, almost certainly without a written opinion. In addition to being physically injured on Briarwood property, Dr. Mayfield would have suffered serious injuries to his wallet--to the tune of several thousand dollars. And Briarwood would have skated home free.

Mayfield's attorney wisely fought the change of venue, and the Jefferson County judge correctly ruled that the case would stay put. Court records indicate the case was settled. My guess is that Briarwood's insurer coughed up some cash to pay for Mayfield's injuries and his attorney fees.

What does this tale say about Briarwood Presbyterian Church? Here's what it tells me:

* Someone in the church's leadership knows the church will be legally protected in Shelby County.

* The church is more than happy to take advantage of this situation.

* If innocent people are harmed and/or cheated by Shelby County judges on Briarwood's behalf, the church evidently has no problem with that.

Kind of gives you the warm and fuzzies about Christian family values doesn't it?

Vanity Fair Has a Big Story Brewing

Acclaimed investigative journalist Craig Unger is working on a major piece about the Don Siegelman prosecution and related issues in Alabama. Glynn Wilson, of Locust Fork News, writes that the piece is due to run in the September or October issue of Vanity Fair.

Unger recently spent a week in Alabama, interviewing people from one end of the state to the other. Your humble blogger is among the folks Unger has interviewed, and it looks like our Legal Schnauzer tale will play some role in the Vanity Fair piece.

Is Vanity Fair taking this project seriously? Consider Unger's resume and check out his Web site.
He is the author of two highly regarded books on the George W. Bush administration: House of Bush, House of Saud and Fall of the House of Bush.

In November 2007, Scott Horton of Harper's presented an excellent interview with Unger. You can check that out here.

If you are interested in the many ills plaguing America's justice system, ills that sprang roots here in Alabama, you won't want to miss Unger's piece.

A seminal moment in the evolving Bush Justice Department scandal came when 60 Minutes reported on the Siegelman case. It appears the upcoming Vanity Fair piece, coming just before the November presidential election, could have an impact that is just as strong--maybe stronger.

Siegelman Calls Rove "Evil" and "Devious"

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman is not in the mood for pulling punches, particularly when it comes to former Bush White House strategist Karl Rove.

In an interview with Sam Stein of Huffington Post, Siegelman fired both the "E" (evil) and "D" (devious) words at Rove. And Siegelman says Rove deserves a place in history for the special brand of corruption he brought to the U.S. Justice Department.

Said Siegelman:

"I think Rove is probably the most devious and evil political operative who has been trained to come on to the political scene in certainly the last fifty years. I can't think of anybody in the annals of history who could even rival this man's pernicious thoughts. It is a lifetime's work for him. . . . I think he learned two things from Watergate: you don't need to establish a secret plumbers union at a mid level office in the White House when you can take over Department of Justice and have them do your dirty work for you, and secondly, you don't leave tapes behind, you destroy evidence."

Siegelman went even further, by saying that Rove is lying when he claims to have had no involvement in political prosecutions:

"Karl Rove saying he's had nothing to do with firing U.S. Attorneys and nothing to do with my case is like President Bush saying he's had nothing to do with the war in Iraq because he hasn't pulled a trigger."

Siegelman's comments came one day after Rove said his involvement in the Siegelman case consisted of learning about the investigations in a newspaper article. The former Alabama governor said last week's subpoena for Rove to testify before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee was a step in the right direction.

"I think the objective from my point is not my case or my vindication or proving any one particular egregious act, but to expose a pattern and practice of political wrongdoing, of abuse of power, of misusing the Department of Justice as a political tool. I do think that my case offers the best route to prove that, and it is the easiest and fastest way to get at abuse from Karl Rove."

Siegelman repeated the suggestion he made last week on Dan Abrams' The Verdict, suggesting that House Democrats compel testimony from lower-level players in his prosecution, including: Bill Canary, an Alabama GOP consultant who reportedly said he would have his wife, Leura, a U.S. Attorney, "take care" of the case, and Rob Riley, the son of the Alabama governor who allegedly helped grease the wheels of Siegelman's trial.

Smoking Out Corrupt U.S. Attorneys?

Word came last week that the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is investigating the actions of several U.S. attorneys for signs of possible political prosecution.

Now that news is reverberating around the country, and the latest echo comes in Mississippi, home of the Paul Minor case that led to the imprisonment of a major Democratic donor and two former state judges.

Jerry Mitchell, an award-winning reporter at the Jackson Clarion-Ledger, reports that the Minor case, the Don Siegelman case in Alabama, and the Georgia Thompson case in Wisconsin are at the heart of the OPR probe.

"This really is a major step for the office to investigate its own prosecutors in the Justice Department," said Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz, who was cleared of any wrongdoing in the Minor case.

Minor, who was known for successfully suing the tobacco and asbestos industries, was convicted and is in federal prison, along with former state judges Wes Teel and John Whitfield.

Mitchell, noting connections between the Siegelman and Minor cases, writes:

In a May 5 letter to House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr., H. Marshall Jarrett, counsel for the Office of Professional Responsibility, wrote that the Justice Department was examining allegations of selective prosecution related to Diaz, Minor, Siegelman and Thompson.

Siegelman's lawyer, Doug Jones of Birmingham, said this is an extension of the probe that began last year into the dismissals of nine U.S. attorneys, which helped lead to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' resignation.

"The investigation is looking at the allegations of possible perjury and obstruction of justice at the highest levels of the Justice Department," Jones said.

The White House reportedly approved the dismissals of seven of those U.S. attorneys after concluding they weren't doing enough to carry out President Bush's policies. Some prosecutors said they were shown the door for refusing to prosecute Democrats.

"The prosecutors who were fired did the right thing," Diaz said. "But that leaves open the question whether there were any pressures brought to bear on those U.S. attorneys who weren't fired."

Dunn Lampton, the U.S. attorney who spearheaded the Minor prosecution, originally was on a Bush administration list of prosecutors to be fired. But he led the Minor case and wound up not being dismissed.

Asked Saturday about the Office of Professional Responsibility investigating allegations of selective prosecution, Lampton responded, "There's not anything I can comment on."

Jill Simpson: She's Still Standing

What's happening with Jill Simpson, the north Alabama attorney and Republican whistleblower whose affidavit regarding the political prosecution of former Governor Don Siegelman was released almost one year ago?

How is Simpson holding up under regular attack from nutjobs in the corrupt wing of the Republican Party?

Alabama blogger and newshound Glynn Wilson addresses those questions in an excellent post at his Locust Fork Journal. Wilson tells us that Simpson is doing just fine, thank you very much.

The latest right-wing hatchetman to go after Simpson is John Hinderaker, writing at The Weekly Standard. Hinderaker claims that Simpson has struggled to make a living as an attorney, that she comes from a family of rabid Democrats, that she is moving to Washington, D.C., because she is on the verge of financial collapse in Rainsville, Alabama.

Wilson sets the record straight, showing that Simpson has done quite well as an attorney, her family indeed has a lengthy Republican resume, and she has made several savvy financial moves to facilitate a planned move to the nation's capital. Simpson long ago acknowledged that standing up to corrupt Republicans in Alabama has hurt her law practice. But she hardly is suffering financially, and greener pastures await in the nation's seat of power.

Hinderaker evidently isn't interested in the facts, so Wilson gets down to it:

As a matter of fact, Ms. Simpson held an auction of some of her extensive property holdings in order to buy a house and open a law office in Washington. She sold her burned down house for $57,000, not bad in a depressed market. And she sold her law office and an out building next door, along with the land next to the Rainsville City Hall and a city park, for $300,000. Not exactly a pauper’s return on her investment of about $65,000 a number of years ago. The city wanted the land anyway to fill out it’s growing municipal complex. Her office building may very well be used for the new Dekalb County satellite courthouse.

She rejected the bid on a 38-acre farm she still owns with a $150,000 lake on it. And she is keeping the house in Rainsville where she still lives with her mother and three children. When she is away working in DC, her secretary will still be working full time on her practice in Rainsville.

Yet without ever having met Jill Simpson, Hinderaker goes on to attack her mental health and the work of CBS’s “60 Minutes” on the story, all while defending the disgraced Karl Rove. He repeats the myth perpetrated by the Birmingham News that she has somehow changed her story several times over the past year.

Since I told the whole story based on an on the record interview almost a year ago, I can attest to the fact that the story has never changed. It’s just a complicated story with a host of characters, and different news outlets pick up on different aspects of the story in the retelling.

Gettin' Down and Dirty on the Siegelman Appeal

Want to get heavily into the legal issues involved in the appeal of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman?

Two very interesting blog posts provide the opportunity to do just that.

Tommy Stevenson, of the Tuscaloosa News, has a splendid piece about the guts of the Siegelman appeal. Stevenson describes the tone of the appeal as both "outraged and sarcastic" and includes a link to the entire 99-page document. If you are a legal junkie like me, you will want to sink your teeth into this.

Stevenson notes four major sections in the appeal that outline key mistakes by U.S. Judge Mark Fuller. But perhaps the most interesting part of the appeal comes from Siegelman's First Amendment assertion that his sentence was enhanced because of out-of-court statements he made regarding the political nature of his prosecution.

The White Collar Crime Prof Blog picks up on the First Amendment argument and calls it "powerful and unique."

Alabama: Love it or Leave it?

A reader left a comment a few weeks back, and it definitely made me stop and think.

The post was about the efforts of Shelby County sheriff's deputies to harass my wife and me over a writ of execution that clearly is invalid. Of course, since that post, the sheriff has gone ahead with an unlawful sheriff's sale of my house.

At that time, a reader wrote: "What keeps you in such a god awful place? The weather?"

I thought that was a darned good question, one I hadn't been asked before--at least not in quite that way. A number of people in the Birmingham area, upon hearing our tale of legal woe, have asked my wife or me, "Why don't you just move?" They were suggesting that we move to another house in this area, to get away from the troublesome neighbor, his corrupt lawyer, etc.

These folks mean well, but that question always tells me they probably never have faced a lawsuit themselves. Here's the reason I say that: When our neighbor first proved difficult, with the trespassing, sassing, etc., moving might have been an option. (Although with his fence taking up almost 400 square feet of our property, we couldn't have sold our house until that was resolved anyway. A survey would have shown an encumbrance, so we were heading for some sort of legal difficulties regardless.) But once someone files a lawsuit against you, moving isn't likely to solve anything. We could have moved to Alaska, and the lawsuit still would have followed us. It's like having a rash you can't get rid of.

The "why don't you just move" question always makes me think of my mother. She and my father were members of the same Presbyterian church in my native Missouri for more than 50 years. At one point, the church had a minister who was a perfectly fine fellow and a pretty good preacher as I recall, but he was not terribly friendly. This was a major flaw, in my mother's book. The fellow was from Pennsylvania, and my mother seemed to think that was the problem. "You know, people up there just aren't friendly," she would say.

Well, in my mom's value system, friendliness is next to Godliness. I suspect Charles Manson could have become minister of her church, and if he was friendly (and got a haircut and a shave), my mom probably would have thought he was A-OK.

One day, after listening to one of my mom's prolonged gripes about the minister (this was after I had moved to Alabama and was no longer a member of that church), I said, "Why don't you and dad move to a different church?"

She was having none of that. "We were there first," she said.

Well, maybe it's the stubborn, "Show Me" Missourian coming out in me, but that's how I feel when people suggest that my wife and I move because of this bad neighbor. "Hey," I want to say, "we were here first." My wife feels that way, too, and she's from Alabama, not Missouri.

But back to the reader's comment. Actually, this was not the first time someone had suggested that being in Alabama was the source of our problems. My best friend from high school, who lives in Missouri, had the same thought. "Don't you think it's time to get out of that state?" he said.

This all brings a couple of thoughts to mind:

* The problem of corruption in the justice system goes way beyond Alabama--Just consider the evolving Bush Department of Justice (DOJ) scandal. Brush fires connected to that have broken out in Alabama, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, California, New York, New Mexico, Washington . . . and well, I can't remember them all. On the subject of judicial corruption in state courts, my research has revealed cases from Washington to Florida, from California to New York, from Mississippi to Illinois, from Nevada to Pennsylvania. Evidence strongly suggests that the kind of problems I've encountered can hit you no matter where you live. And while almost all of the bad guys in my case have been Republicans, the problem is not limited to one party. It's not hard to find cases around the country involving judges who are Democrats. Perhaps the most egregious example I've come across involves family court in New York. One of my goals with this blog is to illustrate the pervasive nature of judicial corruption in the U.S. We will be discussing cases from all areas of the country and even look at the issue from an international perspective.

* I've perhaps given the impression that Alabama is a god awful place, all the way around--If I have, I feel bad about that because that certainly is not my intent. I grew up in the Midwest and have lived in Birmingham for almost 30 years. No one forced me to come here, and no one has forced me to stay, so obviously I must like the place. In spite of its horrible justice system, and its overall sorry government, Alabama in general--and Birmingham in particular--have quite a bit to recommend them. Here are a few of my favorite things about this place I now call home:

# From one end of the state to the other, Alabama is one of the prettiest places I've seen. We have beautiful mountains and lush forests to the north, with some of the world's nicest beaches to the south. Lakes, rivers, and wildlife are abundant.

# You can find some seriously good eatin' in Alabama. Birmingham alone has the best barbecue and some of the best seafood I've ever tasted. And the city has all kinds of excellent ethnic restaurants--Italian, Mexican, Chinese, Lebanese, Thai, Vietnamese, you name it. I'm not a big white-tablecloth kind of guy, but I'm told a number of our high-end establishments are superb. And if you really want to get down and dirty on Birmingham food, I would recommend Full Moon Barbecue and Milo's hamburgers.

# Birmingham has a rich cultural scene. It's no accident that our sons and daughters--Taylor Hicks, Bo Bice, Ruben Studdard, Diana DeGarmo--have done so well on American Idol. I'm hardly an expert on our music scene, but I hear we have a number of other promising musicians out there--Michael Warren, Moses Mayfield, Taylor Hollingsworth, Wild Sweet Orange, Vulture Whale, John P. Strohm, Dan Sartain, The Ackleys, and Ryan Kinder are a few who come to mind. A few weeks back, I read about a gifted young guitarist from our area named Todd Simpson. He fronts a band called Mojo Child and evidently is heavily into the blues. Birmingham has a most interesting musician named Walker Yancey. He's 11 years old, and a Birmingham News article said he looks like Buddy Holly and sings with the heart of Bob Dylan. Not a bad combination. You can read about Walker and hear a couple of his tunes here.

And Birmingham culture goes way beyond rock and/or roll. A woman who worked for ABC and had lived in New York for years once told me that Birmingham has some of the finest church choirs she's seen anywhere. One of our best is at Independent Presbyterian Church. Birmingham has some stunning church architecture, and IPC is a prime example.

# Birmingham has lots of history. Arlington Antebellum Home provides a feel of the old South. Sloss Furnances is a landmark to the city's steel-making past. And the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute is a can't-miss destination, spotlighting the city's role in the nation's battle for equality.

# The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) is one of the great success stories in higher education anywhere. It didn't become an autonomous campus until 1969, and yet it has a powerhouse medical center and an acclaimed undergraduate program. If you need world-class health care, Birmingham is one of the best places on the planet to live. Here's some trivia for you: What three universities in the South receive the most research funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH)? Answer: University of North Carolina, Duke University, UAB.

# I was talking one time to an optometrist who had grown up in Kansas, and the conversation turned to things we liked about Birmingham. Two of his favorites: architecture and cuisine. The second one, of course, referred to our many fine restaurants. But his first choice was particularly interesting. Whether they are residential, business, or sacred, Birmingham has some beautiful buildings. In fact, if you can afford them, we have some of the most gorgeous neighborhoods you'll see anywhere. Even a poor guy like me can live in a pretty neighborhood. One of my brothers and his wife were visiting one time, and they kept looking out our back window and saying, "Look at all the trees." Go out our front door, walk a few steps and look in one direction and you see the lovely Oak Mountain. And the entrance to Oak Mountain State Park is just a little ways down the road. For all the crap we've endured while trying to live peacefully in our own home, my wife and I try to be thankful every day for the beauty that is present all around us.

# If you like sports, Birmingham should be your kind of place. Of course, Alabama-Auburn is one of the great rivalries in college football. And Legion Field is one of the sport's most historic venues. Since I grew up in Missouri, I had no particular allegiance to Alabama or Auburn when I moved here. So I adopted the UAB Blazers, as my team. Gene Bartow left UCLA in 1977 to start UAB's athletics program from scratch, and the Blazers have been strong in hoops throughout their 30-year history. The school started a football program in the early 1990s, and it became Division I-A in 1995. We've had a couple of down years recently, but we once beat LSU and have turned out a number of NFL players, including Roddy White of the Atlanta Falcons and Bryan Thomas of the New York Jets. And I think new coach Neil Callaway has the Blazers back on the right track. Birmingham has been host to NCAA basketball regionals, Olympic soccer, major golf and tennis events, and much more. I'm not much of a motorsports guy, but I'm told the Barber Motorsports Park is one of the best facilities of its kind in the nation. And if you are a baseball fan, Birmingham has one of the sport's shrines, a place that is a must visit if you are ever in the area. Rickwood Field is the oldest ballpark in America that is still in use. Babe Ruth played there. Willie Mays played there. The place reeks of history, and a local organization known as the Friends of Rickwood has kept it in excellent shape. Here's what one minor-league baseball aficionado says about Rickwood.

# Birmingham has a nice zoo. I used to hear that it was considered the best zoo in the Deep South. Don't know if that still holds true, but it's a cool place. The zoo has a great sea lions exhibit, which has helped me determine that if I'm ever reincarnated, I want to come back as a sea lion. They eat, swim, play, chill, and make people laugh. Sounds like a pretty good gig. No wonder they appear to have smiles permanently affixed to their faces.

# Yes, the weather is nice. We do have a little winter, but not too much. If you don't mind the humidity in the summer, and the threat of tornadoes in March and November, I'd say the weather is just about right.

# And for you guys out there, I would say there are more good-looking women in Alabama per capita than anywhere on the planet. In fact, I have to give the entire South high marks in this category. A college buddy from Missouri still has whiplash, I think, from his efforts to take in all the sights on his first visit to Birmingham. In fact, he was so impressed that he left the Midwest and moved to South Carolina, where he has been happily ensconced for years.

# When you consider its location, Alabama should be one of the top 10 states in the country to live. Instead, for a lot of complicated historical and socioeconomic reasons, we rank near the bottom on many lists where you want to rank high and near the top on many lists where you want to rank low. But consider that we have Atlanta to the east, Nashville and Memphis to the north, New Orleans to the west, and the Gulf of Mexico to the south. Talk about the heart of the Sun Belt. I've often called Alabama "the most underachieving state" in the U.S. And in a backhanded sort of way, I mean that as a compliment because it speaks to our huge potential.

I could go on, but you get the idea . . . that Alabama, for all of its problems, has a lot going for it. One of the first steps toward reaching our potential is to clean up the justice system. We at Legal Schnauzer hope we can play a role in making that happen.

Before we go, let's spotlight my favorite of all Birmingham landmarks. The Alabama Theatre is a jewel from the 1920s, and a man named Cecil Whitmire led an effort to restore the theater. Mr. Whitmire deserves a special place in heaven because the Alabama is one of my favorite places on the planet to visit. Tours are available, and it's a gem that visitors to Birmingham absolutely should not miss. Be sure to check out the virtual tour that is available at the theatre's Web site. The wife and I got to see one of Taylor Hicks' two shows at the Alabama on his nationwide tour, and that was a real treat. He closed the show with an acoustic version of "My Home's in Alabama," and needless to say, that was a major hit. Here's a video of that performance.




While we're at it, let's include this video from Taylor Hicks' performance at the Alabama Theatre. It's "The Runaround," with assistance from the drumline at Homewood High School in Birmingham. Enjoy.

Is Bush Sleaze Coming to the Surface?

We are living in troubled times, with a brewing government scandal that someday is likely to be considered the worst in our nation's history.

Evidence continues to mount that the Bush Department of Justice (DOJ) has caused people to be fired for political reasons, has caused people to be imprisoned for political reasons, has thumbed its nose at the oversight powers of Congress, and essentially treated our constitution like yesterday's trash.

Years from now, when historians scour the evidence of malfeasance and criminality at the Bush DOJ, they probably will focus heavily on the past 24 hours, encompassing May 22 and 23, 2008.

Consider what has happened in that time frame:

* Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman files documents asking the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to toss out his conviction on various grounds. I haven't seen the Siegelman appellate documents, but from reading news reports, their general theme seems to be: "My prosecution was ramrodded by cohorts of my political opponent, my conviction was driven by a corrupt and incompetent federal judge, both prosecutors and the judge presented misrepresentations of the law to the jury, and because of all this, I've been held political prisoner--in the United States of America, what is supposed to be the earth's most enlightened and powerful country." My research indicates Siegelman is on pretty solid footing with all of that. And anyone who doubts the evil intent of U.S. Judge Mark Fuller, need only take a semi-objective look at the evidence that Fuller himself has presented.

* Democrats on the U.S. House Judiciary Committee sent a subpoena to former White House advisor Karl Rove, seeking his testimony regarding the possible political prosecution of Don Siegelman. This all raises a couple of questions: (1) What took them so long? and (2) Why is Karl Rove being treated with a respect he doesn't deserve? Rove is just the latest Bush loyalist to thumb his nose at Congress' oversight committee. It's about time committee chair John Conyers truly relies on his instincts and "kicks some ass."

* MSNBC presented some superb television last night. It's an example of how good cable news can be when talented people really put their minds to it. First, Keith Olbermann on Countdown had a splendid interview with Georgetown University law professor Jonathan Turley. Olbermann's questions were succinct, informed, and probing. Turley did the best job I've seen of explaining the audacity driving Rove's refusal to testify, the gross incompetence of Attorney General Michael Mukasey, and the legal options available to Congress. The Greenlee Gazette presents a nice overview of the Olbermann/Turley interview.

* Dan Abrams followed up with an excellent panel discussion on The Verdict. Abrams panel included Don Siegelman, Michael Iglesias, and a constitutional-law expert. Our friends at WriteChic have an excellent wrapup of the Abrams interview. Abrams is a strong interviewer, and he shed considerable light on an important topic. But I have a couple of quibbles with his performance last night:

(1) The presentation would have been far better without Michael Isikoff, of Newsweek. I've generally held Isikoff in high regard, but I recall reading somewhere recently (can't remember where) that Isikoff comes off as a protector of Karl Rove. That's how he came off last night, and he also had a hard time getting his facts straight. The interview would have been far more informative without Isikoff.

(2) Abrams did not allow Siegelman and Iglesias to speak nearly enough. Both men have been on the front line in this scandal, and neither got to say much. Also, when Siegelman tried to bring up the importance of going after Rove's foot soldiers in Alabama (Bill Canary, Leura Canary, etc.), Abrams cut him off. Abrams seemed only interested in Rove, but Siegelman was making an important point and it deserved followup questions.

For an excellent overview of the past 24 hours' events, including both the issues involved and the media coverage of them, check out Dan Froomkin's piece in the Washington Post.

Jill Simpson: All Roads Still Lead to Rove

Word comes today that the U.S. House Judiciary Committee has subpoenaed former Bush White House strategist Karl Rove to testify about his role in several possible political prosecutions, including that of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.

The news comes on the heels of Dan Abrams' televised interview last night with committee member Linda Sanchez (D-CA). The interview included this intriguing tidbit: The Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is officially reviewing the issue of selective prosecution and the actions of several U.S. attorneys around the country.

If the review is legitimate, one would assume it would include heavy scrutiny of Alabama U.S. attorneys Alice Martin and Leura Canary. We are about to start a revealing series of posts that includes clear evidence of selective prosecution on Ms. Martin's part, and we intend to share that information with OPR staff members--and anyone else who cares to read Legal Schnauzer.

But before we commence our "Malice of Alice" series, let's take a closer look at the Rove issue. When it comes to insight on this subject, few Americans can match Republican whistleblower and Alabama attorney Jill Simpson.

After hearing about Rove's refusal to testify, citing executive privilege, a number of observers have been scratching their heads. Rove has said he did not discuss prosecutions with the White House. But by claiming executive privilege, Rove is indicating he did discuss prosecutions with the White House. And that raises the question: Why would George W. Bush be talking about Don Siegelman?

Simpson has considerable insight on that question and issued the following statement today:

Why would Bush be talking about Governor Don Siegelman? The answer is this: In the summer of 2002 George Bush came down to Alabama and held a fundraiser for Big Bob Riley who was running against Governor Don Siegelman at the time for Governor.

Karl Rove tries to claim in his letter to (Dan) Abrams that he wasn't involved with Bob Riley's campaign in Alabama; he was too busy working for the President of The United States of America. He suggested he was only involved in one event that year regarding Bob Riley, but does not say what (that event was) in his famous letter to Dan Abrams.

However, when I spoke with congressional investigators last summer I told them what I knew about the Riley campaign that summer of 2002. They are fully aware of all that was going on with the White House in the Riley Campaign. Further, it is my understanding the trip of President George W. Bush was videotaped from the time the wheels of his plane touched down in Alabama until he left Alabama on the day he raised the four million dollars for Big Bob Riley.

All Presidential trips are videotaped for security reasons, and that video of this day exists and has been talked about in the press. I also pointed out to the investigators last summer that George Bush came to Alabama and raised four million dollars in one day for Bob Riley, whose opponent was Governor Don Siegelman.

Further, that event was not the only event that the President was involved with in beating Don Siegelman in 2002. That is why Bush would have been talking about Siegelman in 2002. He was campaigning for and fundraising for Big Bob Riley to help him beat Don Siegelman.

Also, (you) will probably remember last summer when the President came to Alabama. He got off the airplane, and Mr. Rove started running his mouth, and the media folks for the White House stepped in front of Mr Rove and said what Mr Rove meant to say was "no comment."

Further, when my story broke in The New York Times and Time magazine, the White House said no comment. They knew President Bush was very active in the 2002 campaign against Governor Don Siegelman. That is why I believe Mr Rove is asserting executive privilege.

There is just no telling what they talked about since the President was actively campaigning against Governor Don Siegelman in 2002.

Inside a Selective Prosecution

Selective prosecution, as practiced by the Bush Justice Department, is the subject of an ongoing Congressional investigation.

But how does selective prosecution work?

Well, it comes in two varieties. The first involves going after certain people for political reasons. (See Siegelman, D.; Minor, P.) The second involves not going after certain people for political reasons.

This second variety is more subtle and easier to disguise than the first. But it is every bit as unlawful and damaging to our democracy. And it is the kind of selective prosecution (SP for short) with which I am personally acquainted.

My lesson in SP came courtesy of Alice Martin, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama. Martin is well known in legal circles for a number of things, none of them flattering. She botched the criminal prosecution of former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy. She initiated the first prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, a case that was so weak it was summarily dismissed. She had Alabama legislator Sue Schmitz dragged out of her bathroom and handcuffed, even though Schmitz' attorney had said his client would willingly turn herself in to authorities, if required. She tried to conduct a media circus of serving subpoenas on lawmakers in Montgomery until it became clear that was a violation of state law.

Scott Horton, of Harper's, has written numerous articles about Martin's highly questionable prosecutorial tactics. One of my favorites is here.

Bob Martin, of the Montgomery Independent, wrote a most interesting profile of Martin:

Just who is Alice Martin? Alice Martin ended up in Florence about 1990, having received her law degree at the University of Mississippi and working as a federal prosecutor in Memphis. She married into the well-to-do Martin family who were manufacturers of stoves and other iron products in Florence. The Martin company filed for bankruptcy in the mid 1990s.

Martin was appointed city judge in the early 1990’s and was later appointed as a circuit judge in the 11th Judicial Circuit, by Gov. Fob James. She replaced Judge Don Patterson, a Democrat, who died. (Her federal court bio lists it as the 21st Judicial Circuit, which is incorrect) She ran for the position at the following election on the Republican ticket, spending over $100,000, but was soundly defeated by the Democratic nominee.

Martin was next appointed U.S. Attorney for the Northern District by President Bush, at the behest of her sponsors, sens. Jeff Sessions and Richard Shelby. She still lives on Shoals Creek near Florence.

These lines jump out in Bob Martin's piece:

Although she has had some success as a U. S. Attorney, she botched the first prosecution of Don Siegelman and Richard Scrushy, and her attempted interference in the second case nearly wrecked it.

My sources in Florence tell me she is a very angry person who has an agenda against all Democrats.

Keep that thought in mind as we move forward.

Is Basketball More Important Than Our Courts?

That question in our headline might seem absurd. But the case of Tim Donaghy tells us that the answer is, "Yes, basketball most definitely is more important than our justice system."

Donaghy is the disgraced National Basketball Association referee who pleaded guilty last year to charges he conspired to engage in wire fraud and transmitted betting information through interstate commerce.

Federal prosecutors now say Donaghy bet on approximately 100 games over a four-year time period and cost the NBA more than $304,000 by depriving the league of his "honest services."

Donaghy contends that he cost the league only about $40,000. The former referee is due to be sentenced tomorrow.

All of this hits close to home here at Legal Schnauzer. The key charge against Donaghy, evidently, was honest services mail fraud, which also made up the bulk of the charges in the Don Siegelman (Alabama) and Paul Minor (Mississippi) cases.

My research indicates that the honest-services mail fraud statute, 18 U.S. Code 1346, normally is used against public officials. I don't see how a basketball referee would qualify as a public official, although many federal statutes are broadly written. Evidently prosecutors thought the statute gave them enough wiggle room to go after Donaghy on 1346 charges.

The most interesting part of the Donaghy case is what it says about the priorities of the Bush Justice Department. In New York, the feds are going after a basketball referee for betting on games. In Alabama, the feds turn a blind eye to clear honest services mail fraud committed by state judges who happen to be Republicans. A Bush appointee, U.S. Attorney Alice Martin, not only turns a blind eye to this wrongdoing, she actively takes steps to ensure that it will be covered up. And here at Legal Schnauzer, we will be outlining the steps Ms. Martin took to hide corruption by her GOP compadres.

So which hurts the country more in George W. Bush's America--a corrupt basketball official or corrupt state judges? You make the call.

Motives and Corrupt GOPers

A number of journalists around the country have commented on the apparent disarray currently cloaking the Republican Party. The sitting GOP president has dismal approval ratings, his justice department is enmeshed in scandal, and the party is 0 for 3 in recent special Congressional elections.

For my money, Mark Crispin Miller at News From Underground has one of the best commentaries on the subject, and you can catch his two-part vlog here.

Closer to home, I've experienced firsthand the threats and harassment that come from the hoodlums who run the corrupt wing of the Republican Party. What might be motivating these folks who make it their business to trash our constitution?

We'll be examining that issue in the coming days, focusing on two key figures--Pelham, Alabama-based attorney William E. Swatek and Alice Martin, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama.

These folks have an interesting connection. Bill Swatek, the ethically challenged attorney who filed a bogus lawsuit against me, has a son named Dax Swatek. And Dax Swatek is a GOP consultant who served as Alice Martin's campaign manager when she ran in 2000 for a seat on the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals (and lost to Sue Bell Cobb, now chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court). Dax Swatek also served as Bob Riley's gubernatorial campaign manager in 2006 and has close ties to Bill Canary, who has close ties to Karl Rove, who is George W. Bush's "brain." In other words, the Swatek GOP roots grow right up to the White House door.

Which might explain why Bill Swatek gets away with all kinds of shenanigans in Alabama state courts, even though he has a 30-year record of unethical and fraudulent activity.

But back to my situation. We showed Bill Swatek in action recently, when he made a "bid" on my house as part of an unlawful sheriff's sale on the front steps of the Shelby County Courthouse. In another post, we showed that Swatek's motive clearly was to scare me into shutting down this blog, as opposed to actually trying to satisfy a legitimate judgment.

Which raises this question: Why are Bill Swatek and his GOP cronies so intent on targeting this blog? I think there are several answers to that question.

But one, I suspect, simply has to do with business. Since I started this blog, I've heard from a number of Bill Swatek's former clients. These folks were none to happy with the legal services they received, and they particularly were unhappy with the curious billing processes Mr. Swatek evidently employs.

I had noticed from checking public records that Bill Swatek has sued a number of his former clients. That might be a fairly common thing among attorneys. But of the lawyers I'm familiar with, Swatek is the only one who has sued a rather large number of former clients.

Former clients of Swatek's have given me some insight into why these lawsuits have occurred. A number of these former clients indicated to me that they intended to file bar complaints against Swatek, focusing heavily on his billing practices.

I have no idea if they actually filed bar complaints or not. But another source told me something interesting recently about the bar-complaint process. This individual had filed a bar complaint against an attorney I'm familiar with (not Swatek), and the complainant asked me if I would be willing to testify against the attorney.

I wasn't aware that someone other than the complainant could testify in a bar proceeding. And I gather that published articles about an attorney can be presented as evidence.

I haven't heard anything more about the bar case my source told me about. But if he is correct about the broad nature of a bar inquiry, a corrupt attorney like Bill Swatek would have a vested interest in trying to shut down a blog like mine.

Imagine if former clients were filing bar complaints against Swatek and including copies of posts I had written about him.

If you want to get a feel for what I'm talking about, go to Google and do a blog search for "Bill Swatek." The first three items that come up are uncomplimentary items connected to this blog.

For an even better idea, go to Google and do a regular search on "Bill Swatek." The first NINE items that come up are uncomplimentary items connected to this blog.

Thanks to the wonder of blog analytics, I have a pretty good idea of the number of folks who are doing searches on some variation of the name "William Swatek." And I have a real good idea of where those folks are landing in cyberspace.

Are they coming away with a good feeling about the legal services provided by Bill Swatek? I doubt it.

Is Bill Swatek the kind of guy who would use unlawful means to try to put a stop to such bad publicity? His history suggests the answer is yes.

A Vast Right-Wing Charade in Alabama

Let's return to the issue of motive behind the orchestrated "auction" of my house one week ago today at the Shelby County Courthouse in Columbiana, Alabama.

One thing I've learned in my fight against corrupt public officials in Alabama: The more you learn about the law, the worse the corruption is likely to look--and the more you can understand the motives driving the bad guys.

As we noted in our previous post on this subject, I now know enough about the law to prove that the "sheriff's sale" really was about trying to shut down this blog. How do I know that? Let's take a look at the facts and the law:

* As a result of the "sheriff's sale," the most corrupt attorney William E. Swatek can get out of it is a lien on my portion of our home. That's because the house is jointly owned by my wife and me, and the amount of the "judgment" against me is so small--$1,525. The lien remains dormant until we attempt to the sell the property. I only discovered this in the few days prior to the "sale," and Deputy Bubba Caudill admitted that is all that could be done--after he had repeatedly called us and told us he was about "to sell that property." In other words, we discovered the truth after Bubba had repeatedly committed honest services wire fraud--at the instigation of Bill Swatek and a number of corrupt public officials in Shelby County.

* Now here is where it gets real interesting. If you have a court judgment and want a lien on someone's property to enforce it, all you have to do is file a certificate of judgment. That places a judgment lien on the property and causes the judgment creditor's rights to attach to the property. A search of probate records in Shelby County shows that Swatek didn't do this. Why not? Here's my guess: Getting a judgment lien doesn't do anything to scare my wife and me. It just sits there, minding its own business, until the day comes that we try to sell our house. But threatening to have a sheriff's sale of our house? Why, that gets people stirred up a bit. It might even get someone stirred up enough to cave in to Swatek's thinly veiled desires, which is to put a stop to this blog. Also, it appears that Swatek wanted to leave as small a paper trail as possible on his way to causing my house to be unlawfully "auctioned." Getting a certificate of judgment, garnishing my wages--those things cause paper trails and get third parties involved. It appears Swatek wanted to "keep it down home, cuz" as much as possible.

* Here's the irony of Swatek's bogus plan: Without a judgment lien on my property, he had nothing to gain by holding a "sheriff's sale." No one else's rights can attach to my property without a judgment lien. But Swatek wasn't interested in anyone's rights attaching to my property. He wanted to scare me into halting this blog, and that's why he orchestrated the fraudulent sheriff's sale, which we caught on tape!

* The bottom line? Initiating a sheriff's sale on jointly owned property, in order to satisfy a "judgment" in an amount under $2,000, appears to make no sense under the law. But Swatek, as usual, wasn't interested in the law; he was interested in scare tactics--and corrupt judges, clerks, and sheriff's deputies were actively participating in his little scheme.

* The sheriff's sale failed, so what will Swatek try next? I have no idea. But at some point, you would think he would realize that schnauzers don't scare easily. And schnauzers are fairly adept at figuring things out when people are trying to cheat us. Here's another lesson Swatek evidently has not learned: You keep poking a schnauzer with a stick, and he eventually is going to bite you. And when a schnauzer bites, he draws blood and holds on for dear life. And that doesn't feel so good for the bitee. I suspect many a bitee has looked back on things and said, "You know, I wish I had left that schnauzer alone."

Siegelman and Our Pathological President

I'm not a psychologist, but regular readers know I play one on my blog from time to time.

I'm inspired today to channel my inner Lucy Van Pelt (and put out my "psychological help for 5 cents" sign) by the latest antics of our "commander guy," President George W. Bush.

What is one of the surest signs that someone has a serious personality disorder? My research indicates it's the inability to truly examine the self. In Biblical terms, I would suggest it's the inability to see "the log in your own eye" before noting "the speck in your brother's eye."

If I'm right about that, then our "commander guy" serves up whopping evidence of a personality disorder in a story about his trip to the Middle East in today's New York Times.

In a speech in Egypt, Bush presented a laundry list of things Arab leaders should embrace in order to bring peace to the Middle East. If you have followed the Bush Justice Department scandal at all, be sure you are sitting when you read the following quote:

"Too often in the Middle East, politics has consisted of one leader in power and the opposition in jail," Bush said in an address to the World Economic Forum here, adding, "The time has come for nations across the Middle East to abandon these practices and treat their people with the dignity and respect they deserve."

I hope Don Siegelman didn't have a mouthful of coffee when he read that sentence this morning. If he did, I'm sure the former Alabama governor spewed the coffee clear across his kitchen.

Siegelman, of course, recently spent nine months in federal prison. And what was his crime? Mounting evidence indicates it was being a Democrat, an opposition leader, in a state dominated by Republicans, the "leader in power." And who engineered what increasingly is looking like a sham prosecution and conviction of Siegelman? More and more, it appears it was Alabamians with ties to the Bush administration, through former White House strategist Karl Rove.

Siegelman is far from alone in being targeted for opposing the Bush administration. If attorney Paul Minor and former Mississippi state judges Wes Teel and John Whitfield are able to follow the news in federal prison, I wonder what they thought when they read Bush's quote.

And what about yours truly? One week ago today, I watched as my house was unlawfully "auctioned" on the steps of the Shelby County Courthouse in Columbiana, Alabama. You can catch the action (live and in color!) here, a prime example of what we call "corruption in real time."

Is this what Dubya means when he talks about treating people "with the respect and dignity they deserve?"

And keep this in mind: The attorney in the video, making an unlawful "bid" on my house, is William E. Swatek who has family ties straight to the Bush White House. Swatek's son, Dax Swatek, is a close associate of Bill Canary, who is a close associate of Karl Rove, who is primarily responsible for the eight-year Bush Reign of Error in this country.

So Bill Swatek certainly is a Bush acolyte. Is Swatek capable of seeing the irony of unlawfully stealing someone's property at roughly the same time his commander is spewing high-minded rhetoric in the Middle East? I would say the chances of Swatek, or any other loyal Bushie, having that kind of self awareness is pretty much zero.

Numerous books surely will be written about the Bush administration over the next 10 to 20 years. A suggested title? "A River of Pathology Runs Through It."

Are Bushies Getting Tighty Whities?

Folks in the corrupt wing of the Republican Party, made up almost entirely of "loyal Bushies" we suspect, appear to be feeling tightness in their jockey shorts these days.

Inevitably, the story of the sewer-like Bush Justice Department, centers on Alabama. A number of honest Alabamians are fighting back against the Bush Machine, and that seems to have the Bushies in a lather.

First, it seems clear that the Bushies were counting on former Democratic Governor Don Siegelman remaining in federal prison for the next seven years or so. Instead, Siegelman is free pending an appeal, and he is able to tell his story far and wide. Every now and then, a member of the Alabama press picks up on the story, and that happens today with an enlightening Q&A from Markeshia Ricks, capitol correspondent for the Anniston Star.

Corrupt GOPers can't be happy that Siegelman now has forums to make comments like this:

The Star: Why do you believe Rove hasn't agreed to testify under oath?

Siegelman: He doesn't want to run the risk of lying under oath and being prosecuted for perjury. You know, I think it's telling that he talks a good game. He wrote a, I think it was a five-page letter to [MSNBC anchor] Dan Abrams basically asking Dan Abrams questions about why he should testify under oath. When Conyers invited him to testify under oath, he's dodged that, he's skated, and I think it's clear he's got something to hide. Otherwise, there is no reason why he wouldn't testify under oath.

Or this:

The Star: Since 1998, you've been the subject of some kind of investigation. Why do you think that is?

Siegelman: It's all part of the same case. It started when Karl Rove's bag man, I call him, Jack Abramoff, started putting Indian casino money into Alabama to defeat me in 1998. Shortly after I endorsed Al Gore in 1999, Karl Rove's client, the attorney general of Alabama (Bill Pryor) started an investigation. In 2001, Karl Rove's business associate and political partner's wife, Leura Canary, became a U.S. attorney and started a federal investigation. … It started with the attorney general and the state investigation, followed by the federal investigation, followed by indictments in 2004, and then another series of indictments leading up to the 2006 election … but, yeah, it's all part of the same case.

And then Siegelman repeats a statement that has given him quite a bit of mileage in recent weeks:

I think this will make Watergate look like child's play when it is fully investigated, not so much this case because certainly it's not about me. It's about restoring justice and protecting our democracy and, because this case shows the lengths to which those who are obsessed with power will go in order to gain power or retain power, it has attracted the attention of the national press.
Specifically, because it is tied to the White House because Karl Rove is not only a political adviser to the president but he's a close personal friend of the president, and you asked me if I was surprised, no I'm not surprised that the national media has focused on this because it is the only case that has led Congress directly to the doors of the White House.

The other cases that are being mentioned or being talked about are primarily the eight U.S. attorneys who were targeted for removal either for failing to move quickly enough or for not following really the party line — the Karl Rove party line — of trying to do damage to Democrats who were involved in an elections contest.

What Congress is seeing in this case is the other side of that coin, which is what happens when a U.S. attorney does follow the party line and a person is selectively prosecuted to impact the outcome of an election.

Siegelman goes on to note the critical role of Republican whistleblower Jill Simpson in bringing Bush DOJ sleaze to light. And that leads us to the latest GOP attempt to discredit Simpson. It comes from that trusty right-wing rag, the Weekly Standard.

Writer John H. Hinderaker makes no attempt to hide his misogyny, referring to Simpson as a "conspicuously large redhead" of "uncertain mental health."

And he makes little attempt to convince semi-coherent readers that he has his facts straight.

Hinderaker says Simpson has scratched out an "uncertain living" in DeKalb County, Alabama. Does he tell us what he means by "uncertain living?" Nope. Does he offer any evidence to back up this claim? Nope.

Hinderaker describes Simpson as a "very strange person" who "lives in her own world." What in the heck is this supposed to mean? The same terms could be applied to Stephen Hawking couldn't they? Or Paul McCartney? Or Brian Wilson? Or J.K. Rowling? Or any number of the brightest minds on the planet?

Hinderaker describes Simpson as the daughter of "rabid Democrats." Does he offer any proof of that? Nope. And does he note that this contradicts Simpson's sworn testimony before Congress? Nope.

Hinderaker reports that Simpson's house and law office are on the auction block. Does he offer anything to support this, say from a public document? Nope. And what does he mean by saying the property is "on the auction block?" Does he mean it's for sale? Then why doesn't he say so?
If the property is for sale, so what? What is that supposed to mean? Hinderaker doesn't tell us.

The Siegelman/Simpson tag team apparently is drawing blood. And that seems to have loyal Bushies on the edge of becoming unhinged.

Caught on Tape! Corrupt Alabama Republicans

We've shown you the video of my house being unlawfully "auctioned" on the courthouse steps Monday in Columbiana, Alabama. We also have explained that Bill Swatek, the attorney behind this little charade has direct ties to the Bush White House.

Now let's bring the law into a little clearer focus, to illustrate just how corrupt this piece of "GOP Masterpiece Theater" truly is.

Have Republicans, or Democrats for that matter, ever been caught on camera in a more blatantly unlawful act than this one? I can't think of another similar example.

For those of us who care about the actual law, what does it say about the process that leads up to a sheriff's sale? Let's take a look:

Judges Ain't Invited
First of all, what you saw in the video was supposed to be a sheriff's sale. And it is called that for a reason. It involves the sheriff, not a judge. In the video, you hear Deputy Bubba Caudill saying that he has been ordered by Circuit Judge Hub Harrington to proceed with the "sale." I spoke with Bubba that morning via phone, and he said that Harrington had told him that I had indeed filed a valid, notarized claim of exemption--but Bubba could go on with his sale anyway.

A couple of points about that. First, Alabama appellate courts have specifically said that a sheriff's sale does not involve a judge. A case called Ex Parte Arthur Lynn (Ala. Civ. App., 1999) states that a sheriff's sale is recognized by statute and does not require any action by a judge. In fact, that court found that a sheriff's sale is not a judicial sale.

A judge has no business taking part in a sheriff's sale. Both statutory and procedural law in Alabama are clear: If the judgment debtor files a notarized claim of exemption, as Judge Harrington admitted I did, the sheriff's sale is stayed. The sheriff has three days to notify the judgment creditor that a claim of exemption has been filed, and the judgment creditor has 10 days to file a contest. This is all in Rule 69 of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure.

If no contest is filed, the claim of exemption is considered accurate and uncontested, and the property no longer is subject to a sheriff's sale. The matter is finito.

If a contest is filed, a hearing must be scheduled, and a judge determines if the sale can go forward. But then, and only then, does a judge become a player.

As you can see in the video, I asked Bubba if a contest had been filed, and he admitted he didn't know. Of course, I knew one hadn't been filed because I hadn't received a copy of it. Certainly no hearing was held because I never was notified of one, and I'm a fairly important player in all of this--it's my house.

If Judge Harrington actually did what Bubba said he did--if the judge ordered Bubba to unlawfully proceed with a sheriff's sale--that has major implications, both civilly and criminally.

On the civil side, it's almost impossible to sue a judge when he acts within his judicial capacity--no matter how unlawful or corrupt his ruling might be. But when a judge acts outside his judicial capacity, as Harrington evidently did here, he is fair game.

This process probably doesn't make the kind of reading you will want to take to the beach this summer. But it's actually quite simple, very much like the process for a motion for summary judgment. One party takes a legal action, and if it is properly supported, it must be upheld unless it is lawfully countered by the other party.

In this instance, Bill Swatek made the sheriff's decision for him. By failing to file a contest, Swatek himself determined there could be no sheriff's sale. But as all the world can see in the video, GOPers in Shelby County aren't remotely interested in following the law.

Here's a little more law to chew on:

"The effect of a claim of exemption, if it is not successfully controverted, is that it must be taken as prima facie correct . . . " Robinson v. Ferdon, 76 So. 907 (Ala., 1917).

"Because the claim of exemption was not properly contested, it was considered to be correct and was due to be upheld . . . " Young v. Strong, 694 So. 2d 27 (Ala. Civ. App., 1997).

This is real simple, folks. No contest, no hearing, no sale.

A Paperwork Problem
As I wrote on this blog shortly after I received the writ of execution in this matter last September, I never received a Notice of Right to Claim Exemption, as required by law.

My guy Bubba admitted he had read this on my blog, and he has no proof that it ever was delivered. He has no proof because it wasn't delivered. I took the writ of execution from a deputy that morning, and it included only the writ of execution.

Bubba told me on the phone that my wife must have misplaced it. (Way to go, Bubba, blame your screwup on my wife! Hey, I'm the only guy who gets to blame his screwups on my wife!) This matter didn't involve my wife, and she didn't misplace anything because the document was given to me. And it never included the exemption-claim notice that is required by law.

I told Bubba multiple times that I had not received this document, and he still never made sure one was delivered.

Now, is this just a procedural hiccup--a minor detail that has no impact on the sheriff's sale. Not hardly.

Here's the law: "Judgment must be set aside where sheriff failed to give written notice of claim of homestead exemption as required by this section." McLaren v. Anderson, 81 Ala. 106 (Ala., 1886).

The failure to provide the exemption notice, I feel certain, was intentional. The notice, three times, tells the recipient to contact an attorney if he has questions. And the corrupt GOPers in Shelby County did not want me to contact an attorney. Heck, a student with three days in law school could have told me this was bogus and not to worry about it. And that's the last thing the crooks wanted.

You might ask: Well, how did you file your claim of exemption if you never received a notice? Well, way back in 2003, when it was becoming abundantly clear that I was being screwed, I purchased a copy of the Alabama Rules of Court, the green book I was waving around in the video like Jimmy Swaggart on crack. The form I was supposed to see is in that book, and that's how I knew about my exemption rights. But Bubba & Co. have an obligation under the law to make sure that judgment debtors know of their rights. And they intentionally failed to live up to this obligation.

Slapstick Law in Shelby County
Is it OK, under the law, to screw up a sheriff's sale this badly? Does the law say, "Oh heck, just get it sorta right and everything will be OK--you know what they say about horseshoes, hand grenades, and sheriff's sale?"

Well, here's what the law says: Messing around with someone's property is important business, and you had better get it right:

"The judgment lien statute is in derogation of the common law and is to be strictly construed." AmSouth Bank v. Bischoff, 678 So. 2d 1102 (Ala. Civ. App., 1995). In other words, get it right or it ain't going to hold up. Well, nothing was done right in this fiasco.

Live and in Color! A Federal Crime
As Bubba is walking away at the end of the video, I say that he is knowingly violating the law. This was not idle chat.

What you see on that video is a federal crime. It is the culmination of a several-month conspiracy to threaten me with loss of my property in order to deprive me of my First Amendment rights to free expression on this blog. How many people were involved in this conspiracy? Clearly, Bubba and Bill Swatek were front and center. But it involves a host of other folks--Sheriff Chris Curry, County Clerk Mary Harris, Circuit Judges Mike Joiner and Dan Reeves.

Will any of these folks ever pay for their crimes? Certainly not as long as loyal Bushies are running the Justice Department. If a Democrat wins the presidency in November and appoints an attorney general who is determined to clean up the sewer he or she will inherit, some folks in Shelby County might wind up in orange jump suits.

What makes this a federal crime? For months, Bubba and his cohort Eddie Moore have been calling my wife and me to claim they are "getting ready to sell that property." This was blatant fraud, and because they used the federal wires, it is a federal crime. And the people who put them up to it are accountable under the law.

For weeks and even months, this gambit almost worked. My wife and I are not lawyers, and we were concerned for a very long time that we might wind up homeless if I did not quit blogging. As you might imagine, this caused more than a few sleepless nights.

It wasn't until we found an article by an attorney named Tony Mankus that we began to sense we were being played for fools. You can read the entire Mankus article here.

But the key point is this: Our home is jointly owned by my wife and me. And despite Bubba's repeated claims that he was going to "sell that property," my wife's half of our property was never on the table. Ironically, we had tried to get my wife included as a party to the underlying lawsuit, and by law, she should have been added. But corrupt Judge Dan Reeves kept her out, which wound up being a huge break for us. If Reeves had ever dreamed I would blog about the case, I'm sure he would have handled it differently. But neither Reeves, nor any of the other judges in Shelby County that I've encountered, are known for being terribly sharp.

The Mankus article makes the law clear. He's writing from the standpoint of a federal tax lien, but the same principle applies on state judgment liens:

"In the case of property held in joint tenancy, the federal tax lien attaches to the taxpayer's proportionate interest. As long as neither the owners, nor security holders (including the IRS) take any action to dispose of the property, the lien will remain a dormant right against the property and will not impede its use by the owners."

So that's the law--and thank you Tony Mankus, wherever you are!

If we had not found that article, and gradually figured out how Bubba & Co. were trying to screw us, I'm not sure what would have happened.

As I've asserted repeatedly on Legal Schnauzer, this whole criminal enterprise by Alabama Republicans was designed not to take our house or satisfy a "judgment" but to put a halt to this blog.

I have come to understand the law enough to prove that I was correct about that. And we will discuss that subject next.

Schnauzers Being Schnauzers

We are dealing with some pretty heavy stuff around here lately, so we could stand to lighten the mood.

I can think of no better way to do that than with a little video of miniature schnauzers doing what they do best--playing, having fun, being court jesters, living life with gusto.

Here's a schnauzer trying to tell her owner something. Sounds like this girl lives in Europe. Our Murphy was the real "Great Communicator;" she would put Reagan in the shade. She got to where she could spell all kinds of words, like "l-u-n-c-h" and "S-o-n-i-c," which was her favorite place to go for a ride--and dinner. (No human food for our girl. She chilled out happily in the back seat while we pigged out on all that stuff that's bad for you.)



Here's a big schnauzer and a little schnauzer doing some roughhousing. Murphy loved this kind of stuff. Her favorite game was hide and seek.



Here's a schnauzer and a cat having a good time. This schnauzer has a true tail, which you don't see much in the U.S. Think this video might come from Europe. I've read where tail docking is banned in some European countries.



And this might be my favorite video of all time. Who says cats and dogs can't be friends?

Showdown in Shelby County, Part II

What's it like to be cheated in George W. Bush's America, in Karl Rove's Alabama?

Come along for our little version of show and tell. We hope you find it educational.

First, we have a clip that was filmed about 20 minutes before our house was to be unlawfully auctioned. Columbiana, Alabama, truly is in the middle of nowhere. But between wind gusts and motorcycles, and general traffic, and even a siren, we had all kinds of background noise. Hope you can hear most of what's going on. On a lighter note, I told my inexperienced cinematographer that when I mentioned "Shelby County Courthouse" on this first clip, she was to pan and show the courthouse itself. You'll notice that I had to say the magic words several times and actually point at the courthouse before my cinematographer thought, "Oh yeah, there's a courthouse over there!" Guess you get what you pay for in cinematographers these days. Actually, my cinematographer deserves a whole lot of credit for this story being told. I write the words, but many of the thoughts, and the majority of the courage needed to put those thoughts on paper, come from her. If this just involved me, I probably would have caved in a long time ago. But to quote Hillary Clinton, I'm not giving up.




In this next clip, we have the "auction" itself. Speaking of background noise, I didn't realize how many birds were chirping and having a grand time while this was going down. Guess they were wrens, with maybe a mockingbird or two in the choir. Wish I'd had Atticus Finch on my side. Don't find too many Atticus Finch's around in Alabama these days. The deputy conducting the "auction" is Bubba Caudill, who looks like he came from a cast party for Smokey and the Bandit. The attorney who places the winning "bid" is Bill Swatek, who looks like he came from a cast party for the "The Grifters." Notice the look on Swatek's face when he's asked why he waited three-plus years, after I started a blog, to suddenly get interested in this "judgment." Notice the look on his face when he's asked why he's never asked for the money. By the way, when Swatek saw we were in the vicinity, he went back in the courthouse and about four additional deputies appeared. Guess we were a big security risk. This all prompted my cinematographer to quip, "How many deputies does it take to screw up an auction in Shelby County?"




In the next clip, your correspondent tries to summarize events and tells you what the actual law says--how the scene you just witnessed could not take place.




Finally, we note that Bill Swatek and Bubba Caudill are bold enough to unlawfully "auction" my house, but they aren't bold enough to hang around and answer questions about it afterward. That's the way most bullies are, isn't it? When you push back, they curl up their lip and go hide behind someone's skirt.



Hope this has given you a feel for corruption in George W. Bush's America--May 12, 2008. We have much more coming on this story, and we have more video reports coming. We have all kinds of documents to share, and they will show you exactly the kind of attorney Bill Swatek really is. They also will show what his client, my criminally inclined neighbor Mike McGarity, is all about.

I stopped by the Sheriff's Office and tried to get a comment from Sheriff Chris Curry. Unfortunately, he was "out to lunch." I'm going to try to set up an appointment for an on-camera interview with him. If you would like to e-mail Sheriff Curry and encourage him to talk on camera with Legal Schnauzer, you can contact him at ccurry@shelbycountyalabama.net.

Hope you will stay tuned as I continue to channel my inner Michael Moore and try to expose the cockroaches who have tarnished a country that used to stand for something.

Showdown in Shelby County

Have you ever wondered what corruption looks like, live and in color? Have you ever wondered what it might feel like to be a regular citizen being cheated in George W. Bush's America, right here in 2008? Have you ever wondered what justice looks like in Karl Rove's Alabama, the state where Turd Blossom made his national reputation by turning our state courts into a corrupt Republican enclave.

If you ever have wondered about any of these things, we are about to enlighten you here at Legal Schnauzer. As I've been writing about for months, government officials in Shelby County, Alabama, have been threatening to auction my house (and my wife's house) in order to satisfy a "judgment" in the grand total of $1,525.

Neither the opposing party nor his attorney has ever even asked for the money--no phone call, no demand letter, nothing. In fact, the supposed "judgment" sat around gathering mold for three-plus years; never heard a thing about it. But when I started writing this blog in June 2007, giving voice to the judicial and government corruption I've witnessed in Alabama, someone suddenly got interested in that "judgment." Someone clearly wanted my voice quieted.

That somebody was Pelham, Alabama, attorney William E. Swatek, who filed a writ of execution that prompted Shelby County Sheriff's deputies to threaten first our cars and then our house. Bill Swatek is not just any corrupt attorney. He is a proud practitioner of a special kind of corruption. You might say he's turned it into an art form, considering that he has a record of unethical behavior going back almost 30 years.

And here is something particularly important about Bill Swatek: His son, Dax Swatek, is a Montgomery-based Republican consultant who has served as a campaign manager for both Governor Bob Riley and U.S. Attorney Alice Martin. Dax Swatek also has worked closely for Bill Canary. And Bill Canary has close ties to Karl Rove. And we all know who Karl Rove has close ties to.

If you are at all familiar with the Don Siegelman case, you don't need an introduction to any of those names I just mentioned. They are central to the story that landed the former Alabama Governor in federal prison. They also are central to the unfolding story of corruption in the Bush Justice Department, a tale that is likely to turn into perhaps the worst scandal in the nation's history over the next 12 to 24 months--if a Democratic Congress has the guts to the get to the bottom of it.

The videos you are about to see, on one level, look like a frustrated, exasperated citizen in the middle of nowhere, crying out for justice to authorities who clearly don't give a rip what the law says. Seen on one level, these videos are just about one couple's pain. This is all taking place in a backwater called Columbiana, Alabama, so why should anyone care?

But the attorney in the video, the sleazeball bidding on my house, is Bill Swatek. And I laid out his political lineage above. He has a pretty direct connection right to the Bush White House. And that has allowed him to get away with repeatedly cheating my wife and me--even though public records show we are hardly Swatek's only victims. He's been cheating people for almost 30 years, but Republicans in Karl Rove's Alabama protect him like the Golden Goose.

So come along for my video journey through the ethical morass that has enveloped Alabama and much of our nation over the past eight years. Many historians already are saying George W. Bush is likely to go down as the worst president in American history. The scenes you are about to see are one of many reasons why.

Some of you might have wondered what it was like to sit in the courtroom and watch Don Siegelman be railroaded and hauled off to prison in chains. The videos you are about to see might give you a little taste for what that was like.

That was a criminal case, and mine is a civil matter. That involved loss of freedom, and mine involves loss of clear title to my house.

I don't mean to imply that my pain remotely compares to what the former governor has been through. But cameras, to my knowledge, weren't allowed in the Siegelman courtroom, so the vast majority of Americans have no idea what that looked like, what that felt like.

So maybe we can help fill in that gap. We'll give you a little taste of what injustice is really like--on the front line, in a war for America's soul.

Those videos are coming next.

Fighting Back in George W. Bush's America

I had a front row seat yesterday for corruption in George W. Bush's America, watching up close and personal as corrupt Republicans in Shelby County, Alabama, "auctioned" my house--or at least a portion of my interest in it.

Under the law, they actually didn't do anything. You can't conduct a sheriff's sale without a judgment lien, and you can't get a judgment lien without filing a certificate of judgment. After attorney slimeball Bill Swatek and sheriff's deputy dirtbag Bubba Caudill went through the charade of playing "Monty's Cookie Jar" with my house, I stopped in the probate office in the Shelby County Courthouse.

I checked the computer records myself and saw no judgment lien on my property. But to be doubly sure, I walked across the hall and checked with a woman in the probate office. She checked records back to 2000 and found no judgment lien on my house. I told her that my house had just been auctioned on the courthouse steps, which caused her eyebrows to go up like pyramids. "You would need a judgment lien to do that wouldn't you?" I said. "You would think," she said.

To make de-dog doubly sure, I went back across the hall and down a ways to another probate office. A friendly woman told me they do wills and estates in this office, but she could help me with anything. (The other woman was friendly, too. Nice to see that some decent people do work at the Shelby County Courthouse. The dirtbags are the judges, lawyers, sheriff types and other "officials.") I asked her about a judgment lien on my house, and she checked her computer and didn't find any. I told her the story about the auction on the courthouse steps. Her eyebrows did a pyramid thing, too. "Kind of hard to do that without a judgment lien isn't it?" I said. "You would think," she said.

I've got much more coming on yesterday's Showdown on the Courthouse Steps, hopefully with video of the whole shootin' match. I was trying to channel my inner Michael Moore, complete with goofy ball cap. You can tell me how I did--assuming I can figure out how to get the video up. Working on that, in between trying to put out forest fires.

In the meantime, here's a copy of the Claim of Exemption I filed a week or so ago. By law, this little number had to put a stay on the sale. I told our guy Bubba that, both on the telephone yesterday morning and on camera while I was channeling Roger, I mean Michael, Moore. At one point, I think Bubba actually said he didn't care what the law says. Will have to double check the audio on that. Regardless of what he said, his actions clearly shows he doesn't care what the law says.

I was waving the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure around the way Jimmy Swaggart waves the Old Testament. Bubba acted like Superman (after way too many all-you-can-eat buffets) trying to get away from kryptonite.

This Claim of Exemption should give you an idea of just how unlawful the Bubba & Bill Show was yesterday:


IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF SHELBY COUNTY, ALABAMA
CLAIM OF EXEMPTION FORM
My name is Roger Shuler, and I am the defendant in the case Mike McGarity v. Roger Shuler, Civil Action CV 00-1248. I received a writ of execution, signed by clerk Mary Harris on September 21, 2007, stating that I owed a judgment in the amount of $2,229.64. I received a sheriff's notice of levy on February 8, 2008. On February 29, 2008, I received a notice of sheriff's sale, informing me that my home was to be sold at auction at noon on April 7, 2008, on the front steps of the Shelby County Courthouse. I was told that sale was postponed due to an error by the Sheriff's Office, and I received noticed that it was rescheduled for noon on May 12, 2008.

Pursuant to Rule 69 (d) of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure, I state as follows:

• The judgment in this matter is void because the court acted in a manner inconsistent with due process. Greene v. Connelly, 628 So. 2d 346 (Ala., 1993). The judgment in this matter also violates the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court has held: "The Due Process Clause entitles a person to an impartial and disinterested tribunal in both civil and criminal cases. . . . The neutrality requirement helps to guarantee that life, liberty, or property will not be taken on the basis of an erroneous or distorted conception of the facts or the law. Marshall v. Jerrico 446 U.S. 238 (1980). The record in this case is replete with "erroneous and distorted conceptions" of the law, showing that judges did not act as impartial arbiters. Therefore, the judgment is void and my property is exempt from levy.

• The judgment in this matter is void because numerous necessary parties were not joined in my counterclaim. "The absence of a necessary party requires a dismissal of the cause without prejudice or a reversal with prejudice or a reversal with directions." Holland v. City of Alabaster, 566 So. 2d 244 (Ala., 1990). Therefore, the judgment is void and my property is exempt from levy.

• The judgment in this matter must be set aside because the sheriff has failed to give written notice of my right to claim exemptions. I've even notified Deputy Bubba Caudill of this, and I've still never received the notice that is required by law. McLaren v. Anderson, 81 Ala. 106 (1886). Therefore the judgment in this matter is to be set aside and my property is exempt from levy.

• The judgment in this matter is void because a verdict was improperly rendered with fewer than 12 jurors. Rule 48 of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure states that a jury of fewer than 12 jurors is proper only when it is stipulated by the parties. The parties did not stipulate the use of fewer than 12 jurors, so the judgment is unlawful, and my property is exempt from levy.

* The sale in this matter cannot proceed because records in Shelby County Probate Court show that no certificate of judgment has been filed in this case, and therefore no lien exists on the subject property. "The judgment creditor's rights in the property attach upon the act of recording the certificate of judgment." Garrett v. Garrett, 628 So. 2d 659 (Ala., Civ. App., 1993). The judgment creditor in this case has failed to act in accordance with Ala. Code 6-9-210, 211, so any levy on my property is unlawful.

• The levy is moot because the case already has been settled. I filed a notarized claim of exemption in this matter the week of March 31-April 4, as required by law. The opposing party has never filed a contest, so that claim of exemption is due to be upheld. There is no Alabama law stating that a valid claim of exemption is set aside merely because the sheriff made a mistake on the notice of levy. The opposing party has had way more than the allowed 10 days to respond--and has done nothing. "Because the claim of exemption was not property contested, it was considered to be correct and was due to be upheld." Young v. Strong, 694 So. 2d 27 (Ala. Civ. App., 1997)

• The court and the sheriff's department have butchered this case and this process from start to finish. "The judgment lien statute is in derogation of the common law and is to be strictly construed." AmSouth Bank v. Bischoff 678 So. 2d 1102. (Ala. Civ. App. 1995). Furthermore, Alabama courts have held: "Substantial compliance in every essential particular is required before the benefits conferred by such statutes can be obtained or enjoyed, and an omission of any material or particular requirement cannot be deemed a substantial compliance. Duncan v. Ashcraft, 25 So. 735 (Ala., 1898).

• The sale in this matter is due to be stayed because the subject property is exempt for multiple reasons, primarily because both the judgment itself and the levy process have been reached in an unlawful manner.
_____________________
Roger Shuler
Pro Se
_____________________
Notary Public
My commission expires: ___________________

Roger Shuler
5204 Logan Drive
Birmingham, AL 35242

Corruption, Live and in Color!

Today was the day my (our) house was to be sold on the courthouse steps in Columbiana, Alabama. What happened?

Well, I had the day off and was on the scene for what appeared to be a well-orchestrated charade. Shelby County Sheriff's Deputy Bubba Caudill conducted the sale, and Bill Swatek (my neighbor's slimy lawyer) made the only bid--of $2,700 something dollars. Probate records show there is no certificate of judgment, no judgment lien, no lien of any kind on our property. By law, no sheriff's sale can be done under such circumstances.

But the law means nothing in Shelby County anyway. Was the sale for real? Don't know right now. Under the law, it definitely isn't real. In George Bush's America, who knows what will happen? We might be evicted tonight, for all I know.

Based on my understanding of the law, they can't truly sell our house anyway--it is jointly owned by my wife, who was not a party to the lawsuit. They can only get a lien on a tiny portion of my share of the house. I will write more on this in a bit.

I called Bubba Caudill this morning and told him that, under the law, he could not move forward with the sale. Bubba didn't seem to care what the law says. In fact, he seemed rather proud to be ignorant of the law. He must fit in great at Columbiana.

I told Bubba that he probably had committed a federal crime--wire fraud. He didn't seem to care. Guess he's counting on John McCain winning in November. If McCain doesn't win, Bubba and a few others folks in Shelby County might wish they had handled this situation differently.

The most interesting thing is this: I showed up with a video camera and taped the whole thing. I asked Bill Swatek if I could interview him on camera and he suddenly decided he had a meeting inside the courthouse and scurried away like a cockroach.

I asked Bubba if I could interview him on camera, and he refused--fine public servant that he is. Guess he doesn't mind holding bogus sales of people's houses, but he doesn't want to answer questions about it.

I followed him around the corner of the courthouse, like Sam Donaldson going after Ronald Reagan.

If I can figure out how to put the video on a computer, Legal Schnauzer readers will see all the action, live and in color.

Film at 11!

Clean Up Your Yard, Lose Your House

Does that headline sound ridiculous to you? It should.

But it pretty well sums up the basis for efforts by Alabama Republicans to unlawfully seize and auction my house.

We noted in a recent post that the judgment against me was for a tort called conversion. A jury found that I unlawfully "converted" property belonging to my neighbor, and that's why there was a judgment against me in the amount of $1,525.

Let's look at the facts, and the law, and see just how absurd this judgment is.

In the first two or three years after my troublesome neighbor moved in next door, I repeatedly found all sorts of stuff in my yard. I found whiffle balls, baseballs, fireworks debris, golf balls (plastic and hard), a soccer ball, a football or two, miscellaneous trash, and paintballs. (Our house had been vandalized with paintballs numerous times.) I saw some of the stuff come from my neighbor's yard. I didn't know for sure where the rest of it came from.

For months, my neighbor, his family members, and guests made repeated trips onto our yard to retrieve stuff--even after they had been told (both verbally and in writing) to stay off our yard. One of the so-called adults, Mike McGarity, even threatened to sue me for telling him to stay off my property. (I'm not making this up, folks. Of course, when I later discovered McGarity's substantial criminal record, that explained a lot of things.)

When McGarity continued to trespass after our repeated warnings, we finally swore out a complaint for criminal trespass third degree. McGarity pled not guilty, and a bench trial was held before Shelby County Circuit Judge Ron Jackson. As I noted in a previous post, McGarity inadvertently confessed to trespassing, and Jackson (according to the trial transcript) found that he trespassed. But in a decision that only a truly corrupt judge can make, Jackson gave McGarity a stern warning but issued an acquittal. That's what allowed McGarity to sue me.

But back to conversion. In making his finding, Jackson stated that if we posted written warning and anyone came on our property, the outcome would be different. Actually, that isn't the law at all. Under Alabama law, a property owner does not have to give warning--written or otherwise--in order to have a prosecution for trespassing. In essence, the burden is on the would-be trespasser to make sure he is licensed, invited, or privileged to enter property. If you think about it, this law makes perfect sense in a country that values private property. If you had to warn everyone to stay off your property, you essentially wouldn't have private property. That's why the burden falls on the would-be trespasser. (By the way, you don't have to be a property owner to assert your property rights. The same laws protect renters also.)

After the criminal trial, because of Jackson's statement about written warning, we decided to post a no-trespassing sign on our property, on the boundary facing McGarity's house. All of a sudden, McGarity, his family members, and guests could not come wily-nily on our yard anymore.

How did this go over? Well, our no-trespassing sign was stolen twice. But we kept putting one back up. And eventually, when stuff kept coming on our yard, McGarity and Co. could not come and get it.

When I would go outside in the evening, or early in the morning before going to work, I would often find something in our yard that shouldn't have been there. (By the way, under the law, it is a civil trespass to kick or throw an object either over, under, or onto someone else's property. Again, our country supposedly takes private-property rights seriously. It's one of the primary concepts that makes us different from the former Soviet Union.)

I had no idea who these objects belonged to. There were probably more than a dozen guests involved in the activity on his property, so I had no way of knowing who owned the stuff that wound up on my yard. And under the law, I had no obligation to go around trying to find the owner. It was up to them to come to me. But they didn't come to me.

I picked the stuff up, put it in a bag in my garage, and figured someone would claim it at some point. But no one ever did.

It wasn't until after McGarity sued me for malicious prosecution that he claimed ownership of these items that had come on my property. After McGarity had sued me, his attorney (the esteemed William E. Swatek) requested that I bring the items in my trusty bag to a discovery conference at my lawyer's office.

My attorney, Michael B. Odom (then of Adams and Reese/Lange Simpson, now of Haskell Slaughter) should have objected to this discovery meeting and refused the request. After all, the lawsuit was for malicious prosecution, and these objects had nothing to do with that. But Odom went along with it. (By the way, Odom wasn't acting alone; his mentor, Jesse P. Evans III, took my case, but Odom did most of the work. Both of them now are at Haskell Slaughter. Their handling of my case was disgraceful, and I will be presenting many more details of how they sold their own client down the river, in order to suck up to a corrupt judge. Why would they suck up to a corrupt judge in Shelby County? Well, Shelby is the fastest growing county in Alabama, and Evans represents a number of developers, folks who build subdivisions, shopping centers, etc. A lot of those developers have major projects in Shelby County, so Evans and Odom have huge financial incentives to kiss the fanny of corrupt local judges. And hey, if a guy like me gets ruined financially along the way, that's just collateral damage.)

During this "object inspection" meeting, Swatek took pictures and even got paintball gunk on himself, while I tried not to laugh.

Maybe Odom didn't object to the meeting because he thought the whole thing was a joke. Well, it's not a joke now. My house is at threat because of that stupid "ball meeting," which my attorney never should have allowed. And by the way, Odom didn't treat it like a joke when it came to billing. He made sure I was billed for his "professional" time.

Swatek took the information from this little meeting and filed an amendment to McGarity's lawsuit, claiming I had "converted" these objects. Odom indicated to me in a letter that he thought the whole thing was absurd. But I'd like to say, "Dude, it's not your house being threatened now is it?"

As I noted in a previous post, Swatek's conversion amendment was filed approximately 65 days late. Odom, correctly, filed a motion to strike. But Judge J. Michael Joiner never ruled on it and allowed the conversion claim to go forward.

At that moment, Odom knew for sure that Joiner was corrupt. But did Odom do anything to protect his client (me)? Nope.

Odom could have filed an interlocutory appeal, asking an appellate court to order Joiner to strike the conversion claim. He could have filed a motion for recusal, demanding that Joiner step down from the case. But Odom did nothing.

And that's a classic example of how a corrupt judge like Joiner can get your own attorney to work against you.

Here I am, almost six years later, still dealing with the results of Odom's negligence.

A few more nuggets to show you how nutty this judgment is:

* The jury in the civil case found that McGarity had indeed trespassed and awarded me $1 in damages. (Even though it cost us $200 to determine that his fence was on our yard and to get it moved.) As I noted earlier, the objects being kicked or thrown onto my property from his property represent a civil trespass, and the jury found it was a trespass. Under a legal doctrine called estoppel, you cannot benefit from your own wrong. In other words, McGarity cannot commit a civil trespass against me and then turn around and benefit when I pick up the object off my property. I raised this issue in a postjudgment motion with Judge G. Dan Reeves, and he never ruled on it.

* McGarity never offered any evidence in the trial that these objects belonged to him. And here is a key point: A fundamental component of conversion is that the alleged converter must use the property for his own beneficial use and enjoyment. McGarity never presented any such evidence. The idea behind conversion is that you want this object and you want to use it. I just picked this stuff up off my yard to keep my property from looking unsightly. I didn't want it and I didn't use it.

* How did the jury come up with a figure of $1,525 against me. McGarity claimed that I had "converted" $25 worth of balls. Most of them, he said, were whiffle balls. There must be hidden gold in those whiffle balls because it takes a lot of whiffle balls to be worth $25. The jury awarded McGarity $25 for the balls and $1,500 in punitive damages. You heard that right: A Shelby County jury awarded 60 times compensatory damages because I picked wayward whiffle balls up off my yard. How nuts is this? First, punitive damages cannot be given at all, except under specific circumstances, which were not present in this case. But even if punitive damages are proper, the usual ratio is no more than 3 to 1, even in cases of heinous conduct. Again, I raised this issue with Reeves in a postjudgment motion, and he never ruled on it.

A whole lot more nutty stuff went on in the trial, and we will get to that later. But this gives you the lowdown on what led to the $1,525 judgment against me--and subsequent threat to seize my house. Like I said, I'm not creative enough to make this stuff up.

So next time you find junk in your yard, and you don't know who it belongs to and no one ever claims it, be careful what you do--you could wind up losing your house because of it.

A Junkyard Judgment

Now that we've shown the process for attempting to seize my house has been unlawfully conducted, let's turn our attention to the judgment itself.

To show all the ways this judgment is unlawful would require numerous posts of considerable length, and we will go into those details down the road. But for now, we'll focus in a fairly general way on the major factors that make this a "junkyard judgment."

Some of the stuff you are about to read might sound comical to you. In fact, I would find a lot of it funny if I weren't the one being cheated. But this stuff really happened; I'm not clever enough to make it up. So feel free to let out a guffaw from time to time:

* Confess to a Crime, Be Found Not Guilty--This all started because my wife and I were victims of a crime--criminal trespass third degree, which is not even a misdemeanor under Alabama law; it's called a violation. In other words, it's about as low as you can go in the crime pecking order. But when Mike McGarity moved in next door to us in December 1998, he evidently wasn't happy with his own lot because he immediately started trying to take over ours. He built a fence on our yard that enclosed 300-400 squared feet of our property. Then he, his family members, and their guests made a regular habit of trespassing on our yard. We told him on multiple occasions to keep himself, his family members, and guests off our property. He responded first by sassing us and then by threatening to sue me for "harassment." (You heard that right--telling someone to respect your property rights is harassment, in this guy's mind.) When a lawyer friend wrote McGarity a letter, explaining the law and saying he would receive no more warnings, that still didn't solve the problem. The trespassing continued. So I filed a criminal complaint, thinking the Shelby County District Attorney's Office could handle such a matter professionally. Making the assumption that anyone in Shelby County could do something correctly was my first big mistake. I'll save details for later, but the DA's office messed up our case on numerous fronts. Still, though, when the case went to trial, they managed to get McGarity to inadvertently confess to the crime. But District Judge Ron Jackson, after giving McGarity a stern warning and finding that McGarity had indeed trespassed, found him not guilty anyway. Imagine O.J. Simpson telling Judge Ito: "Your honor, I've got to admit, I stabbed those people that night. I was having a rough day, man, and I thought they were disrespecting me." "No problem, Juice, I understand," Ito says. "People disrespect me all the time, too. The world's tough on short people. Just don't stab anyone else, OK? Not guilty! Next." That's pretty much what happened in our case. Like I said, I couldn't make this stuff up.

* Finding Favor for a Disfavored Tort--Once McGarity was acquitted, that gave him the right to turn around and sue me for a tort called malicious prosecution. This could happen to any victim of a crime. If someone ever mugs you or steals something from you, you had better think twice about swearing out a criminal complaint. If they are found not guilty, maybe because the judge is buds with the thug's lawyer, you are liable to be sued for malicious prosecution. So you see, crime really does pay in the US of A. It's not supposed to, under the law. But as I said in a previous post, we are a nation of "men," not laws; John Adams' vision has been turned on its head. Malicious prosecution essentially means that you prosecuted a case, either criminally or civilly, without having probable cause or grounds to do so. The fact that a judge or jury found in the defendant's favor does not even create a prima facie case for malicious prosecution. If you want to get heavily into malicious prosecution law in Alabama, check out this case. It will tell you just about everything you need to know. But for our purposes now, here's the main point: Malicious prosecution is a "disfavored tort." And here is why:

Malicious-prosecution actions are disfavored in the law. Cutts v. American United Life Ins. Co., 505 So. 2d 1211, 1214 (Ala. 1987). Our Supreme Court has stated:

"One of the reasons for this rule is that public policy requires that all persons shall resort freely to the courts for redress of wrongs and to enforce their rights, and that this may be done without the peril of a suit for damages in the event of an unfavorable judgment by jury or judge. If this were not the case, a large proportion of unsuccessful civil actions would be followed by suits for malicious prosecution, and there would be a piling of litigation on litigation without end."

Remember that line: "All persons shall resort freely to the courts for redress of wrongs and to enforce their rights, and that this may be done without the peril of a suit for damages in the event of an unfavorable judgment by jury or judge."

That, folks, is the law in Alabama. Did it apply to me in Shelby County? Nope.

Most malicious prosecution cases arise in the shopping environment. A shopper is suspected of shoplifting, a security guard apprehends the person once he leaves the store, the shopper is found not guilty, shopper sues Wal-Mart or whoever for malicious prosecution. Such actions, though, should rarely succeed. And outside the shopping environment, they should almost never succeed. In my case, I had not only probable cause ("I have strong reason to believe my neighbor trespassed"), I had actual cause ("Judge, the ding-dong just confessed to trespassing"). By law, the case had to be kicked in a few months time, and the neighbor or his attorney should have had to pay my legal expenses under the Alabama Litigation Accountability Act. Instead, it dragged on for five-plus years, and I'm out thousands of dollars.

* Oh Yeah, You Were Right All Along--By law, the lawsuit against me couldn't go to trial for procedural reasons. (More on that in a bit.) But it also had to be kicked early for reasons of fact and law. For example, an absolute defense to a malicious prosecution claim comes if the defendant consulted an attorney, and shared all the relevant facts with the attorney, prior to proceeding with the prosecution. I consulted both a private attorney (the guy who wrote the warning letter to McGarity) and a public attorney (a member of the DA's staff). In other words, I could have just sworn out a complaint with the magistrate (usually a non-attorney; it's the circuit clerk in Shelby County), but went the extra mile of consulting two attorneys before moving forward. I made this very argument in all three of my motions for summary judgment and presented uncontroverted evidence that I had consulted attorneys and shared all relevant facts with them. All three motions for summary judgment were denied. But when the case went to trial, Judge G. Dan Reeves dismissed the malicious prosecution claim and did not allow it to go to the jury. Why? Because, he said, I had consulted an attorney. I wanted to say, "You fool, I made that very argument and supported it with facts five years ago!" By the way, McGarity's attorney, William E. Swatek, represented him in the criminal trial and therefore knew I had consulted two attorneys all along. In other words, Swatek knew from the outset that McGarity had no malicious-prosecution claim, but Swatek filed the case anyway. That's the kind of thing that should get a lawyer severely disciplined, maybe even disbarred, considering Swatek's sleazy history. But the Alabama State Bar has done zip.

* Deadline, What Deadline?--If you ever get involved in a court case, you will learn early on that deadlines matter. Consider statutes of limitation. If you think you have a medical malpractice case, which has a two-year statute of limitation, and you bring the case two years and one day after the alleged malpractice occurred, you are toast. Your case will get booted. Same thing with the many deadlines that are imposed during a case. The judgment against me was based on a tort called conversion. (More on that in a bit.) McGarity amended his complaint to add the conversion claim approximately 65 days late. And he did it without seeking leave of court, as required by law. In fact, I had already filed a motion for summary judgment at the time McGarity filed his conversion claim. There is no way on earth that such a claim can proceed. It must be struck, and my attorney made such a motion. But the judge never ruled on it, the conversion claim went to trial, and that's what a jury based a $1,525 judgment on--and that's why my house is being threatened now. Again, I'm not making this absurd stuff up. The guy's conversion amendment was 65 days late and still moved forward.

* Conversion? What the heck?--What is conversion? The short answer is that it's a civil form of theft. Here's an example: You and I are eating at the same restaurant. As I'm leaving, I grab a coat that I think is mine. As I head to my car in the parking lot, I think, "Gosh this coat feels unusually good. Wonder why." You run up to me in the parking lot and say, "Hey, you've got my coat; this one is yours." By now, I've figured out that your coat is much better than mine and costs a whole lot more. I want to keep it, so I refuse to give you your coat back. You now have a case against me for conversion. It's not theft because the taking wasn't unlawful. (I made a mistake.) But by keeping the coat, after you identified it and asked for it back, I have committed a civil wrong against you. How did I get a finding of conversion against me? Well, that's a real howler, and we'll address it in a separate post coming right up.

* You've Got No Case? No Problem--Of all the problems in the judgment against me, the biggest involves summary judgment. What is summary judgment? It's a stage reached in most lawsuits, where one party files a motion saying that the other party either has no case or no defense, and there is no reason for the case to go to trial. The motion for summary judgment must be supported with evidence, usually in the form of affidavits. Once a properly supported motion for summary judgment is filed, the burden shifts to the nonmoving party to present substantial evidence of such weight that it requires the case to go to trial. If the nonmoving party fails to respond as required, Alabama law is abundantly clear: Summary judgment must be granted, and the case is dismissed. In my case, the nonmoving party (my neighbor) failed to respond as required three times. In fact, in two instances, he filed no response at all--he filed no answer to my motion for summary judgment and filed no evidence. Why? He had no case, and his attorney knew he had no case. And yet all three of my motions for summary judgment were denied.

Judges who deny summary judgment under such circumstances clearly are biased. As we noted in a recent post, such rulings violate the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution: "The Due Process Clause entitles a person to an impartial and disinterested tribunal in both civil and criminal cases. . . . The neutrality requirement helps to guarantee that life, liberty, or property will not be taken on the basis of an erroneous or distorted conception of the facts or the law. Marshall v. Jerrico 446 U.S. 238 (1980).

These are just a few of the reasons the judgment against me is unlawful. But these are the highlights, and as I noted up front, some of them border on the laughable.

This, however, is serious business. And it shows that America in the Age of Rove is not the America most of us learned about in our grade-school history texts. Our constitution is clear: A citizen cannot be deprived of life, liberty, or property because a corrupt judge has an erroneous or distorted conception of the facts or the law.

But former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman just spent nine months in federal prison, and the evidence is overwhelming that it's because of the actions of corrupt federal prosecutors and a corrupt U.S. judge (Mark Fuller). Three defendants in a Mississippi case--Paul Minor, Wes Teel, and John Whitfield--are currently in federal prison (a fourth, sitting Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver Diaz, was tormented for years before being acquitted on bogus charges, twice) because of a clearly corrupt prosecutor and a U.S. judge (Henry Wingate) who should be impeached and probably convicted of federal crimes.

So we know of at least four men who have been wrongfully deprived of their liberty. And now Republican public officials are trying to deprive me of my property. Actually, they've already deprived me of my property--thousands of dollars in cash. But that's not enough; they also want my house.

I can't predict how the GOP gambit will turn out. But I can promise that Legal Schnauzer readers are going to know the truth about what's going on.

My House, the Target

Do the Shelby County authorities who are threatening to seize and auction my home have a legal leg to stand on?

I'm pretty sure the answer is no. I say "pretty sure" because this kind of action is associated with an area of law that can get complex.

The two legal steps that lead up to a sheriff's sale are called a writ of execution and a notice of levy. These actions often are associated with bankruptcy, foreclosure, mortgage, and collections law. All very pleasant areas, and all quite complicated. In fact, my experience has been that a lot of generalist lawyers don't know the law on this stuff. These are areas that usually require specialists.

So I, as a non-lawyer, am not going to say that I'm absolutely right on everything you are about to read. But I'm pretty confident in saying this threat to seize my house is fraudulent from start to finish.

I'm also confident in saying there is a clear reason for that: These folks don't want my house or the $1,525 judgment that they have ignored for more than three years. Evidence strongly suggests that this is not about satisfying a "judgment." It's about creating a threat that they hope will result in the disappearance of this blog.

After all, the writ of execution was issued in September 2007, roughly three months after I started Legal Schnauzer. Given that it takes several months for many blogs to become known beyond the blogger and his or her immediate family, one can reasonably assume that someone in the GOP hierarchy tried to put a stop to Legal Schnauzer almost as soon as they found out about it.

So let's examine this effort to seize my house and just how badly it misses the mark, under the law:

* Due Process? What's That?--Alabama law says that a judgment is void when the court acts in a manner inconsistent with due process. Greene v. Connelly, 628 So. 2d 346 (Ala., 1993). The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a fundamental component of due process is the right to have a case heard by an impartial judge. Marshall v. Jerrico, 446 U.S. 238 (1980): "The Due Process Clause entitles a person to an impartial and disinterested tribunal in both civil and criminal cases. . . . The neutrality requirement helps to guarantee that life, liberty, or PROPERTY will not be taken on the basis of an erroneous or distorted conception of the facts or the law." The initial judge in my case, J. Michael Joiner, is a regular golf buddy and former neighbor of the opposing attorney. And he and the followup judge, G. Dan Reeves, repeatedly made erroneous rulings. Under the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, their judgment is unlawful.

* A Party Without the Parties--Under Alabama law, a judgment is void when a necessary party was absent. Holland v. City of Alabaster, 566 So. 2d 244 (Ala., 1990). What happened in my case takes a lot of explaining, and I will save those details for later. But numerous parties I sought to add to my counterclaim were unlawfully excluded, so my case was gutted before it even started. A judgment based on such exclusion of necessary parties cannot stand, under Alabama law.

* Aw, You Don't Need That--Rule 69 of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure (ARCP) is abundantly clear: A Writ of Execution must be accompanied by written notice of right to claim exemptions. Almost immediately after receiving the writ, I wrote on this blog that I didn't receive the required exemptions notice. In fact, Shelby County Sheriff's Deputy Bubba Caudill admitted he had read that on the blog, and for good measure, I told him again verbally that I had never received the notice. I've still never received it. I've filed a Claim of Exemptions form only because I have a copy of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure, and I looked up how this process is supposed to be done. Alabama law says a judgment must be set aside when the sheriff fails to properly provide notice of right to claim exemptions. McLaren v. Anderson, 81 Ala. 106 (1886). (By the way, that's not a typo. That law dates to 1886. Not exactly new law, but folks in Shelby County still don't know about it.)

* Who Needs 12 Jurors?--The trial in my case was unlawfully conducted with 11 jurors. Under Rule 48 ARCP, this is proper only when stipulated by the parties. You can check a legal definition of stipulation here. The parties didn't agree among themselves to anything regarding the number of jurors. The judge simply made the decision, meaning the judgment was unlawfully reached.

* Lien on Me--It appears that a sheriff's sale cannot proceed without a lien on the subject property. And a lien cannot attach without a certificate of judgment, which must be filed with the Office of Probate. I've checked Shelby County's probate records, and no certificate of judgment has been filed in my case. This is governed by Code of Alabama 6-9-210 and 6-9-211. Case law also addresses the issue: "The judgment creditor's rights in the property attach upon the act of recording the certificate of judgment." Garrett v. Garrett, 628 So. 2d 659 (Ala. Civ. App., 1993).

* The Matter is Moot--This is the second attempt to unlawfully auction my house. The first sheriff's sale was scheduled for April 7 and postponed because the sheriff screwed up the description of the property in the advertisement that is required by law. But I filed a notarized claim of exemption prior to that first sale, and I know of nothing in Alabama law that indicates a lawful claim of exemption is negated because of a mistake by the sheriff. State law allows the opposing party 10 days to challenge a claim of exemption, and in my situation, they've had way more than the allowed 10 days. No challenge has appeared, so state law is clear: "Because the claim of exemption was not properly contested, it was considered to be correct and was due to be upheld." Young v. Strong, 694 So. 2d 27 (Ala. Civ. App., 1997).

One final point: Messing with someone's home is serious business under the law, and the law requires that it be done correctly. For example, Alabama law holds: "The judgment lien statute is in derogation of the common law and is to be strictly construed." AmSouth Bank v. Bischoff 678 So. 2d 1102 (Ala. Civ. App., 1995). Alabama courts also have held: "Substantial compliance in every essential particular is required before the benefits conferred by such statutes can be obtained or enjoyed, and an omission of any material or particular requirement cannot be deemed a substantial compliance." Duncan v. Ashcraft, 25 So. 2d 735 (Ala., 1898).

Have my criminally inclined neighbor and his ethically challenged lawyer met the requirements under the law? Have the bozos who run Shelby County met the requirements under the law?

Not even close.

A Legacy of Sleaze

Regular readers know that I have nothing good to say about William E. Swatek, the Pelham, Alabama-based attorney who filed the fraudulent lawsuit against me that is at the heart of this blog.

Swatek has an almost 30-year history of unethical behavior in the legal profession, so I am hardly alone in being harmed by this dirtbag.

If I were threatened with waterboarding and forced to say something positive about Bill Swatek, it would be this: "He appears to be about retirement age, so hopefully we won't have to live much longer with his ugly carcass in the legal profession."

Well, looks like the Swatek "legacy" will carry on in Alabama law after Bill Swatek retires.

We recently discovered that Bill's son, Chace Swatek, has joined daddy's "practice" in Pelham. Perhaps Chace is just killing time until a better gig comes along. But maybe he intends to carry on the proud Swatek tradition in the hallowed halls of Shelby County justice.

That certainly would be good news for folks who enjoy being screwed in Shelby County courts.

Stay tuned to Legal Schnauzer for details on the Swatek "legacy" that the Chacester might take over. It's kind of like Sonny or Michael taking over the Corleone family business.

Chace evidently is Bill Swatek's youngest son. The oldest son, Dax, is a Republican "campaign consultant" in Montgomery who has worked for such luminaries as Bob Riley and Alice Martin.

(By the way, what's with naming your kids Dax and Chace? A Schnauzer life lesson: Never trust people who give their kids weird, self-important names.)

I don't know much about Chace Swatek or what he plans to do in his father's miserable law practice. Chace evidently went to law school at Pepperdine University, which is the place where the esteemed Kenneth Starr is now dean. Glad to see Chace has his right-wing credentials in order.

According to a source of mine, those credentials didn't help Chace pass the California bar exam. (In fairness to the Chacester, the California bar exam is considered one of the toughest in the nation. Numerous famous folks have flagged that sucker. Wonder how many times Chace flagged it before he gave up and moved home to Alabama. Obviously, the Alabama bar exam isn't too tough if the likes of Bill Swatek and Mike Joiner passed it.) According to my source, right-wing credentials also didn't help Chace in a real-estate development business on the Gulf Coast. According to court documents, looks like right-wing credentials didn't help Chace avoid a $2,896.87 court judgment against him and for an outfit called Velocity Investments. Even all the strngs daddy pulls in Shelby County apparently couldn't help Chace get off the hook on that one. Ouch.

Wonder what Velocity Investments is about? I guess their name means if you don't pay them, they'll come after you real quick.

Of course, Chace is living at home, so I guess he doesn't have to worry about meeting a budget like most adults.

If you go belly up in enough ventures, maybe daddy's law practice starts to look pretty good. But the history of that law practice doesn't look so good. In fact, it's about as ugly as it gets in the legal profession.

And we will soon be laying it all out for you in gory detail.

A Roadmap of Corruption in Real Time

My house is scheduled to be unlawfully seized and auctioned at noon on May 12 on the steps of the Shelby County Courthouse in Columbiana, Alabama.

With that as a backdrop, we are going to spend quite a bit of time in the next few days, showing you exactly how corrupt this action is. And we will be naming names, showing you the public officials--all Republicans--who are behind it.

The process of threatening my house--and the house of my wife, who is co-owner, and the home of our kitty kats, Baxter and Chloe--is corrupt on multiple levels. So we will address the corruption in two segments, showing that:

* The actual process of seizing my house--the writ of execution, the notice of levy, the sheriff's sale--is unlawful and corrupt from start to finish.

* The underlying judgment upon which the house seizure is based is also unlawful. In fact, the corruption leading up to the judgment is so pervasive that we will deal with it now in fairly general terms, saving many of the details for later.

At the risk of tooting my own horn, I think we are embarking on a journey that is perhaps a first in American journalism--of either the mainstream or nontraditional variety.

I can't think of another instance where a reporter (a citizen journalist or mainstreamer) has outlined exactly how corrupt judges and associated officials go about their dirty business. If anyone can think of another such case, please let me know.

To borrow an important phrase from Don Siegelman, "This is not about me." This is about our broken justice system at the state-court level, which affects far more Americans than our federal courts do. But like the Siegelman case, my situation also illustrates corruption in our federal justice system. Corrupt state-court judges are criminals, and the crimes they commit--because they usually involve the mail or wires--tend to be federal crimes. But is the Bush Justice Department interested in pursuing these state judges who happen to be Republicans? Not in the least.

In fact, my story will show you the two sides to Alice Martin, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama. Ms. Martin went after Don Siegelman (a Democrat) like a rabid wolverine, firing off a case that was so weak that a federal judge bounced it out of court before it barely got started. But when presented with clear wrongdoing by Republican judges in Alabama, Martin turns into a shih tzu.

That's called political prosecution, the subject of an ongoing Congressional inquiry. We will show you that Alice Martin is Exhibit A when it comes to the ugly practice of political prosecution.

We will get to details on Alice Martin in a few weeks. But first, we will deal with the corrupt Republicans who are threatening my home. Thanks to the technology of blogging, I can give Legal Schnauzer readers an inside look at "corruption in real time." This isn't stuff that happened last year or last month or even last week. It's happening right now.

So please come along for a ride that should be educational--for you and for me.

To provide the foundation we need to understand this corruption in real time, we will work backwards--showing first exactly how the home-seizure process is unlawful and then showing how the underlying judgment is unlawful, as well.

Dubya's Economy is in the Dumps

As voters go to the polls today in Indiana and North Carolina, many of them surely are troubled about the state of the American economy.

Justice-related stories are the primary focus of our humble blog. But the dismal American economy figures to be a major story for the rest of 2008 and well into 2009. And if John McCain is elected president, there is reason to believe we are headed for a 1930s-style Depression. In fact, George W. Bush has taken the vibrant economy he inherited and screwed it up so severely that even Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama might not be able to fix it--at least for awhile.

So while the Hoosiers and Tar heels try to clarify the Democratic race (maybe) today, let's consider the economic mess that our next president will inherit.

Dubya would have us believe that our current quagmire is just part of the economic cycle--or that Democrats in Congress are to blame. But the truth is this: Anyone who has read the works of Kevin Phillips, perhaps our foremost economic historian, could have seen this coming as far back as 2000.

Phillips latest book, Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism, is just out--and the picture isn't pretty. In fact, the headline on The New York Times review--"What Ails the American Economy? Everything, and There's Worse to Come"--pretty much sums it up.

How bad is it? Consider this paragraph from the review:

By 2007 total indebtedness was three times the size of the gross domestic product, a ratio that surpassed the record set in the years of the Great Depression. From 2001 to 2007 alone, domestic financial debt grew to $14.5 trillion from $8.5 trillion, and home mortgage debt ballooned to almost $10 trillion from $4.9 trillion, an increase of 102 percent. A crisis in the mortgage market in August 2007 brought the party to an end. Since then we have been living in a twilight zone of what a security analyst quoted in the book calls "one of the slowest-moving train wrecks we've seen."

Phillips is not the only one who saw this coming. The Alabama blog writechic had an excellent post recently, providing historical context to our current economic woes. Title of the post? "The Republican Erosion of America." Here's a highlight:

Did you know that ALL recessions since the 1930’s, save one, have taken place under Republican presidents? True fact. The single exception occurred at the conclusion of World War II during the administration of Harry S. Truman and it was one predictable consequence of ending a war. It was also the shortest, as well as the shallowest. Contrast that with the fact that we are now enduring our SECOND recession due to the gross mismanagement of that congenital idiot and the band of thugs in his administration.The irrepressible BartCop, whom I quite enjoy, is fond of saying “It’s the Republicans’ job to crash the economy so the super-rich can swoop in and buy companies and assets for pennies on the dollar.” (Vol. 2139, in “Quotes” near the top of his page) Now, this is a bit on the simplistic side, but in essence, it’s EXACTLY what they do! And another for good measure: “Never trust a Republican. It’s their job to crash the economy so their billionaire friends can buy once-healthy companies for pennies on the dollar, fire the employees and sell the assets for profit.”

How many Americans go to the polls thinking Republicans are stronger than Democrats on the economy? How many Americans are ignorant when it comes to history?

Need I remind you here about the Great Depression? That worldwide catastrophe was brought to your predecessors courtesy of the Republican Party. After Warren Gamaliel Harding was elected president in 1920…and died two years later, vice president Calvin Coolidge took over the Oval Office. He served out the remainder of Harding’s term and was reelected in 1924, serving until he was replaced by yet another hardline GOoPer, Herbert Hoover, in January of 1929. One of the worst of the outrages perpetrated by “Silent Cal” was the transformation of the Federal Trade Commission, through his appointees, from an agency intended to regulate corporations into one dominated BY Big Business, FOR Big Business. Sound familiar?

Looking back on the so-called “Roaring Twenties,” hindsight quickly reveals the abjectly corrosive nature of Republican ideology. Andrew W. Mellon–at that time one of the three wealthiest men in America!–was Harding’s Secretary of the Treasury and Coolidge kept him on, a voracious fox charged with guarding the henhouse. Mellon’s maniacal dedication to such hair-brained schemes as income tax cuts, inheritance tax cuts and an aggressively pro-business agenda coupled with utter disdain for fiscal caution, resulted in skyrocketing debt…and made the decade appear to “roar.” It also served as camouflage for underlying economic weakness. Farmers were already in an economic depression at the time and it was a widening income disparity which ultimately caused the bottom to drop out of the Stock Market on “Black Tuesday,” October 29, 1929. Bank deposits were withdrawn in a frenzy after that and something on the order of NINE THOUSAND banks failed between 1930 and 1932.

Your GOP at work!

And if you think they’re not trying for a rerun, you just haven’t been paying close enough attention. Did somebody mention Bear Stearns?? The vast gulf between the “have mores” and all the rest of us is at its greatest point since then, excepting only the tech-bubble years of 1999 and 2000. It’s no secret that wages have stagnated…but creative book-cooking has hidden the extent of it. Just over a year ago, it was revealed that in the midst of unparalleled corporate profits, we also have record poverty.

How is this affecting everyday Americans? Associated Press reports that lots of folks are selling prized possessions to help make ends meet. Wonder how many of the folks featured in this article plan to vote Republican.

A Nation of Men, Not Laws

One of the most famous quotes about American justice is attributed to John Adams. The subject was the principle of separation of powers, and the occasion was the drafting of the constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts:

". . . to the end it may be a government of laws and not of men."

That phrase has been quoted with approval by the U.S. Supreme Court and every state supreme court in the United States. But does it still hold true? Is America, in the postmodern Age of Rove, still a "government of laws and not of men?"

The answer, sadly and resoundingly, is no.

In fact, if I were told that I had only one sentence to get across the core message of this blog, it would be this: "Our nation in 2008 is ruled by corrupt men (and women) and not the rule of law, and Legal Schnauzer is designed to present irrefutable proof of that sorry state of affairs--in hopes that people of good faith will rise up and do something about it."

How do I know that our nation currently is controlled by corrupt "men" and not the rule of law? Well, any objective and serious student of the Don Siegelman case in Alabama and the Paul Minor case in Mississippi would have to strongly suspect that something is horribly amiss with our justice system.

But I have an advantage over most folks. I don't have to rely on third-person accounts of injustice, of legal wrongs that have befallen "other people."

I've seen it firsthand. I've been a victim of it. And for some reason--I give credit to my background in journalism and to a wife who is more fearless than I ever imagined--I had the ability, support, and determination I needed to go to a law library and figure out exactly how I was being cheated. And that knowledge, discovered with the help of some wonderful law librarians, forms the foundation for the story that unfolds on this blog.

My hope is that the public at large will take my efforts--and the efforts of folks like Scott Horton, Larisa Alexandrovna, Glynn Wilson, and more--and become alarmed enough to say, "Enough!" As Don Siegelman has correctly pointed out, this is not about my case, his case, or any particular case. It's about our country--and what it stands for.

By the way, what does America stand for? If you did a nationwide survey, I bet the number one answer would be "freedom." I bet the number two answer would be "justice." But here's the key: If number two is tarnished and warped, number one is no longer a possible. Freedom cannot thrive without justice. Just ask Don Siegelman, who lost his freedom for nine months because of a corrupt and dysfunctional justice system. Just ask the three defendants in the Paul Minor case, who are currently imprisoned for crimes the case record shows they did not commit.

People who care about justice have a tough road ahead. Many Americans have forgotten, or never bothered to learn, what the words of John Adams really mean.

Consider my case, where Republican authorities in Shelby County, Alabama, are threatening to unlawfully seize and auction my house--all to settle a "judgment" in the amount of $1,525. I've had more than one person, people who are smart enough to know better, say something like: "Well, you've got a judgment against you, and there's nothing you can do about it. You have to pay the judgment or you're going to lose your house."

John Adams isn't around to say it, so I will say it for him: "Rubbish!"

The "judgment" against me was signed by a "man," Shelby County Circuit Judge G. Dan Reeves. His signature is the only thing that gives the judgment even a hint of authority. But that authority is not grounded in the law. The record in my case is filled with proof that Dan Reeves is corrupt, a corrupt "man." He and his predecessor on my case, Presiding Judge J. Michael Joiner, are glorified rapists. They raped the law repeatedly and viciously.

Corrupt "men" like Reeves and Joiner, thank God, have limited authority in our system of government. They are constrained by the law.

And what does the law say in my case? It says, more than anything, that the lawsuit against me had to be dismissed (summary judgment) multiple times--that the case could not go to trial. And if you take summary judgment out of the equation and consider just the trial itself, the law says no finding could be made against me there, either.

We will be providing many details later to drive home these points. But for now, our key point is this: Under the rule of law, there is no judgment against me that could threaten my house; under the rule of men, there is a judgment against me that is being used to threaten my house.

Which one prevails? John Adams would have a ready answer. So would Thomas Paine, who wrote the following in Common Sense:

". . . the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarchy, that in America the law is king. For as in absolute governments the king is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other."

National Magazine Focusing on Justice

I spoke at length about three weeks ago with a contributing editor for a major national magazine. He was interested in background material on the Don Siegelman prosecution, the Paul Minor case in Mississippi, and my own situation with Alabama Republican authorities threatening to unlawfully seize my house.

My contact, we'll call him "CE" (short for contributing editor), said the magazine almost certainly is going to do a major piece on the Siegelman case. Looks like the writer will be a prominent journalist, who recently released an acclaimed book--a critical one--on the Bush presidency.

The magazine's plans regarding the Minor case and my case are less clear. Sounds like CE is interested in doing a piece on the Minor case, perhaps with a sidebar on my situation. But nothing is firm about that.

I told him that I think the Minor case is every bit as egregious as the Siegelman case, maybe worse, and has not received nearly the attention it deserves. And of course, I couldn't resist pointing out that my case shows that the Republican hierarchy does not just go after the powerful (Siegelman) or the wealthy (Minor). They also go after regular folks like me, particularly when we have the gall to start a blog that unveils their corrupt practices for all the world to see.

CE, by the way, is a major figure in journalism. He has written four books and had two magazine articles turned into motion pictures. His latest book focuses on regular citizens who stand up against corporate and governmental wrongdoing that led to environmental degradation in their state. If you've read Jonathan Harr's A Civil Action, or seen the movie starring John Travolta, you would definitely want to check out CE's latest book.

Hope to hear more soon about the magazine's plans, and I'll try to keep Schnauzer readers posted.

Some Humans Ain't Human

A few weeks back, I proposed Gunslinger by John Fogerty as our official theme song here at Legal Schnauzer.

Gunslinger is a meditation on the need for justice in our broken, postmodern America. And Fogerty makes the point that justice won't come easily, and those who seek justice are going to have to be tough enough to fight for it.

Gunslinger will always resonate with us. But I think we have room for more than one theme song. And I recently discovered another, thanks to a coworker who is a John Prine fan. Prine's song is called Some Humans Ain't Human, and it gets right to the heart of the issues we raise here at Legal Schnauzer.

Experience has taught me that whenever you see injustice, or evil, or both, you can rest assured that at least one really crappy human being--and probably more than one--is behind it.

Prine, like Fogerty, has been around a long time and written a lot of great stuff. But this one really hits home for me. You can check out the lyrics here.

Let's enjoy Prine performing Some Humans Ain't Human live:

Date Looms With the Jack Booted Thugs

So many state and national justice-related stories have been breaking lately that we have pretty much ignored my own story of legal travail.

But much is happening on that front, and we will keep Legal Schnauzer readers up to date. After all, my story is a "regular guy in civil court" version of what has happened to well known people like Don Siegelman and Paul Minor in criminal court. And as we have shown, many of the Republican operatives who have been connected to the Siegelman case also have connections to my case.

So what is going on with efforts by GOP authorities in Shelby County, Alabama, to unlawfully seize and auction my house? Well, they are still at it. They had a slight error in their first notice of levy and resulting the ad that they are required by law to run in a general circulation newspaper--they had someone else's house listed for auction.

I'm not making this up, folks. In their haste to threaten my house, which is a thinly veiled effort to get me to quit writing this blog, the mental giants who run Shelby County incorrectly gave a wrong mapbook description of my property. I conducted a little research and discovered that the property incorrectly described actually exists. In fact, it belongs to some folks who reside one street over from by wife and me--in the same spot on their street as we occupy on our street.

Wonder if those folks got calls about their house being up for "auction." Wonder how those folks reacted to that news. Did someone get reamed out pretty good for this clerical error? (Hah!)

Anyway, a new ad is running, stating that my house is to be auctioned on the courthouse steps at noon on May 12. You can check it out here.

For good measure, here is the text of the ad. Guess they got the description right this time. But as we will show in upcoming posts, that's the only thing they've gotten right:

LEGAL NOTICE

SHERIFF'S SALE

********
By virtue of Writ of Execution issued out of District Court of Shelby County, Alabama, and to me directed whereby I am commanded to make the amount of a certain judgment recently obtained against Roger Shuler in favor of Mike McGarity out of the goods, chattels, lands and tenements of the said Roger Shuler, I have levied on the following property, to wit:Lot 4 block 16 Broken Bow South book 11 page 82.

Therefore, according to said command, I shall expose for sale at public auction, all the right, title and interest of the above named Roger Shuler to the above described property, on the 12th day of May, 2008, at 12:00 noon, on the front steps of the Shelby County Courthouse in Columbiana, Alabama.

Dated at Columbiana this 9th day of April, 2008./s/ Chris Curry, Sheriff of Shelby County, Alabama

Shelby County Reporter April 23, 30 and May 7, 2008

SALE/SHULER
Apr 29, 2008

By the way, if you want to get an idea of how well the Bush economy is going, check out the legal notices in the Shelby County Reporter, the weekly newspaper in my neck of the woods. The legal notices, which can be viewed here, include the bogus sheriff's sale notice above. But they also include row after row of foreclosure sales. And keep in mind, Shelby is the wealthiest and most Republican county in Alabama. Can only imagine how well the economy is clicking in less prosperous Alabama counties.

Wonder how many of these folks in foreclosure voted for Bush--twice. Wonder how many of them plan to vote for McCain. Wonder if any of them have taken the time to consider the connections between their financial distress and the policies of the GOP president they helped to "elect."

Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it, that McCain leads by 19 percent over either Democratic Party presidential candidate in the most recent survey of Alabama voters?

We reap what we sow.

Love Connection? Abramoff and the D.C. Madam

Recent days have brought two major justice-related stories. Could they be connected? Let's take a look.

First came a guilty plea from former Justice Department official Robert Coughlin on conflict-of-interest charges connected to disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Then came word that Deborah Jeane Palfrey, better known as the D.C. Madam, had apparently committed suicide at her mother's home in Tarpon Springs, Florida.

In Legal Times splendid account of the Coughlin plea, an e-mail exchange between two Abramoff lobbyists is cited. The lobbyists are Kevin Ring and Padgett Wilson, and Ring is telling Wilson about a celebration to honor Justice Department officials who helped bring home $16 million for an Abramoff client, the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. "Come to the show, baby," Couglin says. Here is how Wilson responds:

"Are there any tickets left?" asked Wilson, now director of governmental affairs for Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue. He then submitted: "And as for those DOJ staffers, those guys should get anything they want for the rest of the time they are in office -- opening day tickets, Skins v. Giants, oriental massages, hookers, whatever."

So there you have it: One Abramoff associate indicating to another that prostitutes are to be part of the pay off for Justice Department officials who further the sleazy Team Abramoff cause.

Then a few days later, we learn that Ms. Palfrey, who ran one of the most well known high-end prostitution services in the D.C. area, is found hanging in a shed behind her mother's mobile home.

Does this prove that Palfrey's death was something other than a suicide, which is the official version from Tampa-area law enforcement? No. But could a reasonable mind take these two events and ask, "Is this one heck of a coincidence--the public learns that Abramoff lackies evidently were plying Justice Department officials with hookers and then a few days later one of the D.C. areas most renowned practitioners of the prostitution trade is found dead?"

Time magazine was first out with a story saying Palfrey had discussed the possibility of suicide with a writer named Dan Moldea. "She wasn't going to jail, she told me that very clearly," Moldea said. "She told me she would commit suicide."

But Moldea's account does not square with Palfrey's own words. One Web site presents audio of Palfrey saying she would not commit suicide and that she probably would be a victim of a murder made to look like a suicide.

The Coughlin case also brings to mind the case of former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, who resigned after getting nabbed in a prostitution-related investigation. Is anyone investigating the possibility that Team Abramoff, and their "friendlies" in the Justice Department, violated federal law regarding the transport of prostitutes over state lines? That's apparently what got Spitzer into doo-doo. What about folks in the Justice Department, the very organization that led the Spitzer organization?

A major theme of the Bush Justice Department scandal has to do with double standards. Actions that become federal crimes when "committed" by a Democrat are ignored when committed by Republicans, or people associated with GOP supporters.

Could a serious investigation into the Coughlin case and the D.C. madam suicide unearth evidence of a particularly noxious double standard?

Here is something else to keep in mind regarding the D.C. madam death: Hanging is a fairly unusual form of suicide for a woman. According to statistics at suicide.org, the two most common methods of suicide for women, by far, are poisons (overdosing, etc.) at 37.8 percent and firearms at 32.4 percent. Hanging, strangulation, and suffocation are grouped together and come in third at 19.7 percent. But if we can assume that true hanging makes up only one-third of that group, it seems that only a little more than 6 percent of female suicides use the method found in the D.C. Madam case.

Note: In our first post on the Coughlin matter, we noted that one news source had identified Coughlin as a member of the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section and that he had been involved in the Paul Minor prosecution in Mississippi. A source close to the Minor case tell us that the quote that led to that report was misunderstood. Our source says Coughlin apparently was not part of the Public Integrity Section and had no role in the Minor prosecution.

Good Day For Siegelman, Good Day for Justice

Don Siegelman recently spent nine months in federal prison, so it is safe to say the former Alabama governor has had a few crummy days in the past year or so.

But yesterday was not one of them. In fact, Siegelman--now released from prison pending appeal of his conviction on corruption-related charges--had a banner day. And in the Age of Rove, a good day for Don Siegelman almost certainly means a step forward for America's beleaguered justice system.

First came word that federal officials admitted they screwed up in restricting travel for Siegelman. And how did they screw up? Probation officials in Alabama and Louisiana mistakenly applied rules governing offenders who are on probation. But Siegelman is not on probation; he is free on bond pending appeal. "Oops, our bad," justice officials said. More specifically, a spokeswoman for the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts said: "They made an honest mistake."

Right, and no one higher up the line--say, a certain judge or prosecutor--had anything to do with it. This illustrates a point I've seen time and again in my battle with corrupt Republicans in Alabama's state courts. Corruption from the top of a justice system inevitably filters down to lower levels. If you find a corrupt judge at a state-court level, you are almost sure to find a corrupt district attorney, a corrupt county clerk, a corrupt sheriff, and so on.

When a justice system becomes infested with corruption, folks at the lower levels no longer serve the public--they serve the corrupt honchos above them. And since the small fry enjoy their nice government salaries and benefits, they aren't about to buck a system that is treating them pretty darn good--even if it means some people are screwed criminally, ruined financially, cheated civilly, etc.

Experience tells me this was not an "honest mistake" by probation officials in Siegelman's case. If Siegelman had not squawked loudly--with it amplified by his supporters and a semi-alert press--these unlawful travel restrictions would have stayed in place. In other words, the bad guys would have gotten away with it.

In my case, I don't have vocal supporters, and the press easily ignores my situation--even though my case is hardly isolated; the number of people who get cheated in Alabama state courts probably is staggering. So state court officials are likely to get away with just about anything when it comes to low-profile folks like me--up to and including, in my case, unlawfully seizing and auctioning my house.

But back to Siegelman. The former governor got more good news, in the form of an excellent column titled "What Karl Rove Fears Most" (love that headline!) by Dan Froomkin of the Washington Post. There is so much good stuff in Froomkin's column, it's hard to know where to begin. Basically, it's a splendid overview of recent events regarding Rove and his slithering efforts to avoid testifying about his role in the Siegelman case and other Justice Department shenanigans. It's a must read, and it shows that Siegelman's statements about the political nature of his prosecution are resonating with the national press. The Alabama press remains brain dead, but I'm not sure that matters anymore. Siegelman is expertly going over their heads and proving just how irrelevant corrupt Alabama news outfits really are.

Finally, Siegelman received a standing ovation, and supportive words from U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, at last night's annual Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Birmingham. Pelosi heaped a heavy dose of criticism on President Bush:

"He has brought a war without end, a budget awash in red ink, a looming recession, assault after assault after assault on our Constitution, politicizing the Justice Department, and I'm so glad that Congress is looking into that--and I'm so proud we are joined by Gov. Siegelman."

With that, Siegelman stood and received a long and loud standing ovation from the crowd.

While Pelosi had harsh words for Bush last night, more than a few Democrats say she has not been aggressive enough in countering the White House, especially on matters of justice.

Glynn Wilson gave voice to those concerns in a strongly worded piece at Locust Fork News.

Siegelman and the GOP's "Umbrella of Protection"

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman has been featured on recent radio interviews with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Thom Hartmann, and both conversations produced a number of quotes worth remembering.

The Kennedy interview is about 30 minutes long and can be viewed here. The Hartmann interview can be heard, and a transcript read, through links posted here. I encourage readers to catch both interviews.

In the Kennedy interview, two segments--one near the start and one near the end--stood out for me.

First, Siegelman talks about what he calls the "umbrella of protection" that seemingly allows Republican prosecutors, judges, and political operatives to violate the law without fear of being held accountable.

This is a critical point. It's this umbrella of protection that allows Alice Martin, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, to lie under oath in an employment-related case and get away with it. With the Bush Justice Department providing an umbrella of protection, Martin knew she could get away with it.

This umbrella also allows U.S. Judge Henry Wingate to make blatantly unlawful rulings regarding jury instructions and evidence in the Paul Minor case in Mississippi. Wingate knew no one at Bush Justice would hold him accountable. In fact, chances are, the Bushies were encouraging him to act unlawfully.

During the seven-plus years that I've fought corrupt GOP judges and lawyers in Alabama state courts, my wife and I have frequently shaken our heads in disbelief at some of the blatantly corrupt behavior we've witnessed. "These people aren't even good crooks," we've said. "Their corruption is so obvious, and they make no attempt to conceal it. They have no fear of getting caught."

Why is that? Siegelman hits the nail on the head with his statement about an umbrella of protection. And who holds this umbrella for GOP evildoers? Well, the Bushies at Justice are one obvious answer. But large segments of America's corporate-owned press also are umbrella carriers.

In Southern states like Alabama and Mississippi, many newspapers lean to the right philosophically, and they aren't about to uncover wrongdoing by conservatives. And the rare paper that is center or left of center seems to be too cowed to do anything but occasionally tsk, tsk on the editorial page about GOP corruption. I've yet to see even a moderate newspaper unleash an investigative reporter to get to the bottom of the GOP sewer that covers most of the South.

Siegelman's other key comment comes near the end, when he says the threat of GOP corruption is not limited to powerful folks like himself. "If they can do this to me, what can they do to people who don't have the resources I've had to fight back?" Siegelman says.

That quote goes right to the heart of our story here at Legal Schnauzer. I'm not powerful like Don Siegelman or wealthy like Paul Minor. But Republican authorities in Alabama are threatening to unlawfully seize and sell my house because I'm writing on this blog about their corrupt practices.

Siegelman tells RFK Jr. about being almost broke from the expense of fighting a corrupt justice system. My wife and I can identify with that. Our once solid financial picture is pretty much in ruins, thanks to corrupt Alabama judges and lawyers, and now they are trying to take our house, too.

I've never met Don Siegelman, but I admire the fact that he is not focusing only on his own experience with "justice" in the Age of Rove. Given the hell Siegelman has been through over the past five or six years, who could blame Siegelman--now that he has the public's attention--if he spoke only about his own case. But he's painted a bigger picture, and I for one, certainly appreciate it.

In fact, it reminds me why I'm a Democrat. For all of their flaws, Democrats at least tend to think about something besides themselves. They don't just say, "Well, I'm a rugged individualist, and the hell with everybody else."

It's that expansive mindset that makes Democrats so much better than Republicans when it comes to governance. It's the opposite mindset--a tendency to appeal to voters' selfishness--that makes Republicans so good at elections.

The Hartmann interview also is packed with interesting stuff. Here's Siegelman about why the mainstream press, and many citizens, have ignored the story:

"Well, I really believe that people just don't want to believe bad things do happen in America. You know, we want to believe that decisions to go to war are made on what . . . is our best national interest, or we want to believe that our justice system works fairly and evenhandedly, that innocent people don't get indicted. We want to believe that our elections, as opposed to the elections of other countries, are conducted fairly and honestly. But, you know, when we take a close look at what is going on, we find that maybe things are awry."

Siegelman's statements about the broad nature of the Bush DOJ scandal are spoken in the finest Democratic tradition. And for that, he deserves our nation's gratitude.

Terror in the Deep South

Has someone been conducting a terror campaign in Alabama and Mississippi against victims of the Bush Justice Department?

Raw Story presents a compelling article today that strongly suggests the answer to that question is yes.

Reporters Larisa Alexandrovna, Muriel Kane, and Lindsay Beyerstein report that people connected to the Don Siegelman case in Alabama and the Paul Minor case in Mississippi have experienced a total of 10 suspicious incidents. The incidents range from burglaries to arson to unexplained fires to vandalism to traffic mishaps.

Some of the incidents have been reported before, but others are new to these schnauzer ears. For example, Montgomery businessman John Goff reported that a $400 sliding-glass window at his office had been smashed. At the time of the vandalism, Goff was the subject of an investigation by U.S. Attorney Leura Canary. The investigation came after Goff had filed a lawsuit against Republican Governor Bob Riley, claiming that Riley and others had conspired to ruin Goff's businesses.

In summer 2003, Paul Minor's office in Biloxi, Mississippi, was broken into. A brick was used to shatter a window, and the intruder took a computer belonging to Minor's secretary and rummaged through files.

Perhaps most fascinating are the details Raw Story provides about the experiences of Republican whistleblower Jill Simpson. We have known that Simpson experienced a house fire and a mysterious auto incident in the days before she came forward with information about the political motivations behind the Siegelman case. But Raw Story tells us that:

* At the time of the fire, Simpson was talking with Siegelman's attorneys about what she had heard on a conference phone call involving GOP operative Bill Canary. On February 15, 2007, she sent a letter to Art Leach, an attorney for Siegelman codefendant Richard Scrushy. Six days later, on February 21, a house belonging to Simpson in Rainsville caught fire. About 30 percent of the structure was damaged, and Simpson was not home at the time. No formal investigation of the fire has taken place.

* Less than two weeks after the fire, Simpson's car was apparently forced off the road. The incident was caused by a motorist making an improper lane change into her lane. A police report identifies the driver of the other vehicle as Mark Roden of Rainbow City, Alabama. Roden told an officer on the scene that he was an officer with the Attalla Police Department; Roden then was allowed to leave without a citation. A city clerk in Attalla confirmed that a Mark Roden had worked as a police officer, but she could provide no additional information. Calls left for the police chief were not returned. Repeated attempts to reach Roden at the residence listed on the accident report have been unsuccessful.

As usual, it takes a news organization that is national in scope to break new ground on the Siegelman and Minor cases. Any chance a reporter from a mainstream news outfit will follow up?
Consider just a few of the possible questions:

* Why has no investigation been done on the fire at Jill Simpson's home? Who should be responsible for conducting an investigation?

* Who in the heck is Mark Roden and why does he supposedly no longer work for the Attalla Police Department? Why does the police chief not return phone calls from the media? Why was Roden not cited for the traffic incident? Where does Mark Roden work now and where did he work before?

* Why has no serious investigation been conducted on a fire that was clearly arson at the office of former Mississippi judge John Whitfield. Why did local authorities confiscate documents that survived the blaze, particularly those that pertained to Whitfield's defense in the Minor case?