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News :: Civil & Human Rights |
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Howard Dean, Extortion, Bribes and other problems |
Current rating: 0 |
by Scott Huminski
Email: s_huminski (nospam) hotmail.com (verified) |
24 Mar 2005
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DNC Chair Howard Dean’s problems with the Bill of Rights, the Law and Ethics. |
In 1997 Howard Dean announced his desire to appoint judges willing to subvert the Bill of Rights or in Howard Dean lingo “legal technicalities”. Two judges appointed within months of Dean infamous 1997 statement have been found guilty of civil rights violations by a federal court in Manhattan. (fn1) Dean’s top appointee and lawyer, Vermont Attorney General William Sorrell, was defense counsel for the corrupt government employees in this case where Sorrell has expended vast public funds to forward the goal of undermining the First Amendment in Vermont.
To get a true feeling of the judicial and law enforcement climate fostered by Dean in Vermont, it is instructional to look at his # 1 Vermont appointee and life-long friend, William Sorrell. Dean owed a great debt to the Sorrell family for mentoring his ascent in Vermont politics. Dean’s first notable gubernatorial appointment in Vermont was to install Sorrell as Secretary of Administration in 1992. In 1997, it became time to thank the Sorrell family again and Dean attempted to appoint Sorrell as the chief justice of the Vermont Supreme Court. As Sorrell had no judicial experience, Dean’s zeal to appoint his favorite crony was met with a legislative roadblock. Dean had a backup plan, appoint the Attorney General to the Supreme Court and then appoint Sorrell to fill the Attorney General vacancy. All was well with Vermont Cronies. (fn2)
In describing Sorrell, Dean was quite generous with his praise of his friend’s character and abilities, illustrating the nature of their relationship: “I have an enormous amount of respect for Sorrell as a human being and as a really smart lawyer.”
A subordinate of Sorrell’s issued the following prosecutorial written threat in a Vermont state court proceeding,
"The last claim involves a statement made to attorney Capriola warning that the defendant would be charged with additional crimes if he did not clam down. The statement is a reference to the defendant's continued harassment of the victim and the investigating officer in this case through the court process. The defendant has filed a civil action against the victim because of his participation in this criminal case. The State is currently reviewing a contempt charge against the defendants because of this activity. The statement was a proper warning made through the defendant's representative."
Sorrell approvingly has stood behind and defended the above threat which now has become part of a prosecutor’s toolbox in Vermont. The above threat is the epitome of the government’s coercive use of the power of criminal prosecution to influence and manipulate civil court proceedings tantamount to extortion and obstruction of justice concerning a matter before a federal court. Dean’s “really smart lawyer” and top appointee at work.
Sorrell’s conduct doesn’t stop there, his subordinates followed up the above threat with a plea agreement that specified the dismissal and non-pursuit of civil lawsuits against the prosecutors themselves. The dismissal of a lawsuit is an item of monetary value benefiting Sorrell’s underlings – or to put it bluntly this conduct is tantamount to acceptance of a bribe by state prosecutors. Dean’s “really smart lawyer” strongly approved and defended the conduct. One can’t assign full responsibility concerning this government corruption to Dean’s friend alone because two of Dean’s hand-picked anti-“legal technicality” judicial appointees presided over and approved the government misconduct.
Then there was the police shooting of Robert (“Woody”) Woodward in Brattleboro, Vermont in 2001. The massacre involved 7 shots from police revolvers fatally wounding Mr. Woodward – with some of the shots fired into his body while he was bleeding on the ground in the fetal position. Dean and Sorrell, both irrationally obsessive police advocates, put the cover-up machine into gear. Sorrell authored a biased report overlooking much of the testimony and evidence. When Dean was asked to appoint a special independent investigator he backed up his old crony and stated that Sorrell was a “really smart lawyer”. One of Dean’s so-called “legal technicalities”, the Fourteenth Amendment, prohibits a biased decision-maker. Something as trivial as the Constitution didn’t stop Dean from deciding not to usurp his friend’s report by refusing to appoint an independent investigator regardless of his very public conflict-of-interest with Sorrell. Pursuant to the constitution, Dean should have disqualified himself. (fn3)
Sorrell has lately kept busy in the courts fighting to keep Howard Dean’s gubernatorial records sealed. In light of the foregoing, one can only imagine what vile government conduct Sorrell and Dean are covering up in the sealed records lawsuit. Sorrell’s friendship with Dean is still costing the Vermont taxpayers thousands of litigation dollars and Dean’s “really smart lawyer” friend apparently flunked attorney ethics which prohibit Sorrell’s representation of Dean under attorney conflict-of-interest principles. (fn4)
In Sorrell’s possession is a sworn transcript and audio tape of a major U.S. corporation’s quite illegal conduct constituting extortion and other crimes. To date, the reason is unknown for Sorrell’s cover-up of the criminal enterprise set forth in the audio tape aside from the fact that any such reason would be incompatible with law enforcement. Also in this questionable category is Sorrell’s cover-up of an alcoholic beverage retailer’s activities who operated without federal or state licenses for 8 years during the Dean/Sorrell decade in Vermont despite a report from Vermont’s own liquor investigator that the illegal conduct existed. Dean’s appointee response – cover up.
It appears that neither Dean nor his lawyer crony have any respect for the Bill of Rights, ethical considerations or the rule of law when it doesn’t fit into their dubious agendas. Recently, Dean has labeled the members of an entire political party as “evil” and “brain-dead”. Perhaps Dean should look in the mirror and look at the condition he left Vermont in after a decade of his appointments prior to disparaging others. The man who said 95 percent of people charged with crimes are guilty anyway so why should the state spend money on providing them with lawyers should indeed criticize very carefully from his anti-constitutional corrupt glass house. (fn5)
Scott Huminski
111-2c Killam Court
Cary, NC 27513
S_huminski (at) hotmail.com
(fn1)
http://www.time.com/time/election2004/article/0,18471,535358,00.html
http://chapelhill.indymedia.org/news/2005/02/13685.php
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Articles8/Frank_Dean-Sorrell-Corruption.htm
http://toughenough.org/huminski.html
http://victimsoflaw.net/Scott_Huminski.htm
http://neworleans.indymedia.org/news/2003/10/543.php
(fn2)
http://yconservatives.com/Guest-54c.html
http://pittsburgh.indymedia.org/news/2003/09/8836.php
(fn3)
http://www.justiceforwoody.org/
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2003/12/277164.shtml
http://la.indymedia.org/print.php?id=96372
(fn4)
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont/articles/2005/03/11/fight_over_howard_dean_papers_goes_before_vermonts_high_court/
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/president/dean/articles/2003/12/05/deans_unseemly_secrecy?mode=PF
(fn5)
http://www.prisonactivist.org/pipermail/prisonact-list/1996-September/000600.html
http://talkleft.com/new_archives/003199.html#003199
http://talkleft.com/new_archives/003144.html#003144
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A1907-2003Jul2¬Found=true |
This work is in the public domain |
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Tar Baby Huminski Say Nuthin' |
by informative repost
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
24 Mar 2005
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Seems our anti-Dean sue-happy gadfly Scott (after all we are on a first name since Mr. Huminski greats me in his email that way) is a little bit upset.
After my line by line refutation (http://makeashorterlink.com/?Z11423456)
of Josh Frank's highly flawed "news" article "reporting" on Dean's "Constitutional Hang-Up," and my posting links to several of the indymedia sites where he was railing against Vermont (a.k.a. Dean's "Police State" - http://nc.indymedia.org/news/2003/07/5707_comment.php) I received an email (http://makeashorterlink.com/?G52421456) from this busy little litigant intimating he might sue me if he had the time. Actually he suggests that "A law suit against a crazed Dean fanatic might cause quite a stir."
Beyond giving me a good laugh at how misguided our Mr. Huminski is, the only actual point directly addressing anything I have posted is this part:
"Aside from the other inaccuracies in your last "frisking" you claimed that I was banished from Vermon courthouse for my obstruction of justice. That statement constitutes defamation in the written form -- libel."
First... I have never used the term "frisking" in reference to anything anyone posts on the web. The only time I talk about "frisking" anyone is when playing "bad girls in prison" in the bedroom with my significant other! (wink)
Matt at the Dean Defense Force however (among others) uses the term "fisking" when refuting erroneous stories, though I myself never use even that term. He actually did use that term (fisking) in his edited post (http://deandefense.org/archives/000744.html#more) from this blog.
Second, and more directly to the "point" Huminski tries to raise, I do see how it can be read that I implied that he was barred from court for the obstruction of justice charges directly.
My original statement; "He simply could not do so on court grounds, after being barred from court for obstruction of justice charges, which were upheld three times by both state and federal courts." might give the impression that Mr. Huminski was barred because of the obstruction of justice charges stemming from his thrice lost tenant-landlord civil case (http://makeashorterlink.com/?V33415456). He was barred from the courts in another dispute, which grew out of his decade plus battle with the courts stemming from that original proceeding.
He was charged with obstruction of justice in the civil case, but prosecutors agreed to drop that charge if Huminski paid $100 in court costs. Huminski agreed. After that plea agreement was put in place, Huminski's wife sued the Bennington County state's attorney in federal court, and that office sought to reinstate the obstruction-of-justice charge, saying the federal suit violated the terms of the plea agreement. Judge Nancy Corsones granted the motion to reinstate the charge
Mr. Huminski then protested against the court system, parking his van outside the courthouse in Bennington with signs criticizing State's Attorney William Wright and his staff.
In May 1999, he then took his protesting to Rutland, where Corsones was presiding in the District Court, and posted signs on his van critical of her. Several month before however, Huminski sent several angry letters to the state attorney general's office.
In one, Huminski angrily denounced Vermont's judicial system and said he "must take the law into my own hands and initiate activities that will get national media attention."
In the other, he complained again of the state's treatment of him and wrote, "I believe my future activities will prevent the state from engaging in this behavior ever again."
When several months later he parked his van on court property with signs on it saying "Judge (Nancy) Corsones: Butcher of the Constitution." it prompted an order that he remove the signs or leave the courthouse property. He refused, which in and of itself is a violation of the law. He was then removed from the court property after refusing to obey the court officers. This then led to follow-up orders authorized by the court administrator's office in Montpelier and the state Department of Buildings and General Services being issued that effectively barred Huminski from Vermont courts.
The orders barring him from Vermont courts are on appeal, and Mr. Huminski's request for a preliminary injunction against the ban, which was previously granted, was revoked.
Finally, my original statement is not defamation, nor is it libel. Mr. Huminski's comical opinion that they are, and that he "probably "won't waste his time" bringing a libel suit "filed in U.S District Court filed in the United States District Court (North Carolina) under diversity jurisdiction" immediately caused my mind to leap to the notion of blurting out and replying with that Bush phrase so near and dear to my heart... "Bring 'em on!".
However, given how foolish it was for Bush to say such taunts to foreign terrorists... it should perhaps give me pause. We certainly don't want either situations to turn into a quagmire now do we?
Now I certainly have no truck against anyone for being concerned about civil rights, including free-speech in public spaces (oh the irony that Mr. Huminski wishes to anoint himself poster-boy for free speech, yet threatens me with defamation and libel litigation). Especially when it is their own right to speak out which is being curbed by the state. That said however, I think Mr. Huminski's behavior is the very definition of gadfly (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=gadfly) and certainly raises questions in my mind as to how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in man-hours and public resources have been wasted with his misguided litigious behavior.
Sorry, Scott... you will have to wait for some other fool to punch your tar baby (http://xroads.virginia.edu/~UG97/remus/anatar.html) for you.
# posted by Mitchell @ 12:15 AM
Wednesday, August 20, 2003
http://gore4dean.blogspot.com/2003_08_01_gore4dean_archive.html |
