11-02-01 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' in the US Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit: Request for Verification of the Dockets' Validity by Clerk Molly Dwyer is Posted by the Court // Conducta dudosa de los tribunales de EE.UU. // 可疑的行为，美国法院

 

The Clerks of the US Courts hold a key position in the safeguard of integrity of courts and Human Rights in the Digital Era.

Los Angeles, February 1 -  Log Cabin Republicans v USA – appeals pertaining to the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy of the US Armed Forces – are now before the US Court of Appeals after litigation in the US District Court, Central District of California.

As part of his Motion to Intervene in the appeals, Dr Joseph Zernik of Human Rights Alert (NGO) questioned the validity of the two opposing Judgments, which were listed in the online docket of the US District court.  Listing two opposing judgments in one case, with no judicial proceeding to reverse the first judgment is inconsistent with the way litigation is to be conducted pursuant to the law of the United States.


Clerk Terry Nafisi of the US District Court refuses to certify the online docket and the October 2010 Judgment, from which the appeals were taken.

The Log Cabin Republicans opposed the Motion to Intervene and the request for the dismissal of the appeals, based on invalidity of the October 2010 Judgment. [4] However, even in their opposition to the Motion to Intervene, the Log Cabin Republicans have failed to produce the certificate of the October 2010 Judgment from the US District Court.

Now, a request by Dr Zernik has been posted in the online docket for Clerk of the US Court of Appeals Molly Dwyer to verify the validity of the dockets in the appeals. [1]  

In his request, Dr Zernik notes that he has studies the electronic online public access system of the US courts from coast to coast and also published a report on the subject in an international, peer-reviewed, computer science journal, with Editorial Board listing scholars from six European nations and Canada. [2] Regardless of his familiarity with the system, Dr Zernik claims that the online dockets of the US Court of Appeals remain vague and ambiguous.  Ambiguity in court records should be seen as violation of Due Process rights.

Dr Zernik asks that Clerk Dwyer address specific concerns:

·          Validity of the dockets of the appeals in general, as dockets that were published in compliance with US law, under the authority of the Clerk Dwyer, and in compliance with her Oath of Office.

·          Validity of the October 2010 Judgment from the US District Court, as a judgment of 'good faith and credit', and the manner that validity of the Judgment was established by the Clerk Dwyer, as a prerequisite for opening the dockets of the appeals.

·          Validity of unsigned orders by the Court of Appeals, 9^th Circuit, which were published in the online dockets of the appeals. 

Human Rights Alert (NGO) has previously identified the offices of the clerks of the US courts as key to conditions that now prevail in the US courts and called for initiation of corrective actions:

·          Restoring by the US Congress of key provisions of the Salary Act of 1919, which placed the clerks of the US courts under the authority of the US Attorney General

At the time, conditions in the US courts were described in the US Congress as "a burlesque", and the Salary Act was credited as a key measure in restoring the US courts integrity.  It restored the role of the clerks as checks and balances vis a vis judicial corruption, which was the reason for existence of the clerks since the late middle ages.  By the mid 20th century the clerks were again placed under the authority of the judiciary.

·          Enactment by US Congress of federal rules for electronic court records

The evidence shows that the clerks of the courts today do not deem themselves accountable for the integrity of electronic court records that are published in the online dockets.  The online system was implemented over the past decade in the US courts. In the process, a sea change was introduced in court procedures, which had been established for centuries, and were the core of Due Process. However, all US courts that were examined, without exception, failed to publish Rules of Courts pertaining to their new electronic procedures, in alleged violation of Due Process rights.  Moreover, all courts that were examined deny public access to various records in the new electronic system in alleged violation of First Amendment rights. Therefore, the US Congress should perform its duties and establish the system by law.  Implicit in such law should be the requirement for publicly and legally accountable validation (certified, functional logic verification) of the system.

·          “A watchful eye” on the US courts by the public at large and computing professionals, in particular

Implementation of the electronic system of the US courts affected a sea change in court procedures.  Nevertheless, no rules clarifying the new electronic court procedures have been enacted by the US Congress, and no rules have been published by the US courts either.   Based on his review of the system, [2] Dr Zernik claimed that the system failed to meet basic standards of validity and integrity, which are expected in electronic government systems in general, and in an electronic court system, in particular.

The common law right to inspect and to copy judicial records was reaffirmed by the US Supreme Court in Nixon v Warner Communications, Inc (1978) as inherent to the First Amendment. In doing so, the US Supreme Court said that the right was necessary for the public "to keep a watchful eye on government". Today, the public must keep a watchful eye particularly on electronic court records. No other measures could substitute for public scrutiny of court records in safeguarding the integrity of the courts and Human Rights in the Digital Era.

Notice was given to the US Congress Committees on the Judiciary, Armed Services, and the House Rules Committee. 
____
LINKS:
[1] 11-01-27 Log Cabin Republicans v USA et al (10-(10-56634) - Dkt 054-056: Zernik's a) Reply in support of Motion to Intervene, b) Request for Statement by Clerk Dwyer, as posted in the PACER docket

http://www.scribd.com/doc/47983546/

[2] 10-08-18 Zernik, J: Data Mining of Online Judicial Records of the Networked US Federal Courts, International Journal on Social Media: Monitoring, Measurement, Mining, 1:69-83 (2010)
http://www.scribd.com/doc/38328585/ 
[3] 11-01-08 Press Release: ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell' - Motion to Intervene, Requesting the US Court of Appeals to Dismiss the Appeals from an Uncertified Judgment, was Posted in the Docket, is Now Pending before the Court-s
http://www.scribd.com/doc/46528428/ 
[4] 11-01-23 Press Release: ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Litigation  reply claims Log Cabin Republicans’ opposition to intervention amounted to ‘hand-waving arguments’.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/47402283/ 

 ________ 

Human Rights Alert is dedicated to discovering, archiving, and disseminating evidence of Human Rights violations by the justice systems of the State of California and the United States in Los Angeles County, California, and beyond. Human Rights Alert focuses on the unique role of computerized case management systems in the precipitous deterioration of the integrity of the justice system in the United States.

http://twitter.com/inproperinla 
http://www.scribd.com/Human_Rights_Alert

11-02-01 Welcome Ireland - Last New Visitor! // Bienvenido Irlandia - Visitante Mas Reciente! // 欢迎爱尔兰- 最后的新访问者！

Last New Visitor Ireland Visited February 1, 2011

11-01-30 US electronic Voting Machines - Made to Defraud - Wired Magazine // EE.UU. máquinas de votación electrónica - hecho por fraude // 美国电子投票机-欺诈作出

Hacked Voting System Stored Accessible Password, Encryption Key

• By Kim Zetter 
• October 6, 2010  |  
• 1:55 pm  | 

An internet-based voting system that was hacked last week by researchers at the University of Michigan stored its database username, password and encryption key on a server open to attack.

Alex Halderman, a computer scientist at the university, has detailed the vulnerabilities and hacking techniques his students used to completely control the system last week. The hack allowed them to change votes and program the system to play his school’s fight song “Hail to the Victors”after each voter cast their ballot.

The hack, unnoticed by election officials until researchers notified them, forced election officials to take the system offline and adopt a contingency plan for the November elections.

Washington, DC, began testing its internet voting system last Tuesday in advance of the November elections. The system, paid for in part with a $300,000 federal grant, is designed to let overseas military and civilian voters cast ballots quickly, instead of relying on the postal system to deliver their votes in a timely manner.

But within 36 hours of the system going live, Halderman’s team found and exploited a shell-injection vulnerability that “gave us almost total control of the server software, including the ability to change votes and reveal voters’ secret ballots.”

We modified all the ballots that had already been cast to contain write-in votes for candidates we selected. (Although the system encrypts voted ballots, we simply discarded the encrypted files and replaced them with different ones that we encrypted using the same key.) We also rigged the system to replace future votes in the same way.

We installed a back door that let us view any ballots that voters cast after our attack. This modification recorded the votes, in unencrypted form, together with the names of the voters who cast them, violating ballot secrecy.

The hack left lots of traces that an intrusion detection system should have caught. Nonetheless, it went unnoticed for two business days until Friday afternoon when several testers directed election officials to the Michigan fight song playing on their $300,000 voting system.

See also:

• Voting System Pwned by Michigan Wolverines

TAGS: E-VOTING

_____

COMMENT:

Dear Kim Zetter:
Conditions of electronic voting machines, and refusal of the US government to initiate corrective actions, is old news by now... [1-4]
How about reporting some new news, such as conditions of the Case Management Systems (CMSs) in courts and prisons throughout the US? [5,6]
The CMSs are as essential as the voting machines for the safeguard of democratic society.
Joseph Zernik, PhD
Human Rights Alert (NGO)

LINKS:
[1] 10-08-28 Common Cause Voting Machines Report Malfunction and Malfeasance
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36565560/
[2] 10-04-19 Brennan Center for Justice Notice in Re: Unprecleared Voting Machines - violation of the voting act
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36565891/
[3] 05-00-00 Validating Voting Machine Software
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36630297/
[4] 05-05-19 MIT-Caltech: Auditing Technology for Electronic Voting
http://www.scribd.com/doc/36629558/
[5] 10-08-18 Zernik, J: Data Mining as a Civic Duty – Online Public Prisoners’ Registration Systems, International Journal on Social Media: Monitoring, Measurement, Mining 1: 84-96 (2010)
http://www.scribd.com/doc/38328591/
[6] 10-08-18 Zernik, J: Data Mining of Online Judicial Records of the Networked US Federal Courts, International Journal on Social Media: Monitoring, Measurement, Mining, 1:69-83 (2010)
http://www.scribd.com/doc/38328585/

11-01-30 Welcome Mexico - Last New Visitor! // Bienvenido Mexico - Visitante Mas Reciente! // 欢迎墨西哥- 最后的新访问者！

Last New Visitor Mexico Visited January 30, 2011

11-01-30 "Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission" Report - a Cover-up // Encubrimiento de la delincuencia por los bancos EE.UU. // 掩盖犯罪的美国银行

Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission's 10 Major Findings Read the Article at The Huffington Post

Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission Chairman Phil Angelides.

Comments
Joseph Zernik
CRIMINALIT­Y is the key word missing from the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission report...
Therefore, the report should only be deemed another layer of cover-up of the true origins of the crisis by the US government­.

Evidence of criminalit­y by Bank of America and its senior executives is already abundant, there is no need to wait for the WikiLeaks release. It is only that the US Government treats BofA as the beneficiar­y of sovereign immunity.

LINKS:
[1] 10-05-05 Countrywid­e Bank of America NYSE BAC and its President Brian Moynihan Compilatio­n of Records Evidence of Racketeeri­ng
http://www­.scribd.co­m/doc/3097­5368/
[2] 10-05-05 Chairs of US Congress Committees of the Judiciary and Banking Are Requested to Join Senator Feinstein'­s Inquiries on Comptrolle­r of the Currency
http://www­.scribd.co­m/doc/3097­9882/
[3] 10-07-06 Complaint Filed with US Attorney Office Los Angeles Against Moynihan Bank of America [NYSE:BAC] Bryan Cave LLP Alleging Racketeeri­ng
http://www­.scribd.co­m/doc/3397­1099/ 

11-01-28 Whatever Happened to the Rule of Law? - Ron Kay L.A. // Ninguna ley de los Ángeles // 没有在美国洛杉矶法

Whatever Happened to the Rule of Law?

By 

Ron Kaye

 on January 28, 2011 6:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (12) | TrackBacks (0)

Jill Stewart at the LA Weekly asks the right question about disclosure that the LAUSD cop faked the shooting that closed down El Camino Real High and much of Woodland Hills last week as 350 LAPD officers searched for a phantom suspect:

"When is an outside investigation going to do a full and long overdue look at the nasty stuff unfolding inside this non-transparent police department overseen by the Los Angeles Unified School Board -- which can't oversee third-grade recess with consistent success?"

Disclosure that Officer Jeff Stenross actually shot himself comes as another LAUSD police incident has prompted a protest at noon today at District Attorney Steve Cooley's office.

The case involves Verdugo Hills High student Jeremy Marks, an 18-year-old African-American who was arrested last May and jailed for eight months on felony "lynching" charges on high bail involving what at worst seems a minor incident involving LAUSD Officer Erin Robles.

Cooley's office led raids Wednesday by up to 30 LAPD cops on Marks' Lakeview Terrace home and on the home of a student who recorded the skirmish last May and posted it on YouTube -- a video that seems to show Robles was at fault, and Marks was innocent.

With the possibility of Marks being exonerated and LAUSD and Cooley facing huge legal liability, the raids in which computers, cell phones, cameras and papers were seized and the homes left in upheaval clearly was a desperate attempt to try to find  anything that will bolster the case against Marks.

The case has inflamed racial tensions that have been exacerbated by the heavy-handed raids in which officers closed off neighborhoods and refused to show search warrants for up to 45 minutes.

Organizers of the protest today at 210 West Temple St. are accusing the DA of "Gestapo tactics" and demanding a full, independent investigation.

"These raids bring to mind what it must be like to live in a police state," said Celes King, director of the Congress on Racial Equality, said in a statement announcing the protest. "DA Cooley is on a fishing expedition. Nine months after the incident, it is hard to understand why he would need to order a vicious raid on an African-American family's home to gather evidence that has been available since May."

In a personal letter Thursday to Cooley, King appealed to the DA to take charge of the situation before it leads to demands for a federal civil rights investigation that would go far beyond the Marks' case.

"The reality is your office has created a fiasco out of a case that should have been summarily dismissed through a series of inept actions designed to umbrella a fishing expedition to justify unwarranted actions at a tremendous cost to the taxpayers of this county. It is time to stop this charade of justice that has in fact violated several areas of constitutional protections."

Whatever happened to the rule of law?

We are living in extraordinary time of a long-term economic crisis with enduring high unemployment yet crime by ordinary citizens is at a generational low point and abuses of the law by officials is at an all-time high.

A cop who fakes a shooting, police and prosecutor abuses of basic civil rights, a mayor who goes unpunished for taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts, a Councilman indicted for voter fraud, a Community Redevelopment Agency that scoffs at the law, defies the governor and gives away the city's wealth to the rich -- the list goes on and on.

It's all pretty bizarre when the besieged public is law-abiding and the privileged government is making a mockery of the laws they write and enforce.

11-01-27 US financial crisis was 'avoidable' // investigación del colapso bancario de los EE.UU. // 美国银行倒闭调查

Notice: The language from the panel, quoted in the report below is considered an indication of further cover up. The evidence is overwhelming of criminality as the cause of the financial crisis, and any attempt to present it as administrative incompetency or otherwise, should not be taken as honest.

_________

Congressionally appointed panel investigating financial meltdown in 2008 says crisis could have been avoided.

A congressionally appointed panel investigating the roots of the US financial crisis in 2008 has said that the meltdown occurred because regulators, politicians and bankers ignored warning signs and failed to manage risks.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) said in its final report released on Thursday that the crisis could have been avoided.

Instead, the US fell into the deepest recession since the 1930s, with millions of Americans losing their jobs.

The former Bush and Clinton administrations, the current and previous Federal Reserve chairmen, and  Timothy Geithner, the treasury secretary, all bear some responsibility for allowing the crisis to happen, the panel said.

"This financial crisis could have been avoided. Let us be clear. This calamity was the result of human action, inaction and misjudgment, not of mother nature or computer models gone haywire," Phil Angelides, the FCIC chairman, said.

"The captains of finance and the public stewards of our financial system ignored warnings and importantly failed to question and understand and to manage the evolving risks in a financial system that is so essential to the well being of our country.

"Theirs was a big miss, not a stumble."

The report comes six months after congress implemented regulatory legislation to respond to the crisis before the commission was able to conclude its investigation.

'Systematic' failure

The report concluded that the crisis was caused by a number of factors, including a dramatic breakdown in corporate governance and risk management, and a government ill-prepared to handle the crisis.

It also cited the adoption of risky trading and borrowing practices by corporations, and a breach of accountability and ethics.

The report was highly critical of the amount of financial deregulation overseen by Alan Greenspan, the former chairman of the Federal Reserve.

John Thompson, a FCIC member, said: "Unquestionably in our minds, there were actions that could have been taken by regulators that would have forestalled or mitigated the impact of this crisis.

"The Federal Reserve was clearly the steward of lending standards in this country. They chose not to act.

"The Federal Reserve Bank of NY certainly could have reigned in what was being done in some of the large money centre banks in NY.

"I mean on and on and on. Regulator after regulator, they either chose not to act or turned a blind eye to what was actually going on.

"So, it's less about a particular individual than a systematic sense of deregulation and inaction by those who were in power to take action."

11-01-29 Windsor v Maid of the Mist (10-A690) in the US Supreme Court – Opined as “Shell Game Fraud” by the Court // Fraude en los EE.UU. Corte Suprema de Justicia // 欺诈在美国最高法院

"Maybe Justice Thomas indeed denied your application, may not... maybe there is a valid record of the denial, certified by Justice Thomas, may there is none... what form the records of the US Supreme Court are in, the People are not permitted to know...."
  
Justice Clarence Thomas and Clerk William Suter
US Supreme Court

Los Angeles, January 29, 2011 - earlier this week Joseph Zernik, PhD, of Human Rights Alert (NGO) has  filed request with the US Congress for impeachment of US Supreme Court Clerk William Suter. [[i]] The request was based on allegations of violations of the Oath of Office and deprivation of rights by Clerk Suter:

• Denial of the rights to access Supreme Court record (both paper and electronic) to inspect and to copy;
• Denial of the right for valid notice and service of orders and decisions of the Court.

The request for impeachment was based on analysis of:

• Letters, received by applicants and petitioners in a series of cases, where individuals alleged abuse by government or by large corporations, and
• Denial of access to the Supreme Court files in the same cases.  

 Of particular concern were cases, which originated from Habeas Corpus petitions, or allegations of corruption of the lower courts.

On Friday, January 28, Mr Windsor, the applicant in one of the cases, provided Dr Zernik with a series of new records, which he had received by mail from the office of Clerk Suter over the previous two weeks. [[ii]] 

Upon review of the new records, Dr Zernik, suggested that a January 13, 2011 letter, signed by Staff Attorney Danny Bickell, purporting to notice the denial of Mr Windsor's application on the same date by Justice Thomas, was likely to be a case of fraud by the Court.  Dr Zernik is not an attorney, but he has accumulated extensive experience in analyzing fraud in the state and US courts, and his opinions were often supported by leading national and international experts in the related fields. [[iii]]

The reasons for the suspicion of fraud by the Court in the January 13, 2011 letter were the following:

• Bickell is not Deputy Clerk. 
• Bickell did not sign the January 13, 2011, as "Deputy Clerk", either. 
• Therefore, the January 13, 2011, letter should not be deemed as a valid notice by the office of Clerk Suter. 
• No valid record, certified by Justice Thomas was attached to the January 13, 2011 letter by Bickell.
• Similar letters, which were issued by Bickell in other cases, had no foundation in valid records in US Supreme Court paper files.
• Unauthorized conduct by Mr Bickell in other cases, which was the basis for a July 2010 complaint of public corruption and deprivation of rights. [[iv]]   

In order to disambiguate the nature of the conduct of the office of Clerk Suter in Mr Windsor's application (10-A690), Dr Zernik suggested that Mr Windsor file a request with Justice Thomas.  The suggested request is for Due Process notice and service of whatever Justice Thomas and Clerk Suter consider the valid record, certified by Justice Thomas, of the January 13, 2011 denial of Mr Windsor's application.

Dr Zernik noted that inherent to the suspected fraud by the court in the case, are the vague and ambiguous conditions, which were created in the US Supreme Court, following the transitions to electronic management: 

• The office of Clerk Suter has recently denied access to the paper files in a series of cases, including an application by Mr Windsor (10-A404).  
• Previous inspections of US Supreme Court files demonstrated that no valid records are maintained in the paper court files any longer.  
• The office of Clerk Suter entirely denies access to electronic court file records.
• The US Supreme Court has failed to publish any rules pertaining to the nature of its electronic records and valid certifications by the justices in them.

Dr Zernik opined that such vague and ambiguous conditions of the US Supreme Court records, in themselves, amount to "Shell Game Fraud", or a "Confidence Trick".

Dr Zernik concluded his January 29 letter to Mr Windsor:

Maybe Justice Thomas indeed denied your application, may not... maybe there is a valid record of the denial, certified by Justice Thomas, may there is none... what form the records of the US Supreme Court are in, the People are not permitted to know.... 

LINKS
[i] 11-01-25 Request for Impeachment of US Supreme Court Clerk William Suter
http://www.scribd.com/doc/47539382/
[ii] 11-01-29 William M. Windsor v. Maid of the Mist Corporation, at al. (10-A690) in the Supreme Court of the United States: a) Suggested request for a valid record of denial, certified by Justice Thomas, and b) Records provided on January 28, 2011 by Mr Windsor
http://www.scribd.com/doc/47773731/
[iii] 11-01-06 Joseph Zernik, PhD, Biographical Sketch
http://www.scribd.com/doc/46421113/
[iv] 10-07-01 Complaint against US Supreme Court Counsel Danny Bickell Alleged Public Corruption and Deprivation of Rights
http://www.scribd.com/doc/33772313/ 

11-01-27 Further Cover-Up of Criminality by Financial Institutions? //Además Cover Up de criminalidad por las Instituciones Financieras // 进一步覆盖的犯罪由金融机构

JANUARY 27, 2011

Financial Crisis Archive Stirs Fear of Class Actions

The commission set up by Congress to dig into the U.S. financial crisis is releasing more than its final report today, as it begins putting online a trove of investigative documents.

Lawyers for companies at the center of the crisis have wondered what might become of the documents, given that, as The National Law Journal reported in August, they had been internal to the companies and could be of interest to the plaintiffs’ bar. Many of those companies have already been battling proposed securities class actions.

The archive appears on the Web site of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, and hundreds of documents are already up, including testimony and court filings. At a news conference this morning, Phil Angelides, the commission’s chairman and a former California state treasurer, said the commission would be posting more, including “research and investigative documents, audio and transcripts.”

Lisa Rickard, president of the U.S. Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform, criticized that plan. “The commission’s final report and its pledge to post raw materials — apparently including information obtained from companies as well as other government agencies — is an astounding abuse of process that would effectively create a government-sanctioned Wikileaks,” Rickard said in a formal statement today.

Angelides did not address those concerns during the news conference, and a spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment this afternoon.

Last year, U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) took aim at one of the commission’s members, Byron Georgiou, and a staff member, Christopher Seefer, because they are on leave from plaintiffs firm Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd. The firm handles some securities litigation. Georgiou is of counsel there, while Seefer, who was the commission’s director of investigations, is a partner.

At the time, Angelides responded that there was no conflict of interest because commission policies prohibit staff members from disclosing information the commission hasn’t itself released.

Posted by David Ingram on January 27, 2011 at 02:40 PM in Legal Business, Politics and Government | Permalink

Digg This | Save to del.icio.us