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CORRUPTION UPDATES 55 May 8 to 12, 2007 The CORRUPTION UPDATES posts corruption news stories from California, the Nation and the World, and gives you the straight story. |
CORRUPTION UPDATES 55
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Contact Us: Committeefordemocracy.org
1) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE:
Alaska Oil Executives Admit to Bribery
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/us/08brfs-OILEXECUTIVE_BRF.html?pagewanted=print
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Two top officers of an oil services company pleaded guilty to bribing Alaska lawmakers with cash and the promise of jobs, contracts and favors for their backing on bills supported by the multinational firm. Bill J. Allen, chief executive of the firm, the VECO Corporation, based in Anchorage, and Rick Smith, a vice president, pleaded guilty in Federal District Court to extortion, bribery and conspiracy to impede the Internal Revenue Service. Prosecutors say Mr. Smith, Mr. Allen and five state lawmakers conspired to buy the lawmakers’ support with money and other financial benefits.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Alaska: FBI Gets Bribers, But Misses the Corporate Sponsors and Political Tools
There were six lawmakers under investigation, not five. Number six is Ben Stevens. What happened to Republican Senate President Ben Stevens, whose father is Alaska's senior senator? Stevens collected more than $240,000 in consulting fees from these crooks.
I don't trust the FBI, nor the US Attorneys who will prosecute these cases.
The only way to restore confidence in the rule of law is to reestablish our democracy.
Without wholesale Bribery dominating our elections, voters can actually elect politicians who are not beholden to the Corporations and special interests.
Until then, our politicians and all they appoint to manage our government are not individually trustworthy.
Every public official is suspect, as they are working in and with an obviously illegitimate government.
The firing of the US Attorneys provides an excellent example of mundane corruption that has infected every nook and cranny of this government: Not one of them reported the criminal political pressure they experienced until after they were fired.
Even "honest" government employees are silent to the river of political filth they serve in, to maintain their positions.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 1, 11th article on page, "BIG OIL OWNS OUR POLITICIANS
Corruption Updates 5 , 3rd article on the Page, "Ownership of Alaska by Big Oil Contested by FBI"
Corruption Updates 24, 4th article on page, "BIG OIL OWNS INTERIOR DEPARTMENT"
Corruption Update 29, 3rd article on page, "ENERGY LOBBYIST WHO WAS INTERIOR DEPT #2 TARGET IN ETHICS PROBE: ANOTHER LOBBYIST APPOINTED TO GOVERNMENT SUSPECTED OF BETRAYING PUBLIC TRUST WITH ABRAMOFF"
Search the Corruption Database under
Big Oil (19 Abstracts)
2) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
Chiropractic board member's judgment blasted
By John Hill - Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:00 am PDTTuesday, May 8, 2007
http://www.sacbee.com/111/v-print/story/171251.html
An Elk Grove chiropractor recently appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to the Board of Chiropractic Examiners to oversee the profession has drawn criticism from a judge for endorsing "unreasonable theories" about how much chiropractic treatment is too much.
Hugh Lubkin, in a case before administrative law judge Perry Johnson, asserted that it might be legitimate to treat a patient 300 times in 2 1/2 years.
He expressed that belief -- described by one industry expert as "more than on the fringes" -- in testimony as an expert witness on behalf of a chiropractor facing disciplinary action for treating patients too often.
The Board of Chiropractic Examiners on which Lubkin now sits routinely decides whether to discipline chiropractors accused of over treating patients.
An investigation by The Bee into Lubkin's background also found that he admitted violating workers' compensation rules in a case involving injuries he suffered in a fall while working as a reserve deputy for Amador County.
Another chiropractor improperly came to Lubkin's Elk Grove clinic to examine Lubkin, according to filings in the case. And Lubkin has professional ties to that chiropractor, Joseph Ambrose, that should disqualify the medical report that served as the basis of Lubkin's workers' comp award, an attorney for Amador County argued.
In his own workers' comp case, Lubkin was injured in 1997 as a reserve deputy in Amador County when he fell while responding to a fight. He was found to be 32 percent disabled, qualifying him for an award of $23,800 and medical care for his injuries. That award was based on an examination by fellow chiropractor Ambrose, according to his workers' compensation file.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Arnie's Doctors Quack like Ducks, II
This guy, Lubkin is a different kind of duck than Arnie's other ducks, er, appointments. The other dudes were old friends, and fringe players in quackery. This Lubkin guy is the real deal.
Lubkin is more dangerous than Arnie's old buddies. Lubkin is dedicated to green lighting chiropractors to over treat their patients. This endangers the public in two ways.
First, over treatment physically injures the patient. Second, over treatment potentially opens the door to unscrupulous practitioners to intentionally harm their patients as they defraud them.
The motivations behind Lubkin's fight to legalize over treatment are questionable, considering the physical and financial risks involved.
This makes Lubkin's ethics and character important to ascertain the sincerity of his efforts to promote over treatment. The Bee reported that Lubkin qualified for State Disability based on a medical examination done by a business associate.
Lubkin's disability, consisting of financial compensation, was secured by unethical, if not criminal means. This casts doubt on the ethical basis behind Lubkin's fight for over treatment. Lubkin obtained benefits unethically once, casting doubts on the motivations behind his arguments for overrate.
Arnie should throw in the towel, fire all the Chiro Board members, and appoint real experts, rather than friends and hacks.
Also See:
Corruption
Updates 40 , 1st article on the Page, "ARNIE PUTS INCOMPENTENT FRIENDS ON STATE CHIROPRACTIC BOARD"
Corruption Updates 28 , 8th article on the Page, "PERATA'S POLITICAL PAYBACK:PERATA PUTS ALLIES, RATHER THAN EXPERTS, ON BIG BUCK PUBLIC BOARDS"
Read more articles about Arnie
Search the Corruption Database under
Arnie (30 Abstracts)
3) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
Interior's oil lease program head quits
By H. JOSEF HEBERT -- Associated Press Writer
Published 2:44 pm PDTTuesday, May 8, 2007
http://dwb.sacbee.com/24hour/politics/v-print/story/3615808p-12914313c.html
WASHINGTON (AP) The head of the agency overseeing the government's offshore oil and gas leasing program, which has been under fire from Congress over a royalty controversy, will leave the agency at the end of the month.
Johnnie Burton, director of the Minerals Management Service, informed Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne of her plans to resign after five years at the agency and return to Wyoming where she served as state revenue director before coming to Washington.
California Rep. Darrell Issa, the ranking Republican of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said in a statement Tuesday that the "departure creates an opportunity to change a culture and history of failed management" at the agency.
Congress' Government Accountability Office last month estimated that about $1 billion on royalty payments had been lost because of the 1998-99 lease error and another $6.4 billion to $9.8 billion could go uncollected over the life of the leases.
While the error occurred long before Burton arrived at the agency in 2002, she has been criticized for not moving earlier to try to correct the problem
Last year she said she first learned of the flawed leases in 2005 or 2006 and shortly thereafter began attempts to renegotiate the agreements with the oil and gas companies. Five companies have agreed to do so.
But Issa said the committee found evidence Burton had been told of the lease problems as early as 2004. She did not deny that, but said she had no recollection of being told that early.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Oil Industry Tool Burton "Quits" after Stealing a Billion for Big Oil
Burton took the same approach to crime as Attorney General Gonzales, claiming a convenient loss of memory at the moment of liability. The same thing happened to GSA head Doan, when questioned about her illegal use of the GSA for political purposes.
I wish I was lucky enough to forget all the corruption, greed, and unjustifiable violent crimes I have watched this administration and its lackeys commit during the last six years.
Heck, if I really wanted to ignore these crimes, my best bet would be to join the Democratic Party, as they are either unable to see the crimes being committed around them, or are too stupid to understand the gravity of the situation.
In either case, the Democrats are collecting big bribes from the same corporate interests who are currently raping our country through the auspices of the Bush Administration The Democrats are blinded by their lust for greed and power.
It's heartening to know the Dems and Repubs have common ground on which to build bipartisanship.
It's unfortunate that the bipartisanship is based on the only thing they have in common: Greed for Power fed by corruption.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 31, 5 th article on the Page, "Oil Lease Chief Knew of Error, Report Asserts"
Corruption Updates 43 , 9th article on the Page, "GSA Chief on Hot Seat for Corruption, lack of Ethics, and Political use of Office"
Search the Corruption Database under
Interior (30 Abstracts)
Burton (2 Abstracts)
4) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
'Huge' drop in graduations
Officials challenge researcher's study on exit exam's effects
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/05/08/BAGO4PMQPA1.DTL&type=printable
Graduation rates in school districts across California fell significantly in 2006 -- the same year the state introduced the exit exam as a graduation requirement, a UCLA researcher is reporting.
John Rogers, co-director of an education think tank at UCLA, estimates that as a result of the new test of basic skills, the state's graduation rate fell to 64 percent from an average of 73 percent over the five previous years, a loss of about 50,000 graduates in 2006.
In his report, "Constructing Success?" Rogers uses three Bay Area districts to help illustrate falling graduation rates in 2006, compared with the average rate from 2001 to 2005: Oakland, 51 to 37 percent; Mount Diablo, 84 to 76 percent; and San Francisco, 74 to 73 percent.
Wise and state educators acknowledged the state as yet has no accurate means of measuring graduation rates because so many students come and go.
Rogers' report is being circulated by Public Advocates, Inc., a public interest law firm that unsuccessfully sued the state last year in a separate case to delay implementation of the exit exam.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Idiot Harvest in California Schools Threatened by Graduation Standards
The state cannot keep track of graduation rates because "so many students come and go?" The State cannot keep track of graduation rates because it is incompetent, and has failed as an educational system.
Our state education system has devolved into no more than a daycare system for the children of cheap, illegal labor. Nobody knows how many foreign kids who cannot speak english, count, or read are going to show up during the school year, as their parents grovel for slave wages.
Because of the breakdown in our schools, a high school education has become worthless. A high school diploma from California promises that the recipient cannot read, write, understand normal English, or do math. Really. Knowledge of American history, art and culture? Virtually non-exist ant in our high schools today. Really.
Our State's inability, their failure to educate this massive flood of foreigners has brought demands that graduating seniors pass a skills test to receive a diploma.
This drives Crimigration Advocates nuts. They demand high schools teach in spanish. They claim discrimination when illegal foreigners in America are not taught in foreign languages. We don't have enough money to teach all the kids properly in English. To end this "discrimination" the crimigrants are now demanding that all students receive diplomas, independent of their level of knowledge.
The UCLA study is a case in point. It blames the test for a drop off in graduation rates, when blame should be squarely placed on the senior's lack of skills. Much of this lack of skills emanates from cultural issues: crimigrants bring few skills from home to school.
Cheap illegal labor is fine for business, but the flood of students without English skills is a devastating blow to our schools.
The crimigrants and businesses blame everything but themselves for destroying our schools. Currently, they are blaming the Exit Test for revealing ignorance, without addressing the source of this ignorance.
This is like blaming the light of the sun for revealing a rainy day: the problem is not accurate testing, and it's not the schools. In fact, few are looking at the real source of the destruction of our medical and educational system.
Our schools and hospitals have been destroyed by our labor policy, not our educational policy. Until we refuse to allow our corporations and businesses to flood the country with illegal labor, until we force them to pay ALL THE COSTS OF FOREIGN LABOR, our school's only harvest will be idiots.
To our politicians, businesses, and Crimigrant advocates, the problem is the Exit Test. They say, "end the test, end the problem."
They say, turn out the lights, quickly, before we see the problem. We say turn the light on as brightly as possible. Reveal the thieves who have drained our schools, and our country, to make themselves rich.
Shine a bright light on this scam, and people will demand the crimigrants and businesses stop stealing our schools, hospitals, and our money, for their personal profit.
To fix our schools, and end our idiot harvest, we need to turn off the crimigration, not the exit test.
Also See:
Corruption
Updates 31, 5 th article on the Page, "Study: Schools need billions, CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS IN A DEATH SPRIAL"
Corruption
Updates 36, 10th article on the Page, "MEXICANS KILLING BLACKS TO DO JOBS “EVEN BLACKS WILL NOT DO: CRIMIGRANTS KILLING FAIR WAGES, MIDDLE CLASS, AND BLACKS: DEMOCRATS COUNT VOTES, AND CRIMIGRANT-EMPLOYER ALLIANCE WINS"
Search the Corruption Database under
Schools (6 Abstracts)
Crimigrants
5) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
One year for police officer who assisted 2 brothels
He was paid in cash and sex for warning of raids, other help
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
A former Sunnyvale police officer was sentenced Monday to a year and a day in federal prison for helping two brothels avoid police raids, find fleeing prostitutes and collect tens of thousands of dollars in bogus immigration fees from employees who were illegal immigrants.
David Lee Miller Jr., 43, a former crime scene investigator, defensive tactics instructor and longtime SWAT team member with the Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety, pleaded guilty in January 2005 to two counts of conspiracy to commit extortion.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Illegal Immigration Good for Cops, Whores, Johns, Corporations and Profits:
Bad for America
If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Everybody is making money off of illegal immigration. Restaurants, contractors, landscapers and pimps have all earned extra profits by replacing American workers with low paid foreigners.
Since local police can't enforce immigration laws, and the federal government refuses to, it's not surprising that the cops are dipping into illegal profits. Everyone else is.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 36 , 7 th article on the Page, "More in U.S. plunge deeper into poverty: The ranks of the severely poor are soaring, study finds.
Corruption Updates 36 , 9th article on the Page, "The Labor Demand Curve is Downward Sloping: Reexamining the Impact of Immigration on the Labor Market"
Corruption Updates 55 , 6th article on the Page, "Sheriff enjoys Illegal Immigrant Sex, Free Junket: Taxpayers Pay for Illicit Pleasures Two Ways
Search the Corruption Database under
Crimigrants (11 Abstracts)
6) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
Taxpayer funds aid Vegas relay racers
Sheriff, undersheriff later caught up in prostitution sting
Diana Walsh, Chronicle Staff Writer
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/05/08/BAGO4PMOSM1.DTL&type=printable
San Mateo County spent more than $14,000 for employees to participate in a law enforcement relay race that ended in Las Vegas, with the county's sheriff and his top deputy being swept up in a prostitution sting.
The county controller's office said Monday that nearly half of the money -- $6,276 -- was spent on salaries for Sheriff's Department employees who were preparing and planning for the footrace. Taxpayers also paid $5,971 to cover the costs for 11 county vehicles used to support the 54 county employees from the sheriff's, probation and district attorney's offices who participated in the 120-mile relay race.
County Manager John Maltbie asked for the budget review last month after Sheriff Greg Munks and Undersheriff Carlos Bolanos were detained at a Las Vegas massage parlor suspected of being a brothel. Neither man were arrested in the sting, which targeted eight Las Vegas businesses believed to be dealing in prostitution and human trafficking from Asia.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Sheriff enjoys Illegal Immigrant Sex, Free Junket:
Taxpayers Pay for Illicit Pleasures Two Ways
Search the Corruption Database under
Crimigrants
7) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
China Tells Little About Illness That Kills Pigs, Officials Say
NYT May 8, 07
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/world
/asia/08hongkong.html?pagewanted=print
HONG KONG, May 7 — A mysterious epidemic is killing pigs in southeastern China, but international and Hong Kong authorities said Monday that the Chinese government was providing little information about it or the contaminated wheat gluten that has caused death and illness in pets in the United States.
The lack of even basic details is reviving longstanding questions about whether China is willing to share information about health and food safety issues with potentially global implications.
But officials in Hong Kong, at the World Health Organization and at the Food and Agriculture Organization said Monday that they had been told almost nothing about the latest pig deaths and that they had been given limited details about the apparently unrelated problem of wheat gluten contamination.
Hong Kong television and newspapers were full of lurid accounts on Monday of pigs staggering around with blood pouring from their bodies in Gaoyao and neighboring Yunfu, both in Guangdong Province. The Apple Daily newspaper said that up to 80 percent of the pigs had died in the area, that peasants were engaged in panic selling of ailing animals at deep discounts and that pig carcasses were floating down a river.
The disease reportedly started killing pigs after Chinese New Year celebrations in February, but is now spreading. The state-controlled news media in China have had a few reports on the wheat gluten problem and almost nothing on the pig deaths.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
American Corporation's Profits in China based on not paying Pollution, Safety, and Costs of Responsibility:
China's Authoritarian Government Ignores Human Rights, Democracy, and Safety,
Just like US
So far, unsafe Chinese products have killed and injured thousands of American's pets. Last year tainted Chinese products killed at least 100 people in Panama.
Although the China trade is in full swing, our health and safety regulators from the FDA are not permitted to inspect Chinese factories.
This may not bother the FDA, which refuses to effectively regulate food and drug manufactures here, let alone in China.
But this should bother you. China products that do not conform to the few safety laws we have here should not be allowed into the country.
If fact, Americans should insist that all Chinese products made without proper pollution, safety, and labor standards be banned from the United States.
But before American Citizens can demand our government clean up our irresponsible China trade practices, we must clean up our irresponsible labor practices here.
Besides banning American Corporations from importing unsafe, or unethically produced products, citizens should insist that unethical labor practices here be fully addressed, and completely eliminated.
American Business must be forced to take full responsibility for the total costs of services their illegal labor force has thrown onto society.
Business must take responsibility for the medical, educational, and costs of incarceration that their illegal work force has put on society for the last 40 years.
Financial responsibility is especially important now, as our corporate government is preparing to legalize at least 12 million crimigrants who are now enriching business while draining our social infrastructure.
Without demanding financial responsibility from those who hire and profit from crimigrant labor, our schools and hospitals will continue to decline. Our children, let alone the foreigners, have been experiencing declining educational and economic opportunities.
The benefits of immigration presently go to the rich, while poor Americans have seen their wages and working conditions collapse. The medical and educational infrastructure Americans built for their children are now overwhelmed by crimigrants, and inaccessible to the Americans who built them.
Before we start another mad rush of illegals into the country, it would be nice if the businesses who profited from the last amnesty be held responsible for the financial and social costs of the current crimigrant population, before the next deluge of illegals floods our schools, hospitals, and prisons.
The love affair business has with illegal labor will end when business, rather than society, has to subsidize their own labor costs. The same principal applies to the China trade.
Just imagine forcing business to take responsibility to pay for the true costs of foreign labor, either here or over there. If business refuses to pay these costs, as they have in the past, we could increase the financial penalties and enforcement of immigration laws to fund the services their foreign labor has stolen from our country.
This will lower the profits gained by hiring illegals, thereby raising the wages and services American workers receive.
Demanding the flood of foreigners in our schools and hospitals be paid for by the businesses profiting from them will stop this foreigners-business Junta from further damaging our kid's chances for a decent future.
As it stands today, our children are growing up with social and educational standards that are closer to mexican than American standards.
The character of our country, as well as the quality of our health, welfare, and education systems depend on the decisions we make today.
Also See:
Corruption Updates 33, 5th article on the Page, "U.S. firms ensnared in China bribe case"
Corruption Updates 36, 6th article on the Page, "China about to pass U.S. as world's top generator of greenhouse gases"
Corruption Updates 60 , 8th article on the Page, "China: Recall Is Issued for Frozen Fish"
Corruption Updates 61 , 4th article on the Page, "US fears grow over China military"
Search the Corruption Database under
China
Crimigrants
Economics
8) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
House endorses renewal of some tax cuts
By ANDREW TAYLOR -- Associated Press Writer
Published 1:39 pm PDTTuesday, May 8, 2007
http://dwb.sacbee.com/24hour/politics/v-print/story/3615763p-12914125c.html
WASHINGTON (AP) The House Tuesday gave solid but nonbinding endorsement to a variety of President Bush's tax cuts as Democrats sought adoption of a compromise $2.9 trillion budget plan for next year.
By a 364-57 vote, the House agreed to support $180 billion in tax cuts for 2011-12, enough to cover the extension of tax relief for married couples, people with children and people inheriting large estates.
It's commonly conceded that decisions on extending the tax cuts won't be made until after the next election, closer to their expiration date.
In addition to the middle-class tax cuts favored in Tuesday's vote, the Bush tax bills cut rates on incomes, dividends and capital gains, among other provisions.
The underlying budget plan sets goals for subsequent tax and spending legislation, but lawmakers are not bound to it. It does, however, make a statement about the priorities of majority Democrats and provides an early test of the party's ability to prove it can govern.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Dems Represent Same Interests as Repugs: The Irresponsible Reich, Rich
Also See:
Corruption Updates 3, “Media Reports: Both Parties Corrupt”
Corruption Updates 19, 1st article on page, “TOP RECIPEINTS OF LOBBYISTS BRIBES ARE LEADERSHIP OF BOTH PARTIES”
Corruption Updates 19, 1st article on page, “TOP RECIPEINTS OF LOBBYISTS BRIBES ARE LEADERSHIP OF BOTH PARTIES”
Corruption Updates 20, 6th article on page, 10-27-06, “DEMS RECEIVE SPECIAL INTEREST BRIBES ANTICIPATING VICTORY IN NOV VOTERS ASSURED ONLY CHANGE AFTER NOVEMBER WILL BE WHICH PARTY GETS 60% OF THE SPECIAL INTEREST BRIBES, AND WHICH PARTY GETS 40% OF THE BRIBES”
Corruption Updates 21, 8fh article on page, 11-1-06: “DEMS BIG CHANCE TO REAP THE REWARDS OF CORRUPTION POLITICAL VICTORY OPENS DOORS OF LOBBYING FIRMS TO DEMO INSIDERS: IT'S THE DEMS TURN TO ROB THE PUBLIC BLIND, AND BETRAY OUR DEMOCRACY”
Corruption Updates 26, 1st article on page, 12-8-06, “LOBBYISTS SEE NO CHANGE UNDER DEMS CORRUPTION PRESENTED AS FORCE OF NATURE, DEM CORRUPTION NATURAL”
Corruption Updates 28, 1st article on page, 1-2-07: “LOBBYISTS HIRING-BRIBING DEMS SHIFTING FUNDS AND PERSONELL TO DEMS ASSURES NO REAL CHANGES
Corruption Updates 33, 4th article on page, “Lobbyists find new Congress is open for business”
Search the Corruption Database under
Democrats
9) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE :
Inmate rights lawyers are a burden, Sillen says
Health czar files motion to curb those who helped create his job.
By Andy Furillo - Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:00 am PDTFriday, May 11, 2007
http://www.sacbee.com/capolitics/v-print/story/175588.html
The state prison medical care czar filed a legal motion Thursday that seeks to curtail the activities of the inmate rights lawyers who brought the class-action lawsuit that created his office in the first place.
Federal medical care receiver Robert Sillen said the power of the plaintiffs' lawyers to monitor the ongoing case has imposed a burden on his ability to do his job.
"They go around with all those inspections and they create a tremendous amount of work for my staff," Sillen said about the attorneys from the Prison Law Office in San Rafael. "And the results of that work are questionable, both in terms of accuracy and validity, and in terms of any kind of new information."
Don Specter, the directing attorney of the state's most prominent inmate rights law firm, shot back that his office will contest Sillen's effort to cut back the monitoring power it got from federal Judge Thelton Henderson in the case it filed in 2001 and won in a negotiated settlement with the state in 2002. Sillen's complaint was filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco.
"We have an obligation to protect and defend the rights of our clients," Specter said. "He is now running the show. It's our obligation to make sure he is acting in the best interests of our clients. We can't do that if we don't have access to information about how the prisoners are being treated."
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Prison Reformer Calls for End of Oversight of Prison Reform
Also See:
Corruption Updates 16 , 5th article on the Page,"CALIFORNIA PRISONS INHUMANE"
Corruption Updates 34 , 3rd article on the Page, "State prisons in 'tailspin,' panel says
Corruption Updates 56 , 8th article on the Page, "Health czar rips prison bed plan"
Search the Corruption Database under
Prisons
Schools
10) THE ABSTRACT PRINTED BELOW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN THE : NY Times
Colleagues Cite Partisan Focus by Justice Official
By ERIC LIPTON
May 12, 2007
WASHINGTON, May 11 — Two years ago, Robin C. Ashton, a seasoned criminal prosecutor at the Department of Justice, learned from her boss that a promised promotion was no longer hers.
“You have a Monica problem,” Ms. Ashton was told, according to several Justice Department officials. Referring to Monica M. Goodling, a 31-year-old, relatively inexperienced lawyer who had only recently arrived in the office, the boss added, “She believes you’re a Democrat and doesn’t feel you can be trusted.”
Ms. Goodling would soon be quizzing applicants for civil service jobs at Justice Department headquarters with questions that several United States attorneys said were inappropriate, like who was their favorite president and Supreme Court justice. One department official said an applicant was even asked, “Have you ever cheated on your wife?”
Ms. Goodling also moved to block the hiring of prosecutors with résumés that suggested they might be Democrats, even though they were seeking posts that were supposed to be nonpartisan, two department officials said.
And she helped maintain lists of all the United States attorneys that graded their loyalty to the Bush administration, including work on past political campaigns, and noted if they were members of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group.
By the time Ms. Goodling resigned in April — after her role in the firing of the prosecutors became public and she had been promoted to the role of White House liaison — she and other senior department officials had revamped personnel practices affecting employees from the top of the agency to the bottom.
A judge in Federal District Court in Washington signed an order Friday to grant Ms. Goodling limited immunity, which will allow House investigators to compel her to answer questions.
Justice Department officials declined to respond to questions about Ms. Goodling’s actions and refused to allow some agency employees to speak with a reporter about them.
THE COMMITTEE SAYS:
Litmus Test for all Federal Employees: "Are you a Bushie?"
Also See:
Corruption Updates 46 , 8th article on the Page, "Prosecutor Posts Go To Bush Insiders"
Corruption Updates 56 , 8th article on the Page, "The US Attorney Scandal: A Root and Branch Survey; aides given hiring power, records show
Corruption Updates 54 , 2nd article on the Page, "Fired U.S. attorneys are called some of the best"
Read more articles About Abuse of the US Attorney
Search the Corruption Database under
US Attorney
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Next Corruption Updates: Page 56
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