John Clark Pro Se Blog

Appellate judges in the United States occasionally hear criminal cases at the District Court level when they have free time on their calendar, and by chance Chief Justice of the Ninth Circuit Alex Kozinski was randomly given United States vs. Ira Isaacs, a pornography case which will be based on Miller vs. California  (1973), which deals with local community standards. Isaacs is accused of selling and distributing videos depicting bestiality and other beastly images. Right now they are in  the midst of difficult jury selection (nobody wants to view the videos in evidence.) But not so fast!

The L.A. Times this week broke a story concerning pornographic content found on a personal and publicly accessible website maintained by Judge Kozinski, which raises conflict of interest issues. The site has now been locked, but according to the Times, the material included a photo of naked women on all fours painted to look like cows, a video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal, images of masturbation and public and contortionist sex, a slide show striptease featuring a transsexual, a series of photos of women's crotches as seen through snug fitting clothing or underwear, and content with themes of defecation and urination. Questioned about the content, Judge Kozinski told the Times that some of the material was inappropriate, although he defended other sexually explicit content as "funny." The Times in its headline story today states that Kozinski granted a 48 hour stay before the commencement of trial after the prosecutor requested time to explore "a potential conflict of interest concerning the court having a ... sexually explicit website with similar material to what is on trial here."

I've noticed that "Letters to the Editor" entries are many times more observant than newspaper editorial minds working on the same page. Here's one today in the LA Times, commenting on the Barack Obama/Rev.Jeremiah Wright matchup.

Art Saginian says  "Jonah Goldberg is right. Wright is a radical. So what?

Americans are as well-known for their brutal savagery as they are for their compassionate philanthropy. We've butchered probably as many people as we have blessed. Take a count of how many people have been robbed, tortured, raped and/or killed at the hands of Americans and their licensed contractors since we became a nation -- millions.

Why should Wright get blamed for saying so -- and why should Obama get teased for seeing the truth in it? We should admit to our ugliness as much as we take pride in our beauty. "

Lynn opens officially next week in an Off-Broadway play called Grace, which is in previews at the Lucille Lortel Theatre on Christopher Street.  Here the production company gives a brief You-tubed preview.   Wish I could see it.  But an adventuresome female New York theatre-going blogger (age 41) has already given her advance opinion, before the pros get their hands on it.  Bless the Bloggers.  She liked it, and certainly, for me, it sounds most interesting.  Here it is, and I hope this is helpful:

Melz' Adventures in Living

I thanked the blogger for her description of the play "GRACE".  I commented on her review and she published it on her site.

Unfortunately, my comments caused a fan of Lynn (or a handler, or one of the family) to barrage me with libellous statements, and the thread was deleted. Hence this entry.

I said that I couldn't afford to get out of Hollywood to have a look-see, but I read it carefully, and could easily imagine it. I thanked her for giving me this unique opportunity to reveal why I think Lynn took the part instead of seeking a lucrative movie or television deal. I said that I thought that personal catharsis was probably the reason.   "Doctor Theatre" as she liked to say when together we did Shakespeare For My Father on Broadway, a performance that helped her put closure on her relationship with her father (and got her a Tony nomination at the same time). Linking my comments to the wording in her review, I said 

"Remember, I speak from 32 years of marriage whilst also raising our family.

- She was always the strong but subtle matriarch and focus of my family, and she's internationally recognized.

- As her husband, I was always "ever so patient and lovingly supportive without being a complete doormat."

- The part of Ruth is actually Niva, our son Benjy's wife (not girlfriend) who happens to be a lawyer too, and is smart and independent.

- Benjy is just one of our 3 children, all of them conflated into the wall she worships at. In his case however, he convinced her to secretly move, from Hollywood to Connecticut. He's now a Captain for Delta, flying domestic on the East Coast. For Christian theology, substitute flying, a similar obsession. Her struggle towards him is compared and contrasted with her anger and love towards Tony (me).

Or, perhaps Tom is an admixture of son Benjy with daughter Kelly, who now lives in England next to a village in Suffolk called Redgrave. Kelly became religiously bent on becoming a Buddhist nun, to the extent of changing her name to Pema. Perhaps Lynn wars with Pema, I don't know. Lynn hasn't contacted me for 7 years, except through her lawyer. I do know she has found her God through entering the United Church of Christ in Kent, where she now lives. I do hear from Pema.

Yes indeed, Lynn's life was about "strong, intelligent and stubborn characters, multi family members thrown into an intellectual sparring match over god, theology, love, life, resentment, faith, and forgiveness."

I'm sure Lynn will be giving a great performance, and I hope the director understands how she works. I wish her nothing but well."

It's been "time out" for me for a while, I'm afraid.  After my heart attack almost a year ago, I've been medicated and exercised and dieted and monitored within an inch of my life, and then unexpectedly went into atrial fibrillation, fortunately while I was under observation at the hospital.

A short trip to the ER, a few days to settle down while blood clotting problems were dealt with, and then a pacemaker was installed, on this date, December 13. Another tentative Christmas to look forward to.

I feel better now.  A twice daily cocktail of strange looking pills, daily walks, and the knowledge that the blood flowing in my veins has been watered down with Cumadin. aka Warfarin, which in case you didn't know, is used to kill rats. No comment.  Please!

I wish they'd installed a GPS along with the pace-maker. Then I'd feel comforted, knowing I'd never get lost. And maybe, come to think of it, an iPhone.  . . All kinds of junk would fit in there.

Tough.  Kiefer Sutherland had just been honored by my old Canadian performers' union ACTRA for his services to the performing arts and his Canadian heritage (his father is Donald, who used to paint the scenery when I was acting with the Straw Hat Players in Ontario back in the 50's.)  I guess he had a drink or two to be sociable, left, got in his car, made a U-turn, and was pulled over (the rules say you can make a U-turn if there are 2 sets of double yellow lines, but not if only 1 set) by the ever-competing members of the police enforcers hereabouts. A tad over the legal limit of .08 percent was enough to put him inside.

Well, unlike our friend Paris Hilton who managed to avoid serious jail time back in June, Kiefer's lawyer was smart, or maybe it was his damage-control press-rep advisor; anyway, he is pleading "no contest", and agreeing to serve 48 days in jail, 18 of them in December during a production break of his Fox TV "24" television series which pays him millions, and the remaining 30 days within the following 6 months, in order not to disrupt shooting or cause the series cancellation. ( Martha Stewart led the way.)  He also lost his driver's license and will be on 5 years' probation! Fox TV must be very proud of him!

AP report on CNN website

He's going to come out of this looking good, because he's turned it into a showbiz positive.  We wish him well.

Later It's next year and January 21, and today he emerges unscathed. The writers' strike stepped in, and he served his time consecutively.  No harm, no foul. Talk about lucky.

Anyone notice that the stock market is not behaving normally? The up moves are being cut short, not achieving their promise, and all of the technical rules are being breached? And the hoped-for bounces are all dead cats?

The only people making sure money now are the advisors, who risk nothing, except perhaps the cancellation of subscribers. They used to try and forecast the future, now they just shrug their shoulders and tell you what happened yesterday, as if we didn't know.

And Mad Money Jim Cramer, who has successfully taken the stock market into showbusiness, for all the world like Pee-wee Herman having a ball in his CNBC Playhouse. Except he has lost tons of money for his "booya" fans. Well, you already know what I think about him! Mad Money.

And the money-making short sellers and put option buyers. Who is promoting those activities to the public? NOBODY, that's who. Meanwhile, incredibly, the S.E.C. "uptick" rule promulgated by the Securities Exchange Act of 1938 to rein in the professional short sellers, the bear raiders, that inflamed the 1929 stock market crash, was eliminated on July 6th. Read my views here.

So who is promoting long buying? Let's start with the President of the United States, who last year sought legislation to allow pensioners to take more charge of their funds, and as loyal Americans, buy into American industry.

And how about the IRS? Rules. You can't play the short side in a pension fund. Try and do it, and your broker won't let you. Even in non pension funds, try to short many stocks, and your broker will tell you "no stock is available to borrow."

The stock market today is a crap shoot. Be honest, NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING. Just like Hollywood.

Just like Vegas, the odds are still in favor of the bank. On Wall street, the bank is the specialists, the market makers, the day traders who walk the floor, and other insider professionals.

Until and unless things change, you should stay in cash (if you have any left), and enjoy a flutter on the Lottery along with a good night's sleep in your home (provided you are not about to be thrown out by your mortgage lender or an angry spouse.)

Now who is Harry Fain, and why is he interesting to me?

Not because he represented celebrity divorce clients such as Elvis Presley, Cary Grant, Lee Majors, Rod Steiger, OJ's first wife.

It's because he, as a result of his effortful promotion, saw No-fault Divorce come about in California on January 1, 1970. Also the onset of the state's laws of Community Property and the creation of a statewide Family Courts system. He had been appointed to a government Commission on the Family by then governor Pat Brown, charged with finding new solutions to always present divorce wars.

Before that, it was possible to discover the reasons for the breakdown of marriages. For example, read how Arnold Gold, Esq. obtained his divorce from Mrs. Gold, and later obtained custody of their three children (see the side-bar).

It should be noted that Fain also got his divorce before no-fault, in the early 1950's. His wife won custody of their three children, and later, just as Gold did, he got that ruling reversed in his favor. Frankly, I cannot be bothered to check out his case at the Hall of Public Records to find out how he was motivated, as I did with (now Judge) Gold. I'll bet they were close friends.

I believe "no-fault" in many cases is nothing but a cover-up of serious reasons behind breaches of the marriage contract and breaches of property rights, and should be examined and put on the record for all to see, perhaps serving as a warning for future betrothments. Now it seldom gets dealt with. "Not probative" is the usual excuse.

It should be dealt with the same as any other contractual matter, in Civil Court, in front of a jury. The system wasn't "broken" before the Fains and other lawyers got on board in, I believe, their own self interest. Now in charge is a fellow lawyer called a judge, and no jury, and the public kept in the dark, and lots of available money on the emotional table.

Harry Fain, Esq. died on Friday the 13th, yesterday, aged 88. Read his obituary here.

Now that their season is over, law professor Brian Fitzpatrick wrote an opinion piece appearing in the L.A. Times concerning the fact that during their last term the right-of-center Supreme Court had reversed or vacated the left-of-center Ninth Circuit 19 times out of the 22 cases it reviewed, and concluded that the appeals court might not have been doing a very good job.

Brian Fitzpatrick

Then former law clerk Julia Campins weighed in with a letter to the paper about what she calls "bully jurisprudence".  She pointed out that the Supreme Court isn't last because it is right, but is right because it is last.

her letter

For me, that put everything in its proper place.

Judge Roy L. Pearson, a Washington Beltway Judge - and therefore also a lawyer - lost his trousers. at the cleaners. So he went to court, represented himself pro se, claimed 54 million dollars in damages, and then lost his suit!

What does this say for our legal system?  Come to think about it, I'm not actually sure.

July 25, 2007
Today it is reported that the defendants, Jin Nam Chung and Soo Chung, were themselves taken to the cleaners by their attorneys to the tune of $100,000 in legal fees. Sympathizers came from across the country to attend a cocktail fundraiser at the Chamber of Commerce in Washington D.C.  So far they have raised $64,000. . .

Anthony Pellicano was a very popular guy around Hollywood's celebrity legal circles for many years, and for his safety remains in prison pending trial, where one is led to believe he is very happy to be.

He and 5 others were indicted for tapping into phone lines and selling information to whomsoever arranged for the activity, parties to litigation of course, through their lawyers.

A much delayed trial is scheduled to go forward next February 2008. The section of the law which is involved is RICO (see under Topics to the left), and one who got caught up in the enterprise is a prominent celebrity lawyer by the name of Terry Christensen. Now this Esq. is asking for a separate trial to take place PRIOR to Pellicano's on the basis that he had nothing to do with the racketeering, after all, he only had 34 tape-recorded conversations with him, and paid him $100,000. Read about this HERE.

Meanwhile, a number of esquires around here are sweating like Rodney Dangerfield doing his act, except his was for show.