Minnesota Judge Blakely Faces Possible Sanctions for Unethical Relationship With Lawyer

What is rare is for there to actually be any disciplinary action whatsoever. There need to be laws against the same lawyers being appointed as Mediators or Guardian Ad Litems repeatedly as is happening all over resulting in collusive relationships that effect the outcomes of cases. These repeatedly appointed lawyers can materially effect cases, churn fees, and inflict much harm with this unethical appointments.

http://www.startribune.com/local/south/41093187.html

 

State ethics panel calls for judge’s suspension

The rare recommendation is for Judge Timothy Blakely, who sent business to a divorce lawyer and got a $63,503 discount.

By ROCHELLE OLSON, Star Tribune

Last update: March 12, 2009 – 9:17 AM

 

 

Judge Timothy L. Blakely

Timothy Blakely

A Minnesota judge who steered business to a divorce lawyer who gave him a large discount should face the rare sanction of being suspended six months without pay, a judicial ethics panel recommended Wednesday.

The three-member panel of the state Board on Judicial Standards recommended censure and time off the bench and payroll for District Judge Timothy Blakely, who sits in Goodhue and Dakota counties.

Led by former Supreme Court Justice Edward Stringer, the panel found “clear and convincing evidence” that Blakely violated judicial rules and codes by accepting a $63,503 markdown on his $108,876 divorce after appointing his attorney many times as a mediator in cases he oversaw.

A Supreme Court ruling is months away, but Blakely could become the first judge suspended since 1993. Only four judges have been suspended in the 35-year history of the board, according to executive secretary David Paull.

The recommendation by the panel, rounded out by lobbyist Lawrence Redmond and retired Hennepin County District Judge Allen Oleisky, now goes to the entire board. The board can dismiss, accept or modify the prescribed sanctions. The board’s recommendation then goes to the state Supreme Court, which ultimately will decide what punishment Blakely faces, if any.

Blakely’s lawyer, Tom Kelly of Minneapolis, said, “While we respect the panel and the board, we disagree with the recommendation and some of the findings.”

Acting as prosecutor for the board, lawyer Doug Kelley of Minneapolis had sought Blakely’s removal.

The investigation began after Blakely’s ex-wife complained he got special treatment. Evidence included numerous e-mails between the judge and his lawyer, Christine Stroemer. It’s unclear whether she faces any potential sanctions.

Behind in his payments

According to the panel’s findings: The judge struggled to pay for his contentious divorce, which started in October 2002 and ended in September 2004. By December 2003, he was “severely delinquent” in paying Stroemer, at the firm of Collins, Buckley, Sauntry & Haugh. That same month, Blakely appointed Stroemer for the first time to mediate a divorce, and he went on to order many couples to submit to mediation with her over the next several years.

Ultimately, Stroemer agreed to let Blakely settle his bill for $45,372, though he had owed $108,876. The discount was the largest that Stroemer has given a client. Meanwhile, Stroemer e-mailed Blakely that she hoped he would “continue to refer mediation cases to me.”

Blakely responded that he and his fiancée were “deeply appreciative.” He “did not disabuse  her of  the connection between the referrals and the discounted bill,” the panel’s findings said.

The panel’s 15-page report noted that in testimony, “Blakely acknowledged that his reference to significant past and future business referrals while negotiating a fee reduction with Stroemer raises the question of whether he was offering a quid pro quo.”

But Blakely argued that it wouldn’t be a “reasonable inference” to an informed person: “The question is, is it a fully informed person or some guy standing in the courtroom who doesn’t know anything about what we do for a living?”

Acknowledging questions

The panel found his explanation to be “hardly credible,” given his repeated failures to tell Stroemer that he didn’t expect anything in return for the referrals.

The judge admitted to the board’s executive director that e-mail exchanges “looked like crap” and that he had an “ah-ha moment” and “could see a question was raised” by them, the report said.

He acknowledged in a letter that, “I now also see that as a judge, I should not have mentioned my ability to continue to direct business referrals to [the firm] in the context of a negotiation over the fees I owed them.”

Kelly has said Blakely simply referred clients to his attorney as anyone might refer someone to a good lawyer. He argued that it’s common for family lawyers to discount fees from lengthy divorces. Blakely was elected to the bench in 1998. His term expires in 2010.

The last judge suspended by the Supreme Court was Hennepin County District Judge Sean Rice, for 60 days in 1993 for abusive treatment of staff.

Rochelle Olson • 612-673-1747

Maternal Deprivation Research

There have been numerous studies regarding Maternal Deprivation, with a large source of information coming from Bowlby, based on Spitz and Goldfarb, and also from unethical animal experimentation. Overwhelmingly, research shows that severing this natural bond between a mother and child causes severe emotional and behavioral problems, such as depression and psychosis. The phrase maternal deprivation is the terminology used in the early work of psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, John Bowlby on the effects of separating infants and young children from their mother. Some of the research was previously used to discourage mothers from working or using childcare, but it seems important to revive these studies as children are being deprived of their mothers intentionally by abusive men who claim to be “parentally alienated” in an ongoing scandal that rivals that of the Catholic Priest sexual abuse cover up.  

Maternal Deprivation Abuse (MDA), has been identified as occurring with great frequency in legal proceedings, with specific unethical lawyers, psychologists, and judges perpetrating the the same scam on mother after mother with similar horrific results for the children. There has been death by suicide, suicide attempts, depression, academic distress, retaliation by a child against a PAS claiming father, and untold misery for the victimized children and mothers.

Based on Bolwby’s theories, Maternally Deprivation affects children as follows:

• Complete or almost complete deprivation could “entirely cripple the capacity to make relationships.”
• Partial deprivation could result in acute anxiety, depression, neediness and powerful emotions which the child could not regulate.
• The end product of such psychic disturbance could be neurosis and instability of character.(Bowlby J. (1951) pps. 11–12)

 

“Mother love in infancy and childhood is as important for mental health as are vitamins and proteins for physical health.” (Bowlby, 1953.)  Child psychoanalyst John Bowlby (1907–1990). 

 

Maternal Deprivation Abuse

Maternal Deprivation, or Motherlessness, is occurring with alarming frequency due to the unethical treatment of women and children in family court. Maternal Deprivation is inflicting abuse by severing the mother-child bond. It is a form of abuse that men inflict on both the mother and children, especially men who claim they are “parentally alienated” from their children when there are complaints of abusive treatment by the father.

Maternal Deprivation occurs when men seek to keep their children from being raised by their mothers who are the children’s natural caretakers. Some men murder the mothers of their own children. Others seek to sever the maternal bonds by making false allegations of fictitious psychological syndromes in a deliberate effort to change custody and/or keep the child from having contact with their mother when there are legal proceedings. A twisted form of Maternal Deprivation is to kill the children, so that the mother will be left to suffer. Sometimes there are family annihilation murders where the father kills the children and himself (or dies by cop), but the mother is not killed because she has received protective orders and her children have not as in the case of Jessica Gonzales.  

In seeking to define this form of abuse certain common elements are found in the Maternal Deprivation scenario as follows:

• History of domestic abuse that could be physical, psychological, sexual, and/or social abuse occurring on or off again, occasionally, or chronically which could be mild, moderate, or severe, including homicidal and/or suicidal threats. 
• Legal proceedings relating to abuse
• Hiring of “Fathers Rights” attorney
• Use of “Hired Gun” mental health professionals to make accusations of psychological disorder against the mother and children in deliberate effort to excuse abuse and change custody or grant visitation that is contrary to safety concerns. Another name for these unethical professionals are “Whores of the Courts“
• Raising claims of “psychological disorders” against the mother such as “Parental Alienation Syndrome” (PAS), Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome, Malicious Mother Syndrome, Lying Litigant Syndrome, Hostile Aggressive Parenting or any other mother-blaming psychological disorder that can be used by the unethical professional to re-victimize the victims.
• Infliction of “Legal Abuse” by continually and excessively filing motions so that the mother continually has to defend herself and her child(ren) causing financial and emotional devastation.
• Can occur in response to child support legal proceedings as retaliation.

The intent of “Maternal Deprivation” is to punish the mother and the child for revealing the abuse and to falsely claim that they are not abusive. This very commonly occurs as there are more and more “abuse-excuse” parental alienation accusing professionals who use this scientifically invalid theory over and over to achieve specific goals of the person paying them. Maternal Deprivation can also occur in response to child support legal proceedings. When occurring in this manner, Maternal Deprivation is a response to the financial demands as retaliation. Suddenly the father who had little prior involvement wants to take the kids half the time to avoid child support obligations, etc. When the men are really abusive, they ask for sole custody and demand the mother of the child pay them.

Although some people call this “Maternal Alienation”, a distinction needs to be made as the pro-pedophilia “Parental Alienation Syndrome” and the use of the word “Alienation” are most often used AGAINST battered women and abused children. There needs to be a distinction between the phony psychological syndrome and the intentional infliction of abuse on a mother and child by intentionally severing their natural bond. This distinction can best be made by NOT using the label of “Alienation” which will always be associated with the pro-pedophilia monster Doctor Richard Gardner.

Some of the characteristics of the especially heinous abusers who inflict Maternal Deprivation include but are not limited to the following:

• Angry
• Abusive
• Violent
• Coercive
• Controlling
• Threatening
• Intimidating
• Demanding
• Domineering
• Harassing
• Stalking
• Tyrannical
• Oppressive
• Forceful
• Manipulative
• Deceptive
• Unethical
• Un-empathetic (Lacks Empathy)
• Entitled
• Immature
• Self-centered
• Neglectful
• Guilt inducing
• Pushy
• Intentionally tries to humiliate mother and/or child
• Harsh, rigid and punitive parenting style
• Outrage at child’s challenge of authority
• May use force to reassert parental position
• Dismissive of child’s feelings and negative attitudes
• Vents rage, blames mother for “brainwashing” child and takes no responsibility
• Challenges child’s beliefs and/or attitudes and tries to convince them otherwise
• Inept and unempathic pursuit of child, pushes calls and letters, unannounced or embarrassing visits 

There is a distinct overlap of the intimate terrorist type domestic violence abuser with the Maternal Deprivation abusers as follows:

 

• Coercion and threats
• Intimidation
• Emotional abuse
• Isolation
• Minimizing, denying and blaming (Hallmarks of PAS)
• Using children
• Economic abuse
• Male privilege

The people who most often engage in Maternal Deprivation Abuse are most often: 

• Abusive men
• Vindictive second wives who don’t want to deal with the real mother of the children
• Paternal grandparents who raised dysfunctional children (abusers)

The effects of Maternal Deprivation often cause the children to become psychotic, depressed, and sometimes suicidal or to have suicidal ideations. Another terrible reaction is when the child retaliates against the parent who accuses Parental Alienation Syndrome as in a Texas case where the child killed his father. Other times when the Maternal Deprivation abuser completely takes over the will of the child by using brainwashing techniques similar to those used in prison camps where deprivation and isolation are used to force ideological changes in captives, these children often have a sort of trauma-bonding with the abuser and model their behavior. Sometimes these children will also abuse the mother in the same manner as the father. Another generation is created to carry on the abuse, and will likely do the same to their own spouse and children.

 

 

 

For more articles involving Maternal Deprivation:

Failure of Family Court System Leads To Death and Devastation

Doctor Who Intentionally Severs Bonds With Mothers Is a Monster

Child in imminent fear shoots father – vindicated in appeal – PAS fraud nightmare

Cincinatti PAS

VAWnet Joan Meier on PAS-Parental Alienation Syndrome & Parental Alienation: Research Reviews

And many more articles throughout Battered Mothers Lose Children to Abusers and all the links on the sidebar.

Maternal Deprivation Abuse will be featured on BMLCTA Blog in an effort to wipe out this heinous crime against mothers and children.