The bill is in for Orly Taitz, the California lawyer leading the “Birther” litigation: $20,000 for sanctionable conduct. U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land previously issued a stern warning to attorney Orly Taitz and others in the so-called “birther” campaign: do not file another such “frivolous” lawsuit or you will face sanctions. Land threw out the lawsuit filed on behalf of Capt. Connie Rhodes who is an Army surgeon challenging her deployment orders due to President Barack Obama’s alleged ineligibility to serve as President. Land (a Bush appointee) noted that “[u]nlike in ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ simply saying something is so does not make it so.” In the most recent order, Land said that Taitz’s conduct “borders on delusional.”
Rhodes previously accused Taitz of filing new papers in Rhodes v. MacDonald without her approval and after she agreed to be deployed by the military. Taitz declared in one filing: “This case is now a quasi-criminal prosecution of the undersigned attorney.” She is already facing a California bar complaint and Rhodes is promising to file a new complaint against her for “reprehensible” representation.
When Rhodes learned that Taitz had filed a motion to stay deployment after she had decided to forego further litigation, she proceeded to fire Taitz by sending a remarkable letter from Office Max on the advice of “Tim who works in the District Clerk’s office.” She stated in the fax:
September 18th, 2009
To the Honorable Judge Land:
Currently, I am shipping out to Iraq for my deployment. I became aware on last night’s local news that a Motion to Stay my deployment had been entered on my behalf. I did not authorize this motion to be filed. I thank you for hearing my case and respect the ruling given on September 16th, 2009. It is evident that the original filing for the TRO and such was full of political conjecture which was not my interest. I had no intention of refusing orders nor will I. I simply wanted to verify the lawfulness of my orders. I am honored to serve my country and thank you for doing the same.
With that I said, please withdraw the Motion to Stay that Ms. Taitz filed this past Thursday. I did not authorize it and do not wish to proceed. Ms. Taitz never requested my permission nor did I give it. I would not have been aware of this if I did not see it on the late news on Thursday night before going to board my plane to Iraq on Friday, September 18, 2009.
Furthermore, I do not wish for Ms. Taitz to file any future motion or represent me in any way in this court. It is my plan to file a complaint with the California State Bar to her reprehensible and unprofessional actions.
I am faxing this as was advised by Tim, who works in the District Clerk’s office. I will mail the original copy of this letter once I have arrived in Iraq.
Respectfully,
CPT Connie M. Rhodes, MD
In her Motion for Leave to Withdrawal as Counsel, Taitz suggested that her client is lying to the Court.
She states that she not only has a (rather obvious) conflict with her former client but may present evidence that is embarrassing to her:
The undersigned attorney comes before this Court to respectfully ask for leave to withdraw as counsel for the Plaintiff Captain Connie Rhodes. The immediate need for this withdrawal is the filing of two documents of September 18, 2009, one by the Court, Document 17, and one apparently by Plaintiff Connie Rhodes, which together have the effect of creating a serious conflict of interest between Plaintiff and her counsel. In order to defend herself, the undersigned counsel will have to contest and potentially appeal any sanctions order in her own name alone, separately from the Plaintiff, by offering and divulging what would normally constitute inadmissible and privileged attorney-client communications, and take a position contrary to her client’s most recently stated position in this litigation. The undersigned attorney will also offer evidence and call witnesses whose testimony will be adverse to her (former) client’s most recently stated position in this case. A copy of this Motion was served five days ago on the undersigned’s former client, Captain Connie Rhodes, prior to filing this with the Court and the undersigned acknowledges her client’s ability to object to this motion, despite her previously stated disaffection for the attorney-client
relationship existing between them. This Motion to Withdraw as Counsel will in no way delay the proceedings, in that the Plaintiff has separately indicated that she no longer wishes to continue to contest any issue in this case. In essence, this case is now a quasi-criminal prosecution of the undersigned attorney, for the purpose of punishment, and the Court should recognize and acknowledge the essential ethical importance of releasing this counsel from her obligations of confidentiality and loyalty under these extraordinary circumstances.Respectfully submitted,
By:_________________________
Orly Taitz, DDS, Esq.
California Bar ID No. 223433
FOR THE PLAINTIFF
Captain Connie Rhodes, M.D. F.S.
SATURDAY, September 26, 2009
“Quasi-criminal prosecution”? The judge had ordered Taitz to “show cause” why a sanction should not be imposed in the case. He had previously told Taitz that he would consider sanctions if she filed similar claims in the future. After the denial of the Motion to Stay deployment, Land said that the latest filing was “deja vu all over again” including “her political diatribe.” He noted:
Instead of seriously addressing the substance of the Court’s order, counsel repeats her political diatribe against the President, complains that she did not have time to address dismissal of the action (although she sought expedited consideration), accuses the undersigned of treason, and maintains that “the United States District Courts in the 11th Circuit are subject to political pressure, external control, and . . . subservience to the same illegitimate chain of command which Plaintiff has previously protested.”
Then the kicker:
The Court finds Plaintiff’s Motion for Stay of Deployment (Doc. 15) to be frivolous. Therefore, it is denied. The Court notifies Plaintiff’s counsel, Orly Taitz, that it is contemplating a monetary penalty of $10,000.00 to be imposed upon her, as a sanction for her misconduct. Ms. Taitz shall file her response within fourteen days of today’s order showing why this sanction should not be imposed.
I am frankly not convinced that sanctions would be appropriate for filing for a motion to stay deployment per se. At the time of his order, Land did not presumably know that the filing was made against the wishes of the client. If Rhodes was interested in appealing Land’s decision, which is her right, a stay is a standard request. However, the fact that the filing may have been made after Taitz was terminated as counsel and after she was told that Rhodes was abandoning the case is more cause for possible sanctions. Moreover, the low quality and over-heated rhetoric of the filing can support such sanctions. Her filings appear more visceral than legal. In demanding reconsideration of the Court’s earlier order, she used language that does cross the line:
This Court has threatened the undersigned counsel with sanctions for advocating that a legally conscious, procedurally sophisticated, and constitutionally aware army officers corps is the best protection against the encroachment of anti-democratic, authoritarian, neo-Fascistic or Palaeo-Communistic dictatorship in this country, without pointing to any specific language, facts, or allegations of fact in the Complaint or TRO as frivolous. Rule 11 demands more of the Court than use of its provisions as a means of suppressing the First Amendment Right to Petition regarding questions of truly historical, in fact epic and epochal, importance in the history of this nation.
She also (as noted by Land in his later order) essentially accused Land of treason, as she has in public statements:
Plaintiff submits that to advocate a breach of constitutional oaths to uphold the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, is in fact a very practical form of “adhering” to those enemies, foreign and domestic, and thus is tantamount to treason, as Defined in Article III, Section 3, even when pronounced in Court. The People of the United States deserve better service and loyalty from the most powerful, and only life-tenured, officers of their government.
Taitz is also facing a California Bar complaint, here. Ohio lawyer (and inactive California bar member) Subodh Chandra wrote the bar, stating “I respectfully request that you investigate Ms. Taitz’s conduct and impose an appropriate sanction. She is an embarrassment to the profession.” For that complaint, click here.
A complaint by a former client would likely attract more attention by the Bar. These are now serious allegations including misrepresentation, false statements to the Court, and other claims that will have to be addressed by a Bar investigation. This could take years to resolve — perhaps just in time for Obama’s second inauguration.
The court ruled that Taitz violated Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in filing frivolous papers. Declaring the filings as made in “bad faith,” the court concluded that Taitz’s legal conduct was “willful and not merely negligent.” Sanctions were warranted, he held, because “Counsel’s frivolous and sanctionable conduct wasted the Defendants’ time and valuable judicial resources that could have been devoted to legitimate cases pending with the Court.”
“When a lawyer files complaints and motions without a reasonable basis for believing that they are supported by existing law or a modification or extension of existing law, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law,” Land writes. “When a lawyer uses the courts as a platform for a political agenda disconnected from any legitimate legal cause of action, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law. When a lawyer personally attacks opposing parties and disrespects the integrity of the judiciary, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law. When a lawyer recklessly accuses a judge of violating the judicial code of conduct with no supporting evidence beyond her dissatisfaction with the judge’s rulings, that lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law. When a lawyer abuses her privilege to practice law, that lawyer ceases to advance her cause or the ends of justice. . .
Regrettably, the conduct of counsel Orly Taitz has crossed these lines, and Ms. Taitz must be sanctioned for her misconduct. After a full review of the sanctionable conduct, counsel’s conduct leading up to that conduct, and counsel’s response to the Court’s show cause order, the Court finds that a monetary penalty of $20,000.00 shall be imposed upon counsel Orly Taitz as punishment for her misconduct, as a deterrent to prevent future misconduct, and to protect the integrity of the Court. Payment shall be made to the United States, through the Middle District of Georgia Clerk’s Office, within thirty days of today’s Order. If counsel fails to pay the sanction due, the U.S. Attorney will be authorized to commence collection proceedings.
I expect that Taitz will appeal the decision, given her past statements. The opinion goes into considerable detail on her conduct and interaction with the court, as shown below.
For the decision, click here.
For the story, click here
You want to know where Obama was born? Here’s a picture.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23100995/Coast-Province-General-Hospital-picture-photo
You want a hospital saying he was born there? Here’s a video with a picture of that too.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et2nZuJATaw&hl=en_US&fs=1&]
No hospital in the U.S. will back Obama’s claim to having been born Hawaii. They won’t even say that Obama’s mother was a patient there in August of 1961. She’s dead. There are no privacy concerns.
Another excellent job Vince!!!!! Hey out of curiosity, how are you able to ascertain the exact comment number?
More housekeeping. James David Manning, who announced the May 14, 2010 Columbia Obama Trial, is a complete and total liar.
His tape was posted here, up above, at:
QUOTING
#441 Bdaman 1, February 22, 2010 at 8:43 pm.
“CIA COLUMBIA OBAMA COVERUP”
Bdaman 1, February 22, 2010 at 8:43 pm
UNQUOTE
An excellent site has collected all the links to the full story and deserves full credit: http://ohforgoodnesssake.com/?p=8047
The list of his lying is here: http://ohforgoodnesssake.com/?p=6524
The guy tells a great story, if you like inherently incredibly bad spy thrillers, but it is all cut from whole cloth, a farrago of fiction, and a gallimaufry of undigested hatred.
I just do not want any wingnuts to claim that a posting of Manning here at the Turley blog is any kind of endorsement. At this blog, we finger the liars.
Anonymous birther posters, you have asked a lot of questions. Now please answer some. P
lease state whether or not you think Obama was born in Kenya. Please state whether or not the Kenyan birth certificates posted on the web are valid. Please post links to the valid birth certificates showing birth in Kenya.
(Please note that Kenya allows release of birth certificates to anyone:
http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/2010/02/wheres-the-birth-certificate/
Please report findings of results of requests to Kenyan officials.
It does not matter what documents are produced. The birthers will always doubt them, so it would be a waste of time to dignify them or to pander to them. A birther last year posted a story that someone he knew had heard in a bar from a special agent that there was a team at work busy forging a birth certificate with a 1961 typewriter and that they were aging it to perfection, so the crazy stories are already in the can.
That is why the answer is no, nothing that can be released will ever end any part of the controversy. They hate him with an abiding, irrational, irreducible hatred, and nothing will change that.
I think I have made the case that the answer to the question “Where’s the birth certificate?” is that he has released his birth certificate, as defined by federal law and as verified by an independent press, and that Armstrong landed on the Moon in 1969.
If birthers want to keep on denying it, and spreading lies like the Kenyan birth certificates, and in general acting like the Moon-landing doubters, they can just go on polluting the public debate.
Do I think release of records would end the controversy? No. If the birthers have not believed an official birth certificate issued by the public official with custody, or her statement that she has seen the originals and that they verify he was born in Hawaii and is a natural born citizen, then nothing will ever convince them. Ever. When the original records show that birth took place in the hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii, then the birthers will just claim that the originals were falsified.
And on and on and on….
Infinite regress. Wiki: “An infinite regress in a series of propositions arises if the truth of proposition P1 requires the support of proposition P2, and for any proposition in the series Pn, the truth of Pn requires the support of the truth of Pn+1. There would never be adequate support for P1, because the infinite sequence needed to provide such support could not be completed.”
Try going to the birther sites and asking them if release of any documents would end the controversy. They will say no.
Besides, this is how the birthers make their living. WorldNutDaily and Post&Email both try to separate gullible viewers from their money, a lot like the televangelizing hucksters on late night cable. Without this scam, they would have to work for a living. No one has EVER solicited funds at the Turley blog.
Professor Turley, thanks for deleting that racist comment posted earlier on this thread
Sorry, Charlie, just blowing smoke.
Inconveniently, they photographed the raised seal:
http://www.factcheck.org/UploadedFiles/birth_certificate_1.jpg
So what is the story? What really happened? As they said at politifact, “And there’s the rub. It is possible that Obama conspired his way to the precipice of the world’s biggest job, involving a vast network of people and government agencies over decades of lies. Anything’s possible.”
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/27/obamas-birth-certificate-part-ii/
And they faked the moon landing. The sun is not at the center of the solar system. There really were witches who had to be burned.
So what is the story? Just what did happen?
There is a reason why no responsible official in the entire country has embraced the birthers, and the even the FoxNews guys and Hayworth are running the other way.
Per Janet Okubo and quoted on Politifact
“I don’t know that it’s possible for us to even say beyond a doubt what the image on the site represents.”
And this one from Okubo was so stupid it made me LOL. “I guess the big issue that’s being raised is the lack of an embossed seal and a signature,” Okubo said, pointing out that in Hawaii, both those things are on the back of the document. “Because they scanned the front … you wouldn’t see those things.”
Really Janet? The EMBOSSED stamp is only on the back of the document? Did you think most people are too stupid to know that the act of embossing requires counter pressure from the other side of the document? To state it plainly. It doesn’t matter which side the embossed stamp is on.
A candidate in PA is dropping the birher issue:
“As for the birth certificate issue, he’s decided to let it go.
‘Once eight or nine courts toss it out (maybe it’s time),’he said. ‘It’s like an old pork roast in the freezer. Maybe it’s time to put it out for the trash man.’”
This is a good read: http://www.delcotimes.com/articles/2010/03/03/opinion/doc4b8dddb8d1c87908418462.txt
Actually, there are more than 60 — repeat, six zero — frivolous birther lawsuits, not just eight or nine, and ALL have been dismissed. One or two are awaiting dismissal. There have been NO successes. NONE. NADA.
If this had been a prizefight, the referee would have stopped it many rounds ago.
QUOTESON: Birthers’ claim Gibbs lied when he said Obama’s birth certificate is posted on the Internet
False
Update: We first posted this item on July 1, 2009. Since then, the Birther movement has only gained more national exposure, including discussion on numerous political television and radio programs. That prompted Dr. Chiyome Fukino, director of the Hawaii Department of Health, to issue this statement on July 27, 2009:
“I, Dr. Chiyome Fukino, director of the Hawai’i State Department of Health, have seen the original vital records maintained on file by the Hawai’i State Department of Health verifying Barrack Hussein Obama was born in Hawai’i and is a natural-born American citizen. I have nothing further to add to this statement or my original statement issued in October 2008, over eight months ago.”
….
So back to the claim that Gibbs lied about posting Obama’s birth certificate on the Internet. WorldNetDaily is correct that the Obama campaign didn’t post his original birth certificate on the Internet. But their suggestion that there is some significant difference between the two documents is wrong. They both prove the same thing. Maybe the original would identify the hospital where Obama was born, but that’s irrelevant. The issue is what city, and therefore country, was he born. The document posted by the campaign proves Obama was born in Honolulu, according to Health Department officials. And that’s really the central issue here.
The Health Department says the “Certification of Live Birth” is Hawaii’s version of a birth certificate. Calling it by other names — Certificate of Live Birth, Certification of Live Birth — is just semantics. WorldNetDaily may be right that the original birth certificate wasn’t posted, but if Hawaii says the document Obama posted can rightly be called Obama’s birth certificate, how is Gibbs lying? We harbor no delusions that anything we say here will slow the persistent drumbeat of the birthers, but we rule this statement False. UNQUOTE
Source: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/jul/28/worldnetdaily/birthers-claim-gibbs-lied-when-he-said-obamas-birt/
Ruled false. Case closed.
Politifact is operated by the St. Petersburg Times in Florida.
Avoid the message. Get to the point. Especially if it avoids the message.
FactCheck.org Vince’s Truth Squad on their website states
“Update, Nov. 1: The director of Hawaii’s Department of Health confirmed Oct. 31 that Obama was born in Honolulu.”
Did Dr. Fukino, on Oct 31st 2008 “confirmed Oct. 31 that Obama was born in Honolulu”?
I didn’t hear you? Would that be NO? Would that mean that Factcheck.org didn’t tell the truth?
It gets even better. On that same Factcheck.org page. Under the analyisis it states “The announcement was posted by a pro-Hillary Clinton blogger who grudgingly concluded that Obama “likely” was born Aug. 4, 1961 in Honolulu.”
The best we have is a confirmed from a likely. That’s what I call fact checking.
I’m not done yet. Who is this Amy Hollyfield with the contradictory information that the video refers to? She’s a staff writer for Politifact.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/27/obamas-birth-certificate-part-ii/
Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Thanks Vince, I knew you would give a good analysis.
Maybe I missed it, but I did not hear that guy linked at 4:40 PM mention the July 27, 2009 news release in which the Hawaiian official with legal custody of all state birth records verified that she had looked at the original vital records verifying that Obama was “born in Hawaii” (then in 1961 and now in 2010 a part of the “U.S.A.”):
http://hawaii.gov/health/about/pr/2009/09-063.pdf
I think I have made the case that the answer to the question “Where’s the birth certificate?” is that he has released his legal birth certificate, as defined by federal law and as verified by an independent press, that the responsible state officials have verified that he was born in Hawaii, and that Armstrong landed on the Moon in 1969. I think most reasonable people will accept that and move on. If birthers want to keep on denying it, and spreading lies like the ones in the Kenyan birth certificates, they are just polluting the public debate.
I leave it to the readers.
Atty Mario Apuzzo will be on the Sean & Frank Radio Show, 680 WCBM, of Baltimore MD – Monday, 8 Mar 2010, 8:35 a.m. Segment
http://www.wheresobamasbirthcertificate.com/main/page_home.html
Mike it doesn’t matter now, he’s our president. So even if he was out to destroy the country, he’s our president.
Oh well, is it snowing at your house.
“I reviewed file of a senior individual who obtained his birth certificate twice, at a 40-year interval. Both certificates were like the COLB, in that they showed a certification by the official that the birth records were in that official’s custody, and showed the relevant birth information. These certificates did list a hospital, but there was no information on delivering physicians or nurses, and no identification of witnesses or any other officials. The certificates therefore did not constitute actual copies of the original birth records, but were certifications by the custodial officials of the content of those records. They were valid birth certificates.” ~Vince Treacy
Pretty interesting stuff. A 40 year interval would indicate that one of those was prepared prior to the “computer age”. You know “back in the day” when copies of public records were actually copies, not computer generated documents. Please give us a few more details about how this 40-plus year old document was “like a COLB”. Do you think all certificates of live birth look like a COLB?
If the account presented by Vince Treacy is true, he should be able to scan and upload redacted copies of these birth records to scribd so the rest of us can see how much they look like a COLB.
______________________________
Maybe we can get an answer from Vince on this if we try a second time.
Vince Treacy,
Don’t you consider Barack Obama to have a tangible interest in his own vital records?
If Obama can view and obtain a certified copies of his vital records, and those vital records will show that he was born in a hospital in Hawaii, why not have them released and end that part of the controversy?
http://www.scribd.com/doc/27721631/Table-of-Bills-Pending-in-State-Legislatures-Regarding-Eligibility-for-the-Presidency
http://www.scribd.com/doc/12873456/Amending-the-Natural-Born-Citizen-Requirement-Sarah-p-Herlihy-Feb-22-2006
If Obama can view and obtain a certified copies of his vital records, and those vital records will show that he was born in a hospital in Hawaii, why not have them released and end that part of the controversy?
He doesn’t have to, he has provided prima facia evidence backed by the state of Hawaii. If that’s not good enough, too bad. Who cares if people don’t believe it, he’s our president. Barack Whosane Obama UM UM UM. The great unifier of the world. He will be the greatest president ever. He’s historic don’t ya know and will extend a hand if your willing to unclench your fist. It’s obvious that the information contained in the original birth certificate would be embarrassing to the president. Any other sane person would have released it long ago.