Bizarre, Courts, Lawyering

Court Spokesman Fired After He Butt Dials A Reporter And Leaves A Four-Minute Message About His High-Salary, No Work Job

The spokesman for the New York State Court system has been fired after a disastrous butt-call to a reporter in which he admitted barely working to earn his $172,000 job.  David Bookstaver, 59, was previously stripped of his duties but he remained as “communications director” with his high salary and virtually no work.  That is when the spokesman was undone by the accidental dialing of a reporter and a four-minute tirade in which he laughed about this sweet job.

Bookstaver lost much of his duties under the new chief judge, Janet DiFiore, after she took over  in 2016.  DiFiore however left a highly paid spokesman with little responsibility for actually speaking.  He then spoke too much in the butt dial to the reporter in which he laughed at his current status:

“I spoke to [the reporter] on the record for awhile. I said, ‘I’m in a much less visible position; that doesn’t mean I’m not doing anything.’ But, frankly, look, the bottom line: The story’s true. I’m not doing anything. I barely show up to work and I’ve been caught.”

Bookstaver ia now a former spokesman.

Bookstaver told The New York Times that he “deeply regrets” his actions.   We are still waiting for a possible posterior statement to follow.

29 thoughts on “Court Spokesman Fired After He Butt Dials A Reporter And Leaves A Four-Minute Message About His High-Salary, No Work Job”

  2. There is no independent oversight of these jobs.Taxpayers are being fleeced
    by the failure of government to
    use technology private employers use. Voice mail, texting, scanning documents ,etc
    We no longer need home delivery Mail as everyone has email. The post office RIP.

  3. Does anybody see anything wrong with tax payer employed, Government Employees belonging to a Union?

    1. LC in Texas – I don’t care if govt employees belong to a union, as long as it is voluntary and and it is illegal for them to strike. Hell, I don’t care if they work naked.

    2. LC, FDR, the Liberal King was adamantly opposed to govt. unions. They are losing their control slowly. Taxpayers in Wisconsin said, ENOUGH, and broke the backs of that AFSCME cabal.

  6. I have not figured out why people put their phones in their back pockets. Women, especially, do this. Clothing manufacturers must catch up to the times, and put more pockets on the sides and fronts of garments !

  7. Being a PI, as a small businessman, I would have regular contact w/ govt. employees in many departments, not just law. And, if you want to get what you need, you have to schmooze them. And, they are quite schmoozable. But, it too some great acting on my part.

  8. I worked a total of 5 years for the Federal and County government. That is what made me a libertarian. If all voters understood just how rampant this is in all levels of govt. then I believe the revolution would start. There was a mini revolution in Wisconsin a few years back. All that really happened was govt. union membership became voluntary. A baby step, but a start. On all levels of govt., it needs to be cut in half. We wait a few years, then we cut in half again.

      1. Indeed it is not. But, most of the private enterprise corruption does not involve tax dollars. However, I often talk about the need to eliminate corporate welfare. One of my pet peeves are billion dollar stadiums built for billionaire owners and millionaire, mindless, athletes, like Colin Kaepernick.

        1. Tax dollars, schmax dollars. Government or private sector monopolies. The worst of the worst can be found in the private sector oligarchs that control the government. From one end or the other, there is no such thing or precious little of price control through competition. The golden rule is what the market will bear. In institutions as large as government there is bound to be corruption and slacka**es. As an architect I learned never to go to the building department after noon on Friday. However, I pitied those poor saps as they dealt with the holier than thou private sector every day. All it took was offering a little respect and their eyes lit up. Our main problem lies in the private sector where lies the biggest lie. At least in the government sector they are known to be targets and scrutinized on a constant basis, as can be seen from this blog.

          1. Does anyone get the sense the Canadian Rain Man does not pay taxes. On the dole?

      2. What I saw in private-sector corruption was blatant cronyism, and employment of obviously unqualified people in many cases, to important jobs.
        Also, in larger organizations, groups or packs of friends to move up in an organization, sidelining or dismissing others.
        The cream did not rise to the top, in many cases.

        1. Deflection by 2 socialists. Again, I have seen corruption in business. Indeed I have investigated it. But one need only to look @ the evils of govt. monopolies seeing the Thunderdome in Venezuela, Chicago, Detroit, etc.to know that govt. corruption, where there is no accountability, is exponentially worse. To even intimate otherwise one must be stupid, dishonest or a hybrid of both.

          1. Or perhaps one just has to follow the corruption in the careers of the Trump organization and the Kushner organization. These pinnacles of society have used public funds destined for affordable housing to finance mega projects of condos then sold to the ultra rich. It took an incompetent public sector but the crimes were committed by the private sector. How many working stiff self employed contractors has Trump skipped out on paying, banks, etc. There is no more obvious ‘get out of jail free’ card than the bankruptcy. Trump is the king of the bankruptcies. It may not be the average taxpayer that directly pays for Trump’s failures but it is the backbone of the working force that simply doesn’t get paid. The corruption in government is more exposed as ‘everyone’ hates the government and those of us who have worked without a built in safety net somewhat envy the guy who works 35 years to retire in his fifties. Government is exposed in a way that the private sector is not. Have we had a chance to look at Trump’s taxes? Yes there is corruption in government but there is also a scrutiny that is nowhere near approached in the private sector. The private sector corruption envelops the public sector. This is like blaming the soldier who commits an atrocity when in fact it is the politician that sent him in and the general/politician wannabe that gave the order. If one does not understand the hierarchy topped by the oligarch then one must have one’s head up there where the sun don’t shine, perhaps looking for a clue.

            1. The violent corruption of Communist and Socialist monopolies have murdered close to 100 million people. But, Rain Man is obsessed w/ Trump, just like he was w/ Wapner, Jeopardy and K-Mart. This is an insanely stupid argument driven by Rain Man’s OCD. Communism/Socialism v private enterprise. Not even close, Rain Man, not even close.

  11. It seems that Judge Janet DiFiore is the one who should be removed. She took over in 2016, stripped the guy of his job duties, but allowed him to continue earning $172,000 for doing nothing. That’s beyond gross mismanagement; it’s waste, fraud and abuse. He was stupid to brag about it to a reporter, but that’s not an offense. It was the Judge’s responsibility to properly manage court resources and she clearly failed.

  12. Living about 80% of the time in the D.C. area, I have many friends employed by the federal government. Many of them will admit to having high paying jobs just like this or at minimum, that they’re surrounded by people like this. And in the federal government, they could probably go on the record and still keep their jobs. In fact, they’d be promoted to another position and agency just to get them out of what agency they just sandbagged.

    1. Well again, I take the same position. It’s petty to criticize the employee in this situation. The fault lies with management. And BTW, where is the agency’s Inspector General? That office is charged with conducting periodic operational reviews and ferreting out waste, fraud and abuse. It sounds like the IG has a “do nothing job” as well.

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