The St. Valentine's Day Justice/Tree Massacre

[XLFD]

Half the fun of making these threads are deciding how to title them.

A recurring theme occurs when I go shopping for my mother.  She loves to buy easy rebate items at Staples and register rewards items at Walgreen's, and almost every time I leave those stores, we leave with a load of paper for rebates and rewards, printed out at the register.  The usual comment is there goes another tree, from my environmentally conscious helper and clerk.

My mailbox was stuffed yesterday with two big parcels from my friends from Manistee, the Ludington City Attorney Firm.  I had been complaining about the lack of any response to a coarse E-mail sent to me by Richard Merlin Wilson, concerning the methods of interrogation of his fellow lawyer, George Saylor.  The very first pages of these documents, 132 of which I alone received, stated his "apology" and the extent of what he included:

<----- Gockerman, Wilson, Saylor & Hesslin, CM John Shay in foreground

That wasn't a misprint, each of us got 132 pages, 50 of which were specially prepared documents by the law firm, the rest as "Exhibits".  If we continue to presume that it takes the law firm 15 minutes to produce a page of their original material, the 50 pages would denote 12.5 hours of work at the special project rate of $185/hour.  An expenditure of $2312.50 to the City of Ludington's taxpayers. 

Here's the paper count:  132 pages for me, for Toni, for the County Clerk, for the Circuit Court, and for their own use, one would presume.  That's 660 pages, that we can hope the Attorney's only charged $.25 per copy to us taxpayers (that's $165, not including the law clerk's time for doing so).  Bet those trees came from the Manistee National Forest as well.

Notice that after 5 months of trying to get the information we were seeking, they have included it as one of the Exhibits, and now make a statement that my complaint has been rendered a moot point.  As they have done many times in the past, however, they are mistaken.  The information they gave me as the FOIA response does not fulfill the request, it was a duplication of Toni's 1-24-2011 request, and not only did it include material we didn't come close to requesting, it did not include material that should still be in possession of the City of Ludington.

This means that either the City is illegally withholding this information, or they have destroyed such documentation as a means of keeping it from the prying eyes of the public (or to make the recent request identical to the prior one).  Both are serious breeches of the FOIA.  We'll find out in court, I presume.

Also note the amount of vindictive sanctions they wish to apply to the plaintiffs.  The plaintiffs submitted a Motion to Quash (as yet undetermined by the court) for the deposition of Toni Swiger primarily because the defendants violated court rules by asking her to produce documents in less than the 14 days required by law to produce them.  We also answered our interrogatories with some court-tested objections, that blocked us from the harassing nature of what they were meant to be, as used by the defendant.  Can you say "brow-beating the rabble that dare to ask to look at the Empire's secret documents"?  Sure you can.

Today is the last day of discovery and deadline for many other things.  We go to court for Summary dispositions and defendant errata on March 7th.  We can't wait.

[Willy]

I applaud you for you guts and determination in your fight for everyone's rights. In my opinion George the III,  got his titty caught in a ringer so he had to form some kind of apology and of course a lame excuse for his totally unprofessional conduct. May I suggest that his actions were in violation of his oath and the Bar. I believe a complaint forwarded to the ADB, Attorney Discipline Board http://www.adbmich.org/ with a request for a hearing or discipline action would be appropriate in this case. Not only has the City used tax dollars wrongfully but they are using a vindictive law firm that mirrors Ludingtons City Manager John Shays attitude and personality

[XLFD]

Great idea Willy... and already done.  The ADB has already received my complaint, a complaint that my attorney was fully in support of doing-- he sent me a form, but I had already filled one out the day I received his letter.  I hope he creates a real funny joke for the board-- they don't get to laugh about things too often, LOL.  Included in the complaint was the remark specified in his partner's E-mail, the length, subject matter, and threats he made at my deposition, and I will likely enter a supplemental complaint over the next week regarding the baseless motions he enters into the court after his aforementioned activities, that he included in the massive half ream of papers we received.  I suppose if we each received 250 pages, we could effectively say that we were reamed by George-- again.

[Marty Redman]

What every Ludington citizen and everyone else looking in needs to know is that almost each of those motions made by the city attorneys are meant to intimidate, not meant to be real.  Look at how George III explains his partners gaffe, and how he offers what appears (to the court at least) what should fulfill the request to try and get your case rendered pointless and moot. 

If the reply was the same as the previous reply, why couldn't Shay quit speaking from his behind until now.  This is BS, and it looks like Georgie is trying to make some more tears flow.  But all he is really doing is sticking it in the behind of the Ludington taxpayers and the rights of all americans in a personal quest to fatten his wallet with Mason county dollars.

[XLFD]

Your imagery is troubling, but essentially correct, Marty.