As in recently elected Albany City Court Judge Cheryl Coleman. In a bizarre and inappropriate confrontation with four fans at a Bon Jovi concert at Pepsi Arena the other night, Coleman managed in one short evening to bring great discredit to herself, strain the credibility of the Albany Police Department and the city's judiciary, and consequently embarrass our fair city.

The shouting, poking and pushing event that started it all is murky in the details. Four women from Orange County, in the their 20s and 30s, were caught up in the concert, and perhaps more than a touch belligerent. Coleman and her boyfriend, Larry Walley, who works security at RPI, were bothered by the four and got into an argument with them. One sweet word led to another and, before long, security was called -- by one of the four women. Coleman, not once but twice, pulled out her business card with "Judge Cheryl Coleman" on it to "educate" the four.

Apparently, Coleman then somehow persuaded the security guard who showed up to deliver the four women to an Albany cop. A complaint was filed, essentially on the strength of her position and say-so, and the four were arrested.

Coleman subsequently said that the incident was unsettling, that she and Walley had tried to avoid a confrontation and that they had availed themselves "of the same rights that any citizen should have and that was to involve law enforcement."

All I can say is I hope Cheryl Coleman got a great deal on business cards.

At this point, let's put the camera on pause, and look at this ridiculous scene.

What judge in his or her right mind would get caught in this situation, except one so infected by the black robe disease that he or she has totally lost perspective?

Any other judge I know, seeing how this confrontation was deteriorating, would have weighed the heat of the moment against law degree, career and the dignity of the bench and quickly walked away. Sorry for the misunderstanding folks; good night.

But no, not Coleman, who apparently can't shake off her manner as a former pitbull assistant Albany County district attorney. She was a terrific, relentless prosecutor. But those are not necessarily the traits you look for in an impartial referee, which is the definition of a judge. So. Let's roll the camera again. Four women were then caught in a low-level nightmare. At least two were handcuffed to a bench to await arraignment. City Court Judge Will Carter was reluctantly drawn in as well, setting bail at $1,000 each. Judge Carter, who is Coleman's colleague on the bench, never should have touched this case, but should have recused himself instead, as all the City Court judges did eventually.

Paper work supposedly was lost, so there were a few hours of jail time. Ominous hints persist that maybe the four were being taught a lesson because they mucked around with a judge. Boy, if that doesn't stink from top to bottom.

Besides, on its worst day, such an altercation between fans at the Pepsi would have netted no worse than an appearance ticket for a violation. Now these four have been dramatically overcharged with misdemeanors -- all because of Coleman.

I'm convinced, after reading the statements sworn to by Coleman and Walley and talking to some of those who know the case, that everything evolved from Coleman's insistent intervention -- not the "crimes" involved. The arrests that the cops would have preferred not to make and usually don't. The awkward involvement of Judge Carter. The time and cost of Albany cops, transportation in the police wagon, the court.

All over a silly non-event foisted on us by an arrogant judge with much to learn before those robes fit right.

Contact Fred LeBrun at 454-5453.

Military Courts vs. Civil/Criminal Courts  
by LINDA L. KENNEDY

The Injudicious
Judges who crossed the line -- or erased it

Gail Diane Cox
The National Law Journal
05-05-2003


You'd think they'd learn, what with all the shattered careers and yuckfests with Jay Leno presiding.

For Law Day 2003, The National Law Journal offers its list of judges behaving poorly -- or perhaps we should say behaving incomprehensively.

They are cause for celebration, because they were sitting in judgment over the rest of us on May 1, 2002, and this May 1, they weren't.

Each year, some are gone because they retired early while under investigation, in hopes of salvaging something. For some, it worked.

The allegations against an Arkansas judge, Sam Whitfield, were sealed when he agreed to retire effective Aug. 30, 2002 -- leaving behind only a notation that there were investigated complaints of misconduct on and off the bench.

Other judges were ousted by their state judicial conduct commissions with an embarrassing press release but their pensions intact. In a few cases, the judges are sitting out suspensions until their supreme courts decide what to do with them.

One judge who made this year's list of court buffoons has been off the bench since June of last year as a healthful side effect of his being under house arrest.

Ronald D. Bodenheimer
Deal gone bad: 4-year-old for a shrimp contract.

Judge Ronald D. Bodenheimer had a dream. It revolved around a scruffy brew-and-bait marina that he owned. Neighbors complained about drug dealing on the premises.

On the opening day of fishing season, a 15-year-old was electrocuted there because of a faulty conveyer belt. But the eyesore could be turned around, Bodenheimer believed, with one major fishing contract. And Bodenheimer, who sat on Louisiana's New Orleans District Court, thought he could use the power of the bench to get it.

A millionaire restaurateur, Al Copeland, had a child custody case against his ex-wife in Bodenheimer's court. Using go-betweens, the judge let Copeland know he could have anything he wanted -- taking the 4-year-old away from his mother on Christmas morning was specifically mentioned -- in return for a healthy contract to supply shrimp. In one phone conversation, the judge warned Copeland's brother that he was planning a rant-and-rave performance for the courtroom and Copeland should not take it personally, it was just necessary to keep the wife from suspecting "the fix is in."

Copeland hasn't been charged in the FBI's courthouse corruption investigation. Bodenheimer, a 50-year-old career prosecutor who won election to the bench in 1999, initially claimed innocence -- until scraps of the FBI bugs of his phone conversations started leaking out.

When another judge refused to quash the tapes, he pleaded guilty. Bodenheimer has been off the bench, and under house arrest, since June 2002.

It turns out that even his attempts to discredit his critics backfired. One of the charges in the indictment is that he planted three of the painkilling pills Oxycontin in a neighbor's truck -- only to find out the neighbor was an FBI informant.


Bruce Van Voorhis
This California judge hasn't heard of Emily Post.

Until judge Bruce Van Voorhis came along with his Judge Dread routine, California had never removed a judge for rotten demeanor alone.

But as the state's judicial performance commission observed, Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge Van Voorhis took rudeness to new realms that qualified as abuse of authority and embroilment.

One target was a prosecutor, three months out of law school, who was nonplused by erratic evidentiary rulings that the judge forced down her objecting throat. He later insisted it was a sort of tough-love session, designed to show her the importance of anticipating the unexpected even if one has a slam-dunk case.

Rookie female prosecutors had it the worst. One noted for the commission that the young women were the most vulnerable because they felt they had to show that they could "take it" without complaining. But others were humiliated as well.

The judge berated a defense attorney, examining a witness in front of a jury, with, "Now you need to ask him the question that you learned in law school is a legitimate question." He told a deputy public defender who was born in Ecuador that however "charming" his way of speaking, he should "lose the accent."

Jurors wrote complaints after they passed a note to the judge asking for a clarification and instead he did a number on them for a grammar error in the note.

The judge said he is misunderstood. He also admits it's getting worse, not better. In 1992, six years after Van Voorhis was elected, the commission sanctioned him for being harsh with his staff, intimidating with counsel and inflexible with jurors.

In 1994, there was another reproof. Last year he was semi-sidelined, assigned to hear only small claims and fender-bender cases. On Feb. 27, the judicial conduct commission took him off the bench altogether.

Van Voorhis' attorney said he'll ask the state supreme court to rule on whether being a jerk -- by itself -- is ground for a judge to be ousted.


Gerald Trudel
A judge with a God complex and a gulag.

The state's judicial conduct board concluded in mid-February that Gerald Trudel, a judge in Michigan Circuit Court, Allen Park, should be removed from office for abusing county workers, taking unearned vacations and faking illness.

He's been suspended since July 2002, pending the Michigan Supreme Court acting on the conduct board's recommendation.

The judge had a fondness for driving his staff into opposing camps with arbitrary rewards and punishments, the board alleges. It says he secretly used city money, without authorization, to rent a second courthouse without running water or working toilets -- and exiled those who were out of favor to the gulag.

Meanwhile, he set out for palmier climes. The board reported that he tried to take seven months vacation in three years, disguising much of it as medical leave for depression, while taking trips to Newport Beach, Calif.

We may be seeing a trend here that helps explain judicial thought. One of the allegations against Trudel is that he referred to himself as "God."

California's Bruce Van Voorhis explained his gush of anger in the courtroom as being comparable to the frustration Jesus felt when he saw the money changers in the temple. And in Texas, Richard W.B. Davis -- a lawyer who almost made our cut -- sent notes about how critics' comments struck him as being like defecation on Mt. Sinai.


Rodney P. Owens
Gaining a pension after avoiding the tax man.

Rodney P. Owens fought his judicial conduct commission just long enough -- from his July 2002 suspension until Jan. 6, 2003 -- that it was irrefutable that he had been on the bench for a decade and so would have a vested pension.

Then the district judge from Little Rock, Ark., quit.

The commission urged his ouster for tax avoidance. He had bought a 37-foot, 1989 Vogue IV, a trailer worth about $103,000, and then paid an extra $1,000 to have it fraudulently registered in Oregon, which has no sales or use tax on vehicles.

When he discovered the investigation was under way, Owens paid about $10,000 in taxes, interest and penalties. Now his attorney is appealing, alleging six major errors, e.g., that the trial judge did not give the jury the option of convicting on the lesser offense of failing to register a vehicle.


Charles E. Low Jr.
Woman kept 'on the side' while her case was in court.

When April 14 came, so did a reprimand from the judicial conduct commission against Judge Charles E. Lowe, a Pike County, Ky., Circuit Court judge, for having a sexual relationship with a litigant.

"The conduct of the judge shocks the conscience of the commission," said the chairman, Stephen D. Wolnitzek, adding that Lowe could have been removed from office if he hadn't already resigned.

The judge restricted his resignation to one sentence, and has not been available to comment on the sworn declarations that Debbi Mullins gave the commission. She and her husband had adopted a baby girl, and were frightened when the birth mother tried to back out of the agreement. Mullins said a cousin worked for Lowe and told him she would do anything to keep the child.

"He took me up on it," wrote Mullins, adding that she became the judge's "on the side" for five years, the length of time it took the adoption to become final.


Thomas B. Woodard
A 'touchy-feely' guy where women were concerned.

The competition is always tough for judicial horndog of the year, but Judge Thomas B. Woodard, 52, of the Pickens County, Ala., juvenile court, wins the title going away.

And going away is just what he did, negotiating his retirement two days before the state's conduct commission was opening hearings into the case it had made against him for touching, hugging and kissing women and girls in his courtroom.

The judge had served a six-month suspension for the same thing eight years earlier, and had been indefinitely suspended again as of August 2002.

In one alleged incident, he held a 10-year-old girl in his arms for 15 minutes while counseling her, concluding with a kiss. In another, he questioned a crying teenager, insisting on knowing how many people she had slept with. When she finally replied, he called her a "whore."

And then there was the troublesome case in which he didn't recuse himself even though he was dating the defendant; he ruled for her in a child support case and, in an assault case against her, sentenced her to probation.

Until the end, his attorney insisted Woodard's only problem was that he was a "touchy-feely kind of guy."


Francis X. Golniewicz Jr.
Jurors felt unappreciated, as did lots of others.

Appointed to the bench in 1991 by the Illinois Supreme Court, Judge Francis X. Golniewicz of the Cook County Circuit Court was the son of a respected judge.

But in less than a year, complaints started about his bullying, profane ways, like the time he lectured a black defendant: "When I'm talking to you, boy, you look at me."

The stories finally made it to the judicial inquiry board, and Golniewicz was removed from judicial duties as of June 2002 until his case is resolved.

According to the conduct board, he "engaged in rude, inappropriate, undignified, prejudicial and biased behavior," toward defendants and witnesses, including using profanity in open court.

What he said, his lawyer insisted, was "friggin.' " And for the judge, "boy" is not a racial epithet.

Stories about how Golniewicz derided jurors may pose his biggest hurdle to getting back on the bench. In one case, according to the judicial board complaint, the judge said he was not signing the certificates of appreciation routinely given to jurors for their service.

Remarking that jurors didn't deserve it, Golniewicz purportedly tore up the papers and threw them in the trash in view of the departing jurors.


Joyce Julian
A ballet with the bottle falls flat at judges' conference.

OK, the rules we set for each year's list of judicial shenanigans exclude the routine ticket-fixers and those (re)arrested for drunken driving -- because there's usually a dozen of each, and they're pathetic in any case.

But Broward County, Fla., Family Law Judge Joyce Julian's ballet with the bottle qualifies her as anything but a garden-variety drinker. And, voters decided last fall, it also disqualifies her from sitting in judgment on others. It was the first time in a decade that an incumbent Florida judge failed to win re-election.

The incident occurred at the state judges' annual conference, with 450 attendees, at the posh Amelia Island Plantation near Jacksonville, Fla.

Security reports describe the 44-year-old judge cutting quite a figure on the first night: verbally abusing a valet, crashing a private party, announcing she wanted to "pick up a cowboy" and drinking until she was falling down on the lounge dance floor.

She was spotted at 3 a.m. lying on a floor in a hotel corridor, rising to take off her pants and trying to hide behind an ice maker. That's when the really bad stuff started.

By way of cover-up, the half-naked judge told a Nassau County, Fla., sheriff's deputy someone had spiked her drink and sexually assaulted her. In a victim's report, she fingered a man in a long, dark, leather coat. She recanted it, then refiled it.

After a two-week investigation, the authorities concluded that the story was a lie. Her attorney, citing blackout problems, negotiated a stint in rehab, and all charges were dropped.


James I. Aaron
Judge sniffs, others smell a big stench from the bench.

When Fresno County, Calif., Superior Court Judge James I. Aaron presided over drug court, he'd order defendants to approach the bench and smell their hair to determine if they were playing by the rules.

It turned out, however, that the stench came from the other side of the bench.

Last July, the state commission issued a public censure that the judge stipulated to as part of his agreement to step down within five days.

Besides deriding the drug-sniffing, the censure states that the judge helped run a ponzi scheme out of his chambers.

A Fresno businessman named Kenneth Roper recruited the judge and gave him a $20,000 finder's fee to bring in investors. The judge talked up the get-rich potential of it, while neglecting to mention to potential suckers that he hadn't put his own money in or that he got kick-backs for everyone he signed up.

Fresno lawyer David Mudridge said he finally invested $2,500 -- but not because he expected to make any money. Mudridge said he'd go for a court appearance and the judge would take him into chambers to discuss investments, so Mudridge finally agreed "to get him off my back."

Aaron told court staff that Roper and any investors had primo access. If they phoned, they were put through to the judge even if he was on the bench.

When the scheme collapsed, Aaron agreed to cooperate with investigators. Roper is now doing time.

Aaron's attorney says the judge and Roper went to the same church, and Aaron never thought the scheme was illegal. He adds that Aaron, 60, was planning to retire anyway.


Danny Ray Wells
A judge puts on the bite in West Virginia.

What is it about West Virginia judges putting the bite on people during bail hearings?

To celebrate Law Day 1998, The National Law Journal recounted how Judge Joseph Troisi lost it -- as well as his job -- when he came off the bench after a bail proceeding to bite a defendant on the nose.

This year, Logan County Magistrate Danny Ray Wells was convicted of shaking down those who came to his courtroom to try to help friends and loved ones.

The way it worked -- from January 2000 to last summer -- is that he would tell, say, the mother of an arrestee that she must pay $300 in "special, nonrefundable bonds" to a mysterious man who appeared to be a bondsman or the runner for a bondsman.

Then the judge would free the defendant on a personal recognizance bond, which doesn't require any payment, and pocket the cash. The man, John Nagy, a former court marshal, said that he and Wells would go into chambers afterward and split the take down the middle.

The prosecution initially alleged that Wells, 51, accepted not only cash but also sex. A woman testified that she believed the only way to free her husband was to take Wells up on his offer to have intercourse with him at night in the magistrate's lunch room.

Wells denied all the allegations, insisting that Nagy had run the bond racket by himself. The jury concluded that the prosecution hadn't proved the sex part, but convicted Wells of bribery and extortion.

The state supreme court suspended Wells without pay in October 2002. Two weeks after his March 3 conviction, he resigned.

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1051121825488

---

 

J.A.I.L. is an acronym for Judicial Accountability Initiative Law
JAIL's very informative website is found at www.jail4judges.org
JAIL proposes a unique new addition to our form of government.
JAIL is powerful! JAIL is dynamic! JAIL is America's ONLY hope!
JAIL is spreading across America like a fast moving wildfire!
JAIL is making inroads into Congress for federal accountability!
JAIL may be supported at P.O. Box 207, N. Hollywood, CA 91603
To subscribe or be removed:  AddRemove@...
E-Groups, sign on at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jail4judges/join
Forum to make your voice heard JAIL-SoundOff@yahoogroups.com
Ask not what J.A.I.L. can do for me, but ask what I can do for J.A.I.L.
 
"..it does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds.." - Samuel Adams
 
"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is
striking at the root."                         -- Henry David Thoreau    <><

In November and December 1998, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette published a landmark 10-part series by veteran investigative reporter Bill Moushey on prosecutorial misconduct and corruption. The investigative report alleges that Federal agents and prosecutors across the U.S. repeatedly break the law in pursuit of convictions (Bill Moushey, "Win at all Costs: Government misconduct in the name of expedient justice," Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, reprint of articles from November 22, 23, 24, 29, and December 1, 6, 7, 8 and 13, 1998).

The two-year investigation by Post-Gazette reporter Bill Moushey found numerous examples of prosecutors lying, concealing evidence, distorting the facts, engaging in cover-ups, paying for perjured testimony, and prosecuting innocent people to win guilty pleas and convictions. In addition, the paper reported that Federal officials were rarely punished for their misconduct. The misconduct caused victims to lose their jobs, their assets and even their families, according to the paper.

The U.S. Justice Department denied the allegations. "Our prosecutors live by strict, comprehensive and effective ethical rules," said spokesperson Myron Marlin.

However, the Justice Department is aggressively seeking the repeal of the Citizens Protection Act (P.L. 105-277, Section 801), passed last year in the Omnibus Spending bill, which requires Federal prosecutors to abide by the bar ethics rule in the states in which they work. The measure is scheduled to take effect in April. The Justice Department argues that the new law would deny them important prosecutorial tactics, such as using wiretaps, informants or other undercover techniques against certain types of suspects (Eric Lichtblau, "Justice Dept. Contends Law Would Handcuff Prosecutors," Los Angeles Times (National Edition), February 2, 1999, p. A3).

CHICAGO TRIBUNE FINDS PROSECUTORS BREAKING RULES AND SUBVERTING JUSTICE

A similar 6-part series in the Chicago Tribune found that overzealous prosecutors across the U.S. are skirting ethical rules and subverting justice. The Tribune reviewed thousands of court records and appellate court decisions across the U.S. and found that since 1963 at least 381 defendants have had a homicide conviction dismissed because prosecutors either concealed exculpatory evidence or presented evidence that was untrue. Sixty-seven of those defendants were sentenced to die. None of the prosecutors involved were convicted of criminal charges or banned from practicing law, according to the paper (Ken Armstrong and Maurice Possley, "The verdict: Dishonor," Chicago Tribune, January 8, 1999; Ken Armstrong, "'True patriot' not quite a shining star," Chicago Tribune, January 9, 1999; Maurice Possley and Ken Armstrong, "The flip side of a fair trial," Chicago Tribune, January 11, 1999; Maurice Possley and Ken Armstrong, "Prosecution on trial in DuPage," Chicago Tribune, January 12, 1999; Ken Armstrong and Maurice Possley, "Reversal of fortune," Chicago Tribune, January 13, 1999; Ken Armstrong and Maurice Possley, "Break rules, be promoted," Chicago Tribune, January 14, 1999).

In an editorial, the Dallas Morning News wrote: "Considering the tens of thousands of cases tried nationwide since 1963, the 381 convictions may seem inconsequential. They aren't. Homicide cases account for only a fraction of all criminal cases. No one knows how many aggravated assault, rape and armed robbery trials may have been tainted by unethical conduct." (Editorial, "Wrongful convictions," Dallas Morning News, January 14, 1999).

[Considering that drug cases are the largest category of cases in the criminal justice system (there were 1.5 million drug arrest in 1996, for example) and that 400,000 prisoners are serving sentences for drug convictions, it is probable that many thousands of such cases were "tainted by unethical conduct." Certainly, the cases examined by PBS's Frontline documentary "Snitch" were so tainted. -- RCT]

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette report is available on-line at <http://www.post-gazette.com/win/default.asp>
or contact the paper at 34 Boulevard of the Allies, Pittsburgh, PA 15222-1204, Tel: (412) 263-1100 or
(800) 228-6397, Fax: (412) 391-8452.

Bill Moushey - 34 Boulevard of the Allies, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, Tel: (412) 263-1887, Fax: (412) 391-8452,
E-mail: <bmoush@...>.

The Chicago Tribune report is on-line at <http://www.ndsn.org/JANFEB99/www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/>, click on "Trial
and Error" on the left-hand side. Contact authors Ken Armstrong - E-mail: <karmstrong@...>,
Tel: (312) 222-4661 or Maurice Possley - E-mail: <mpossley@...> , Tel: (312) 222-3401.

U.S. Department of Justice - 950 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC 20530, Tel: (202) 514-2001,
Web: <www.usdoj.gov>.

To obtain the PBS Frontline documentary "Snitch," contact Frontline, WGBH-TV, 125 Western Ave.,
Boston, MA 02134-1008, Tel: (617) 492-2777, Fax: (617) 254-0243, E-mail: <frontline@...>, Web:
<www.wgbh.org/frontline>.•

J.A.I.L. is an acronym for Judicial Accountability Initiative Law
JAIL's very informative website is found at www.jail4judges.org
JAIL proposes a unique new addition to our form of government.
JAIL is powerful! JAIL is dynamic! JAIL is America's ONLY hope!
JAIL is spreading across America like a fast moving wildfire!
JAIL is making inroads into Congress for federal accountability!
JAIL may be supported at P.O. Box 207, N. Hollywood, CA 91603
To subscribe or be removed:  AddRemove@...
E-Groups, sign on at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jail4judges/join
Forum to make your voice heard JAIL-SoundOff@yahoogroups.com
Ask not what J.A.I.L. can do for me, but ask what I can do for J.A.I.L.
 
"..it does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds.." - Samuel Adams
 
"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is
striking at the root."                         -- Henry David Thoreau    <><

Justices, as everyone knows, typically don't say much during their speeches for fear of commenting on something that might eventually come before the court. That's why they tend to stick to generalities with which almost no one can disagree.

Most of O'Connor's remarks were in that category - with one exception. O'Connor said the Supreme Court hadn't quite "solved" the problem of race. There are two important implications to this remark: It is up to the court to "solve" the problem and that, given some more cases, it can somehow do so.

"Now what liberty can there be where property is taken away without
consent?" - Samuel Adams (Nov 20, 1772)

"Property must be secured, or liberty cannot exist." John Adams
("Discourses on Davila," 1790)

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as
sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and
public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If 'Thou
shalt not covet' and 'Thou shalt not steal' were not commandments of
Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before
it can be civilized or made free."  - John Adams, "A Defense of the American Constitutions," 1787

Jefferson wrote "The true foundation of republican government is the
equal right of every citizen in his person and property, and in their
management." To which he added - the defense of private property is
the standard by which "every provision" of law, past and present,
shall be judged. (Bergh, Albert Ellery, ed. "The Writings of Thomas
Jefferson, 2d ed. rev." Washington Thomas Jefferson Memorial
Association, 1907, p. 1532.

In The Federalist (number 79, by Alexander Hamilton) it is written
that "In the general course of human nature, a power over a man's
subsistence [i.e., property] amounts to a power over his will."

"Property" is more than just the physical thing-the land, the bricks,
the mortar-it is also the sum of all the rights and powers incident
to ownership of the physical thing. [t]he right to use the physical
thing to the exclusion of others is the most essential and
beneficial. Without this right all other elements would be of little
value.'" Dickman v. Commissioner, 465 U.S. 330, 336 (1984).

"Each of us has a natural right to defend his person, his liberty,
and his property."   -- Frederic Bastiat

As Justice Bryon White noted,  "A man's right to defend his property has long been recognized at common law...[P]erhaps a government edict barring one from resisting the loss of property is the constitutional equivalent of taking such property in the first place..."  

We call a tyrant the leader whose only law is that of his own whim, who
expropriates the property of his subjects, and then drafts them to go
take that of their neighbors. -- Voltaire, "Tyrannie", Dictionnaire
Philosophique, 1764

"It is too bad that the overall value to human beings of their basic
right to private property is so widely and prestigiously denied. It is
one of the most beneficent institutions and certainly the bulwark against any kind of tyranny, be it that of a ruling party, a dictatorship, or even of
a democratic majority." - Tibor Machan, Hoover Institution Research.

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within
limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add
"within the limits of the law," because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."
                                                                  - Thomas Jefferson

Judicial Accountability Imitative Law (legislation) is an idea whose time has come. Stop judicial immunity.  Ron Branson 1995 California attorney
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time, a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it." -- Frederic Bastiat, The Law, 1846

"The sacred rights of property are to be guarded at every point. I call
them sacred, because, if they are unprotected, all other rights become
worthless or visionary. What is personal liberty, if it does not draw after it the right to enjoy the fruits of our own industry? What is political liberty, if it imparts only perpetual poverty to us and all our posterity? What is the privilege of a vote, if the majority of the hour may sweep away the earnings of our whole lives, to gratify the rapacity of the indolent, the cunning, or the profligate, who are borne into power
upon the tide of a temporary popularity?" -- Judge Joseph Story, 1852 
  
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who think they are free." ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." - Thomas Jefferson
(1743-1826) 

"IN GOD WE  TRUST," politicians pay cash. --Bill Monroe