SAN DIEGO - A judge Monday granted a temporary restraining order stopping the Padre Dam Municipal Water District from doing further construction on a planned reservoir and pumping station near Lake Jennings Park Road and Old Highway 80 on a recently unearthed Indian burial site.
The Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians said the restraining order issued by Judge Judith Hayes will halt the water district from further desecrating the burial and ceremonial ground. A hearing is scheduled June 25 to make the injunction permanent...
School Districts Have Flexibility in Making Layoffs in Order to Provide Equal Education to All, Ruling Says
Saying that the state’s education code allows school districts flexibility in laying off teachers in order to comply with constitutional requirements to provide equal education to all students, a Superior Court judge granted an injunction today that prevents the Los Angeles Unified School District from laying off teachers at Gompers, Liechty and Markham middle schools this year. The three schools, which primarily serve low-income students and students of color, saw their teaching corps disproportionately decimated by a round of budget-driven layoffs last year, causing their education efforts to fall below the state constitutional guarantee that all students will receive a basic education consistent with prevailing statewide standards.
“Today's landmark decision carries on the ideals of Brown v. Board of Education that no child may be deprived of the right to learn,” said Mark Rosenbaum, chief counsel for the ACLU of Southern California.
Judith Hayes believes in free speech for some people, as shown by this ruling from Judge Hayes in the Digital Cornerstone v. Kevin Carmony case:
"...the Defendant had a bona fide noncommercial use for the website, the Court finds the general purpose of the website to be a free speech forum wherein Defendant criticized the management of Plaintiff. ..the Defendant at no time harbored a bad faith intent to profit from a registered mark and that his use of the website undertaken to inform consumers and criticize Plaintiff's management constituted a lawful use of the site."
But Judge Hayes came to a very different conclusion about free speech in a case where there was no attempt to fool people about who owned the website, and no profit was made.
The possible explanations for her behavior in my case are considerably narrowed by her recent ruling in Digital Cornerstone v. Kevin Carmony.
One difference between my case and the Kevin Carmony case is that I'm a school teacher, not a CEO, and I'm representing myself. Judge Hayes apparently sees me as someone whose rights can be easily violated, and no one will notice. Clearly, she sees Stutz Artiano Shinoff & Holtz law firm as a group of people whom no schoolteacher should ever criticize, no matter how much money they charge the public or how many documents that refuse to produce. The firm walked out of its deposition, and the lawyer most involved in my case refused to show up for his deposition. This was fine with Judge Hayes. I wonder if Digital Cornerstone also walked out of its deposition? I'm sure Carmony's lawyer Gil Cabrera wouldn't let the plaintiff and Judge Hayes get away with such shenanigans. I'm trusting that in my case, the Court of Appeal will put a stop to the shenanigans of Stutz law firm and Judge Hayes.
The odd thing is that my case is much clearer and simpler than the Carmony case. My website is a purely public interest website. I never allowed advertisements on it, much less advertisements from competitors of the people I criticized. I never paid a premium ($6000) to get a domain name that was likely to fool people into thinking my site was owned by the very people I was criticizing, as Carmony did. My site has my own name: mauralarkins.com. Judge Hayes and her research attorney Monica Barry should have had no trouble seeing that my case was completely different from Del Junco v. Hufnagel, particularly since they found a difference between Freespire.com and the website in the Del Junco case.
Judge Hayes made the above ruling in the Carmony case just over a month after this ruling slapping me with $3000 in contempt sanctions for not erasing every mention of Stutz law firm from my website. (Hayes' ruling in my case is so brazenly unconstitutional that Michael Robertson look like a free speech advocate compared to this incarnation of Judge Hayes.) Clearly, Hayes knows how to act like a good judge when she knows she's being watched. She can be quite the stickler for the appearance of integrity. For example, it was rather extreme for her to recuse herself just because her bailiff's daughter was on a high school girls sports team. But she refused to recuse herself in my case.
I keep asking myself why Judge Hayes would act as she has in my case, regardless of whether she thought she could get away with it. What was her motivation? Perhaps District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis has a theory about this. She forced Judge Hayes out of the criminal courts even though both Dumanis and Hayes share a conservative philosophy. Dumanis seems to consider Judge Hayes' behavior on the bench to be unpredictable.
Freespire.com apparently exists to criticize Michael Robertson. From the home page of the website: "Freespire.com is dedicated to shedding light on the REAL Michael Robertson. Robertson tried unsuccessfully to shut down this site, as he clearly doesn't want the truth about him known. We've seen Robertson go to great lengths to create a skewed public persona, quite different from the one you will hear about from those who know him..."
I could say these same words about Stutz, Artiano Shinoff & Holtz, the lawyers who are suing me on their own behalf.
But my site isn't limited to criticizing one person or even one group of people. It covers a broad range of education issues.
Here's what Wikipedia says about Michael Robertson: "Michael Robertson (born 1967) is the founder and former CEO of MP3.com, which quickly became one of the most popular Internet music sites. In the years following his departure from MP3.com, Robertson launched several small start-up companies, including Linspire, SIPphone, MP3tunes, and Ajax 13..."
In an interview today with Linux-Watch, controversial Linux leader Kevin Carmony confirmed rumors that he had resigned as CEO of desktop Linux vendor Linspire on July 31. Carmony said he plans to work on several of his own business projects, and on Mitt Romney's presidential campaign.
Carmony said that, after six years at Linspire, it was time to move on. Projects he plans to work on include continuing as Chairman of the Board of Sadie's, a nationwide children's photography studio chain, and serving as CEO of Dating DNA, an online dating service based on social networks. In addition, Carmony will be working more on Mitt Romney's campaign to become the Republican candidate for the U.S. Presidency in 2008.
While he may be leaving Linspire, Carmony said, "I will always be a big supporter of Linspire and desktop Linux." And, "I will always be a desktop Linux user."
Carmony also said that Linspire is stronger than ever. "I can't speak for Linspire now, but I believe the upcoming release of Freespire 2.0 and open CNR (Click N' Run) will be great for Linspire and desktop Linux."
"With the new Freespire coming along, the continued push of Linspire to our OEMs [original equipment manufacturers], and CNR making it easy for other Linux desktop distribution users to install software, Linspire is doing great, and it was time for someone else to take it forward from here," Carmony added.
Carmony also said his resignation, contrary to some rumors, had nothing to do with any disagreement with Linspire's primary owner Michael Robertson, or with fallout from either of Linspire's recent deals with Microsoft, which covered technology licensing and patent indemnification.
Carmony joined Linspire, then known as "Lindows," in June of 2001 to become its president. Later, he became the company's CEO...
A December 11, 2009 injunction prepared by Stutz law firm and signed by Judge Judith Hayes of San Diego Superior Court says I am permanently banned from mentioning the names of Stutz law firm or its lawyers. This injunction is clearly unconstitutional. But Judge Hayes knows that, right? She's read the following cases, I trust. Or is it possible that she simply doesn't understand constitutional law?
Yesterday, a California appellate court struck down a brazenly unconstitutional preliminary injunction prohibiting two defendants from making "false and defamatory statements" about, or publishing the "confidential personal information" of, Thomas Evans, a deputy sheriff in San Diego. The case, Evans v. Evans, 2008 WL 2009669 (Cal. Ct. App. May 12, 2008), involves a nasty post-divorce dispute between Thomas Evans and his former wife, Linda Evans, and her mother, Shirley Preddy. Linda and Preddy allegedly posted false statements about Thomas on various websites, filed complaints about him with his employer, and published confidential information from his medical and financial records on the Internet. The lower court granted Thomas a broad preliminary injunction against their alleged misconduct, without specifying any particular forbidden statements or defining what "confidential personal information" means.
The appellate court held that the preliminary injunction was an unconstitutional prior restraint on speech, and that it was unconstitutionally vague because it failed to alert Linda and Preddy as to what conduct would violate the court's order. The case itself is relatively prosaic; it is interesting largely because it demonstrates yet again just how unfamiliar many lower court judges are with basic First Amendment principles. Beyond that, it tells us two important things about California law relating to prior restraints:
1. The venerable principle that courts cannot enjoin alleged defamation before trial still holds despite the Calfornia Supreme Court's decision in Balboa Island Village Inn, Inc. v. Lemen, 40 Cal.4th 1141 (2007). Not a huge surprise. According to Evans, Balboa means only that a court may order a defendant not to make certain specific statements found at trial to be false and defamatory.
2. A court has more leeway to prohibit the publication of private personal information than to prohibit publication of allegedly false statements... the lower court would be "fully justified" in prohibiting the disclosure of Thomas's telephone number, address, and Social Security number on the Internet, especially because he is a police officer...
BALBOA ISLAND ALLOWS COURTS TO ISSUE PRIOR RESTRAINTS ONLY FOR SPECIFIC STATEMENTS THAT HAVE BEEN FOUND TO BE DEFAMATORY
The California Supreme Court ruled last week that it is constitutional for courts to issue limited injunctions prohibiting defendants from repeating statements that were determined at trial to be defamatory.
The ruling arose from a case where the defendant, Anne Lemen, vocally criticized and protested the noise and activities occurring at a bar, the Balboa Island Village Inn, close to her home.
According to the court's majority opinion, Lemen told the neighbors that there was child pornography, drug dealing, and prostitution going on in the Village Inn. She also videotaped customers and made derogatory comments to employees.
In October 2001, the Village Inn sued Lemen for nuisance, defamation and interference with business, and sought a court order against Lemen.
The trial court agreed with the Village Inn and granted a permanent injunction prohibiting Lemen from contacting the inn's employees; from repeating certain defamatory statements, including that the bar "acts as a whorehouse" and "encourages lesbian activities"; and from filming within 25 feet of the Village Inn. The order applied not just to Lemen but also "her agents" and "all persons acting on her behalf."
The appeals court overturned most of the injunction...
For the past year I've gotten the chills every time I thought of the years Judith Hayes spent as a criminal judge. If she treated me with so much contempt, and disregarded the law in my case, I reasoned she must have done the same thing to at least some criminal defendants, particularly the ones who didn't have their own lawyers. (Public defenders are so overworked they simply don't have time to give a lot of time to each defendant.) I wonder how many falsely-accused people went to jail because of Judith Hayes.
Click on image to enlarge.
See the injunction on which this ruling is based. According to case law, this injunction is wildly unconstitutional.
I was surprised recently when I read that Judith Hayes was actually ousted from the criminal courts. I was further surprised that her removal was not for behavior such as what I have witnessed. In fact, she was boycotted by Bonnie Dumanis because of her surprising leniency to at least one particular criminal defendant:
...Hayes was boycotted just months after Dumanis took office in 2003. The former state and federal prosecutor now hears civil cases in downtown San Diego.
She was challenged soon after dismissing murder charges in the middle of a trial against Michael Savala, who was accused of fatally shooting two bouncers at a Bonita restaurant after the prosecution had presented its case... --San Diego Union Tribune
Here's the problem with what Judge Hayes' decision, and the reason Bonnie Dumanis was so outraged. The killer went home and got a weapon and came back and committed the murders. That's definitely NOT a classic crime of passion. There is a BIG question here, which requires the taking of evidence and a jury's finding of fact (not a judge's): what was the killer's psychological state? Judge Hayes isn't God. She doesn't know the answer to this question. A more restrained and respectful jurist would have had the jury decide this question. But this leaves me wondering why Judge Hayes did this. What would possess a Republican conservative to suddenly go soft on a criminal?
I have to agree with Bonnie Dumanis that Judge Hayes can not be trusted to appropriately apply the law.
The injunction ruling on which the above contempt finding is based is being appealed.
RELATED STORY: BLOG BLOCKED IN CHINA See posts about Google and China.
It's a mystery why this blogger removed an important story from her blog in China. I'm thinking she probably didn't get a call from Judge Judith Hayes. I'll bet she got a call from someone even scarier.
HONG KONG — A Hong Kong actress-singer has removed a news story about an activist's court case from her mainland Chinese blog, purportedly to placate angered fans, underscoring the difficulty of navigating sensitive subjects in China's tightly controlled cyberspace.
Hong Kong entertainer Gigi Leung on Wednesday posted an excerpt of a news story about the trial of Zhao Lianhai on her blog hosted by mainland Internet company Sina Corp., Leung's agent, Jacky Wong, told The Associated Press in a phone interview Thursday.
Zhao had advocated on behalf of parents whose children were sickened in a tainted milk scandal and pleaded innocent to charges of inciting social disorder on Tuesday.
But Leung removed the posting later the same day, Wong said, sparking speculation that the Hong Kong actress-singer was bending to Chinese censors. "Gigi Leung is muzzled," Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily wrote in a headline...
