Update for June 24, 2013: Bruce Leichty files two new motions

On June 20, 2013 Ellen Mariani’s attorney, Bruce Leichty, filed two motions directed to the Second Circuit Federal Court of Appeals.  He filed: (1) an Emergency Motion For An Order Requiring That All Future Motions In This Case Be Considered By Different Judges From Those Who Issued The 5/15/13 Decision; and (2) a Motion For An Order Vacating The 6/14/13 Order And Asking The Court To Reconsider The Rulings (dated 5/30/13 and 6/14/13) Which Prevented The Filing Of The Petition For Rehearing En Banc. 

One of the arguments Bruce made in both of these motions is that the court issued the 5/15/13 order which issued sanctions against and harshly condemned both Bruce and Ellen only after the mandate had been issued, which was improper, and then the court would not allow Bruce to respond because the mandate had issued.  A “mandate” is a document issued by an Appeals Court and sent to the lower court after the Appeals Court is done with an appeal.  It returns jurisdiction of the case back to the lower court.  No activity is supposed to happen in the Appeals Court with a given case after the mandate is issued because the Appeals Court no longer has jurisdiction (except that it is possible in some cases for an Appeals Court to recall a mandate and then it could act).  What the Appeals Court did was it waited until after the mandate had issued and then, in violation of basic legal principles, it issued its vitriolic 5/15/13 order.  But then when Bruce sought to respond by filing the Petition For Rehearing En Banc, the court said that the mandate had already issued and that therefore Bruce could not file his petition.  This was a kind of trick that Judge Carney and Judge Hall of the Appeals Court used to deny Ellen her basic right to file a Petition For Rehearing En Banc and to prevent any other judges from reviewing their corrupt and demented handling of Ellen’s appeal.

Update for June 18, 2013: The court issued an order dated 6/14/13 denying Ellen’s motion to overrule notice of defective filing and to allow filing of the Petition For Rehearing En Banc

The Second Circuit Federal Court of Appeals issued an order dated 6/14/13 which denied Bruce Leichty’s motion, dated 5/31/13, which sought to (1) overrule clerk Catherine Wolfe’s Notice Of Defective Filing dated 5/30/13 (which prevented Bruce from filing his Petition For Rehearing En Banc), and (2) to file the Petition For Rehearing En Banc of Ellen Mariani’s Appeal.  (A petition for rehearing “en banc” means that one is seeking to get a full panel of judges to review a decision, as opposed to just the small panel of judges who initially reviewed the appeal.)  In essence this means that this little cabal of judges along with clerk Wolfe are trying to make sure that no other judges besides them get to see Ellen Mariani’s appeal.  They are saying that Bruce does not even have a right TO FILE a Petition For Rehearing En Banc.  Only judges Susan Carney and Peter Hall have been permitted to review Ellen’s appeal, the same two judges whose vitriolic 5/15/13 order excoriated Bruce and Ellen and issued sanctions against each of them and condemned them as “anti-Semitic” for merely showing improper connections of Judge Hellerstein to the Israeli defendants in this case (in his filings dated 4/19/12).  (The Petition for Rehearing en Banc also sought review of the 6/26/12 summary order denying Ellen’s underlying appeal.)

Hey Judge Carney and Judge Hall, what are you afraid of?  Are you afraid that if other judges looked at this appeal they would see that your conduct was very unlawful and that it violated Ellen’s basic rights?

The conduct of these two judges constitutes abuse of power and it violates not only Ellen Mariani’s rights but it also even violates the rights of the court itself, since the other judges are wrongly being prevented from reviewing this case.

After Judge Hellerstein oversaw a process in which every single one of the approximately 100 cases which sought a trial (instead of taking the government hush money from the Victims’ Compensation Fund) after a family member died on 9/11 was forced to settle out of court without any trial, Judges Carney and Hall are doing all they can to stamp the legal life out of the one remaining case which is still trying to find justice in the courts.

Update for 6/1/13: The clerk of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals refuses to allow Ellen Mariani to file her Petition For Rehearing En Banc of the 5/15/13 order

Ellen Mariani’s attorney, Bruce Leichty, attempted on 5/29/13 to file a Petition For Rehearing En Banc of the 5/15/13 order of the Second Circuit Federal Court of Appeals (which strongly castigated both him and Ellen, alleging that he was “anti-Semitic” and that he had acted in “bad faith” and that he had filed frivolous briefs).  However, the clerk of the court, Catherine Wolfe, refused to file it and sent Bruce a Notice Of Defective Filing.  However, Bruce argues that she was overstepping her authority in doing this because she based her position on a legal analysis of some of the details of the motion, details which were argued inside that motion.  That is a decision that should be made by a judge, not a clerk of the court.  (See discussion in the MEMORANDUM OF APPELLANT ELLEN MARIANI IN SUPPORT OF EMERGENCY MOTION FOR ORDER OVERRULING NOTICE OF DEFECTIVE FILING, ALLOWING FILING OF PETITION FOR EN BANC REHEARING, AND FOR RECALL OF MANDATE IF NEEDED.)  Bruce called her and tried to discuss the matter with her.  She hung up on him.  (See Bruce’s affidavit [after the Memorandum of law], paragraphs 3-5.)  Bruce was forced to file an additional motion just to try to get the Petition For Rehearing En Banc filed and considered.  (That motion includes the following documents as attachments: the Notice Of Defective Filing; the Petition For Rehearing En Banc; the Second Circuit Court of Appeals’s 5/15/13 order; and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals’s 6/26/12 order.  That motion also includes an affidavit from Bruce which refutes many of the false positions contained in the 5/15/13 order [in particular see pages 8-17 of that affidavit].)

Vincent Gillespie was interviewed on Inside The Eye Live! with Dennis Fetcho on 6/1/13.  You can listen to that interview by clicking here.