Friday, July 20, 2012

Crocodile tears


CED led group - Joe Campbell, Nelson Rivera, Stephan Thomas and Kendra Hill have sent out an email blast under ‘What’s up with Arthur Schwartz and John Samuelsen?’ , their underlying message was Arthur Schwartz ‘violated his ethical obligation and the law.’
In their allegations there was some sort of communication between the two in the past so that would be enough grounds to ‘not serve as a counsel to the Elections Committee for the Local 100 officer elections this year’. One wonders if that past communication rises to the level of conflict of interest, and would confer such privilege to the CED led group to demand anything. It is unclear whether that past communication rises to the level of self-dealing ‘provided support, information and advice’ charge. Also whether they will be able to substantiate those allegations. It is also not known what else they would demand and allege in August, September, October, November and finally in December.
We have to remind the CED led group ‘One wonders how come this slate is not offering anything credible or tangible that would benefit the membership? Many have observed that those above were Roger Toussaint’s beneficiaries when he was in power. During Roger Toussaint era many agreements were signed that had the intention of eliminating titles such as conductors in Rapid Transit Operation as well as the CTA position in the Station Department in which Nelson Rivera and Stephan Thomas acquiesced.’
The other side of the coin is that usually when a lawyer violates his ethical obligation he is disbarred from practicing law and his law license is yanked by his state. Now the question for CED led group is if they believe they have evidence to back those charges then they should proceed directly to New York State to get Arthur Schwartz disbarred. That would be a public service because it will protect the public and the legal profession by ensuring that lawyers adhere to the ethical standards. However instead they have resorted to The Chief and email blast which have no power to disbar a lawyer. Thus one can conclude that it is innuendo nothing more nothing less or maybe they will allege they do not know the address of where to file the complaint - here it is. 
Departmental Disciplinary Committee
Supreme Court, Appellate Division
First Judicial Department
61 Broadway, 2nd Floor
New York, New York 10006
Telephone (212) 401-0800
For those who have evidence they can present it to New York State which does reprimand and discipline lawyers from crossing the line. In this case we can surmise that due to the lack of evidence presented by this CED led group they were unable to proceed to New York State. We also know New York State had disbarred former President Richard Nixon in 1976 for obstruction of justice and Ed Fagan, a New York lawyer who prominently represented Holocaust victims against Swiss banks was disbarred in New York in 2008. It is clear New York State has the ability to disbar lawyers, now do you believe the CED led group have truth in their allegation? Or is it crocodile tears?

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