The name “Tony Dolz” rang a bell, but not loudly enough for me to remember where I’d heard the name before. A little research was required in the Obama Conspiracy Theories archives. I think the first time I noticed the name was in a list of contributors to Orly Taitz. Dolz is back in the news, this time as a witness for Taitz.
I wrote previously about the question of whether Orly Taitz lied to a judge in the Liberi v. Taitz case, a defamation lawsuit involving multiple personalities in the birther movement. I took Orly’s side, perhaps mistakenly, but we’ll let the judge sort that out. The issue was the nature of sanctions in the amount of $4,000 assessed Taitz in the Taitz v. Obama case, and how Taitz represented them to the judge.
To my knowledge, no recording was made of the hearing before Judge Marginis on November 1 where the sanctions were imposed. Raicha, posting at The Fogbow, described it this way:
Then [Judge Marginis] tells Taitz that he is awarding sanctions not as a punishment but for cost shifting, to shift Oxy’s costs to her. Orders $4,000 to be paid personally by Taitz to Oxy, to Mr. Ritt’s client trust account. Mr. Ritt to give notice of the ruling.
According to a new affidavit, Tony Dolz was there too, and his version is:
I heard Judge Charles Marginis rule that Occidental College was to be awarded $4000 in order to shift the cost for attorney’s fees and travel expenses from the defendant to the plaintiff.
The two accounts are wholly consistent, and the same thing coming from “both sides of the fence” gives me a high level of confidence that this is what was said.
The affidavit was submitted as an exhibit in Orly Taitz’ response to an order to show cause (embedded at the end of this article) why the court shouldn’t string her up (figurative language) for lying.
First Taitz points out that the Court’s reporting order referred to “pending ethical, disciplinary or related matters regarding Orly Taitz” and she states (correctly, I think) that there were no pending matters related to her on October 22, 2012, when the order was issued.
We do not have a transcript of what Taitz told the Judge in the Liberi case on January 14, 2013 beyond the Court’s remark that it related to discovery. What Taitz says in her second point is that the said that the $4,000 award was for “discovery, that it was indeed a cost shifting of attorneys fees related to discovery.” The court noted that a “flurry” of filings were made on this question, but nothing of particular use.
Taitz counter charges that Plaintiffs falsified information provided to the Court by deleting 2 relevant pages from the papers filed by Occidental College in the Taitz case.
By the way, Taitz gives a shout out to RC and his fine radio show in her response, along with many other reasons for not getting involved in lawsuits if you can avoid it.
CDCA ECF 593 – Liberi v Taitz – TAITZ Response to OSC by Jack Ryan
The word “sanction” appears nowhere in CA 1987.1 or 1987.2. Moreover, because Obama had already been personally subpoenaed to produce his records, Oxy had no obligation to move to quash because they were exempted from doing so under 1987.1(c) . Thus the Oxy $4000 legal cost was optional.
[While Hermitian is banned, I thought it worth mentioning that the $4,000 award was not for a subpoena, but in defending against a motion to compel by Taitz. Doc]
IANAL, but I don’t think Taitz’s reply helped her any. Less than one-fourth of what she wrote was a reply to the judge’s very specific question about whether she lied when she said her fine was related to discovery. She goes into unrelated BS about Occidental’s lawyers, actions not taken by the previous judge in this case, accusations of Berg’s and Liberi’s misdeeds, etc. She just can’t stop herself from falling down every rabbit hole she comes across.
C.C.P. sec. 1987.2 are not “discovery sanctions”. There is case law to that effect.
Taitz either lied or was ignorant of what the sanctions were issued for or both.
I believe I posted it in another thread here, but the Notice of Ruling clearly states the sanctions were issued under 1987.2 which is not… not discovery.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/122025407/CA-Taitz-v-Obama-2012-11-01-Notice-of-Ruling
From Sterngard at Fogbow…
First City argues that section 1987.2 is in reality a discovery statute and that specific written findings are not required for an award of discovery sanctions. While we recognize that specific written findings are not required for issuance of sanctions in routine discovery disputes (Mattco Forge, Inc. v. Arthur Young & Co. (1990) 223 Cal.App.3d 1429 [273 Cal.Rptr. 262]), we cannot agree that treatment of sanctions pursuant to section 1987.2 falls within the same purview as issuance of discovery sanctions.
First City Properties, Inc. v. MacAdam (1996) 49 Cal.App.4th 507, 515.
emphasis added by me
But that’s not true.
The $4,000 award was explicitly issued in relation to the subpoena and Occidental’s motion to quash.
The declarations filed along with Occidental’s motion to quash the subpoena made that clear — Occidental’s lawyer did contact Taitz to ask her to drop the “motion”, and her response to that was to “serve” a subpoena by email. Occidental hired outside counsel only after receiving the subpoena, and the sanction were explicitly premised on the statute relating to subpoenas of consumer records.
Personally? Heh. Gard puts Herms to shame in all respects. I have a new favorite!
A more extended quote from the case Realist cites:
Link: http://law.justia.com/cases/california/caapp4th/49/507.html
Note the difference in the standards for issuing the sanction: in the “discovery” context, sanctions are mandated and the losing party has the burden of showing substantial justification in order to avoid the sanctions.
Under the consumer records subpoena statute, the sanctions are discretionary and awarded upon the court’s finding that the sanctioned party acted “in bad faith or without substantial justification.”
Honestly, does anything Orly file ever help her? Instead of taking any approach that might help her, coupled with a bit of humility, she went on the attack. Pretty much the only thing she could have done worse was call this trial judge complicit if he hits here with more sanctions.
While even a blind acorn can find a squirrel from time to time, with Orly, she couldn’t find the acorn if you put it in her hands.