Some recent reflections on former DC Madam civil attorney Montgomery Blair Sibley

I've been torn about this man for some time. I don't believe him to be dishonest. Perhaps referring to him as "eccentric" or even "off-the-hook" is accurate, but I never experienced any dishonest or dishonorable acts at his hand. His representation of Obama accuser and homosexual hustler and con artist Larry Sinclair wasn't to my liking, but then, I think I understand what that was about (more on that one day). His attempts to reopen the DC Madam case for a retrial was appropriate as well as brave, it was what gentlemen do under such deplorable circumstances and Sibley is a unique kind of an aristocrat to put it mildly.

Maybe he's Don Quixote, maybe his behavior has been peculiar. Maybe his fixation on his Scottish heritage is archaic. Yes, his behavior has sometimes been peculiar.

However: He was zealous in the defense of Deborah Jeane Palfrey. His constitutionally-based suits against the Supreme Court were principled. His love for his son is clearly genuine, sincere. His humanism is apparent. He has been a threat to established power that's corrupt as well as sadistic and has inflicted itself on the American public via the power of the state. He's not getting rich from charging windmills and I suspect that he's not even remotely how he's been portrayed in the mainstream press, notably by the Washington Post. Indeed, he's drawn to the spotlight like a moth and his being driven from the legal profession could have had merit to it, but that wasn't valid based on his actions in the DC Madam case, albeit that it was probably the main reason for it in the end.

His recent attempts at co-founding a medical marijuana growing space in the nation's capital has my moral support. Other actions by him do not, but what do I know about all of them? What does the press? They don't appear to know very much in any detail. Yes, he "wore a kilt" (traditional, no underwear and he also plays the bagpipes) at his appearance with Larry Sinclair to the National Press Club when his "client" was supposed to present his evidence that he'd snorted coke and had sex with the future presidential candidate in a limousine in Chicago over a decade ago. Sinclair had no evidence. Yet, I cannot come to any conclusions about the man. He's part of our history, for better or worse, and he's terrifically complicated to the extent that he defies one. What would his ancestors like Hiram Sibely be like now? Probably a lot like him, and I leave it at that. He's an anachronism. There are far worse things to be these days.

Montgomery Blair Sibley: Well hung?

"I asked him to wear a suit and tie."

--Obama-accuser, Larry Sinclair.

Washington D.C./Florida--For those of you who don't know the story of Obama accuser Larry Sinclair, count yourself lucky. Sinclair has been claiming for some time that he had coke-fueled sex with the presidential candidate in a limousine in Gurnee, Illinois way back in 1999. Right, he's an annoying liar and an idiot.

Can he prove it? No. Does he have a criminal record? Yes, dating-back 27 years. Is he so incredibly ugly that nobody in their right mind would fuck him, and certainly wouldn't be paying him for the sex? Correct. Is he insane? Probably, but some (other) bloggers wrote things that hurt his feelings, calling him a liar (which we can assume is accurate), and he tried to sue them. Now it's clear that he's just a disturbed sociopath. [Ed., 07.31.2009: and probably still is.]

By all appearances, Sinclair's going to keep trying, we can assume it's going to go nowhere and that he's going to lose miserably in any courtroom that would be stupid enough to accept his presence. Who would represent someone like this? Enter Montgomery Blair Sibley, an attorney I've actually communicated with: Sibley is currently suspended from practicing law in the District of Columbia and the State of Florida, apparently for frivolous litigation and filings.

In case you don't already know, Mr. Sibley was the third sequential attorney [Ed., 07.31.2009: partly-true--as criminal her counsel, but he was civil counsel very early on until January 2008.] for the troubled DC Madam, Jeane Palfrey. Palfrey fired Sibley sometime in January of this year, re-replacing him with her former criminal attorney, Preston Burton. Burton is currently representing the estate of Palfrey, but that's not stopping Sibley from trying to re-enter the picture. [Ed.,08.28.2008-This isn't to say that Burton is pure or unsullied in his motives, which remain unclear.] More on that later.

On Wednesday, Sinclair and counsel Sibley held a press conference at the National Press Club so that Sinclair could convey "evidence" of his alleged one night stand with Barack Obama. I wasn't there, and I'm glad. Anyone can rent a room there for such purposes, and reports state that Sinclair paid-out $4,100 USD for...I don't know what for. The stories are already becoming legend, but it's obvious that Sinclair has no evidence whatsoever, and that he was clutching his last 15 minutes of fame as hard as he could. In the spirit of things, counsel Sibley did likewise, and appeared at the press conference in a kilt. Yes, you read it correctly: a kilt.

Sibley was asked why he was wearing the kilt by an exasperated journalist, possibly from Reason magazine. Sibley's reply, from Huffington Post: "I don't know why men wear pants. It's a function of male genitalia. If you're size normal or smaller, you're probably comfortable with [pants]. ... Those at the other end of the spectrum find them quite confining." In other words, he's saying that he's well-hung. Where is this coming from? Why all the filings of motions and complaints in the courts?

Sibley grew up in Rochester, N.Y., one of six siblings. "We're a big family, but nobody is crazier than Blair," says Harper Sibley Jr., Sibley's father and now a prominent South Florida developer. Sibley played rugby and several other sports with so much aggression that his father often picked him up from the hospital. Sibley's ambitions soon turned to the law. He graduated from the University of Miami and later from Albany Law School at Union University, returning to his hometown district attorney's office as a prosecutor for the next five years. After losing his bid for district attorney in 1987, Sibley headed to Miami. ("The Man Behind the Madam," Law.com, 03.30.2007)

Comparing the M.O. of the Sinclair case with Palfrey's, it's not hard to understand why hers just kept going-and-going-and-going, seemingly without end. Certainly, the client, the government, and her counsel contributed to this fact. Palfrey was clearly a troubled and disturbed individual, but is Sibley?

For that, we'll all have to wait-and-see, but there appear to be columns of thick, black smoke rising from the embattled attorney and his quest for the white whale. The prognosis is not good, not at all, especially considering that Sibley technically cannot represent Sinclair in D.C., though it's possible he could in New York and New Jersey. If any of this is about anything at all it's money, the American Dream (really a nightmare). Jeane, you should have taken the plea deal...

"The Man Behind the Madam," Law.com, 03.30.2007: http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1175159039205

Montgomery Blair Sibley's May 8th Suspension from Practicing Law in the District of Columbia: http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/5/16/1914169/sibley-dc-suspension.pdf

The Florida Bar on Montgomery Blair Sibley: http://www.floridabar.org/names.nsf/0/686B8824E4A5B00185256A8400151BDD?OpenDocument

"The Colorful Case of a Well-Named Lawyer," the Washington Post, 05.04.2007: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/03/AR2007050302233.html

Revised 06.23.2008

Postscript, 07.31.2009: At this point, considering the incredibly crappy coverage surrounding the Palfrey scandal and numerous others during the Bush II administration, I have to question the veracity of the Washington Post article. I'd also add that while Mr. Sibley might be considered eccentric, I've never seen any indication he had any nefarious intent as an attorney or a private citizen. Why he would wear a kilt to events like this is probably a matter of "doing battle." I can see and hear wise-ass journalists mocking him and Sibley making his retorts that were then conflated into a lot more than they really constituted. Such is public life...