"Prosecutors in the office who handled the case were quite anguished about how that turned out. Nobody was happy with that result." --Outgoing U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeffrey A. Taylor.
Washington D.C.--This is something else: soon-to-be ex-U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeffrey A. Taylor is saying that the suicide of Deborah Jeane Palfrey upset members of the prosecution and that it was a "shock" when she committed suicide on May 1st, 2008.
Funny that they suddenly get all teary-eyed after their absurd zealousness in prosecuting her to the point of death.
This is a lie and Taylor is a black liar who's hiding something along with his associates. That something is that he and the prosecution had ample reason to think that Palfrey was unstable, might kill herself and did nothing about it.
Even as a low-level member of her defense team, I knew for certain by February 28th, 2008 that the defendant was unstable when she forwarded me and the rest of the defense team an exchange between herself and journalist Jason Leopold. Would it have mattered had I forwarded it to the prosecution or the Court? Doubtful, and I wasn't going to violate attorney-client privilege when my contact with her was only via email. There wasn't enough to go on, and others missed the import of the email entirely.
Jason… let’s put it like this, the bastards aren’t going to take me alive. Of course, anytime that you want to do an interview – I will make myself available. However, I doubt that I will be doing any interviews once I am in D.C., for the trial. –Best, Jeane
Yet Taylor is stating that he wasn't aware of how unstable Palfrey was. This is going to be found to be a lie, a fabrication to protect the members of the prosecution from gross negligence in their mishandling of the case, their over-zealousness, and the fact that a competency hearing should have been convened. Why wasn't this done? Ask Taylor and ask Federal District Judges Gladys Kessler and James Robertson.
Is this one of the reasons why Judge Kessler was removed from the case? Did she have an awareness that Palfrey was in fact suicidal? I haven't listened to the entire WTOP radio broadcast, but I assume that their own Neil Augenstein interviewed Jeffrey Taylor and D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier who was on-hand for gender backup so that the prosecution of the deceased didn't look too much like a victory for entrenched patriarchy (it was). Where were the other prosecutors like Catherine Connelley, William R. Cowden, and Daniel Butler? They must have been busy getting ready for the wave of firings with the new president coming into office in January 2009.
This comment by Taylor was illuminating:"That's not to say we're not uncomfortable with the havoc that [we] can wreak on the lives of these individuals. We are careful, but at the same time have an obligation having brought the charges to prove that case." ("Prosecutors 'quite anguished over D.C. Madam's suicide," WTOP, 12.04.2008) He omits "we" in the sentence, so I reinserted it for his (and our) edification.
The Palfrey prosecutors should be "anguished" over it alright, they destroyed her life, humiliated over a dozen former escorts on the stand for a few days, and did their best to ensure that the defendant wouldn't receive a fair trial. They have a lot to feel "bad" about and it's this writer's humble curse that it haunts them until the day each of them die. I don't imagine that hey were asked by WTOP who leaked the unsigned warrant to The Smoking Gun's Bill Bastone, it being just another elephant in the room that they must ignore to get out of office safely, unscathed by civil suits from Palfrey's estate. Did they know Palfrey was suicidal?
They knew. They knew Palfrey was unstable and suicidal when she stated she wouldn't serve even one more day in prison several times in the mainstream media. When I decided to help her, I knew "this isn't going to end well. " It was obvious over time. They knew full-well that their case was political, but they lie because they got themselves into "quite" a mess. They knew they were doing their best to hide the identities of the "Johns" because many of them were either part of or had connections to the GOP in Washington D.C. Appointments have a way of working-out like this.
The WTOP article also contains a glaring mistake of its own. "Most of the former escorts subpoenaed to bolster the prosecution's claim that Palfrey ran a prostitution service managed to keep their identities secret before her federal racketeering and money laundering trial. " (ibid) This is factually incorrect, it wasn't "most," but a few of the girls did manage to stay hidden. Discovery documents contain a list of well over one hundred former escorts of Pamela Martin & Associates which was in-the-possession of the prosecution; they knew who almost all of them were. They settled on around fifteen of them to testify against Palfrey under immunity, meaning that they were busted at some point and forced to turn on her.
If USA Taylor wants to clear his and the rest of the prosecution's names, they should make the vast majority of documents related to the investigation and the prosecution available to the press, researchers, and historians. Transparency is key. With Ms. Palfrey now dead, there's no specific reason to keep these materials classified any longer...unless it was part of a larger investigation, which there have been indications of in the past. There is one thing that USA Jeffrey A. Taylor was honest about in the interview--Palfrey was offered several very good plea deals and she turned them all down.
In the fall of 2007, she conveyed to me that she almost took one of them, but by that point the prosecution wasn't offering much. For every reason, they should have seen very clearly that as an indicator of instability, she was not acting rationally in her own best interests. As a matter of fact, they most certainly did notice having reasonable proximity with her during negotiations. In addition, when she fired a couple members of her counsel at various points in the legal proceedings the papers were sealed by the Court. This is because they also knew she was unstable, maybe even suicidal. This could implicate the Court, the prosecution, and perhaps at least one of Palfrey's former counsels in the matter. One of them tried to do something about it, but for more on that one, you'll just have to wait...
Washington D.C.--It appears the actions and motions have begun, and that the public and Deborah Jeane Palfrey are going to see an actual pretrial process. In all fairness, both sides have caused the process to become prolonged.
However, it should be noted that these recent motions planned for her November 29th civil action hearing against former employee Paula Neble (aka "Paula Mactavish") have the element of trying to achieve some due process through discovery, the stage of the legal process when the plaintiffs and defendants exchange information, namely, the evidence against them. Well, at least in-theory.The government simply isn't letting the defendant see any of the evidence, or to question her accusers. This hasn't changed for several months on the government's side of the table. And of course, Palfrey has moved to suppress what one must presume is the very same evidence, or at least in-part. Where's Professor Moriarty and Colonel Mustard (Ron Roughead), or Dr. Van Helsing ? Rest assured: more subpoenas will be requested, and Kessler's going to have to approve some of them. Doctor! Doctor! You know--there are lots of Doctors and pedigree in all of this. Physician: heal thyself. Curiously, a WTOP article states that their research uncovered Neble has no doctorate.Yet, all this said, Palfrey has been significantly more forthcoming than the government in the discovery process, as site meter readings since as early as June at this site will demonstrate.The prosecution has certainly been getting their side of discovery, that's certain. Palfrey is not. Also, it has to be said that the government has likely leaked documents to the media from the inception of the public-side of this case. Indeed, the government made the case public through the leaking of e-mail excerpts published at www.thesmokinggun.com
, which most certainly came from employees of the United States Government (the plaintiff). This would mean the troubled Justice Department.
These improper leaks, and other similar examples of pretrial tainting, are what Judge Kessler should be paying attention to. She quite possibly has, however, as there have been several hits from the US Courts over the months. They have hardly been alone. There have been numerous hits from the Senate, the House, and even one from Senator David Vitter's home town of Metarie, Louisiana. From today's newsletter from Palfrey and her civil attorney, Montogmery Blair Sibley:As a result of Judge Kessler order of yesteday which set a hearing for Wednesday, November 28, 2007, at 10:00 a.m. in Courtroom 26A of the federal courthouse in Washington D.C. on whether the injunction prohibiting Jeane's suit against a former escort should be dissolved, Jeane has this day sought from the Clerk of Court subpoenas for Senator David Vitter and Harlan Ullman, former customers of Paula Neble, an independant-contractor escort of Jeane's escort service. (Palfrey Update #31 - Jeane seeks subpoena for Senator Vitter, 11.02.2007)
Why Kessler is erring on-the-side of the government's prosecution is likely a sad example of congressionally mandated federal district court procedures that were simply wrong-headed. Again, the question emerges: who are Deborah Jeane Palfrey's accusers? Paula Neble appears to be that lone name until trial, a fact which hasn't changed for almost a year now. Remember that the complaint filed by Palfrey towards the end of April against Neble and 15 other 'Jane Does?' Assistant U.S. Attorney William R. Cowden has done his best to quash all motions on this count, namely exposing the identies of her accusers. What are they hiding? In March, Judge Gladys Kessler put a stay on Palfrey's aforementioned civil action (formally, a complaint against Neble), which was at the request of the prosecution. Since Neble's what you might be called a 'cooperating witness,' it might be safe to assume that she has to testify against the defendant under some form of legal duress. A subpoena can answer the question of who Neble really is, as well as all the others unknown who are testifying against Palfrey. It can also provide specific evidence that the government is holding, such as the possibility that Sen. David Vitter and Harlan K. Ullman had illegal sex with "Dr." Neble (the Doctor is in, indeed) without Palfrey's knowledge, and even government misconduct in the proceedings.
The government is curiously guarded about its informants, many of whom have committed greater crimes than the people they testify against. It's a dishonest law enforcement and prosecutorial tool in-place of competence and good investigatory skills. No, subpoenas are going to have to be granted somewhere in all of this legal mess for the satisfaction of the public's right to know. This is a good part of why trials of this sort occur at all, for the sake of the public. The excuse that it would 'hamper investigations' sounds lame, as though the case is flimsy-at-best. Yet, Kessler continues to believe them. A discovery process would be logical, but are there things Kessler just doesn't want to know?
One would expect some form of an evidentiary hearing. At least, that's how normal trials are supposed to work, but this whole affair is anything but. Whether it's going to be present in this case and all its proceedings remains to be seen. We have a name as to whom David Vitter 'sinned' with, whatever that may mean, and her name is Paula Neble. This has been known since July, thanks to the aforementioned research of WTOP. Wendy? Are you listening? Lorena Bobbitt time has come.
Somehow, I think Vitter's "sinning" was more involved than Larry Craig's incident in a Minneapolis airport restroom. The public certainly deserves to know whether Senator Vitter violated prostitution laws along with Neble, and considering people like Ullman, Vitter, and Roughead are also involved, this can only be a political trial in the most obvious sense. At least Vitter's going to hear more nagging at home, and we should hope it's a little slice of hell.
Judge Kessler appears stuck-in-the-middle of this case with Palfrey in some regards. Interestingly, Harlan K. Ullman has vowed to testify against Palfrey in her criminal trial, and it's certain that Neble will too. In case after case, the use of informants has shown that they are often just criminals--frequently the ones who started the whole mess being presented to the courts--and that they're running the show more than their so-called 'masters,' the prosecution.
Note today's comment in the scuttled trial of former FBI Supervisor Lindley DeVecchio:
In a four-page decision that brought the trial of ex-agent Lindley DeVecchio to a stunning end Thursday, state Supreme Court Justice Gustin Reichbach said the FBI violated its own rules by allowing DeVecchio to court a known killer as an informant for well over a decade. "In the face of the obvious menace posed by organized crime, the FBI was willing ... to make a deal with the devil," Reichbach said in a hushed Brooklyn courtroom. "At best, the FBI engaged in a policy of self-deception, not wanting to know the true facts about this informant-murderer whom they chose to employ."
(AP, 11.02.2007, http://www.journalgazette.net/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071102/APA/711020609&template=apart)
Just note author Bill Keisling's work on the murder of Jonathan Luna for a good example of informant misconduct and the FBI's incompetence in handling them. The recent statement by Judge Reichenbach should be viewed as a warning.
If we allow such criminals too much credibility in our legal system, it could seriously wreck the public's faith in the rule of law, never mind our social peace. Considering that much of this is under the Bush Justice Department, and none of this should be a surprise. But the informant programs have been around a long-time. It's time to end them, they're endangering all of us.
Revised 11.07.2007
