The Sixth Amendment in the Bill of Rights
guarantees that "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused
shall...have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense," and that
principle has been reaffirmed in a
number of Supreme Court cases.
However, it is quite one thing for the
courts to rule, yet someone must pay for the services required.
In the wave of civil rights legislation in the 1970's Congress
established the
Legal Services Corporation (LSC)
as a nonprofit corporation funded under the
LSC Act
originally passed in 1974, and amended in 1977, 1997, and 2000.
In Section 1001 of the LSC Act the
Congress found and declared that:
(1) there is a need to provide equal
access to the system of justice in our Nation for individuals
who seek redress of grievances;
(2) there is a need to provide high
quality legal assistance to those who would be otherwise unable
to afford adequate legal counsel and to continue the present
vital legal services program;
(3) providing legal assistance to those
who face an economic barrier to adequate counsel will serve best
the ends of justice and assist in improving opportunities for
low-income persons consistent with the purposes of this Act.
(4) for many of our citizens, the availability of legal services
has reaffirmed faith in our government of laws;
(5) to preserve its strength, the legal services program must be
kept free from the influence of or use by it of political
pressures; and
(6) attorneys providing legal assistance must have full freedom
to protect the best interests of their clients in keeping with
the Code of Professional Responsibility, the Canons of Ethics,
and the high standards of the legal profession.
As many
government operations do, things didn't quite turn out that way.
The LSC is currently charged with funding
and monitoring their Grantees, who provide free (actually
greatly reduced cost) criminal and civil legal aid in the United
States with a $300+ million budget. LSC funds
138 legal aid programs with 700 offices
around the nation to help poor Americans gain equal access to
the judicial system.
Sitting judges in several states have
acknowledged that the filing of false claims of domestic
violence is both pervasive and that employees of LSC Grantees
are among those scripting the statements of their clients in
these cases. Additionally, these judges have expressed their
concern over reluctance of their local district attorneys to
file charges against the participants in those actions and the
lack of redress the legal system and LSC offers to its victims.
First Phase
Passing mention to the above was made in
an opinion piece by author
Carey Roberts on May 17, 2006.
Following publication of Robert's article, the general contact
email address and offices of
True Equality Network (TEN)
were inundated with unsolicited contacts from victims of the
complaints listed in the letter below to Mr. Kirt West,
Inspector General of Legal Services Corporation. Presently TEN
has received over six thousand contacts.
As a result of these thousands of
complaints, TEN began to collate, compile, and produce a letter
seeking redress from the LSC Office of Compliance and
Enforcement (LSC-OCE) presented below and mailed June 19th.
Numerous groups, tabulated at the end of the letter, have joined
with TEN in requesting action on these grievances.
Second Phase
While TEN has presently documented
evidence of the abuses listed in the June 19, 2006, letter to
the LSC below, they are still assembling proof of more serious
allegations that include the use of physical torture to coerce
confessions/agreements to domestic violence accusations
sanctioned or supported by LSC grantees. Unlike the civil rights
issues, that only required review of the documentation to
validate the alleged victims complaint, claims of physical
torture requires medical-forensic evaluation to validate.
These cases are very time consuming and
expensive to investigate and TEN started by investigating the
worst cases first, of which there are now 27 verified cases out
of the many who complained. Given logistical and financial
constraints it is impossible to move quickly on this project as
most of the putative victims are uninsured and live in diverse
locations.
In the worst cases the defendant -
alleged abuser - was imprisoned without charges being filed,
held without bail, sleep deprived, not fed, kept in cold rooms
with little clothing, not allowed to lie down, kept shackled,
and denied access to legal counsel.
During their imprisonment some defendants
were stripped naked, doused with water then "stun-gun/tasers"
were applied to their genitals. This was repeated until they
confessed/agreed to the complaint against them. This practice
leaves permanent scaring with distinctive patterns that can be
forensically verified against their account of the actions and
the type of stun-gun/taser used in the assault.
If you know of any such victims, or
victims of other methods of physical torture, please contact
Terri Lynn Tersak.TEN
has been advised to have the victims tested locally near their
area of residence, then to have all the evidence reevaluated by
one group of forensic pathologists. The testing and reevaluation
takes about three weeks total and costs roughly $1,700 per
victim. Obviously, financial support is needed for this
investigation and TEN was required to embark on a fund raising
drive to cover the reevaluation costs. Currently several venture
capitalists and hedge fund operators have agreed to support the
investigation.
Terri Lynn Tersak
President & CEO, True Equality
Network
Charles E. Corry, Ph.D., F.G.S.A.
President, Equal Justice
Foundation
Re: Complaint of systemic
abuses by LSC Grantees and the failure of LSC-OCE to respond.
Monday, June 19, 2006
Kirt West, Inspector General
Legal Services Corporation
3333 K St NW
Washington DC 20007-3558
Tel: 202 295 1660
Fax: 202 337 6616
Dear Mr. West:
The undersigned individuals and
organizations are writing to request that your office initiate
an investigation of widespread abuses and the apparent failure
of Legal Services Corporation (LSC) to address them. The issues
covered in this complaint are outlined below and include:
systemic civil rights abuses, participation in filing of false
claims, failure to accept complaints, and other abuses by LSC
Grantees. To the best of our knowledge the LSC Office of
Compliance and Enforcement (LSC-OCE) has failed to respond to
complaints regarding an assortment of abuses.
Among the numerous abuses reported to us,
the following are most common:
Participation by employees of LSC Grantees
in:
- Filing false domestic violence claims.
- Scripting the statements for clients filing false claims of
domestic violence in what amounts to subornation of perjury.
- Refusing to accept complaints of abuses committed by
employees of LSC Grantees.
- Refusing to accept complaints of false claims made by
employees and clients of LSC Grantees.
- Misrepresenting services.
- Retaliation against abuse victims for filing complaints
against employees and clients of LSC Grantees.
- Blatant discrimination against males requesting service
including:
- Refusing services to men.
- Charging male clients as much as eights times the rates
charged to female clients.
Sitting Judges in several states have
corroborated the above in meetings and interviews with some of
the undersigned. They further acknowledged that the filing of
false claims of domestic violence is pervasive and that
employees of LSC Grantees are among those scripting the
statements of their clients in these cases. They have also
expressed their concern over reluctance of their local District
Attorneys to file charges against the participants in those
actions and the lack of redress the legal system and LSC offers
to its victims.
The information in the prior paragraph was
given passing mention in an
opinion piece by author Carey Roberts
on May 17, 2006. Within hours of the release of his article, the
general contact email address and offices of
True Equality Network (TEN)
were inundated with unsolicited contacts from the victims of the
complaints listed above and other egregious abuses. As of the
date of this letter, TEN has received over five thousand
contacts.
Of the complaints received, many
referenced a complete lack of response to complaints sent to
Legal Services Corporation's Office of Compliance and
Enforcement. This contradicts LSC-OCE's published mission
statement wherein it states, "Further, to respond promptly
and effectively to inquiries and complaints pertaining to
recipients filed by members of the public" as found on
this web page.
Many of the individuals who contacted us described acts of
retaliation committed against them. Retaliation included, but
was not limited to, false claims of abuse, some of which were
filed ex-parte on behalf of their minor children. Many of the
individuals who dared to file complaints have not seen or heard
from their children since as a result of the retaliatory actions
taken in response to their speaking out.
In other cases where a client of an LSC Grantee has complained
about one of their attorneys, they were assigned a different
attorney who worked first to calm the client's complaint. Then
when the case came before the court, the Grantee's new attorney
went on the attack against their putative client requesting that
the court punish them with every possible deprivation that the
court can deem applicable.
Complainants who have reported abuses to LSC Grantees concerning
the Grantee's employees are not being informed of the complaint
process available via LSC-OCE. The Grantees also strongly
suggest not submitting written complaints to them and often tell
the complainants there is no avenue of redress. However, most of
the complainants who have discovered, and then contacted LSC-OCE
have not received any response.
However, a significant number of the individuals that have sent
complaints to LSC-OCE, but received no response, have later
found themselves cornered, such as in waiting areas of the
courthouses, being berated by employees of the LSC Grantee
representing the adversary in their case. Further, the employees
of the LSC Grantee were able to cite verbatim the content of the
complaint the individual had sent to LSC-OCE. These complainants
have then been told that they should understand and accept that
there is no one that is going help them.
As a check on information provided us, some of the undersigned
have called several LSC Grantees requesting information about
filing complaints about them. The specifics of the replies vary,
e.g. call the Governor, your Congressman and such, but all
reflect a position that no such system as the LSC-OCE system is
in place.
When organizations such as True Equality Network receive
unsolicited pleas for help by the thousands from victims of
abuses of our publicly-funded legal system, it is decisive
evidence that the system as a whole has categorically failed in
its charge to serve the public and in the oversight of it
operations. When one takes into account that TEN does not offer
such support services, and the supplemental commentary of
sitting Judges proffered to us, it is reasonable to assume the
actual abuse rate is considerably higher than even what is
indicated by the thousands of comments we have so far received.
The opinion shared by the undersigned is that the current system
of reporting a complaint against an LSC Grantee is unreasonable,
unethical and lacks any moral foundation. Working within the
current system can be equated to someone who has been mugged.
Victims are then restricted to a complaint process that requires
them to report the crime only to their attacker. The system then
grants their attacker the exclusive authority to decide whether
to (a) turn themselves into the police for arrest (b) attack
their victim even more viciously to stifle their complaint. It
is quite apparent in the thousands of comments TEN has received
that LSC Grantees have chosen option (b).
When it was suggested to the complainants that they contact or
contact LSC-OCE again, the vast majority expressed a deep fear
of contacting anyone within the publicly-funded legal system
citing understandable fear of severe retaliation should they do
so. Most of these victims are devastated, financially and
emotionally as a result of both the abuses they have been
subjected to, and also the disastrous results of prior attempts
to file complaints.
In addition to the comments received from individuals, we
examined the LSC web site and found that the procedures for
filing a complaint with LSC-OCE against Grantees are not clearly
displayed on the LSC site. Rather this information in contained
among a myriad of documents none of which are displayed, linked
to on the LSC-OCE page, or can be found using common search
terms such as "complaint manual," "complaint procedures,"
"complaint instructions" on the LSC web site.
Contacts for complaints are located on just one page of the LSC
web site, identifiable only by the word "Complaints" listed in
parentheses among other terms following a contact's name and
prior to their email address. We suggest that a concise manual
of easy to follow instructions for filing complaints against LSC
Grantees needs to be developed. A direct link to this manual
must be prominently located in plain view on the LSC-OCE page on
the LSC web site. In addition, a "Complaints" link should be
added to the master menu system of the LSC web site at the top
level of the menu hierarchy.
The complaint reporting system must be completely independent of
the LSC Grantees and all personal and identifying information
submitted by any complainant must be kept strictly confidential.
LSC-OCE complaint investigations must be able to validate
complaints to the level of prima facie evidence where abuses are
indicated. Those claims and investigation results should be
submitted directly to the district attorney's office. Under no
circumstances should the claims and investigation results ever
be submitted to the LSC Grantee in question. Violating the
confidentiality of an individual's complaint is both unethical
and likely to contribute to their fear of seeking assistance
from LSC-OCE or LSC in general.
The complaint investigator must also be required to track the
progress of the complaint and report failures to the government
entities responsible for oversight and funding of the violators,
and to the Department of Justice when violations require their
intervention.
Additionally, it must become a requirement of grant compliance
(a) that LSC Grantees must display in their offices, in
prominent public view, accurate contact information for
submitting complaints to LSC-OCE against LSC Grantees, and (b)
that LSC Grantees must print the aforementioned contact
information for submitting complaints in all advertisements for
their services.
It is noted that in the LSC Office of
Inspector General report referenced below, "Interim Report on
Management Oversight of Grantees: Office of Compliance and
Enforcement," of 31 March 2006 it is stated that review of
LSC-OCE in relation to public complaints is among the LSC-OCE
responsibilities not included in the current OIG audit. This is
stated in reference item seven found in the footer of page 4 of
the "OBJECTIVES, SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY" section of the interim
report. The above referenced report was located on the
OIG webpage
as of June 1, 2006.
In view of the above, we believe that the LSC Inspector General
needs to conduct a broad inquiry to assess why LSC's current
policies and procedures have failed to prevent widespread abuses
of the public and our family courts by LSC Grantees, and why
LSC-OCE has failed to combat this trend. Based on those
findings, the Inspector General needs to make specific
recommendations designed to prevent a recurrence of these
serious abuses and violations of civil rights and the Inspector
General must then insure that these recommendations are
implemented.
In 1997, the United States Congress held public hearings to deal
with the horrific abuses by the Internal Revenue Service carried
out against the American taxpayers. Those abuses of citizens
pale in comparison to the daily occurrences in our nation's
family courts today. However, today employees of LSC Grantees
are among those inflicting the abuses on the public.
The public's perception of fairness and unbiased operation by
taxpayer-supported legal services will ultimately hinge on the
outcome of this investigation.
We await your response.
Sincerely,
Terri Lynn Tersak
President & CEO
True Equality Network
Richard L. Davis
Director
R.A.D.A.R.: Respecting Accuracy in
Domestic Abuse Reporting
Charles E. Corry, Ph.D., F.G.S.A.
President
Equal Justice Foundation
David Usher
President
American Coalition of Fathers and
Children - Missouri Coalition
David A. Roberts
Chairman,
American Coalition of Fathers and
Children
Wendy McElroy
ifeminists.com
Joseph D'Agostino
VP for Communications,
Population Research Institute
Michael J. Geanoulis,
President, NH Chapter
National Congress for Fathers &
Children
Mike LaSalle
Publisher
MensNewsDaily.com
Lisa Scott
TABS:
Taking Action Against Bias in the System
Jamil Jabr
Coordinator, Board Member
Fathers-4-Justice-US
Doug Parris
President
TheReaganWing.com
'
Marc Angelucci
President
National Coalition of Free Men, Los Angeles Chapter
Pastor Kenneth Deemer
Director
Shattered Men
L. Anton Jaks
Alliance of Non-Custodial Parents
Rights
Robert Muchnick
Executive Director
Center for Children's Justice
C. Thomas Shea
Businessowner
Dr. L. Ronald Hoover
Businessowner, Investor
G. Patrick Stillman
Venture Capitalist
Roy A. Getting
Fathers for Equal Rights
Jim Untershine,
Ground Zero Services
Tom Porter
Vision4Children
Harry Crouch
San Diego Men's Center
Marc Snider
NHCustody.org
Tom Smith
American Union For Men
Mark Klein, Ph.D.
Presidential Candidate 2008
Teri Stoddard
SharedParentingWorks.org
Brian Lovett
LoveisEarned.com
Charles Strange
Michigan Fix the Friend of the Court
Jeffrey W. Dick
Executive Director
Men's Custody Shelter Network
Roger W. Knight
www.antipeonage.0catch.com
Seattle, Washington
Robert Norton
Founder
FathersUnite.org
James Semerad
Chairman
Dads and Moms of Michigan
Mike East
FATHERS: Fathers Asking to Have Equal Rights
Lee Newman
Executive Director
Safe New Hampshire (Stop Abuse for
Everyone) www.safe-NH.org
Philip Lutz
Chairman, Philadelphia Chapter
Fathers' and Childrens' Equality (FACE)
Michael Burns
Dialogue on Sustainable Community
Revs. Sam and Bunny Sewell
Directors
Family Resources and Research
Steven Shepardson
Children Need Both Parents
Westfield, MA
Albert Schafer
President - San Diego Chapter
Coalition of Parent Support, Inc.
David L. Levy, J.D.
Chief Executive Officer
The Children's Rights Council
If you would like to add your name, or
the name of your group to the above list of those endorsing this
investigation please contact
Terri Lynn Tersak.
Copies of this letter were
also sent to the following individuals:
Karl Zinsmeister
Domestic Policy Advisor to the President
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Tel: (202) 456-1414
Fax: (202) 456-2461
Senator Susan M. Collins
Chairman, Senate Homeland Security
and Government Affairs Committee
461 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-2523
Fax: (202) 224-2693
Senator Richard Shelby
Chairman, Subcommittee on Commerce,
Justice, Science, and Related Agencies
110 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Tel: (202) 224-5744
Fax: (202) 224-3416
Senator Michael B. Enzi
Chairman, Senate Committee on Health,
Education,Labor, and Pensions
379A Senate Russell Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Tel: (202) 224-3424
Fax: (202) 228-0359
Senator Thad Cochran
Chairman, Senate Appropriations Committee
113 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-2402
Tel: (202) 224-5054
Fax: (202) 224-9450
Senator Richard Burr
217 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510
Tel: (202) 224-3154
Fax: (202) 228-2981
Representative Jerry Lewis
Chairman, U.S. House of Representatives
Appropriations Committee
2112 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Tel: (202) 225-5861
Fax: (202) 225-6498
Representative F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr.
Chairman, U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary
2449 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Tel: (202) 225-5101
Fax: (202) 225-3190
Representative Chris Cannon
U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Commercial and
Administrative Law
Washington Office
2436 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Tel: (202) 225-7751
Fax: (202) 225-5629
Representative Frank R. Wolf
U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee
Chairman, Subcommittee on Science,
the Departments of State, Justice, and Commerce,
and Related Agencies
241 Cannon Building
Washington, DC 20515
Tel: (202) 225-5136
Fax: (202) 225-0437
Issues of interest to the Equal
Justice Foundation http://www.ejfi.org/ are:
Civilization
http://www.ejfi.org/Civilization/Civilization.htm
Courts and Civil Liberties http://www.ejfi.org/Courts/Courts.htm
Domestic Violence http://www.ejfi.org/DV/dv.htm
Domestic Violence Against Men in
Colorado http://www.dvmen.org/
Emerson
case
http://www.ejfi.org/emerson.htm
Families and
Marriage http://www.ejfi.org/family/family.htm
Prohibitions and the War On Drugs http://www.ejfi.org/Prohibition/Prohibition.htm
Vote Fraud and Election Issues
http://www.ejfi.org/Voting/Voting.htm
_____________________________________________________________________________
The Equal Justice Foundation is a non-profit 501(c)(3)
corporation supported by members and contributions. Dues are $25
per year and you may join at http://www.ejfi.org/Join.htm.
Additional information about the Foundation can be found at
http://www.ejfi.org/Intro.htm. Ideas on what you might do to
help are outlined at http://www.ejfi.org/What_you_can_do.htm.
Contributions are tax deductible and can be made on the Web
at http://www.ejfi.org/join2.htm or by sending a check to the
address below. Federal employees in Colorado can contribute to
the EJF through the Combined Federal Campaign. We are listed in
four Colorado regions. In the Denver region our agency number is
4086. In Larimer County # 8032. In Weld County # 4022. In SW
Colorado (Mesa Verde-Durango) # A003.
______________________________________________
Charles E. Corry, Ph.D., F.G.S.A.
President
Equal Justice Foundation http://www.ejfi.org/
455 Bear Creek Road
Colorado Springs, Colorado 80906-5820
Personal home page: http://corry.ws
Curriculum vitae: http://www.marquiswhoswho.net/charleselmocorry/Default.aspx
The good men may do
separately is small compared with what they may do collectively.
Benjamin Franklin
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