California Commission on Judicial Performance Assessed FAILing Grade for Judicial Accountability in National Government Corruption Study

The California Commission on Judicial Performance and Director Victoria B. Henley are responsible for judicial oversight and accountability in the state.

Read the full article at the San Jose Mercury News. 

California Supreme Court Corruption: Whistleblowers Charge Supreme Court Justices with Enabling Bias Against the Poor in Family Courts

California Supreme Court Justices Tani Cantil-Sakauye, Ming Chin, Leondra Kruger, Carol Corrigan, Goodwin Liu, Mariano Cuellar and Kathryn Werdegar are accused of enabling family court bias against financially disadvantaged and disabled "pro per" litigants who cannot afford to hire a lawyer.

Institutionalized Socioeconomic Bias 

California Supreme Court judges are ignoring and thereby enabling systemic bias against the poor in family courts throughout the state, Judicial Branch reform advocates have charged.  

Earlier this year, Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye and the state Judicial Council were engulfed in a nationwide firestorm of controversy when a report released by the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area revealed that traffic courts throughout the state were trapping the poor in long cycles of poverty using fines, fees and driver license revocations. 

Family court whistleblowers have catalogued examples showing that similar, institutionalized socioeconomic bias occurs in family courts, where more than 70 percent of court users cannot afford to hire an attorney. "This is a statewide epidemic of the same scale as the traffic courts scandal," said Ulf Carlsson, a whistleblower and former state employee. "Like they did in that debacle, the Supreme Court is playing deaf, dumb and blind to the problems." 

Sacramento Family Court News, an online, nonprofit journalism organization recently published an investigative report compiling court scandals attributed to Judicial Council Chair Tani Cantil-Sakauye. To view the report, click here. Other sources of news and information about socioeconomic bias in state courts include the California Supreme Court & Judicial Branch Report Tumblr, and the Judicial Misconduct Facebook Community. 

Commission on Judicial Performance Controversy: Judge Discipline Process Secrecy Questioned

The Commission on Judicial Performance and Director Victoria B. Henley have long been criticized for excessive secrecy when investigating allegations of judge misconduct in California. 

A Central Valley political science professor has published an editorial criticizing the state Commission on Judicial Performance for conducting secretive, "under the radar" deliberations when it considers allegations of judge misconduct brought by the public. After he filed a complaint against a court commissioner - which was summarily dismissed by the CJP - Tamir Sukkary was surprised at what he learned about CJP procedures. 

"[I] found out from my state senator's office that the CJP's meetings are neither open to the public, nor subject to the California Public Records Act, Brown Act or Freedom of Information Act," Sukkary wrote. "Not even the CJP clerical staff is allowed to attend during deliberations. Why is the commission operating in such a secretive fashion? Isn't the commission supposed to be serving the public?"

The full editorial is posted below, or at this Scribd page. Sukkary has been profiled by CBS News in Sacramento and runs a YouTube Channel featuring educational videos on political science and the Middle East. For additional reporting about the CJP, visit California Commission on Judicial Performance News.   

CJP Secrecy Questioned by Academic in Daily Journal Editorial: Deliberations of Judicial Watchdog Should Be... by California Judicial Branch News Network - Independent Investigative Reporting on California Courts

Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye Starves Courts of Funding, Spends Millions on Limo and Security Service for High Court Judges

Judicial Council Chair Tani G. Cantil-Sakauye Caught on Camera Using Highway Patrol as Personal Taxi Service

Tani Cantil-Sakauye caught in the act by News10 in Sacramento.

ABC News10 in Sacramento has caught California Supreme Court Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye in the act of using the California Highway Patrol as a personal taxi and security service at taxpayer expense.

Emmy Award winning News10 investigative reporter Thom Jensen and his photographer tailed Cantil-Sakauye and her personal, armed CHP officer and driver to her home in a gated community in the Sacramento area.

As the video records, Jensen received an inhospitable reception from the chief justice and her CHP valet. At minute 1:40 of the clip, former 3rd District Court of Appeal Justice Arthur Scotland is caught on camera telling a lie to cover for Cantil-Sakauye - his long-time former colleague from Sacramento County Superior Court, the Third District Appellate Court, and the Deukmejian administration...

Click here to read the complete article at Supreme Court of California News.

Sacramento Superior Court Judge Matthew Gary Slated to Give Anti-Gay Talk at Local Evangelical Church

Sunday Satire by RoadDog

The Right-Wing Evangelical Church in Fair Oaks next Sunday will 

host a talk by Sacramento Superior Court Judge Matthew Gary.

In response to the US Supreme Court ruling issued earlier this year legalizing same-sex marriage, controversial Sacramento Superior Court Judge Matthew Gary will give a talk next Sunday on the effects of homosexuality on children.

"How the homos harm kids" is the title of a speech Gary will give at the Right-Wing Ideologue Evangelical Church in Fair Oaks, according to a press release from Gary's publicist and court clerk Christina Arcuri.

"The Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges is an outrage, and an outrage that will have far-ranging consequences," Gary is expected to rant.

"The legalization of same-sex marriage will cause irreparable harm to countless children throughout the United States. As a family court judge, I am an unimpeachable authority on this subject," Gary will rightly point out. "These gay homos are criminalizing Christianity and the beliefs of Evangelicals and someone must make a stand."

Judge Robert Hight Misconduct: Sacramento County Presiding Judge Rehires Ex-Con Judge Peter McBrien

Criminal Investigation Against Judge Peter McBrien: Whistleblower Leaked Report from Sacramento County District Attorney's Office

In 2000, Judge Peter McBrien faced
a felony criminal prosecution for
the destruction of trees in a
public park. 

The criminal investigation report of Judge Peter McBrien by Sacramento County District Attorney's Office Criminal Investigator Craig Tourte is embedded at the end of this post. To view additional records from the 2000 prosecution and conviction of McBrien, click here. To read the Sacramento News and Review cover story about the case, click here. 

In 2009, McBrien was caught lying under oath to the Commission on Judicial Performance about the circumstances surrounding his 2000 criminal conviction. 

Court watchdogs allege that the judge also is responsible for a family court criminal racketeering enterprise involving collusion and kickbacks between judges and divorce attorneys who also work as part-time judges in the same court. Click here for an investigative report by Sacramento Family Court News. 

McBrien retired from the bench in 2014, but was authorized to continue working as a family court commissioner by controversial Sacramento County Presiding Judge Robert Hight and troubled family court Supervising Judge James Mize. 

To continue reading, click Read more >> below: 

Judge James Mize Corruption, Cronyism: Rehires Dishonest, Controversial Judge Peter J. McBrien

Perjury and Lies by Judge Peter McBrien Documented by the Commission on Judicial Performance in Whistleblower Leaked Records

Sacramento Superior Court Judge Peter McBrien's personal vendetta
against Ulf Carlsson was detailed and reenacted in the 2014
documentary Divorce Corp.

False testimony under oath by Judge Peter McBrien is documented by the Commission on Judicial Performance in this set of whistleblower leaked documents, embedded below. The CJP is the state agency responsible for the oversight and accountability of judges in California. 

McBrien's serial misconduct in the Carlsson divorce case led to his prosecution by the CJP and was chronicled in the 2014 documentary film Divorce Corp. To view a clip from the movie featuring an interview with Ulf Carlsson describing what a court of appeal judge called McBrien's "judicial reign of terror," click here.

To continue reading, click Read more >> below: