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A Strand-by-Strand Unraveling of Judge Lee P. Rudofsky’s Web of Lies and Deceit – Chapter One

All the misstatements and outright lies told by Federal Judge Lee P. Rudofsky in his opinions on my case against debt buyer Portfolio Recovery Associates, LLC could not fit into a 13,000-word appellate brief.

Here I have no word limitation and no time constraint. It is the perfect place to expose the corrupt judge, hopefully blocking him from moving any further up the official court hierarchy.

Let’s start at the beginning of the order granting Summary Judgment in favor of Portfolio Recovery on all claims, docket number 173.

CONSOLIDATED ORDER1

Judge Rudofsky made ample use of footnotes. There are two things I look for when I am digging for deception. One is footnotes. (You’ll need to return for the next installment to find the other indicator.)

Footnote 1: “The Court is issuing two versions of this Order. The Court will file a redacted version on the public record. The Court will file an unredacted version under seal. Only Ms. Hammett, PRA, LLC, and PRA, LLC’s counsel may view the unredacted version of this Order. Neither party may share the unredacted version with anyone else or reveal the contents of the redacted information. If there is an appeal in this matter, the unredacted version of this Order should be filed under seal with the Eighth Circuit, unless the Eighth Circuit concludes otherwise.”

Star Chamber anyone?

Judge Rudofsky denied my right to have a jury as fact finder, then he cloaked the supposed facts in secrecy.

Out of fear of incarceration, I will honor the judge’s order until, hopefully, the Eighth Circuit overturns it. (A news agency, citizen’s group or the Democratic Party might want to file a stand-alone suit asking for declaratory relief that the top-secret documents be unsealed.)

In the meantime, it is not contemptuous to tell you what is not in the blacked-out text.

Let’s look at the first block on page 4, footnote 30, referenced in the main body text:

“PRA, LLC also tried to contact Ms. Hammett by phone.30

sshhhhhhh. The blacked-out text is super-secret. What the judge shares publicly is that he pulled words or ideas from other documents. The first was from my response to PRA’s statement of facts, paragraph 36. The other secret sections are from PRA’s “Dreano” declaration as an exhibit to PRA’s statement of facts, all under seal.

Judge Rudofsky, in deciding that there were no genuine issues of material fact that preclude granting PRA’s motion for summary judgment, failed to acknowledge that I reasonably disputed the “facts” from PRA’s statement of facts that are under seal.

Rudofsky finished the footnote paragraph: “As will be discussed below, these processes are not full proof.” (Perhaps a Freudian slip for “fool proof”.) “In this case, for example, there are two occasions in which Ms. Hammett was called after 9:00 p.m. Central Standard Time.”

Judge Rudofsky himself let the cat out of the bag. He told the world that the blacked-out text discusses “processes” meant to deter the debt collector from calling after 9 p.m. The processes under seal were not full proof. They were not even partial proof. Nowhere under seal or publicized did PRA prove, nor did I admit that PRA maintained any procedures reasonably adapted to avoid calling after 9 p.m.

Judge Rudofsky said that “these processes” are not perfect. The implication is that they are reasonable.

I love math. I love teaching math. Weird. I know.

I love to “proof”, to figure out in which step someone went wrong to come up with the wrong answer.

“Oh! You added where you should have multiplied.”

From there out, my student could adapt his behavior, and multiply instead of add.

The sealed information did not explain why two calls were made outside the 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. time frame.

PRA never tried to figure out why they got the wrong answer. Therefore, they could not adapt the processes to be effective.

Don’t let Lee P. Rudofsky fool you into thinking there was a reasonable explanation where there was none.

Compare Trump Judge with Obama Judge in Cases Against Portfolio Recovery Associates

Today you get two FREE Docs of the Day. OK, one is a repost.

It is just so interesting to compare the court opinions on two motions for summary judgment filed by Goliath Debt Buyer Portfolio Recovery Associates, LLC. (This is a wholly owned subsidiary of publicly traded PRA Group Inc. [PRAA])

Judge McNulty was nominated by Barack Obama. Judge Lee P. Rudofsky was nominated by Donald Trump.

Judge Rudofsky went out of his way to alter or misstate the record in favor of the big business interest. In fact, I’m going to repost two more docs for you today, my appellate brief and reply, which enumerate a few of the most egregious lies told by the judge.

If the Eighth Circuit reverses and remands my case, I hope to find an attorney to represent me at trial. Feel free to contact me if you are interested. My contact info is on the briefs.

It is a bit lackluster and full of stupid lawyer tricks, also, but here is the responsive brief filed by PRA’s team of attorneys. (Lead appellate attorney, Misha Tseytlin, is a former State Solicitor general and is in the Federalist Society Cabal with Lee Rudofsky.)

FREE Docs of the Day: Pro Se plea against qualified and absolute immunity, discrimination against nonlawyers

Some jurisdictions deny self-represented litigants from filing electronically. The Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas is one of the discriminatory courts. The Northern District of Florida is another.

Opposing council on one of my appellate cases, former Solicitor General Misha Tseytlin, applauded the practice of making pro se litigants file four paper copies of all documents in their case at the courthouse. He pointed out a Florida case where the nonlawyers were denied the right to file from the comfort of their own homes, like the attorneys who get paid hundreds of dollars per hour and usually have clerical help to do the filing anyhow.

The motion is not well written. But the sentiment is good.

The order of denial makes the judge sound like a pompous ass.

The 169-page complaint in the case against Desantis, Trump, Biden and a list of other government workers is …. long. I’m working on an appellate brief and don’t have time to read it all. I wish I did.

The complaint seems legitimate to me. Basically, it calls out the corrupt who bestowed immunity from civil prosecution on themselves, then abuse that immunity by pilfering the property from elderly and forcing murderous “guardians” on the victim under the color of law.

I know for a fact that Judge Susan Weaver of Arkansas intended to transfer all my property to her attorney friend and his client. So far, she got away with transferring $200,000 of my property that was held in trust. I appealed her decision 16 months ago, and still no word from the Arkansas Court of Appeals. The money is probably spent and Judge Weaver will not be held accountable. It is difficult to get the public corruption unit of the FBI to do anything. It would be impossible for them to keep up with the corruption created systemically.

Well, I hope you find something here to inform and inspire you. Get loud.

City of New York’s Administration for Children’s Services Hit With 4th Amendment Suit

FREE Document of the Day, courtesy of four public interest law firms. Kudos to them for their enlightened work. Too few will help the many.

While it may be unlikely to qualify for class certification due to the varied nature of damages and conduct in each case, the suit’s spirit is commendable.

Enjoy the read.

Domestic Violence, Police Shooting and Wrongful Death Appeal. Qualified Immunity?

Thank you to opposing counsel on my appeal of the Portfolio Recovery Harassment case, Misha Tseytlin, who brought this interesting appeal to my attention.

I warn you; the briefs are long. So long, that the attorneys felt compelled to violate local rule 28A(j) to squeeze in a few extra words. (Just like former Wisconsin Solicitor General Tseytlin did on my case.) There are photos that have the descriptions on the photos. I have no clue if those were added into the word count. If my plate wasn’t overflowing, I’d cut and paste the countable words into a blank Word Doc and see.

Enjoy the read.

[CORRECTION: Feb. 28, 2024. Originally, I wrote that Misha Tseytlin was “attorney general” instead of “solicitor general”.]

FREE Docs of the Day

Words of Wisdom to A Pro Se Litigant from ChatGPT

“It’s important to approach this situation with patience, perseverance, and a commitment to seeking justice.” – chat.openai.com (FREE artificial intelligence)

I cut and pasted the sentence above into my other favorite app, http://www.dogpile.com. Usually if a sentence is used on the internet verbatim, it will pop up at the top of the dogpile. “It’s important to approach this situation with patience, perseverance, and a commitment to seeking justice” did not.

ChatGPT pulls from the vast writing collected in cyber space and usually imparts common knowledge or sentiment. (Don’t use AI to write your legal documents for you, though. As one law-librarian told me, AI has been known to “hallucinate” and invent case-law.)

What We Wish We Could Say In Court

I am working on a reply brief in Laura Lynn Hammett v. Portfolio Recovery Associates, yada yada.

It is so difficult for me to refrain from snarky comments and sarcasm. The court would not be amused.

So, thank you my dear readers, for giving me someone who appreciates my humor to share the portions that land on the cutting room floor. (I am old.)

**********************

PRA’s Arguments:

  1. PRA did not know who answered the landline or cell phone, and therefore were allowed to call repeatedly until the old lady on the other end answered personal questions about herself.

In support of this argument, PRA followed Judge Rudofsky’s lead by misquoting Hammett’s houseguest in the exact way Hammett was misquoted by Judge Rudofsky. The sentence was truncated, and a period was placed inside the closing quotation mark, without straight brackets, indicating the sentence ended. (Response 8) –you can download PRA’s brief on yesterday’s post.

Actual: “[Laura Lynn] won’t be here until September 11th.”

PRA’s: Plaintiff “wo[uldn’t] be [there] until September.”

Apparently, PRA’s attorneys and Judge Rudofsky read the same litigation playbook.

PRA attorneys from Troutman-Pepper and Rose Law Firm wrote that my complaints about fictionalized transcripts in this Rudofsky case and a Judge Susan Weaver case were part of a “litigation playbook”. I haven’t had time to put together my complaint to the commission on professional conduct, but that is one snarky and unprofessional comment that should be included.

I’m not an attorney and I think it should be left unsaid — in a filed brief.