Dershowitz "Angela Corey should be disbarred"!

[Cheshire Cat]

An angry Alan Dershowitz who has gone toe to toe with Angela Corey in the past via the Christian Fernandez case now says she should be disbarred.


http://www.isthatbaloney.com/liberal-law-professor-alan-dershowitz-zimmerman-prosecutor-should-be-disbarred

prosecutor Angela Cory must be a real winner if liberal professor and former lawyer Alan Dershowitz says she should be disbarred.

Not only is Dershowitz saying Corey should be disbarred, he saying she should be investigated for purposely withholding evidence from the judge who ended up bringing this case to be heard in front of a jury. The main contention is that she never turned over the pictures of Zimmerman's bloody and broken nose and blood on the back of his head to the judge that decides whether or not there is enough evidence for a trial.

Read more of Dershowitz's interview transcript from Read Clear Politics below:

MIKE HUCKABEE: You have said that you thought the prosecutor ought to be disbarred, that's a pretty serious type of violation to get a person disbarred. It is that serious to you?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Right, it is. She submitted an affidavit that was, if not perjurious, completely misleading. She violated all kinds of rules of the profession, and her conduct bordered on criminal conduct. She, by the way, has a horrible reputation in Florida. She's known for overcharging, she's known for being highly political. And in this case, of course she overcharged. Halfway through the trial she realized she wasn't going to get a second degree murder verdict, so she asked for a compromised verdict, for manslaughter. And then, she went even further and said that she was going to charge him with child abuse and felony murder. That was such a stretch that it goes beyond anything professionally responsible. She was among the most irresponsible prosecutors I've seen in 50 years of litigating cases, and believe me, I've seen good prosecutors, bad prosecutors, but rarely have I seen one as bad as this prosecutor, [Angela] Cory. (Huckabee, July 14, 2013)[/quote

[Josh]

Yeah he's been saying this since early last year I believe; due to the same claim of withholding evidence.

[icarus]

Dershowitz isn't the only one pointing the finger at Corey but perhaps he is the most vocal.

I think that taking a look at how the charges were brought and why is relevant.  Honestly, I am not sure there ever was enough evidence to support a Murder 2 charge.

[Charles Hunter]

I have heard the conspiratorial opinion that, since charges were only brought after public pressure, Gov. Scott - who selected her to prosecute - got a big charge in 2nd degree murder.  This calmed the public outrage at the time, especially in the black community - an electorate he is woefully lacking.  A Second Degree Murder charge was unsustainable from the start.  Now, since the 2nd Degree Murder could not be proved, Zimmerman was acquitted.  And it is the court system that let him go.  Not Scott.  Not Cory.  They can even express outrage at the verdict.

[Cheshire Cat]

I have heard the conspiratorial opinion that, since charges were only brought after public pressure, Gov. Scott - who selected her to prosecute - got a big charge in 2nd degree murder.  This calmed the public outrage at the time, especially in the black community - an electorate he is woefully lacking.  A Second Degree Murder charge was unsustainable from the start.  Now, since the 2nd Degree Murder could not be proved, Zimmerman was acquitted.  And it is the court system that let him go.  Not Scott.  Not Cory.  They can even express outrage at the verdict.

I have no doubt that politics played heavily into this situation.

[Cheshire Cat]

Looks like a lot of high profile folks are not singing Corey's praises.  Some are very pointed in their criticism.

Below a part of the commentary.  Click the link for the complete story. 

A six-member jury found Zimmerman not guilty on counts of second-degree murder and lesser charges Saturday, setting off widespread outrage.

The acquittal is a rare high-profile failure for Corey, and she will struggle will the perceptions this case generated, said former 4th Circuit Public Defender Bill White.

"She doesn't take criticism well, and there's going to be a lot of second guessing," White said. "But Angela will have her difficulties and she'll have to deal with it."

Corey, a conservative Republican, is in the odd situation of being blasted nationally by right-wing talk show hosts and columnists who say the decision to charge Zimmerman was politically motivated.

"In the hall of shame goes Angela Corey, the prosecutor brought in to get an indictment," wrote conservative Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin. "She proceeded to overcharge, grandstand and personify abuse of prosecutorial discretion."

Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz called for Corey to be disbarred, saying she submitted affidavits that bordered on perjury and violated all kinds of rules of the profession

Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/news/crime/2013-07-15/story/state-attorney-corey-scrutinized-nationally-over-handling-trayvon#ixzz2ZA2RoPU3

http://jacksonville.com/news/crime/2013-07-15/story/state-attorney-corey-scrutinized-nationally-over-handling-trayvon

[Bridges]

She's taking a lot of heat for this case, and rightfully so, but what you don't realize is that this is how she operates her office on a day to day basis.  And when the defendant has a PD or a bad attorney, this kind of crap is passes.

I hoped this case would shine some national spotlight on her, and it has.  Hopefully it can bring change in an election, but that is far off, and memories and national spotlight fade quickly.

[Bridges]

And it is the court system that let him go.  Not Scott.  Not Cory.  They can even express outrage at the verdict.

I don't blame Corey one bit for the Zimmerman outcome.  But, she withheld information from the defense and dragged this out.  Did you see Don West and O'Mara at the press conference?  They were furious.  Two well seasoned and good lawyers said they've never been treated so bad the way the prosecution treated them.  They saw things done by the prosecution that they've never seen or heard of being done in 30 years of practice.  Don West was furious and rightfully so. 

This is more than the Zim case.  This is about fair trials for all and the rule of law.

Probably shouldn't be saying that here. She'll try to hunt me down, sue me, and try to get me fired.

[JayBird]

Through Prisoners of Christ I have had the displeasure of working with both Angela Corey and her office and I will be very happy when she uses the fame this case has brought her to ride out of Jacksonville.  I can say she micromanages everything and has that entire office in a chokehold. Unfortunately, we are beginning to see the effects of her work as those that were given extremely light sentences are now returning to the streets and committing crimes again.  WJXT is currently working on the story, believe they are airing it on Thursday. Apparently the cage the media has been kept in by her office has been opened. I thought Ed Austin was a wonderful man and did a lot to help Jacksonville, but bringing on Ms Corey and raising her through the ranks was blemish on an otherwise wonderful political career.

[Cheshire Cat]

And it is the court system that let him go.  Not Scott.  Not Cory.  They can even express outrage at the verdict.

I don't blame Corey one bit for the Zimmerman outcome.  But, she withheld information from the defense and dragged this out.  Did you see Don West and O'Mara at the press conference?  They were furious.  Two well seasoned and good lawyers said they've never been treated so bad the way the prosecution treated them.  They saw things done by the prosecution that they've never seen or heard of being done in 30 years of practice.  Don West was furious and rightfully so. 

This is more than the Zim case.  This is about fair trials for all and the rule of law.

Probably shouldn't be saying that here. She'll try to hunt me down, sue me, and try to get me fired.

She is taking fire from folks with public profiles that far exceed most of ours.  I think she will be spending her time and energy on them. 

[tufsu1]

She's taking a lot of heat for this case, and rightfully so, but what you don't realize is that this is how she operates her office on a day to day basis.  And when the defendant has a PD or a bad attorney, this kind of crap is passes.

I hoped this case would shine some national spotlight on her, and it has.  Hopefully it can bring change in an election, but that is far off, and memories and national spotlight fade quickly.

+10000000

[Cheshire Cat]

Now we are getting down to the politics of Scott and his decision to step into the Zimmerman issue and appoint Angela Corey as special prosecutor.

Protestors filled Governor Rick Scott's office Tuesday to push for a special legislative session in the wake of Saturday's George Zimmerman verdict.

State Attorney Angela Corey, who Scott appointed as a special prosecutor, charged Zimmerman with second-degree murder after the shooting of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old black male. Zimmerman was found not guilty, a verdict that has prompted protests across the country.

Two groups, Florida New Majority and Dream Defenders, want a special legislative session to pass what they are calling the "Trayvon Martin Civil Rights Act." Specific laws they want considered are Florida's "zero tolerance" laws and the now infamous "Stand Your Ground" law, which does not require a person to retreat if they feel there is "reasonable fear of imminent peril of death or great bodily harm."

Zimmerman, who claimed he shot Martin in self-defense, did not use the Stand Your Ground law as part of his defense, but was not arrested for two months after the Feb. 2012 shooting because of the law.

"Together we are united in ensuring Trayvon's unjust death was not for nothing," read a statement circulated to media and read inside Scott's office. "Our anger in the face of gross injustice has led us to take action but it is the love of our people and our community that pushes us forward."

Protesters, who spilled out into the hallway in front of Scott's office, said they wanted to speak directly speak to Scott, who is in New York.

"There is a war on youth every day in this country especially in this state," said Michael Sampson, an organizer with Dream Defenders. "Trayvon Martin happened on his [Scott's] watch...he needs to definitely address that."

Scott commissioned a 19-person panel led by former Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll to examine Florida's self-defense laws in the wake of the Martin shooting. In a February report, the panel recommended, among other things, not repealing the Stand Your Ground law.

Senate Minority Leader Chris Smith, D-Fort Lauderdale, urged Scott to re-consider the Stand Your Ground law after the Zimmerman verdict.

"The self-defense claims invoked by George Zimmerman in the killing of Trayvon Martin once again highlighted the glaring shortcomings in our self-defense laws," he wrote in a statement.

In addition, state Sen. Geraldine Thompson, D-Orlando, has urged Scott to address the verdict, which he has so far not talked about publicly.

Protestors say they will remain in his office until they can speak with Scott directly. Law enforcement said as long as the group does not interfere with state business, they will not be asked to leave.

"We will close these doors into the governor's suite, and they will be allowed to remain here," said Rick Swearingen, director of Capitol Police.

Matt Dixon: (352) 233-0777

Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/news/2013-07-16/story/groups-flood-rick-scotts-office-demanding-special-session-wake-zimmerman#ixzz2ZF3am1UG

[Bridges]

Keep the pressure on.  When NRO is siding with Dershowitz, something is seriously up. 

There are at least 3 articles on NRO about Corey.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/353633/angela-coreys-checkered-past-ian-tuttle/page/0/1

Shortly after Dershowitz's criticisms, Harvard Law School's dean's office received a phone call. When the dean refused to pick up, Angela Corey spent a half hour demanding of an office-of-communications employee that Dershowitz be fired. According to Dershowitz, Corey threatened to sue Harvard, to try to get him disbarred, and also to sue him for slander and libel. Corey also told the communications employee that she had assigned a state investigator — an employee of the State of Florida, that is — to investigate Dershowitz. "That's an abuse of office right there," Dershowitz says.

What happened in the weeks and months that followed was instructive. Dershowitz says that he was flooded with correspondence from people telling him that this is Corey's well-known M.O. He says numerous sources — lawyers who had sparred with Corey in the courtroom, lawyers who had worked with and for her, and even multiple judges — informed him that Corey has a history of vigorously attacking any and all who criticize her. But it's worse than that: Correspondents told him that Corey has a history of overcharging and withholding evidence.

The Zimmerman trial is a clear case of the former and a probable case of the latter. Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder, also known as "depraved mind" murder. The case law for that charge, an attorney who has worked in criminal prosecution outside Florida tells me, is near-unanimous: It almost never applies to one-on-one encounters. Second-degree murder is the madman who fires indiscriminately into a crowd or unlocks the lions' cage at the zoo. "Nothing in the facts of this case approaches that." Which Angela Corey, a veteran prosecutor, should have known, and a grand jury would have told her. In fact, both the initial police investigation and the original state attorney in charge of the case had determined exactly that: There was no evidence of any crime, much less second-degree murder

But that did not stop Corey from zealously overcharging and — the facts suggest — withholding evidence to ensure that that charge stuck.

Still, by the end of the case it was clear that the jury was unlikely to convict Zimmerman of second-degree murder; hence the prosecution's addition of a manslaughter charge — as well as its attempt to add a charge for third-degree murder by way of child abuse — after the trial had closed. "In 50 years of practice I've never seen anything like it," says Dershowitz. It's a permissible maneuver, but as a matter of professional ethics it's a low blow.

Corey's post-trial performance has been less than admirable as well. Asked in a prime-time interview with HLN how she would describe George Zimmerman, Corey responded, "Murderer." Attorneys who spoke with me called her refusal to acknowledge the validity of the jury's verdict everything from "disgusting" to "disgraceful."

But will Corey ever be disciplined for prosecutorial abuses? It's unlikely. State attorneys cannot be brought before the bar while they remain in office. Complaints can be filed against Corey, but they will be deferred until she is no longer state attorney. The governor can remove her from office, but otherwise her position — and her license — are safe.

Meanwhile, those who speak out against her continue to be mistreated. Ben Kruidbos (pronounced CRIED-boss), the IT director at Corey's state-attorney office, was fired last week — one month after testifying during the Zimmerman trial that Corey had withheld from defense attorneys evidence obtained from Trayvon Martin's cell phone. Corey's office contends that Kruidbos was fired for poor job performance and for leaking personnel records. The termination notice delivered to Kruidbos last Friday read: "You have proven to be completely untrustworthy. Because of your deliberate, wilful and unscrupulous actions, you can never again be trusted to step foot in this office." Less than two months before this letter, Kruidbos had received a raise for "meritorious performance."

The records in question — Kruidbos maintains he had nothing to do with leaking them — revealed that Corey used $235,000 in taxpayer money to upgrade her pension and that of her co-prosecutor in the Zimmerman case, Bernie de la Rionda. The upgrade was legal, but Harry Shorstein, Corey's predecessor, had said previously that using taxpayer funds to upgrade pensions was not "proper."

Meanwhile, while Kruidbos has been forced out of the state attorney's office, the managing director who wrote his termination letter — one Cheryl Peek — remains. In 1990 Peek was fired from the same state attorney's office by Harry Shorstein's predecessor, Ed Austin, for jury manipulation. Now, as managing director for that office, she trains lawyers in professional ethics.

Since her election, Corey seems to be determinedly purging from the ranks any who cross her and surrounding herself with inferiors whose ethical scruples appear to mirror her own. Meanwhile, those she chooses to victimize — most recently, George Zimmerman — far too often have little recourse.

"Make crime pay," Will Rogers once quipped: "Become a lawyer." Angela Corey seems to be less interested in making crime pay than in making her critics pay.

[JayBird]

But will Corey ever be disciplined for prosecutorial abuses? It's unlikely. State attorneys cannot be brought before the bar while they remain in office. Complaints can be filed against Corey, but they will be deferred until she is no longer state attorney. The governor can remove her from office, but otherwise her position — and her license — are safe.

Wow that's shocking. So in the case of that position, they are legally above the law. Tsk tsk.

[Cheshire Cat]

There is also this piece from T.U.  This may be part of what Bridges was referring to above.  But it is worth repeating.  Corey has some serious ego, control, vendetta issues.  She not only goes after media and high profile people but she has gone after private citizens with venom many times in the past.  She has quite a chip on her shoulder, time the public, legal community and voters knock it off.  Corey views all that comes before her through a narrow lens of ego backed by an aggressive anger.  Not a good thing for the public or as a representation of Florida law and it's law community.


http://jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/403455/matt-dixon/2013-07-17/national-review-takes-angela-corey

Angela Corey, by all accounts, is no Atticus Finch. She is "one hell of a trial lawyer," says a Florida defense attorney who has known her for three decades — but the woman who has risen to national prominence as the "tough as nails" state attorney who prosecuted George Zimmerman is known for scorching the earth. And some of her prosecutorial conduct has been, well, troubling at best.

Corey, a Jacksonville native, took a degree in marketing from Florida State University before pursuing her J.D. at the University of Florida. She became a Florida prosecutor in 1981 and tried everything from homicides to juvenile cases in the ensuing 26 years. In 2008, Corey was elected state attorney for Florida's Fourth Judicial Circuit, taking over from Harry Shorstein — the five-term state attorney who had fired her from his office a year earlier, citing "long-term issues" regarding her supervisory performance.

When Corey came in, she cleaned house. Corey fired half of the office's investigators, two-fifths of its victim advocates, a quarter of its 35 paralegals, and 48 other support staff — more than one-fifth of the office. Then she sent a letter to Florida's senators demanding that they oppose Shorstein's pending nomination as a U.S. attorney. "I told them he should not hold a position of authority in his community again, because of his penchant for using the grand jury for personal vendettas," she wrote.

Corey knows about personal vendettas. They seem to be her specialty. When Ron Littlepage, a journalist for the Florida Times-Union, wrote a column criticizing her handling of the Christian Fernandez case — in which Corey chose to prosecute a twelve-year-old boy for first-degree murder, who wound up locked in solitary confinement in an adult jail prior to his court date — she "fired off a two-page, single-spaced letter on official state-attorney letterhead hinting at lawsuits for libel