Mike Ioane: The saga continues.

We live in a world turned upside down. Every right we thought we had under the Constitution is threatened. The threats come, not from some sworn enemy but rather from those who have sworn to uphold the Constitution! The madness of a rogue government full of confused, undisciplined, power and money hungry incompetent men and women has taken us all into some strange places recently. Selling guns to Mexican Drug Cartels, driving a young man accused of hacking to suicide, even after the school which had been hacked dropped all charges. The continuing harassment of people like Julian Assange, the jailing of Private Bradley Manning who has been in prison for three long years without being tried. Most of this is happening under Obama’s watch. I won’t go into gun-control here. That’s a whole other issue. What I do want to mention is the bankers who are Too Big To Jail. Seems the government and the banks in league with one another, are breaking laws and dragging the Constitution through the mud. They seem to be above the law. Everything goes, laundering drug and terrorist money, stealing from the citizens of the U.S., while the government they are bankrolling is using unconstitutional tactics to restrain and detain citizens without trial; while letting real criminals go free. The ones who are lucky enough to be tried like Mike Ioane are most certainly not being tried properly or legally. Trials run by corrupt judges like Lawrence O’Neil mock the law. Innocent people are going to jail, while big bankers make millions in openly criminal enterprises!

Imagine having agents of the Federal govt. breaking into your home at night. They bear an open-ended warrant. It does not specify what the Feds can look for, or even what sort of crime may have been committed. Without warning they break into your home, guns drawn, screaming at your wife and yourself. Seeing you are both sitting on the couch terrified, obviously unarmed, they continue to scream at you and point guns directly at your heads for unending nightmarish minutes. One of the agents is screaming at her people to “Lower your weapons” but they don’t. They seem desperate to shoot someone, anyone, for any reason. All because of a possible case of alleged tax evasion by someone you barely know.

Later they ransack your home, taking books, files, computer records, telephone lists and notes to yourself. You realize they aren’t looking for criminals, they are looking to suspend your rights to free speech and expression. They have come because you told the IRS you were going to sue on your own behalf. So the IRS brought the heavy hammer of the law down upon you. Even though you have a right to redress your grievances with the government in a civil and peaceful manner, including instigating a law-suit, the government begs to differ. To them we are terrorists if we even open our mouths to protest their activities. This is what happened to Mike Ioane. In the end they threw him in jail over another man’s tax accounts and then let that man, Dr. Steven Booth, go free. Why? Pretty simply because Mike wrote a book the government does not like. Dr. Booth wrote nothing, and instead conspired with the IRS to railroad Ioane. I’ve gone on about this at some length in previous posts.

Mike was under house arrest and was about to ask for leniency when the court at Fresno, and judge Lawrence O’Neil had him re-incarcerated. The reason, because someone posted an advertisement for his book “The Boston Tea Party Book”  on-line. He’s been languishing there for months. But he has also been busy applying for various reliefs under the law while thinking about writing a new book about his saga.

Recently he has amended a lawsuit that names several government agents as defendants in the case. He accuses them of wrong-doing, conspiracy to trample his rights, conspiring with the IRS and the Judge Lawrence O’Neil and the Fresno court to lock him up even though he truly had not committed any crime. They used a vague search warrant to take away personal items and even money which they now refuse to return. They questioned him at the scene about the people he associated with, conferences he attended, business deals and other things which rather than connecting him to any crime, instead connected him with Political Affiliations and Ideologies which the U.S. Government finds threatening to their power. In other words they locked him up in order to shut him up.

At this time Mike resides in the Lompoc Federal Prison, awaiting his appeal and awaiting his final time in court to defend himself. He has accused this list of people of conspiring to keep him in jail and trumping up tax burdens on him. I have several times stated that these people need to be investigated thoroughly. There is something terribly wrong with the world today and the Michael Ioane case is a good case in point. I am providing this list of defendants in Michael’s law suit so that people have the names of certain agents and cohorts of the Fresno Court, The IRS and the Justice department who may be involved in usurping and trampling on the rights of good and decent citizens of this nation, who are in no way a threat to the nation or our way of life. Yet Michael is being treated like Bernie Madhoff, while bankers at HSBC and the Big Six get off scott-free with their crimes. Too many people with greed in their hearts and power plays on their minds are conspiring to trample our Constitution and this must be stopped now!

MELINDA S. PEYRET (falsifying documents)

ROBERT A. RAMIREZ (unethical practices)

JACOB SCOTT (false arrest, obstruction of justice, conspiracy)

MONTGOMERY OLSON (false arrest, obstruction of justice, conspiracy)

MICHELE CASAREZ (false arrest, obstruction of justice, conspiracy)

KENT R. SPJUTE (false arrest, harassment, obstruction)

JEAN NOLL (false arrest, harassment, obstruction)

JEFF HODGE (false arrest, harassment, obstruction)

BRIAN APPLEGATE (false arrest, harassment, obstruction)

DR. STEVEN BOOTH (perjury, bearing false witness, conspiracy)

If you or anyone you know has had dealings with any of these individuals or know about other criminal activities they may be a part of, please inform you attorney general’s office. These types of people are a blight and a stain on our country and our flag.

Thom Horne, Investigator.

Mike Ioane Re-Incarcerated by O’Neil!

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mike ioane

Finally after sometime with no word I was able to get in touch with Mike Ioane through one of his associates. Apparently his worst nightmare came true when on…after a hearing as to whether he had broken his house arrest rules, Judge…O’Neil had Mike Ioane thrown back into Federal Prison. This time it was on the flimsy excuse that because a website had published some blurbs from one of his books that he was practicing or promoting his business which was grounds for re-incarceration.

Mike himself had been totally unaware that these blurbs or his name had been used on the website, as this was done by the company that not only owns the rights to his books, but even to his name. He did not tell them to use his name or work. And had he known they were doing it he would have stopped them. But he was unaware of it, as they were trying to sell the book which they owned. In essence Mike Ioane had done nothing wrong. That didn’t fly with the “Hanging Judge” Lawrence O’Neil! As we have seen this judge, who lightly hands down 700 hundred year sentences and dismisses whole cases that serve to improve the environment without flinching, and who is improperly allied with the IRS in Fresno, had no qualms against re-incarcerating Ioane. In fact he wanted to do it. He was itching to do it! Ioane’s attorney knew this and warned Ioane not to do anything to irritate this Darth Vader of the Fresno court. Mike was warned to not even take lunch or go to the bathroom while at court, lest the judge see him and make an excuse to put him away again.

Previously I told you that Mike Ioane was just going to file his appeal with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, who were already requesting leniency in this case…when the IRS filed a complaint stating Mike had broken the rules of his house-arrest agreement. A hearing for that complaint was called, which took precedence over the appeal. This put Mike right back into the hands of Judge O’Neil. O’Neil had already improperly asked Mr. Ioane to do things that were not only highly suspect to be in the Judge’s personal interests but which were also patently illegal. He had asked Ioane to turn over the three Bakersfield properties to Stephen Booth, properties which Ioane didn’t even have control of! Because Mike would not do it, he had to stay in jail. When he was released it was unprecedented. This obviously enraged O’Neil so much that he swore he would throw Ioane back into prison without hesitation. So now he has.

Mike was not treated well after they took him away. He languished in the Fresno jail for some weeks before being transferred to Lompoc Federal prison. There he found out they had no space for him. So they threw him in the high security “Hole” for two more weeks, where he had no comforts of any kind, no communication with the outside world, no books, pens or paper. Basically it was solitary confinement. During this six weeks of him being incommunicado his wife and associates nearly went mad with fear and grief. Then to make matters worse when Ioane tried to get some sort of leniency the IRS decided they would take all of his homes, putting his wife and kids out on the street if he tried to get out of jail again! Poor Ioane had to back down and not make any waves in order to keep his family safe. So he opted to continue to stay in prison until his appeal.

Now, we are talking here about a man, who if he did anything wrong, it was to help some idiot client keep his property out of the hands of the IRS. He didn’t steal anyone’s money, he simply kept property safe. He did not defraud the public. His financial and property protection techniques didn’t hurt anyone. In fact they kept everyone investing in the techniques safe from IRS and government liens and seizures. He used the law to keep the IRS from touching what they never had proved was theirs! Mike Ioane didn’t bilk anyone out of billions like Bernie Madhoff. He didn’t cook anyone’s corporate books like Enron. There is absolutely no reason why he would be arrested and convicted of fraud except that the IRS found out he couldn’t be swayed to lie, cheat or steal for THEM. Why then is he not allowed to work or do business in his field? Only because the IRS claimed fraud where in fact, none existed.

There is also something to be said about the fact that the U.S. Government does not like the fact that he wrote the book that was seminal to the formation of the Tea Party. There are many Tea-Party senators and congressmen and local governors and politicians who are giving the Feds a lot of headaches. So I believe the Fed wants to make an example out of Ioane. And yet all Ioane has done is use the law as it stands today, to help civilians protect their assets from the avaricious and greedy government tax department. Is this a Federal Crime now? If so, arrest Dick Cheney and Mitt Romney and everyone else who uses the same laws to protect their assets and interests.

So Mike Ioane is now back in Federal Prison, and the IRS continues to threaten and make invalid cases against him. Meanwhile he, through his family run corporation, is keeping all of the cases I have spoken about previously, alive and open. Any of these cases, should they be ruled on in Mike’s favor, would show up the IRS for what it is, a bunch of pirates who use the law to destroy decent citizen’s lives as they corrupt the state courts and disrupt and override the laws of the Constitution.

Response to Letter to Justice Dept. on Behalf of Michael Ioane

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booth, Friends of Michael Ioane, Judge Lawrence O'Neil, Mark Cullers, Mark E. Cullers, michael ioane, michael scott ioane, mike ioane, Steven Booth

Just received this letter from the Attorney General’s office in response to the Michael Iaone case, whereas I informed Eric Holder that the Fresno Court system was engaged in a conspiracy to make Michael Iaone culpable for paying the back taxes of Steven V. Booth. Next step, get in touch with the FBI.

Meanwhile I believe the government might have take over Mike’s computer as someone “reads” the messages I send, but no longer responds. There is a growing mystery here. I will attempt to get to the bottom of it.

Sincerely,

David St. Albans

Mike Iaone Missing! Fresno Court, Conspiracy Central!

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Eric Holder, Judge Lawrence O'Neil, Mark Cullers, Mark E. Cullers, michael ioane, michael scott ioane, mike ioane

(At the writing of this post I have been out of touch with Michael Scott Ioane for two weeks, going on three. He informed me that the govt. was trying hard to put him back in prison due to certain apparent violations of his house arrest order. I have not heard from him, or his family. I do not know what has happened to him. And I fear the worst. This post is one I wrote shortly after speaking with Ioane through emails. It may be the last post I do if I cannot find out any more pertinent information about this case. As it stands it looks as though he’s been railroaded once again. Send out your prayers to him and his family.)

Recent developments in Michael Ioane’s case have been darkened by yet more conspiracies between the IRS and the Federal court at Fresno and specifically, Judge Lawrence J. O’Neil.

Ioane and his attorneys asked for some leniency on the house arrest restrictions so that Ioane could practice real estate and business management and at least make enough money to pay for his Federal GPS monitoring bracelet. Once the motion was filed for leniency with the court of appeals, showing that Mr. Ioane was not a threat to anyone, nor that he would run away, the US Government filed a motion that said Ioane was in “violation” of his house arrest because he had “posted information on his web site that promoted his business of helping people with their trusts. Also that he had written a book which also helped people with trust information and could be used to hide money from the IRS.

The IRS neglected to inform the court that the book was written in 2009, prior to Ioane’s conviction. It is also owned by the Acacia corporation. And it was Acacia corporate staff that posted the information (articles made up from various chapters of the book), not Ioane himself. According to Michael Ioane he “doesn’t even know how to post things on a website.”  Michael Ioane never told them to post these articles and the Acacia corporation thought they were doing something in good faith and well within their 1^st Amendment Rights.

It all started when Mike Ioane was to show up for the motion hearing regarding his restrictions being loosened. His lawyer asked him how he would get to court and if he would eat before the court convened? Mike innocently said “I usually eat at the cafeteria.” His attorney then said “What if Judge O’Neil sees you eating?” Mike said jokingly: “He’d probably throw me back in jail.” So his attorney then had to caution him strongly to NOT eat at the court cafeteria, to go to the bathroom BEFORE he came to court, and to only come into the courtroom and go through the process and leave…as the attorney was positive that the judge would see anything else as a violation of the arrest order!

When I was informed of all of this I had to laugh. Then things went from bad to worse as the Govt. filed a motion of violation of the arrest order the very same day Ioane was to file his appeal motion! That trumped the appeal. As long as there is some idea that a violation had been committed, that case must come first. Of course. Judge O’Neil knew that. He was playing chess with Ioane’s life.

Even though the Preliminary Appeal court suggested on Ioane’s behalf that he have some of his work restrictions loosened, Judge O’Neil went on the attack telling the govt. to find cause for him to toss Ioane back into prison on some trumped up violation! Apparently the heat is on O’Neil. Had Ioane been granted his motion the Fresno District Court under O’Neil would have had no more jurisdiction over Ioane’s case, finally freeing him of this judge’s vindictive and selective prosecution, and his heavy handed judgments. Making Judge O’Neil look like the conspirator and corruptor he truly is.

Upon reading the motion of violation, which claimed he was a financial risk to the community, I told Mike Ioane this:

“First of all how can you be a “financial risk” to your community??? You weren’t convicted of defrauding anyone for money! You were convicted of showing the IRS securities which they considered to be fake. And of helping Booth form “Sham trusts.” No one has lost any money! It was just that the IRS couldn’t take properties from Booth! You aren’t like that guy Bernie Madhoff they caught with the billion dollar Ponzi Scheme! He’s a financial risk. He could bilk some folks out of money if allowed to do his financial business. But I think your opposition motion to the govt. is correct. You don’t have to do anyone’s taxes or do any trust work. They should be allowing you to work to pay your bills. If not, then, just like in prison THEY pay all expenses for cells, food, clothing, etc. Expecting a man to pay for something when they won’t allow you to make a wage is a crime. Plus it is illogical. Hell they’d make you work in prison… AND give you a stipend! So where’s the logic in declaring that you might “help someone form a corporation which is “perilously close” to what you did with Booth? What hogwash!

“And seriously, no one is a risk for “financial misdeeds!” A cat-burglar, set free, might go burgle a house. A killer might kill someone. But I’ve never heard of any financial law-breaker going out on parole and creating some scam to make money off the IRS! Idiotic! Someone needs to make sure this is written plainly in your oppositions. POPPY COCK! is exactly what the IRS is bringing to bear. Stupidity made into law! It’s laughable that you would go out and form some more “sham trusts” because geez, wasn’t that just the best idea you ever had in the first place? Didn’t that get you right where you wanted to be? (satire!) Why not give forming sham trusts another try while you await an appeal! Duh!

“As for the whole cafeteria thing…you are too much like me. You ask all the right questions! In this case you should have just gone, eaten at the cafeteria and if someone said you were in violation, you plead ignorance. Now you’ve made it hard for yourself to even eat or pee! Because your attorney put it all in writing. So you’re sunk. However I don’t think anyone would send you back to jail for eating lunch.

“Man we need to get you out of this. We need someone like Eric Holder to look into all this from outside, I think then your troubles would be over. These criminals and corrupt judge can hide in Fresno beneath the Stars and Stripes, telling everyone they are just serving the public trust. Until someone from D.C. says “What the heck are you people up to!? We’re getting heat from all over the country because you are being a-holes!”

“Like one commentator on the blog said, “we should be smelling and investigation by now…” I can’t believe how cruel and officious this O’Neil is! Some judges think way to highly of their own opinions. And you should tell the government, “You want to keep me penned in and unable to work, then you get no payment from me for your precious bracelet!” I mean if they think you are being a bastard and not being remorseful, you USE THAT TO THE HILT! Because an INNOCENT MAN NEED NOT FEEL REMORSE. Just because a man is sentenced to prison DOES NOT MAKE HIM GUILTY OF A CRIME! (We find that to be thecase over and over again these days!) They cannot victimize you any more than they have already. They can lock you up in prison, or at home, but that’s no reason for you to act guilty. Maintain your rights. Only an innocent man would fight them so hard! And they know it! So to them, show no remorse. It’s your only hope. If you keep being a victim they will destroy you.”

As of the date of this writing, Michael Scott Ioane is once again in the clutches of Judge O’Neil, a “hanging judge” if ever there was one. He is in danger of being thrown back into prison, again for something he did not do. This investigator wonders when justice will truly be served. Meanwhile Michael Ioane and his attorney have worked out a possible solution to all the civil cases still extant which would clear up much of the problems with the Booth trusts and monies owed to the IRS, etc. We can only hope someone, somewhere will listen to reason.

Tom Horne, Investigator.

Open Letter to Eric Holder, Attorney General.

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booth, boston tea party, corruption, court, Cullers, First Amendment Right, Fraud, Freedom of expression, irs, IRS Conspiracy, Judge Lawrence O'Neil, Mark Cullers, michael ioane, michael scott ioane, mike ioane, Obama, Spjute, Steven Booth, U.S. district court Fresno, US District Court, wrongful arrest

I’m sending this letter out to Eric Holder today! If anyone here wants to copy it and send one off under their names be my guest! Let’s get our friend Michael Scott Ioane free now!

Send To: Eric Holder,

Attorney General of the United States

950 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest

Washington, DC,  20530-0001

To: Attorney General of the United States, Eric Holder.

Re: Wasting tax payer money and the IRS applying illegal tactics to recover monies not owed.

Dear Atty Gen. Holder,

Date: 10/06/2012

Dear Atty Gen. Holder,

It has come to my attention after reading numerous blogs on the “Friends of Ioane” WordPress Blog Site that a good and honest man has been put in Federal prison for no apparent reason except perhaps a political one. His name is Michael Scott Ioane. He was sentenced by Judge Lawrence J. O’Neil in the Federal court for the Eastern District of California, to nine years in the Federal Penitentiary. The crime was Defrauding the U.S. Government. Recently the sentence was appealed and overturned by the 9th District Court of Appeals. Mr. Ioane was released into house arrest, where he is forced to be monitored day and night, not allowed to be gainfully employed, and forced to pay for his own Federally mandated GPS bracelet.

From what I have read this completely nonsensical charade started because another man, Dr. S.V. Booth of Bakersfield, CA ,was judged by the IRS to owe them back taxes. In order to pay for this tax burden they wanted to seize property that they mistakenly believed belonged to Dr. Booth. It did not. It had been put in a trust for his children in 1995. In 1996, Booth and his wife divested themselves of all interest in these 3 properties and gave them over to the trust’s managers. This was three years before Dr. Booth and his wife ever met Michael Ioane!

Sometime in 2004, the IRS began to make a criminal case against Dr. Booth, saying his trusts were shams and they were used to hide the properties from the IRS. (Ridiculous on the face of it, since they knew exactly where the properties were and how they had changed hands over the past ten years!) They knew that Michael Ioane had been hired by the trustees  (not Dr. Booth), to manage these trusts. In the meantime, Acacia Corporate Management LLC and Michael Ioane had purchased interest in the properties; Acacia holding 95% and Ioane holding 5% of the investment. At the time the IRS began asking Dr. Booth for the money and attempting to put liens and levies on the said properties, Dr. Booth made the testimony under oath in a court of law that Mr. Ioane and Acacia had nothing to do with the management or foundation of Booth’s initial trusts. After several years of arm-twisting and mob-like thug tactics by the IRS they convinced Dr. Booth to recant his testimony and place Michael Ioane in harm’s way by saying he was some sort of evil Svengali who had made Booth give him and Acacia the properties for free! Booth, at the behest of Mark E. Cullers, perjured himself in a court of law, convincing a judge and jury that Michael Ioane somehow had access to these properties from the beginning, had defrauded the Federal govt. by hiding the properties in sham trusts, and was a con artist! This slander and libel convinced the jury to incarcerate Michael Ioane! They released Dr. Booth. Yet, it was Dr. Booth who owed the IRS money, not Ioane. Ioane was dragged into a trial for which he was ill-prepared. He lost the case and the Judge sentenced him to an extensive prison term! Yet not one shred of evidence of Ioane’ wrong –doing or any criminal conspiracy was ever admitted into evidence. The evidence admitted was circumstantial and came from a raid by the IRS which was later disputed. At the time it was Judge O’Neil, acting as a Magistrate who gave the IRS a vague and ill-worded search warrant. When the warrant was disputed, Judge O’Neil took it upon himself to uphold the warrant, after he was appointed a Federal Justice! He should have recused himself altogether from this case. Instead he colluded with the IRS to jail and innocent man!

The outrage is this. At no time did Ioane ever help Booth create any trust. As a competent business leader in his community, he made suggestions to the trustee board on the already legal and established trusts, in how to fight the IRS claims. It is NOT illegal to dispute any IRS claim. Nor is it illegal for property to be passed and sold from one trust to another. What is illegal is trying to dissolve a trust, which is established for the good of minor children, without giving them a Guardian Ad Litem. Which is exactly what Judge Lawrence O’Neil and the IRS tried to do. It is also illegal to try to persuade a person in prison, that he will get a better “deal” if he just deeds over said properties back to Dr. Booth, and so reconvict himself as a fraud!

This Sir is a criminal conspiracy, and it was perpetrated by a Federal Judge, officers of the court and the IRS!  It was done because Michael Ioane, as they found out, was the author of the “Boston Tea Party Book.” Because Ioane understood the law as regards asset protections, (the same ones used by Dick Cheney or Mitt Romney and other wealthy persons) he was deemed suspect of criminal intent and prosecuted selectively and vindictively because he was seen to be a threat to the govt. All this is well documented with legal documents and testimonies throughout the various blogs I have read on the Friends of Michael Ioane site.

http://michaelsioane.wordpress.com/2012/09/02/selective-and-vindictive-prosecution-irs-threatens-americans-civil-rights/

I believe an innocent man, who was also a thorn in the side of the IRS and the Federal government was unjustly marked for imprisonment and silence, in a concerted conspiracy between the IRS and the Fresno court. Because he chose jail over making a deal with the powers of that court, he has at least been given a second chance to defend himself. However, I am aghast that your offices are being thus misused by Federal agents in Fresno. I am also upset that my money as a tax payer, is going towards this strange campaign to convict a Bakersfield chiropractor and an Asset manager working for a strong, legal, and protective Asset Management corporation, of high crimes against the Federal govt. while drug dealers, murderers, human slave traders and others go scott free! The govt. is spending my hard earned money to try and get money which is not owed them, and to steal properties they have no right to, while at the same time stifling business, ruining people’s lives and reputations, and stealing money from minor children! You should read this blog site Mr. Holder. It has a wealth of information about how your office is completely in collusion with the Fresno court to strong-arm money from good tax-paying citizens. The stink of the power brokering and favoritism of that court in Fresno is about to be wafted to the general public at this critical juncture during a national election. I believe it is time you took note and investigated this mess!

Here are the names of the people who need to be investigated:

1.Judge Lawrence J. O’Neil

2.Mark Eugene Cullers    AUSA,

3.James Richard Terzian  AUSA

4.Susan Phan AUSA

5.Lawrence G. Brown, acting United States Attorney

6.Dennis Collins, Revenue Officer

7.Revenue Officer Michael Hoos

8. Revenue Officer Fred Chynoweth

9. John A. DiCicco, Acting Assistant Attorney General

10. Verna Santos AUSA

11. Special Agent Kent Spjute

12. Ronald A Cimino, Chief Western Criminal Enforcement Section

13. Special Agent Brian Hodges

14. Special Agent Michele M. Casarez

15. Special Agent Brian Applegate

16. Special Agent Jean Nole

17. Lauren M. Castaldi, AUSA

18. G.Patrick Jennings, AUSA

Sincerely,

David St. Albans

Concerned Citizen

Judge Lawrence J. O’Neil, Ringleader of the Fresno Court/IRS mob!

Tags

9th district, California, cell, corrupt, corruption, Eastern District, extremist, Fraud, Fresno, Friends of Michael Ioane, Government, government fraud, IRS Conspiracy, IRS FRAUD, jail, judge, Judge Lawrence O'Neil, michael ioane, michael scott ioane, mike ioane, mob, prayer, spider, Steven and Louise Booth, Steven Booth, Tom Horne, U.S. district court Fresno, US District Court, Vindictive, web, wrongful arrest

As I’ve researched this story of the tangled, deceitful, web-like lines of entrapment, which seem to have entangled the lives of quite a few Bakersfield and Fresno area residents; I think I have found the spider at the center of this web. There has been much talk in the news lately of “liberal judges,”  “Activist Judges,” “Extremist Judges” and “Partisan Judges.” Yet one type of judge, which is not being spoken about, is the old-fashioned “Corrupt Judge.” To me it is the corrupt judge, the one who works for bribes, for favors, or who hands out bribes and favors to others, that is at the rotten core of what is wrong with this country’s legal system. Judge Lawrence J. O’Neil, I think, qualifies of one of the great corrupt judges of our time!

Why do I think that? The IRS case against Dr. Steven V. Booth and Michael Scott Ioane alone has shown how corrupt this judge really is. He started out by signing a vague and suspect search warrant for the IRS. The warrant was to search the premises of Dr. Booth and Mr. Ioane; it was so vague that it seemed to be an excuse to simply ransack the citizen’s homes. The homes were ransacked, money and personal property went missing and Mr. Ioane’s lawyers called them on it. Judge O’Neil was only a magistrate. You see magistrate judges have only statutory authority and if someone challenges what they do, which Ioane did, they have no authority to decide their own case, instead it must be heard by a Article Three Federal Judge. O’Neil was not legally supposed to rule on whether his own signed warrant was valid after it had been questioned. He should have recused himself. Instead, he buried the case until he was catapulted from being a magistrate, to being a fully-fledged Federal Judge after being nominated by President G.W. Bush in 2007. Oddly, the case involving his signing of a disputed search warrant as a magistrate, now came under his own jurisdiction!  O’Neil should have recused himself in that case as well.  This is what he did wrong, he ruled on his own search warrant as to whether it was valid or invalid just as the IRS was making their criminal case against Dr. Booth and Mr. Ioane. Evidence was then put forward by the IRS, which should never have been allowed. Talk about letting the fox guard the hen house!

Judge O’Neil then went on to become one of the most arrogant, heartless and cruel judges on the Federal Court dais. He continually handed down severe, almost medieval sentences. He quashed bills about cutting California carbon emissions in favor of the Big Oil companies. He was said by his colleagues to be an extremist judge. Yet, what he said and did to Dr. Booth’s co-defendant was indeed a crime bred out of corruption. Judge Lawrence was washing the backs of the IRS while they apparently washed his. The co-defendant was made aware by several friends and attorneys that there was a cabal of judges and lawyers in Fresno that had pretty much staked a claim on the Federal Courts. Anyone crossing this gang of corrupt personages was bound to feel their wrath. In his case, every time he tried to make a motion to save himself, Lawrence O’Neil quashed it. He would not reverse his decision on the search warrant, allowing evidence to be brought to the case that was nothing but circumstantial. “Right to a speedy trial” for Michael Scott Ioane? Denied! Then, mixing the trial of Booth with Ioane as if they had been some sort of criminal cohorts, O’Neil allowed Booth’s perjured testimony to be seen as “proof” that Mike Ioane had bilked the government out of millions of dollars! Calling Booth’s trust manager a “slick, cagey, wily con-man who was only upset over getting caught, rather than having committed a crime” he sentenced Ioane to 9 long years in Federal prison, using the IRS “$4,000,000.00 estimate” of what Booth owed them, as a basis for the harsh sentencing! Even though he knew full-well that Booth only owed $207,000, and that his tax burden had nothing to do with Michael Ioane’s case.

However, it gets worse. For Michael Ioane himself reported to me that an attorney for the court was ushered into his cell, (not into an anteroom or meeting room or other area where most such conversations take place in prison, but right in the defendant’s cell, as if he were some sort of Death Row inmate). There Mike was offered a deal. It seems that Judge Lawrence O’Neil did not really think he was guilty of conning the government. Instead, he was angry as hell that he would not deed over the properties in his portfolio back to Booth. So now, O’Neil was cutting a deal on behalf of the IRS and Booth! If Ioane would simply turn over his 5% portion of the properties, and convince the company he worked for to give over their 95%, back to Booth and the IRS he would be released. Case closed. Records expunged.

Now Michael Scott Ioane faced a real dilemma. Either do something that was patently wrong…since the IRS had convinced a jury that all the various trusts involved were “shams,” he would be signing documents that said this was correct and true, that he was a criminal and his life’s work a sham. He would be relinquishing properties, which were legally bought and paid for and mostly in the hands of a corporation he worked for, which could also be seen to be disreputable if he did as Judge O’Neil demanded. Mike would then have to try to convince his partners to do likewise. Then he would be freed. Or he could say no and spend 9 years in prison. He was put between the veritable rock and a hard place. His wife needed him out and working. His associates needed him to be out, and not only that, his reputation re-established. His kids needed him. His community needed him. He was already in jail and desperate for freedom. Yet if he did what O’Neil asked, he would be denying every principle he ever stood for or believed in.

After a long night of prayer, Mike Ioane gave his answer to his wife and to his own attorney and to O’Neil. “No deal.” He had chosen prison over lying and wrongdoing. He would not give over the properties to Booth or the IRS. Instead, he would fight them all. Now you tell me, what con-man, with a deal like that, which could free him to go about his daily confidence games, would NOT have taken the deal? Only an honest man would say “I’m staying in jail!” In the end, Judge Lawrence O’Neil’s evil plan did not work. Only because he was facing down a decent man; someone who would not roll over and play his games.

Michael Ioane was finally released on appeal. He still remains under house arrest, unable to work, to make a living, to travel or even to walk to the local store. He wears a Federally mandated ankle alarm bracelet, which the Feds want him to pay for even though they have disallowed him the right to work! They still work their evil machinations against this man who stood up to them and to the vile Judge O’Neil, who sentences men to 750 years in prison and doesn’t care if his own children choke on the noxious polluted air of California, so long as his Big Oil bedfellows are happy.

Having heard all this I realized, Judge O’Neil is the wily, cagey con-artist here. He’s the fat spider spinning the web to entrap and entangle innocent people. He does it for power and favor and money. He’s the ringleader of the Fresno/IRS gang, going after chiropractors and business managers instead of drug lords and crime king-pins. This man needs to be exposed. He’s not fit to be a judge. And really he needs to be in a cell somewhere contemplating his own failings, rather than lording it over others.

Tom Horne, Investigator.