Los Angeles, CA. Watch this 7 minute video news update report featuring
- Mary Tiedeman ACLU Jail Project Coordinator
- Peter Eliasberg ACLU Managing Attorney
- Richard I. Fine by collect telephone call from his jail cell
On March 4, 2010 it will be one year in the L.A. County Jail for Richard I. Fine, who accused Superior Court Judge Yaffe of corruption for taking illegal payments from the L.A. County in a case involving the County of Los Angeles. The ACLU has been called in to prevent inmate abuse by the L. A. County Jailers who are holding Fine in solitary “Coercive Confinement” in Central Men’s jail for contempt of court by order of Superior Court Judge David P. Yaffe.
Having never been convicted of a crime, Richard I. Fine, a 70 year old anti-trust attorney, who holds a Ph.D in International Law, has been held without a trial and without bail and no hearing or release date. These are circumstances in violation of U.S. Supreme Court precedent, In Re Farr (1974), where the five day limit on “coercive confinement” in civil contempt of court cases must apply.
The ACLU had previously informed Mr. Fine’s family and Full Disclosure® that they were unable to assist him. But when his upper dental plate broke on January 5, 2010 he complained to his jailers that he could not eat without them, he realized he desperately needed their help.
We called Actor Ed Asner, long known as a humanitarian and who was recently honored by the ACLU for his devotion to preserving Civil Liberties. Mr. Asner unhesitatingly offered to call Ramona Ripston executive director of the ACLU and wife of prominent Ninth Circuit Court Judge Steven Reinhardt, to request help for Mr. Fine. For years the ACLU has served as court appointed monitor for the L. A. County jails to prevent inmate abuse and assure attention to inmate health care complaints.
Comments to date: 15. This is page 1 of 2.
Anonymous II Location unknown
Posted: 08:09 pm [PST] on April 13 2011
In my opinion what Judge Yaffe's doing here would warrant immediate suspension as judge by any & all legal avenue's necessary. He should be brought to trial as any ordinary citizen would & for this gross violation of power which he has purposely committed.
I use the term "ordinary citizen" which would describe a decent normal individual in our society. But seeing the despicable nature of what's going on here I'd say he's nowhere near as good as the ordinary law-abiding citizen.
If ranked on a scale of 1-10, the ordinary law-abiding citizen ranking a 5,
I give this Yaffe bum a minus 5 at best from not having or showing any integrity or any honesty in this matter whatsoever!
As a matter of fact I would see this as nothing less than "PURE DISHONESTY".
For a Superior Court Judge, a person who's job we pay for, who we expect & is their duty to be, "absolutely Fair & Balanced", for them to do something like this is 100% Wrong & so Wrong, it's completly off the charts!
I think it goes without saying he should be an Honest & Law-abiding Citizen when both on, & off the bench.
I believe this is an extremely horrendous crime for a judge to be guilty of & should be punished to the "Fullest Extent".
I mean this guy is our judge, surely we are in the Twilight Zone!
Based on what I see, he has no integrity, no standard's & was never qualified to be any judge of anything at all, not even the judge of a cub scout's soap box derby. I wouldn't want this guy as a janitor at my local junior high school down the street.
THIS GUY IS NO GOOD, he is the Criminal!
Is this who we want deciding our citizen's guilt or innocent's & future?
Because this especially gross violation & abuse of power, Mr. Yaffe when found guilty, should be sentenced more severely than normal to say something like 2 days for every one which Mr.Fine has endured. Plus under precisely the same conditions Mr. Fine's was subjected to, the solitary confinement, the tiny cell, no visitors & he was only allowed out of that cell for 9 hours total in the first SIX MONTHS of his incarceration period. & so on down the line an eye for an eye, all that but X-2 two days for every one for having done this & see how he likes it.
None of this stuff where I the end he's just deemed a bad Judge & allowed to simply quietly retire !
Oh No, He needs to be Punished, & Punished big time!
Once that 2 for 1 punishment has been served, Mr. Yaffe should serve what ever standard "Prison Sentence" the jurors deem appropriate that he deserves from all his blatant abuse of power in this matter on top of that & consecutively.
That's how wrong I feel this man is.
. I would expect this should turn out to be a landmark case, one that should send a powerful message to other judges who might be doing or attempting to do the same thing.
I think Mr. Yaffe & addressing him as Mr.Yaffe seems a little to polite in this situation & at this point since he certainly has no right being a superior court Judge no more than a common criminal does having subjected one of our honest aw abiding citizens,this 70 Year Old Senior Citizen is profoundly illegal, unfounded & undeserved incarceration should have the book THROWN at him so hard it knocks him out at the sentencing. And this Judge Yaffe I'm told by everyone who's been involved with nothing less than a supreme asshole o a daily basis anyway,
I'm sure Judge Yaffe knows full-well each & every morning when he gets up, that this is dead wrong, how extremely wrong this is & in the back of his mind that he might possibly be caught for all this, brought to trial & possibly heavily prosecuted for doing this.
Now Leslie, I think we can both agree that this would be a
SURPRISING REALIZATION, WAKE UP CALL & a " FULL DISCLOSURE DAY in COURT" for poor Mr. Yaffe & who, I'm sure, would like us all to believe was in error & that he just made an honnest mistake for the last year & 2 months here? Well then what the hell is he doing being a judge?
It's A JOKE & it seems to be his joke on us, is that what we deserve for giving this Bum a job & our tax dollars? I ask you!
You talk about bring out the "stage hook".
I say bring out the stage hook & get the Hangman's noose ready,hey Bob, we got a real live joker over here, we're gona' need a studio audience, a news crew & plenty of popcorn & candy for this here execution!
You know Mr.Yaffe, sometimes ya just can't see the forest for the tree's. You just can't see what you got coming to you, can you?
You know maybe we should start callin' him "Old Laffy".They've nick named the electric chair "Old Sparky", maybe we should hook em both up.
Not that he's in any way laughable, it's just that, apparently he sees the whole thing as a joke, a joke on us!
Anything beyond 5 days he's subjected Mr. Fine to is illegal. So again every day, day after day, Yaffe has broken the law again one more time. Each day violating Mr. Fine again time after time, day after day.
So what's the count on all this going down here? On the number of times of Yaffe's Criminal conduct?
Count the number of days, that's the math & number of times of "Yaffe's guilt", not Mr. Fine's!
On top of that, factor in Yaffe thinking in his own mind or betting in his own mind that Mr. fine would have to give in, you know, possibly sign something a long time ago & go away quietly & cave in to the "all mighty judge".
Well, Yaffe you bet wrong on that one too, Flat OUT WRONG!
Don't go to Las Vegas Mr. Yaffe, save your filthy bribe money.
Your a lousy Gambler & if you ever get a real day job after all this, say something like a Sewer worker, which is suitable because you STINK!... Then KEEP IT your gona' need it!
But don't Gamble, your not a gambler, your a looser, a looser who should be fined any money paid to you by our taxpayers & which, you sir, or not entitled to & don't deserve one single red cent!
There is no question this man has no right holding this office & should be seen & judged as no better than a common criminal.
Oh, did I say doesn't deserve being called your Honor ... what a Joke!
I believe anyone allowed the privilege to hold a position of such importance should be absolutely sure each & every day & every morning, when they get up, of the difference between what's RIGHT & what's WRONG." Developing more knowledge & awareness of this as time goes on, not intentionally disregarding it as we've seen here. Not throwing the very job away that were paying him for, & I mean right down the drain & then thumbing his nose at us & the entire legal system to boot.
I can only imagine him rubbing his greedy hands together, counting the thousands of extra dollars in additional filthy bribe money he keep's for himself & that while all the rest of us are suffering thru this terrible depression we're in.
This despicable abuse of power subjecting this polite, mild mannered, upstanding citizen, Mr. Fine, who has the Decently Concern & what I'd call "Nobility" for having exposed this & Must be Punished.
It's like Yaffe's taken the key to his cell & swallowed it leaving Mr. Fine there forever or till death do he part. This, Yaffe's solution to resolve his own wrong doing, all his own making & all his own fault.
What ever happened to the old belief that 2 wrongs don't make a right.
For God's sake get this Bum the hell out of there!
As a taxpayers & citizen's we all are expected to obey the laws as we all should but this doesn't apply to a Judge, who does he think he's kidding.
When asked, if found guilty do I think Judge Yaffe should be punished, I say the sky's the limit baby,.. lower - the - boom!
It's high time this low life be held responsible & accountable for his actions & get a powerful dose of what he's wrongly dished out to countless other undeserving citizens while at the same time sitting up there behind the bench playing God.
A Judge crazy enough to completely abuse power like this hiding his own criminal agenda like, might also just be crazy enough to think he actually is Satin himself in order to justify the crime within his own mind.
But one thing we know for sure & as much as he likes playing the role,
he's certainly no God & certainly nobody we need presiding on the bench in a court of law.
Leslie Dutton LosAngeles
Posted: 09:38 pm [PST] on December 05 2010
I have known two people who served as President of SAG. Ronald Reagan and Ed Asner. Both of them were humanitarians and leaders. You may not agree with them on all the issues but where were you? When Richard Fine the 70 year old attorney had no teeth to chew his food while jailed illegally in solitary coercive confinement, we did not hear from you but Ed Asner's interest in this tragedy prompted the L A Sheriff Leroy Baca to fix the dental plate. So what is your problem? You wanted more perks in your union contract? What was it that Ed couldn't get for you?
Leslie California
Posted: 09:32 pm [PST] on December 05 2010
Ed Asner, humanitarian, liberal, preserving Civil Liberties!!!!!! Are you out of your fricking mind. Just look at the Board Minutes of SAG when he was President and you will see what a smuck he really is!!!!
Ruth Cincinnati, Ohio
Posted: 10:33 am [PST] on August 30 2010
Is this the best the ACLU can do? Mary Tiedeman is stupid, barely able to articulate. What an inferior outfit! They made her Jail Project Coordinator, how about latrine maiden? She could do a better job. The ACLU has shown itself to be quite useless in the past with serious and critical issues.
Laos Deo Location unknown
Posted: 09:12 pm [PST] on May 24 2010
Amazing!
Cheryl Meril San Francisco
Posted: 08:32 am [PST] on April 18 2010
This is the reason I no longer donate to the ACLU. Yet they were right there for Rush Limbaugh's case? As others have said, their body language, especially the guy's says it all. Very unprofessional. Gay marriage is more important to them then anything else. They're priorities are completely out of order. The ACLU is the new PETA of human rights. (Hint, PETA euthanizes animals people hand over believing they'll be adopted out).
Tricia L Ross Chicago
Posted: 07:17 pm [PST] on April 17 2010
The ACLU's Body language and excuses speaks volume's to anyone with half a brain. I am disgusted . That girl was lying flat out her hands were following the most typical protocol for lying and nervousness.
Richy Nexico
Posted: 04:35 am [PST] on April 17 2010
It is sad to see someone so youg, already so corrupt
Paula Maine
Posted: 03:00 pm [PST] on April 04 2010
At my website, click on the flashing star for a potential solution to the corruption in our judicial system.
www.dirtydecisions.com
Anonymous Los Angeles
Posted: 04:12 pm [PST] on March 07 2010
Shame on the ACLU because here a 70 year old man cannot eat properly due to cracked denture plate. This man is a political prisoner in our American jail becuase he exposed widespread court corruption in Los Angeles Superior Court system -- with over 200 judges.
Shame on the ACLI -- what dunces these two are. Who's paying them under the table? Prison confinement in solitary for a 70 year old man.