person:ophelia basgal

  • REDACTED COMMUNICATION SENT TO COUNSEL IN MATTER OF SUIT AGAINST MORRISON & FOERSTER ET AL ON AUGUST 7, 2015

    Dear Counsel:

    I hope you are well and are enjoying the summer.

    This will serve to discuss various matters dealing with the two above referenced actions. At times, each counsel is addressed individually and at times issues are addressed to all (or the majority of) counsel collectively, as follows:

    1. YOLO COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT JUDGES DAVID ROSENBERG AND DAVID REED — First, as to the part of this communication addressed to Messrs. Michael Fox, Keith Fink and Olaf Muller, please be informed that an upcoming federal action of Levi v. Girardi & Keese will include one cause of action seeking only equitable relief against “Yolo County Superior Court.” Since your clients (Judges David Rosenberg and David Reed) are part of the “Yolo County Superior Court”, I wanted to give you a heads-up of the upcoming action, as well as to inform you that it is unrelated to the topics which were previously the subjects of various agreements.

    Simply put, and as discussed in more detail below as events relate to other parties, there have been serious new developments dealing with: a) Yolo DA / AARP b) Michael Cabral / Yolo and Riverside DA’s offices/ SNR Dentons - Rod Pacheco - James Hsu / Yolo County’s Cache Creek Casino - Chief Marshall Mckay/ Mark Friedman / DLA Piper / Kapor Enterprises.

    As far as (a) — developments involving Yolo DA and AARP, etc, note that last week I learned that AARP — where George Davis (formerly a California Bar BOG member who voted to press false criminal charges against me with Yolo DA, president of AARP-California, and with strong financial ties to CCPF) and Barbara O’Connor (AARP and AARP Foundation Director, Link America Foundation Director - whom I caught in major alleged fraud re Washington DC party to celebrate the “linking” of the two Americas — which in actuality was a Barack Obama inauguration party - and employee of Sacramento-based Donna Lucas’s Public Affairs) — has bestowed an unusual grant of $40,000 on the Yolo County District Attorney (see attached press-release and HERE ) headed by Jeff Reisig and Jonathan Raven.

    As far as (b) — developments involving Yolo / Riverside Assistant District Attorney Michael Cabral — note that during the pendency of the criminal action against me, a very unusual theory was explored by which Cabral had been transferred from Riverside County DA to Yolo County DA for the sole reason of falsely and maliciously criminally prosecuting me in order to intimidate me into silence and otherwise confiscate incriminating evidence through the execution of an invalid search warrant.
    At that time, I looked into those facts and rejected the theory dealing with Cabral (See story HERE). About one month ago, I learned that Cabral is no longer with the Yolo DA, and has returned back home to the Riverside County District Attorney.

    As you may recall and as I stated previously, I agreed to a plea of no contest to a charge of misdemeanor attempted extortion as a stopgap measure since I was under duress on various fronts. As part of the plea bargain I agreed to, among other things, not contact the State Bar of California Board of Governors/Trustees directly, and other overreaching conditions.

    Both as a journalist and as a victim of the above alleged malfeasance, I am obviously interested in informing the State Bar of California Board of Governors/Trustees and the public vis-a-vis press releases, published articles, and by contacting other journalists of those events. However, per conditions imposed on me while under duress as part of the plea bargain in the criminal matter by Judge Reed, I am prohibited from directly contacting BOG members. As such, in addition to suing some of the above named and others in federal court, I plan to ask the same federal court for relief to allow me to freely exercise free speech.

    As such, if the attorneys for Judges Rosenberg and Reed believe that advancing an action against Yolo County Superior Court for equitable relief is not consistent with the spirit or language of our prior agreements, please let me know.

    Note that from my perspective past events are all forgotten history and there is absolutely no desire to rehash old claims against Rosenberg and Reed. In fact, as I mentioned to Rosenberg’s attorney (Mr. Fink) over the phone, I am a huge fan of Rosenberg and was recently disappointed that he was not appointed as a justice to the California Supreme Court given his outstanding judicial qualities, experience, and political background (i.e. former chief of staff to Governor Jerry Brown; Judicial Council member; mayor of Davis, etc).

    2. SERVICE OF BRIEF AND APPENDIX — California Rules of Court Rule 8.124 (e)(1)states that “a party preparing an appendix must: (A) Serve the appendix on each party, unless otherwise agreed by the parties....”

    As far as the service of the appendix, I am hoping that each party will agree to waive formal service and instead agree that the service of a searchable PDF Appendix via electronic mail is sufficient. Note that I will be advising the court of my request and the responses received from counsel, if any.

    Similarly, I am hoping that you will also agree to waive formal service of a hard copy of the appellant’s brief and to instead agree that the service of searchable PDF and/or Microsoft Word version of the brief via electronic mail is sufficient. I will also be letting the court know that I made this request of counsel and the responses received, if any.

    I would like to urge everyone to agree to the above in order to save a tree, costs, and the unnecessary labor of printing, copying, and binding thousands of pages.

    3. SETTLEMENT DISCUSSIONS — As applied to the two above referenced actions, I would like to remind everyone that the window to engage in settlement discussions has been closed, as was stated previously. As such, due to multitudes of reasons, in connection with the above two referenced actions, please refrain from extending any settlement offers, attempting to engage in settlement negotiations, or offering anything of value. The only exception will be if the undersigned originates a proposal.

    4. DOCKET — As far as the matter pending before the California Third District Court of Appeal, note that the docket maintained by the court contains many inaccuracies and is otherwise lacking. For example, a search for the last name of defendant/respondent “James Brosnahan” yields no result. Ditto defendants Freada Kapor Klein, Michael Cabral, Mark Friedman (only the name of the late distinguished Morton Friedman OBM appears), Fulcrum Property (only “Fulcrum Davis” appears, which I assume is associated with the Friedmans), Mary Cary Zellerbach, Martin Investment Management, Ronald Olson, Jeff Bleich, Chris Young, Kamala Harris, Douglas Winthrop, Holly Fujie, Ophelia Basgal, and others.

    As such, I ask that each of you contact the court of appeal on behalf of your respective clients — similar to the 4th entry of the docket by which the attorney for Darrel Steinberg independently wrote the court to advise that Steinberg is a respondent, see HERE — to inform the court of the problem and ask for it to be rectified.

    Moreover, please ensure that the name of your clients are spelled correctly i.e. “Munger,Tollis” or “Freada, Kapor, Klein” are not the correct spelling, at least based on my understanding.

    The attorney representing Ms. Kamala Harris is requested to inform the court to remove a comment by which the docket states that Ms. Harris was sued in her capacity as the attorney general or forward proof where I allege she was sued in such capacity.

    The attorney from Locke Lord representing defendants Cary Zellerbach and Martin Investment is asked to inform the court to correct the docket which does not mention either yourself, your firm, or your clients. Also with respect to your client that has thus far managed to avoid service, please be advised that the California statute of limitations is tolled and I intend to pursue claims against her either in state or federal court. REDACTED

    5. SKADDEN ARPS — ISSUES RE RAUOL KENNEDY REPRESENTATION OF CALIFORNIA JUDICIARY — Mr. Russell, as you may recall, in reply to my inquiry you wrote: "My colleague Raoul Kennedy does indeed represent Justice Robert Mallano in Mallano v. Chiang et al., LASC Case No. BC533770. As you may know, Judge Elihu Berle granted class certification in Mallano on January 15, 2015. The class members have not yet been identified because notice has not been circulated, nor has the period for opt outs occurred. Nevertheless, regardless of which judges or justices eventually become members of the class, pursuant to section 811.9 of the California Government Code, the “fact that a justice, judge, subordinate judicial officer, court executive officer, court employee, the court, the Judicial Council, or the Administrative Office of the Courts is or was represented or defended by the county counsel, the Attorney General, or other counsel shall not be the sole basis for a judicial determination of disqualification of a justice, judge, subordinate judicial officer, the county counsel, the Attorney General, or other counsel in unrelated actions.” Cal. Gov’t Code § 811.9. As a matter of law, there is no conflict. The statute is attached for your reference."

    As a reply, I wrote in part that the statute applies only to one justice, and in the case at hand Mr. Kennedy represents (as of now and assuming none chose to opt out) the entire qualified panel of justices of the Third District and that, most importantly, per the statute, the representation must be the “sole” basis. Here, the representation of Skadden/ Kennedy is NOT the sole basis. Rather, there is an additional basis for the disqualification — which is the fact that Skadden itself is also a DEFENDANT in the “unrelated action.”

    In any event, this will serve to inform you that I intend to seek to disqualify any and all judicial officers who are clients of your firm. As such, I ask for you to please forward a list identifying the class members and all those who chose to opt-out of the litigation.

    6. MORRISON & FOERSTER: Mr. Besirof, associate Davis indicated that you replaced Mr. Dresser as the attorney in this matter. Please let me know if you have any questions or require certain clarification. Since you are new to the case and since it is summer, if you need extra time to catch up on materials as far as the filing of an appellate respondent brief, I am extending to you (and by extension everyone else) an additional 60 days in which to file your brief.

    7. DEFENDANT MARK FRIEDMAN / COUNSEL - BROTHER PHILIP FRIEDMAN — Mr. Friedman, in connection with events dealing with Michael Cabral / Yolo DA / Chache Creek Casino and SNR Dentons, can you please provide a list of all the partnerships between defendant Mark Friedman and the Rumsey / Yocha Dehe tribe which operates Cache Creek Casino in Yolo County?

    A lawsuit (attached) the tribe/casino filed against your brother and REDACTED lists the following: Government Property Fund,LLC; Government Property Fund II, LLC ; Government Property Fund III, LLC ; Government Property Fund IV, LLC ; 4330 Watt,LLC; Fulcrum Management Group LLC ; Fulcrum Friedman Management Group, LLC ; Illiniois Property Fund, GPF ; and Illinois LLC. Are these partnership still in effect ?

    Also, for purposes of determine potential conflicts of interest in the current pending matter as far as your ability to serve as legal counsel given your role as a potential witness, please inform me whether Paragraph 108 of the lawsuit which states: “The other Vectors partners included REDACTED and Opper, as well as Friedman, Friedman’s father and brother, and John Krasznekewicz (a Friedman friend)” refers to you, Philip Friedman. In essence, what I am asking is are you the Vector partner or is the brother alluded to someone else ? Also, starting in 2006 to the present, were you involved in any other partnership with the tribe and the casino ?

    8. MUNGER TOLLES & OLSON: Mr. Senator, if not a bother, I will appreciate if your firm would forward me the following:

    a - copy of the report prepared by your colleague Bart Williams dealing with alleged misconduct by Joe Dunn, especially in connection to a trip overseas by which Dunn was accompanied by Howard Miller of Girardi & Keese and Tom Layton. As you may be aware, accompanying the Yolo County District Attorney officers during the execution of the search warrant at my home was also Tom Layton — who served as liaison. As such, if said report is in the public domain, I will appreciate if you forward a copy.

    b - your colleague Jeffrey Bleich recently solicited as clients a group of UC Davis APA law students in connection with their bid to admit post-mortum an APA applicant to the State Bar of California. If not a bother, will it be possible for you to please forward to me a copy of the motion and all other pleading submitted to the California Supreme Court.

    9. FREADA AND MITCHELL KAPOR / LEVEL PLAYING FIELD INSTITUTE : Mr. Medina, at your earliest, I will appreciate if you please address the following:

    a. In order to determine your status as potential witness, can you please forward your employment history to date beginning from around 2006 ? Were you ever employed at the DLA Piper office in Sacramento ? If yes, can you please state the dates of your employment.

    b. Are you and your clients in a position to disclose who is paying Kapor and LPFI’s attorney’s fees? If it is DLA Piper who set you up to defend the two or otherwise is paying your attorney’s fees, please let me know. As you may know, DLA Piper managing partner Gilles Attia, daughter Sarah Attia, and partner Steve Churchwell played a huge role in CaliforniaALL / Obama for America. Also, separately and around the same time, there is an allegation that DLA Piper laundered $50,000 to “Obama Victory Fund” through defendant Level Playing Field Institute / Kapor Enterprises vis-a-vis the so called “Kapor Maneuver.”

    c. Recently, I have learned from a YOU-TUBE video featuring Mr. Kapor that he is heavily invested in what he refers to as “Ed-Tech” companies.

    It will be appreciated if you let me know if Mr. Kapor, his wife, or their entities have any business relationships with Steve Poizner or former California Bar Foundation treasurer Lindsay Lee — both of whom are also involved with Ed-Tech.

    d. Yesterday, just as I was about to send you settlement business proposals, much to my chagrin and indignation, I encountered the following article in USA Today. Under the heading of “Kapors pledge $40 million investment in tech diversity” it stated, among other things: “Mitch Kapor and wife Freada Kapor Klein will invest $40 million over three years in a set of initiatives designed to give women and underrepresented minorities a better shot at becoming technology entrepreneurs.” The article further stated that “Kapor Capital will make more than $25 million in investments in technology start-ups working to narrow the achievement gaps. At least half of the companies will have founders from underrepresented groups.” (See story http://tinyurl.com/p33dxlx )

    My understanding is that any and all non-profit and for-profits companies operated in the State of California are deemed to be “business establishments” that come within the purview of Civil Code Section 51 known as The Unruh Civil Rights Act.

    Be advised that the plan by the Kapors and Kapor Capital to “make more than $25 million in investments in technology start-ups working to narrow the achievement gaps. At least half of the companies will have founders from underrepresented groups” runs afoul of The Unruh Civil Rights Act which reads: “All persons within the jurisdiction of this state are free and equal, and no matter what their sex, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, or sexual orientation are entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, privileges, or services in all business establishments of every kind whatsoever.”

    In other words, Kapor Capital’s plan to pick and choose “founders from underrepresented groups” (based on the article, women and “underrepresented minorities”) is unlawful. If you or your clients disagree, please forward an explanation. Otherwise, I shall await word from you that there has been a change of plans.

    e. As you may be aware, starting around 2000, the former executive-director of the State Bar of California (Ms. Judy Johnson) secretly served as the president of the “California Consumer Protection Foundation” ("CCPF") an entity which obtained millions of dollars from class-action “cy pres” awards and from fines, settlements and payments the CPUC — during the time Michael Peevey and Geoff Brown served as commissioners — imposed on various utility companies. For example, anytime a merger took place i.e. between various cell-phone companies such as Verizon, millions were paid to CCPF.

    CCPF, in turn, funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to entities in South-Central Los Angeles [with very close connection to State Bar of California BOG members Shrimpscam’s Gwen Moore and George Davis], a dubious entity in Venice for “Youth Radio”, an entity headed by Michael Shames, various Asian-American entities with close connections to State Bar officials (Holly Fujie and Madge Watai — Little Tokyo Service Center, etc.) and money to entities headed by associates of Justice Ming Chin.

    Based my estimation, around $3 million cannot be accounted for, and separately I alleged that CCPF submitted false reports to the IRS. Months before the execution of the search warrant, I complained to the IRS against CCPF as well as filed an ethics complaint against Judy Johnson and others with the State Bar of California. Later, as you may recall, the State Bar of California BOG voted to file criminal charges against me, alleging among other things, that the CCPF ethics complaint constituted criminal conduct which served as one basis for the search warrant.

    Based on my recollection, it also appeared that CCPF may have funneled money to entities established by the Kapors. Since all the materials have been confiscated by the Yolo DA and are otherwise inaccessible, at your earliest, I will appreciate the names of those entities and the dates / amounts each of these contribution.

    f. Please consider this a formal request for “Kapor Center for Social Impact” to produce its 3 last 990 forms submitted to the IRS. If you need me to request this information from the entity directly, please let me know.

    Thank you for your attention to these matters. Please let me know if you have any questions.

  • REDACTED COPY OF MOTION TO JUDGE LESLIE NICHOLS TO PRODUCE FORM 700 AND DISCLOSE RELATIONSHIP WITH PG&E

    In California, all state and local public officials and all candidates for public office must file a Statement of Economic Interests, also known as a Form 700. It appears that Hon. Leslie Nichols failed to comply with this requirement. Accordingly, the Plaintiff hereby requests that Judge Nichols produce forthwith said Form 700 at the next available opportunity and before rendering any other decisions or issuing any other orders in this matter.

    Additionally, Plaintiff moves Hon. Leslie Nichols to disclose whether he or a family member owns (or owned in the last year) any financial instruments (such as bonds or stocks) with defendants PG&E, Berkshire Hathaway, Edison International, Southern California Edison, Accenture, or any other defendant named in this case.

    Moreover, Plaintiff moves this Court to provide details (such as dates) describing his involvement with the Judicial Council, JAMS, and all prior matters involving PG&E.

    Plaintiff also moves this Court to disclose the extent of his relationship with defendants Ophelia Basgal and PG&E in the context of the California Supreme Court Historical Society (“CSCHS”).

    As this Court is aware, defendants Basgal and PG&E were named in this suit in connection with alleged misconduct relating to non-profit CaliforniaALL. However, Plaintiff in the past also unearthed misconduct relating to PG&E and Basgal in connection with the CSCHS in that PG&E and Basgal (who, shockingly, served as the treasurer of CSCHS), as well as Justice Ronald George and attorneys from Howard Rice / Arnold & Porter, misused CSCHS to launder money to a UC entity (where Justice George’s son, Eric George, served as director) for the purpose of bribing Joseph Grodin in a suit filed by California’s former attorney general Bill Lockyer against PG&E.

    Lastly, Plaintiff asks that this Court confirm that it was not involved in any fraudulent activities in failing to disclose that Ophelia Basgal was an employee of PG&E during her tenure as the treasurer of the CSCHS.

    Due to the above pending requests, Plaintiff moves this Court to suspend any and all rulings and orders pending the disclosure of the requested data. Plaintiff also moves this Court to schedule an evidentiary hearing at the earliest possible opportunity to allow defendants PG&E and Ophelia Basgal to testify under oath as to the extent of their relationship with Judge Nichols.

    Respectfully submitted.

  • Eric George in Addendum # 11 to Suspicious Financial Machinations Surrounding University of California Regent Richard Blum — Husband of Dianne Feinstein : UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies aka “IGS” [TLR Note: 1- Eric George part of IGS; 2- California Supreme Court Historical Society ("CSCHS") headed by Ronald George, PG&E’s Ophelia Basgal of CaliforniaALL, and Kay Werdegar forward money to IGS 3- In 2007 , CSCHS transfers the unusually high amount of $ 51, 720 to IGS — which YR is in the process of analyzing — may have been used to bribe Joseph Grodin in matter involving PG&E, Jerry Brown, Bill Lockyer, Howard Rice’s Jerome Falk and Amy Margolin 5. CSCHS also transfers funds to “University of California Board of Regents” 6- Separately, according to YR, CSCHS can’t treat expenses for services as “grants” or “donations” 7- Eric George remains under scrutiny in matters involving Toyota, In Re Girardi, Ocean Liners, Winnie the Pooh, Bet Tzedek, 1st. Century Bank,
    etc...]

    Please see story :

    http://lesliebrodie.wordpress.com/2013/02/09/eric-george-in-addendum-11-to-suspicious-financial-machinati

    Eric George of Browne George Ross — son of deposed Ronald George — hereby asked disclose reason necessary to solicit money from private parties (i.e. law firms, lawyers) during time surplus funds of non-profit “California Supreme Court Historical Society” were invested at brokerage-house Smith Barney

    Please see @:

    http://lesliebrodie.wordpress.com/2013/02/08/eric-george-of-browne-george-ross-son-of-deposed-ronald-geor

  • Fraudster/Alleged Racketeer Arnold & Porter’s Jerome Falk (aka Jerry Falk; formerly of Howard Rice) Joins JAMS Amid Controversies Surrounding PG&E, Ophelia Basgal, CSCHS, In Re Girardi, Doug Winthrop

    Jerry Falk, a former named partner at now defunct Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin, abruptly quit Arnold & Porter.

    Per the Recorder:

    “Jerome Falk Jr.’s new career move has been more than a year in the making.”

    Falk began work at JAMS, concluding four decades of appellate advocacy spent predominantly at San Francisco’s Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin.

    At 72, an age when some lawyers might be looking to retire, Falk said he’s ready for his “second act” at JAMS, where he will work full time as an arbitrator and mediator for a range of commercial, intellectual property, employment, insurance and other disputes.

    Falk, who has experience as an arbitrator, was prepared to make the move a year ago, around the same time the 80-lawyer Howard Rice struck a merger deal with Arnold & Porter. He stuck around to see his partners through the transition.

    “At the end of one year, I was ready to return to Plan A,” Falk said in an interview Wednesday.

    Douglas Winthrop, then managing partner of Howard Rice, said Falk’s support helped smooth the merger with Arnold & Porter, which took effect in January 2012."

    For the complete Recorder’s story, please click HERE.

    –----------------

    IN RE GIRARDI; JERRY FALK LACK OF CREDIBILITY

    At the conclusion of the appeal in a civil case prosecuted by the firms of Girardi & Keese and Engstrom Lipscomb & Lack against Dole Food Company, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski issued an order to show cause why Thomas Girardi and Walter Lack should not be disbarred, suspended, or sanctioned for the attempt to defraud this Court for the purpose of unjustly collecting a $500 million judgment.

    Representing Thomas Girardi in those disciplinary proceedings before ther Ninth Circuit were Wayne Gretsky of Skadden Arps and ethics expert Diane Karpman.

    Oral arguments ensued, during which one of the judges on the panel stated that the “elephant” in the room is the manner in which the matter would be developed by the State Bar of California.

    Subsequently, the Court found both Girardi and Lack culpable, and imposed close to $500,000.00 in monetary sanctions, reprimanded Girardi, and suspended Lack. Some of the findings included that Lack and Girardi have resorted to employing “the persistent use of known falsehoods” and that “false representations” were made “knowingly, intentionally, and recklessly” during years of litigation.

    The State Bar of California assigned the matter to an outside special prosecutor (Jerome Falk of Howard Rice) since Howard Miller of Girardi & Keese served as President of the State Bar, and had hired the Chief Trial counsel of the State Bar at the time, Mr. James Towery.

    After conducting an interview with Walter Lack, Jerome Falk chose to not file any charges against Lack or Girardi based on his position that any false statements submitted were not “intentional.” This determination was contrary to findings made by the Ninth Circuit.

    Within days of the issuance of Mr. Falk’s decision, YR advanced an ethics complaint against James Towery, Jerome Falk, Howard Miller, and Douglas Winthrop, contending that it had been improper for Mr. Towery to select Jerome Falk (of Howard Rice) to serve as special prosecutor because, among other reasons, Howard Miller (of Girardi & Keese) had appointed Howard Rice’s managing partner (Douglas Winthrop) as president of the California Bar Foundation, a foundation owned, controlled, and maintained by the State Bar of California, as well as because of the close business relationship between Howard Rice’s Jerome Falk and Wayne Gretsky of Skadden Arps.

    Subsequently, and fortuitously, YR also discovered that Lack and Girardi were actually clients of Jerome Falk and Howard Rice. YR had inquired with Mr. Hawley of the State Bar of California whether this fact was known to the Special Master investigating the complaint. The State Bar of California remained mum.

    Subsequently, Jerome Falk wrote to YR:

    I received your November 13 email concerning my participation in the State Bar’s investigation of Walter J. Lack, Thomas V. Girardi and other attorneys. It is filled with disparaging characterizations, all of which seem to stem from your allegations that I or my firm have represented Mr. Lack and Mr. Girardi.

    Your allegations are false.

    I have never represented either person, or their firms. Neither has Douglas Winthrop. Nor has my firm ever represented Mr. Lack or Mr. Girardi.

    From 2006-2008, my firm represented several law firms, including Engstrom, Lipscomb & Lack and Girardi & Keese, in a litigation matter. The public records of that litigation show that neither Mr. Winthrop nor I had nothing to do with that representation; in fact, I was unaware of it. The public records also show that my firm represented the law firms, but did not represent Mr. Girardi or Mr. Lack. The attorney responsible for that representation had left Howard Rice and taken the files with him before I was asked to serve as Special Deputy Trial Counsel in the State Bar matter.

    You are on notice that your allegations are false. The falsity of those allegations can be determined from the public records of the litigation in question.

    Jerome B. Falk, Jr.

    Dear Mr. Falk:

    Thank you for replying to my letter of November 13th, 2011 This will serve as a reply.

    In your letter dated December 7, 2011, you attempt again to defraud and mislead in your attempt to avoid responsibility for your repugnant and deceitful actions taken in connection with your actions as a special prosecutor on behalf of the State Bar of California against two of your and your firm’s clients — Girardi & Keese and Engstrom Lipscomb & Lack (and by operation of law, Thomas Girardi and Walter Lack), as part of a scheme to exploit your authority for financial gain.

    By analogy, rather than acknowledging that you were caught with your hand in the cookie jar, you seek to bamboozle the unwary by stating that it wasn’t actually your hand in the cookie jar but, rather, only your fingers, and in any event it wasn’t a jar but, rather, a plastic container which you contend doesn’t qualify as a jar. Therefore, you devote an entire paragraph proclaiming, “Your allegations are false.” You conclude by placing me on “notice” that my allegations are “false.”

    The contents of your communication are unethical in the extreme, as well as entirely frivolous factually, legally, and by operation of law, to wit:

    You claim, “In fact, I wasn’t aware of it” (referring to the fact that you and your firm had represented Girardi & Keese and ELL). While you acknowledge your firm (Howard Rice) did represent Girardi & Keese and ELL from 2006 to 2008 , you assert that you were not aware of this representation. Simply put, your assertion is false; it is simply implausible that for two entire years you were unaware that your firm represented such celebrity/famous/notorious attorneys such as Thomas Girardi, Walter Lack, and Pierce O’Donnell.

    This is particularly true since you are a member of Howard Rice’s “attorney liability” group, which consists of between 7-9 attorneys (including your colleagues Sean SeLegue, Pamela Phillips, and Steve Mayer), and the subject matter of the litigation was a suit advanced against Girardi & Keese, ELL, and O’Donnell for legal malpractice in connection with alleged attorney misconduct in the litigation involving El Paso Natural Gas/Sempra Energy, a series of cases which received significant publicity.

    I am also hard-pressed to believe that you were unaware of the estimated $250,000 retainer Girardi & Keese and ELL paid to your firm (money which paid your and your colleagues’ salaries), and that no one ever discussed this matter with you for purposes of addressing legal strategy or legal issues in person or during meetings.

    Most importantly, in your letter to Robert Baker you acknowledge that you had interviewed Walter Lack. Again, you ask me to believe that Walter Lack did not mention the fact that Howard Rice represented him and his firm only one year prior to your meeting.

    The fact that Walter Lack did not speak up during the interview with you is just too convenient, and is further circumstantial evidence that you and he both knew of the prior representation, and chose to nevertheless further continue with the conspiracy to obstruct justice for financial gain, to the detriment of the public and the proper administration of justice.

    Please see complete story @:

    http://lesliebrodie.blog.co.uk/2013/01/06/fraudster-alleged-racketeer-arnold-porter-s-jerome-falk-aka-jer

  • Alphabetical List of Organizations / Individuals That Are of Interest to The Leslie Brodie Report — Year 2013

    For updates, please see @:

    http://lesliebrodie.blog.co.uk/2013/01/01/the-leslie-brodie-report-2013-people-of-interest-15372924

    A.

    AARP - American Association of Retired Persons;

    Peter Arth of CPUC;

    Accenture;

    Robert Adler of Southern California Edison, formerly of Munger Tolles;

    Marty Africa of Lindsey Major & Africa;

    Allen Matkins;

    Ruthe Catolico Ashley (aka Ruthe Ashley);

    Lance Astrella of Astrella & Rice;

    B.

    Starr Babcock of State Bar of California;

    Ophelia Basgal, formerly of PG&E;

    Gibor Basri of UC Berkeley Foundation/ CaliforniaALL;

    Jeremy Ben Ami of J. Street;

    Bet Tzedek Legal Services of Los Angeles;

    Jeffrey Bleich of Munger Tolles & Olson/ Obama for America;

    Richard Blum;

    Geoff Brown of CPUC;

    Frederick Brown of Gibson Dunn;

    Boyd Gaming;

    James Brosnahan of Morrison & Foerster / Obama for America;

    Ron Burkle of The Yucaipa Companies;

    John Burton of California Democratic Party;

    C.

    CaliforniaALL;

    California Forward;

    California Emerging Technology Fund;

    California Consumer Protection Foundation ("CCPF");

    California Supreme Court Historical Society;

    California Endowment;

    Annette Carnegie of Morrison & Foerster;

    CB Richard Ellis;

    Center for Asian Americans United for Self Empowerment (CAUSE);

    Alec Chang of Skadden Arps;

    Raj Chatterjee of Morrison & Foerster;

    Erwin Chemerinsky of UCI School of Law;

    Ming Chin, Associate Justice of California Supreme Court;

    Steve Churchwell of DLA Piper;

    CityView:

    Richard Claussen of Goddard Claussen;

    CleanTECH;

    Joe Cotchett of Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy

    Dick Costolo of Twitter / Posterous;

    D.

    Angela Davis of US Attorney’s office in Los Angeles/ Judicial Council

    Howard Dickstein ;

    Jeannine Dickstein (aka Jeannine English);

    Jack Dorsey of Twitter/Posterous;

    DLA Piper;

    Duke Energy;

    Joe Dunn;

    Kinde Durkee;

    E.

    Edison International

    Judge Morrison England;

    Torie Flournoy-England;

    Jeannine English (aka Jeannine Dickstein);

    EPIC Church at 543 Howard;

    Martha Escutia;

    F.

    Jerome Falk of Arnold & Porter(formerly of Howard Rice);

    Timothy
    Judge Tim Fall of Yolo Couty Superior Court (image:courtesy photo)

    Judge Timothy Fall (aka Tim Fall) of Yolo County Superior Court;

    Nancy Fineman of Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy;

    James Brosnahan, Jeff Bleich, Willie Fletcher
    From left James Brosnahan, Unknown, Jeffrey Bleich, and Judge Willie Fletcher (Image: courtesy photo)

    William Fletcher : FOB — Friend of Bill Clinton;Democratic Party Operative; Judge with Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals; UC Berkeley;

    For People of Color, Inc. — entity associated with MTO;

    Mark Friedman of Fulcrum Property;

    Holly Fujie;

    Fulcrum Property;

    G.

    Ronald George;

    Eric George;

    Girardi & Keese;

    Thomas Girardi;

    Golden Pacific Bank;

    Joilene Wood Grove;

    David Grove ;

    Jasmine Guillory;

    H.

    Karina Hamilton of UC Irvine;

    Robert Hamilton of Allen Matkins;

    Leslie Hatamiya;

    Kamala Harris;

    William Hauck of Goddard Claussen;

    Robert Hawley of State Bar of California;

    Tony Haymet of Scripps Institution of Oceanography ;

    James Hsu

    I.

    Institute on Aging;

    J.

    Judy Johnson;

    K.

    Raoul Kennedy of Skadden Arps;

    Freada Klein Kapor;

    Mitchell Kapor;

    Keker & Van Nest;

    John Keker of Keker & Van Nest;

    Brenda Kempster of LINK AMERICAS Foundation

    Pat Fong-Kushida

    Stewart Kwoh

    L.

    Walter Lack of Engstrom Lipscomb & Lack;

    David Lash;

    Tom Layton of State Bar of California / Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department;

    Patricia Lee

    Richard Lehman of Lehman Levi Pappas & Sadler;

    Larry Lessig;

    Level Playing Field Institute;

    David Lira;

    Little Tokyo Service Center;

    Donna Lucas of Lucas Public Affairs

    Greg Lucas

    M.

    Susan Mac Cormac of Morrison & Foerster;

    Nancy McFadden of PG&E / UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy / Jerry Brown’s

    Dennis Mangers;

    Manika Jewelry;

    Patrice McElroy;

    Nancy McFadden of PG&E;

    Sunne McPeak;

    Howard Miller of Girardi & Keese;

    Victor Miramontes of CityView / CaliforniaALL;

    Gwen Moore of GEM Communications / Shrimpscam/ State Bar of California;

    Munger Tolles & Olson;

    N.

    Bettina Neuefeind;

    Tom Nolan of Skadden Arps;

    Bill Novelli of AARP/Porter Novelli;

    O.

    Barbara O’Connor of AARP, Lucas Public Affairs;

    Pierce O’Donnell

    Ron Olson of Munger Tolles & Olson / Berkshire Hathaway / Southern California Edison

    P.

    Pacific Gas & Electric Company;

    Larissa Parecki;

    Mark Parnes of Wilson Sonsini;

    David Pasternak of Pasternak Pasternak & Patton ;

    Bradley Phillips of Munger Tolles & Olson;

    Michael Peevey of CPUC;

    Pegasus Capital;

    Roman Porter;

    Porter Novelli;

    Q.

    R.

    Sarah E. Redfiled of UNH School of Law;

    Jeff Reisig ;

    Reliant Energy;

    JoAnn Remke;

    Mark Robinson of Robinson Calcagnie Robinson/Judicial Council;

    Richard Robinson

    John Roos, formerly CEO of Wilson Sonsini;

    Alan Rothenberg of 1st. Century Bank;

    Fred Rowley of Munger Tolles;

    Dave Rosenberg of Yolo County Superior Court / Judicial Council;

    Bonnie Rubin of 1st. Century Bank / State Bar of California Legal Services Trust Fund Commission

    S.

    Scripps Institution of Oceanography;

    Douglas Scrivner of Accenture

    Thomas Silk;

    Larry Sonsini

    Southern California Edison;

    State Bar of California Legal Services Trust Fund Commission

    Station Casinos;

    Jon Streeter of Keker & Van Nest;

    Aaron Swartz;

    T.

    Mary Ann Todd of Munger Tolles & Olson / California Bar Foundation

    Richard Tom of Southern California Edison / California Bar Foundation

    U.

    UC Irvine School of Law;

    UC Irvine Foundation;

    UC Berkeley Foundation;

    UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy

    University of Phoenix;

    V.

    Venoco;

    Verizon Communications

    Voice of Orange County

    W.

    James Wagstaffe of Kerr & Wagstaffe;

    Monica Walsh of Manika Jewelry;

    David Washburn of Voice of OC;

    Madge Watai

    Henry Weissmann of Munger Tolles & Olson

    David Werdegar of Institute on Aging;

    Kathryn Werdegar, Associate-Justice of California Supreme Court;

    Matthew Werdegar of Keker & Van Nest;

    Tony West of United States Department of Justice;

    Steve Westly;

    Anita Westly

    Wilson Sonsini

    Douglas Winthrop of Arnold & Porter(formerly of Howard Rice), California Bar Foundation;

    X.

    Y.

    Christopher Young of Keker & Van Nest
    Christopher Young of Keker & Van Nest (image: courtesy)

    Christopher Young of Keker & Van Nest

    Z.

    Carry Zellerbach (aka Mary Ellen Zellerbach);

    Daniel Zingale;

    Zurich Financial Services / Zurich Insurance;

  • As public service to the community, staff members of The Leslie Report shall publish a copy of a complaint YR submitted to the IRS, below:

    August 31, 2012

    Internal Revenue Service
    Exempt Organizations Unit
    1100 Commerce St.
    Dallas, TX 75242-1198

    Re: A referral for noncompliance with tax laws against exempt organizations Edison International Foundation EIN:95-4383002; Southern California Edison Co Veba Represented Trust Ein: 95-4372790; Southern California Edison Co Veba Non Represented Trust EIN: 95-4372792

    PRELIMINARY STATEMENT:

    In lieu of using IRS Form 13909 (Tax-Exempt Organization Referral Form), please consider this communication a formal complaint (referral) against Rosemead, California-based Edison International , Southern California Edison; Edison International Foundation EIN:95-4383002; Southern California Edison Co Veba Represented Trust Ein: 95-4372790; Southern California Edison Co Veba Non Represented Trust EIN: 95-4372792.

    On August 22, 2012 Edison International (“EIX”) and Southern California Edison (“SCE” — collectively, “Edison”) were duly served with a request for production of IRS Form 990, Form 990 Schedule A, and Form 1023. (See Exhibit 1.)

    Specifically, the request stated in part: “Please consider this communication a formal request to SCE and EIX (including, but not limited to, all subsidiaries and foundations owned and maintained by SCE/EIX) to produce their IRS Form 990, Form 990 Schedule A, as well Form 1023. ”

    In a letter dated August 30, 2012 (see attachment), Edison (through their senior attorney Allan D. Johnson) informed me that they will not comply with the request. Edison wrote: “EIX and SCE are unaware of any authority that would obligate them to produce these documents to you.” Furthermore, Edison also wrote: “Neither EIX nor SCE plan to take any further action in response to your request.”

    In view of Edison’s anticipatory failure to comply, the undersigned reluctantly makes this referral.

    INTRODUCTION:

    Close to one year ago, I fortuitously stumbled upon unusually large and highly peculiar financial transactions in conjunction with what appeared to me to be clear attempts to conceal and mislead involving the California Bar Foundation, CaliforniaALL, as well as utility companies Southern California Edison, PG&E, AT&T, Sempra, and Verizon.

    In my opinion, and based on the information I’ve discovered, it appears that funds were misappropriated and/or laundered through the misuse of non-profit entities California Bar Foundation and CaliforniaALL. Although other potential explanations certainly exist, based on these individuals’ involvement in the “OBAMA FOR AMERICA” 2008 presidential campaign, one likely possibility is that funds originating from utility companies were unlawfully misdirected to that campaign by representatives of those utility companies (i.e. Edison International, Southern California Edison) who supported then Senator Barack Obama in hope he would expand the Smart-Grid and clean energy initiatives.

    INTRODUCTION OF ACTORS:

    1. AMBASSADOR JEFFREY BLEICH — Mr. Bleich served as a director with the Foundation in approximately 2007-2008, as well as president of the State Bar of California.

    In 2007, Mr. Bleich established “OBAMA FOR AMERICA” National Finance Committee and served as its Chair.

    He is a personal friend of President Obama, who served as President Obama’s personal attorney and subsequently was appointed as the U.S. Ambassador to Australia. Prior to joining the Obama administration, Mr. Bleich was a partner with the San Francisco office of Munger Tolles & Olson, which represents clients Edison International, Southern California Edison, and Verizon Wireless.

    Out of close to 230,000 lawyers in California, also serving as a director with the California Bar Foundation in approximately 2007-2008 was another attorney from Munger Tulles Olsen, Mr. Bradley Phillips. Presently, Ms. Mary Ann Todd (also of Munger Tolles & Olson) and Richard Tom of Southern California Edison are directors with the California Bar Foundation.

    2. DEREK ANTHONY WEST OF THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE — Mr. West, who goes by the name “Tony West,” presently serves as third in command within the Department of Justice below Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer.

    Around 2007-2008, Mr. Tony West also served as Chair of the “California Finance Committee” of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA.”

    Prior to joining the DOJ, Mr. West was a partner at the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster, the law firm which assisted with the legal aspects of creating CaliforniaALL.

    Along with attorneys Raj Chaterjee and Susan Mac Cormac, Mr. West was part of senior partner James Brosnahan’s clique. For example, it was Brosnahan, West, and Chaterjee who defended John Walker Lindh, who is more widely known as the “American Taliban.” (It should be noted that it was actually Mr. Brosnahan who initially agreed to the representation since he knows Lindh’s father — Frank Lindh — who served as in-house Chief Legal Counsel at PG&E; Mr. Lindh is presently the Chief Legal Counsel of the CPUC.)

    Mr. West is married to Maya Harris, sister of Kamala Harris, who was part of CaliforniaALL.

    3. STEVEN CHURCHWELL OF DLA PIPER — Mr. Churchwell is a partner at the Sacramento office of DLA Piper, where non-profit CaliforniaALL was housed free of charge. Churchwell served as Treasurer, draft committee of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA” — also housed at the Sacramento offices of DLA Piper, adjacent to its roommate — CaliforniaALL.

    DLA Piper represents client Sempra Energy which owns San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E).

    4. RON OLSON OF MUNGER TOLLES & OLSON — Mr. Olson is a partner with the Los Angeles office of Munger Tolles & Olson, which represents clients Edison International, Southern California Edison, and Verizon Wireless. In addition to representing Edison, Olson is also a board member of Edison International and Southern California Edison, as well as the board of Berkshire Hathaway, City National Corporation, The Washington Post Company, Western Asset Trusts, RAND Corporation, the Mayo Clinic, and the Council of Foreign Relations.

    As of 2008, in-house general counsel for Edison International and Southern California Edison is Mr. Robert Adler — former managing partner of Munger Tolles & Olson.

    Around 2007-2008, Ron Olson was also part of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA.”

    5. JAMES J. BROSNAHAN OF MORRISON & FOERSTER – Mr. Brosnahan is presently a senior partner at the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster.

    He considers himself to be the “mastermind behind the Democratic Party.” CaliforniaALL was created by Morrison & Foerster, under the supervision of Mr. Brosnahan (known as the prosecutor of Caspar Weinberger). Specifically Susan Mac Cormac and Eric Tate assisted with the legal aspects of creating the entity. Mr. Brosnahan represented utility companies during California’s energy crisis (which Joe Dunn, Martha Escutia, and Geoffrey Brown were investigating) opposite Thomas Girardi.

    Later, Dunn, Escutia, Brosnahan, and Girardi launched the online publication known as Voice of OC.

    6. CHRISTOPHER JACOB YOUNG OF KEKER & VAN NEST — Mr. Young, commonly known as “Chris Young,” is currently listed on the State Bar of California’s database as an associate with Keker & Van Nest. Around 2007-2008, Mr. Young was an associate at Morrison & Foerster.

    Around 2007-2008, Mr. Young served as “Northern California Deputy Finance Director” for “OBAMA FOR AMERICA.”

    As noted above, State Bar of California records still show that Chris Young is an employee of Keker & Van Nest. However, very recently, Keker & Van Nest ( at the direction of partners John Keker and Jon Streeter, who also worked on the 2008 campaign as a “bundler” and is presently a director with the Foundation) abruptly removed Chris Young’s name from its web-site.

    7. ANNETTE CARNEGIE — Ms. Carnegie is presently employed at the Kaiser Foundation. Around 2007-2008, she was a partner at Morrison & Foerster and served as a director of the California Bar Foundation. In 2008, the Foundation poured into CaliforniaALL the large sum of $774,247; by comparison, most other donations were around $10,000 to $20,000. As shown below, the transfer of said money appears to be imbued with fraud and secrecy, especially in connection with four utility companies (Verizon, PG&E, Edison, and AT&T).

    8. KAMALA HARRIS — In around 2007-2008, Ms. Harris served as the District Attorney in San Francisco while at the same time she was also Co-Chair of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA.” Ms. Harris was part of CaliforniaALL’s “Advisory Council.” She is the sister of Maya Harris, who is married to Tony West. Media reports provide that parliamentarian Willie Brown served as mentor to both Tony West and Kamala Harris, and was Ms. Harris’s paramour. John Keker of Keker & Van Nest (known as the prosecutor of Oliver North) is also considered to be a “mentor” of Kamala Harris. (Incidentally, State Bar of California Board of Governor member Gwen Moore — also a “mentee” of Willie Brown — was honored by CaliforniaALL at a lavish dinner in a Sacramento hotel. Parliamentarian Moore is no stranger to your agency, having been the target of a sting operation known as Shrimpscam.)

    9. OPHELIA BASGAL OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT (“HUD”) — In around 2007-2008 , Ms. Basgal was Vice President of Civic Partnership and Community Initiatives at PG&E, where she managed the company’s $18 million charitable contributions program, and oversaw its community engagement programs and partnerships with community-based organizations. Separately, around that time she surprisingly served as “Treasurer” with the “California Supreme Court Historical Society.” In that role, she presumably had contact with many judges, including those who were handling matters dealing with PG&E, such as Justice (Ret.) Joseph Grodin who acted as the mediator in a case Attorney General Bill Lockyer advanced against PG&E, which Jerry Brown (cousin of Geoffrey Brown) later dismissed in his capacity as the new Attorney General for California.

    Ms. Basgal served as a director of CaliforniaALL.

    10. VICTOR MIRMAONTES — Mr. Victor Miramontes, a resident of San Antonio, TX and business partner of former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros in an entity known as CityView, was the chairman of CaliforniaALL.

    Mr. Miramontes has various connections to Orange County, and is otherwise familiar with its various legal circles.

    11. SARAH E. REDFIELD — Ms. Redfield is presently a professor at the University of New Hampshire School of Law, and served as the interim director of CaliforniaALL. Events surrounding Redfield, as shown below, also appear to be imbued with fraud and deceit, and it appears her role was to create a subterfuge to justify the existence of CaliforniaALL. Since CaliforniaALL’s main achievement was the purported creation of a “Saturday Academy of Law” at UC Irvine (“SALUCI”), Ms. Redfield pretended to have engaged in Requests for Proposals (“RFP”), as well as falsely claiming that she “launched” SALUCI. For her services as interim executive director and an alleged consultant of CaliforniaALL, Professor Redfield was paid approximately $160,000 as an “independent contractor.” She gave very little, if anything, in return for the $160,000 she was paid. In fact, she took credit for the extremely hard work of others, especially that of Rob Vacario of Santa Ana who co-founded SALUCI several years earlier.

    12. JUDY JOHNSON – Ms. Johnson is the former Executive Director of the State Bar of California. Ms. Johnson (along with Robert Hawley and Starr Babcock) is no stranger to financial schemes. For the past 8 years, she has been quietly serving as the president of an entity with a misleading name (California Consumer Protection Foundation AKA “CCPF”). This entity absorbed close to $30 million in class action cy pres awards, as well as fines and settlements imposed by the CPUC on utility companies. CCPF forwarded those funds to mostly questionable ACORN-like entities in South Los Angeles or to an entity headed by Michael Shames known as UCAN — presently under federal grand jury investigation in San Diego. It appears that Ms. Johnson used her position as executive director of the State Bar of California (which is supposed to supervise and discipline lawyers) as “clout” to obtain cy pres awards from the settlement of class actions prosecuted and defended by various law firms in courts and before the CPUC. In addition, while never prosecuted for the scheme, some have speculated that Johnson and cohorts Hawley (whom Johnson labeled the “Wizard of OZ”) and Babcock were “in” on a financial scheme perpetrated by former State Bar employee Sharon Pearl, who was lightly prosecuted by then-attorney general Jerry Brown, cousin of Geoffrey Brown.

    Ms. Johnson was part of CaliforniaALL’s Advisory Council and was responsible for maintaining secrecy over the project by misleading the public, including a quadriplegic law-student, litigant Sara Granda.

    13. RUTHE CATOLICO ASHLEY — Ms. Ashley is a former employee of McGeorge School of Law who later served as a “Diversity Officer” at Cal PERS. Ms. Ashley also served as member of the State Bar of California Board of Governors alongside Mr. Bleich, and came up with the idea to create CaliforniaALL during a meeting with Sarah Redfield and Peter Arth, Jr. (the assistant to CPUC President Michael Peevey). After CaliforniaALL came into existence, Ms. Ashley, after a simulated search, was selected to serve as CaliforniaALL’s executive director.

    14. SONIA GONZALES — Ms. Gonzales presently serves as the Foundation’s executive director as of earlier this year, after the former executive director (Ms. Leslie Hatamyia) suddenly quit. Ms. Gonzales is a close friend and confidante of Ms. Maya Harris, the wife of Mr. Tony West.

    She presently serves the same function as current Foundation directors Mary Ann Todd of Munger Tolles & Olson, Jon Streeter of Keker & Van Nest, Douglas Winthrop of Howard Rice, Richard Tom of Southern California Edison, and Raj Chatterjee of Morrison & Foerster.

    15. JOE DUNN — Mr. Dunn is the creator of online publication “Voice of OC” – Orange County’s Nonprofit Investigative News Agency. He is also a Trustee of the UCI Foundation (an entity which obtained funds from a separate charitable entity known as CaliforniaALL (FEIN Number 51-0656213). Presently, Dunn serves as Executive Director of the State Bar of California – an entity which also controls and maintains a foundation known as the California Bar Foundation. The California Bar Foundation very quietly transferred close to $780,000 to CaliforniaALL. Previously, In his role as a politician and business partner of Martha Escutia, Dunn was involved in matters relating to utility companies operating in California.

    16 . GEOFFREY BROWN – a former commissioner with the CPUC and former board member of the California Bar Foundation. While at the CPUC, Brown was the assigned commissioner in the application Edison International/ Southern California Edison — owners of San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) – submitted to the CPUC for authorization: (1) to replace SONGS 2 & 3 steam generators; (2) establish ratemaking for cost recovery; and (3) address other related steam generator replacement issues.

    Messrs. Geoffrey Brown, Michael Peevey, and Peter Arth were also involved in countless proceedings involving California energy crisis. Those proceedings were mainly litigated by the law offices of Munger Tolles & Olson (representing Southern California Edison), Morrison & Foerster, Keker & Van Nest (representing PG&E), DLA Piper (representing Sempra Energy — owner of San Diego Gas & Electric). At times, said proceedings concluded in settlements worth billions of dollars.

    Previously, I asked the State Bar of California to investigate this matter. Within a few hours of sending the request, Geoffrey Brown sent me a demand to cease and desist from insisting that he had done anything wrong under threat of litigation. In essence, Brown wanted me to ignore the circumstances dealing with the fact that he was both a CPUC Commissioner and a Director with the Foundation when it quietly made the largest grant in its history to an entity that was conceived by CPUC’s Peter Arth to absorb hundreds of thousands of dollars from utility companies.

    FACTUAL BACKGROUND:

    In approximately 2007, Ruthe Catolico Ashley — an attorney from Sacramento and a member of the State Bar of California Board of Governors — was employed by Cal PERS as a “Diversity Officer.” Prior to her employment with Cal PERS, Ms. Ashley was employed as a career counsel at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento. While at McGeorge, Ms. Ashley met diversity expert Sarah Redfield. At that time, Jeffrey Bleich of Munger Tolles & Olson was serving as President of the State Bar. Both Bleich and Ashley are politically active, and were supporting the 2008 campaign of Barack Obama for President. Ruthe Ashley was involved in the Asian-Americans for Obama branch in Sacramento.

    In April 2007, Ashley and Sarah Redfield were urged to meet Peter Arth, Jr. of the California Public Utilities Commission at a restaurant in San Francisco. During that meeting, the idea to create CaliforniaALL (initially named CaAAL or CaALL) was conceived. Eventually, Cal PERS, the CPUC, and the State Bar of California endorsed in principle the creation of CaliforniaALL – a Section 501(c)(3) entity that would raise funds to be used to support a more diverse workforce in California.

    At that time, both Ashley and Redfield were also part of the State Bar of California’s Council on Fairness and Access, as well as a separate project by the State Bar of California known as The Diversity Pipeline Task Force, through which both presumably amassed vast amounts of data and information on the topic of diversity pipeline projects.

    Subsequent to the meeting with Peter Arth, on June 26, 2007 State Bar BOG member Ruthe Catolico Ashley and Patricia Lee presented to the entire BOG a proposal (see http://www.scribd.com/doc/48713393/1-In-June-26-2007-Member-of-State-Bar-Board-of-Governors-Ruthe-Ashley-Presen ) urging the BOG to support the creation of California Aspire Achieve Lead Pipeline Project (CaAAL), later named CaliforniaALL.

    For reasons that are not clear to me, Jeffrey Bleich saw fit to call an urgent, emergency-like meeting of the State Bar of California Board of Governors, Committee on Operations in order to appoint Peter Arth of the CPUC as member of the State Bar of California’s Council on Fairness and Access. See: http://www.scribd.com/doc/103136304/2nd-Upload-of-Document-Peter-Arth-Assistant-of-CPUC-s-Michael-Peevey-Emergen

    Papers were filed with both state and federal agencies to allow CaliforniaALL to operate as a tax exempt entity. Victor Miramontes listed himself as Chairman of the Board, and Sarah E. Redfield served as CaliforniaALL’s interim executive director for a period of 6 months. Serving as CaliforniaALL’s legal counsel were Susan Mac Cormac and Eric Tate of Morrison & Foerster.

    Despite the fact that she served as interim executive director, and despite the fact that it was a given that Ruthe Catolico Ashley would be hired as the permanent CEO, Sarah Redfield nevertheless apparently engaged in an RFP (request for proposal) which was closed just as quickly as it started even before Ms. Ashley was hired as the permanent CEO.

    CaliforniaALL’s web site (www.calall.org) stated:

    “Saturday Law Academy RFP

    PLEASE NOTE:

    The application process for this RFP is closed. Please contact Sarah Redfield at sarah.redfield@gmail.com or (207) 752-1721.

    RFP PROPOSAL INFORMATION

    California ALL seeks proposals to implement its law career pathway starting with the 2008-09 academic year (AY).

    The following and attached document describes a program area in which California ALL has particular interest based on its initial research. An additional RFP will follow for college level prelaw work. Self generated proposal for other parts of the pipeline will also be considered, and another round of RFPs is possible. California ALL has not attached a specific dollar amount to the RFP, though cost effectiveness and the presence of a competitive match will be part of its consideration. California ALL has some funding in hand from a generous grant from Verizon for the Saturday Academy and intends to seek additional funding as needed to support programs selected. It is anticipated that funding will be provided for year one of the (3 year) proposal, with following years contingent on successful completion of the prior year(s). ”

    The California Attorney General RCT reflects that CaliforniaALL obtained its “Charity” status on March 14, 2008 (FEIN Number 510656213). The address for CaliforniaALL is listed as 400 Capitol Mall, Suite 2400, Sacramento, California. This is actually the address of the law firm of DLA Piper, where CaliforniaALL resided free of charge courtesy of partner Steven Churchwell – an attorney specialized in the representation of political entities.

    CaliforniaALL’s 2008 tax-return shows an expense of around $16,000 for “occupancy.” See http://www.scribd.com/doc/48714110/6-CaliforniaALL-2008-Tax-Return

    In June 2008, after a nationwide search and aided by a pro bono head-hunting firm in its search for a permanent CEO, CaliforniaALL not surprisingly hired Ruthe Catolico Ashley as its chief executive officer. (See Press Release http://www.scribd.com/doc/48717715/5-California-ALL-Announces-Hiring-of-Ruthe-Ashley-as-CEO-on-June-4-2008 )

    As the purpose of CaliforniaALL was to transfer funds forward, it did so by awarding small grants to the UCI Foundation (FEIN Number 952540117), where State Bar of California executive director Joe Dunn serves as trustee and chair of the Audit Committee, for the purported purpose of establishing a Saturday Law Academy at UC Irvine known as SALUCI.

    Sarah Redfield’s CV, which states (falsely) that she launched SALUCI, can be found at: http://www.scribd.com/doc/48772426/10-Resume-CV-of-University-of-New-Hampshire-School-of-Law-Professor-Sarah-E-

    In September 2009, Ruthe Catolico Ashley exited CaliforniaALL (http://www.scribd.com/doc/48713268/7-Ruthe-Ashley-Announces-Departure-from-CaliforniaALL-in-September-of-2009 ), the entity which she previously proclaimed to Diane Curtis that it “will change the face of the future in the workplace and of our leaders,” “will be a model for other states,” and “is here to stay for the foreseeable future.”

    Ultimately, the following events prompted me to ask Voice of OC to make its tax returns available for my review, as required by IRS regulations: the sham RFP by Sarah Redfield, who pre-selected the UCI Foundation as the only recipient of funds from CaliforniaALL; Joe Dunn served as chair of the UCI Foundation audit committee; in September 2009 Ruthe Ashley abruptly exited CaliforniaALL; in September 2009 Joe Dunn (together with his business partner Martha Escutia, James Brosnahan — who created CaliforniaALL, and Thomas Girardi of In Re Girardi, Erin Brokovich, and the one who James Towery appointed his personal attorney (Jerome Falk of Howard Rice) to act as special prosecutor against him) launched an online “news agency” known as Voice of OC. I also suspected that James Brosnahan of Morrison & Foerster (who represented various utility companies during California’s energy crisis) may have engaged in a scheme with Joe Dunn, as Dunn was the person investigating those utility companies and California’s energy crisis. In fact, Dunn was discredited by the media for claiming that he was the one who “cracked” Enron.

    Voice of OC ignored my request for its tax records, whereupon I filed a complaint with the IRS. To date, I have not received a response from the IRS indicating that it has taken any steps to help me obtain those much needed records and impose the appropriate sanctions against Voice of OC.

    Nevertheless, I continued with the inquiry as large pieces of the puzzle were missing. Later, when Mr. Tony West was appointed third in command at the DOJ, I learned of his identity due to wide media coverage and his association with Morrison & Forester and James Brosnahan. From there, it became harder to ignore the common denominator of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA” involving James Brosnahan, Tony West, Chris Young, Annette Carnegie, and Susan Mac Cormac (of Morrison & Foerster) Geoffrey Bleich, Ron Olson (of Munger Tolles & Olson) Steven Churchwell ( of DLA Piper) in conjunction with Kamala Harris — which is that money originating from utility companies was misappropriated or laundered through the California Bar Foundation / CaliforniaALL to the campaign of “OBAMA FOR AMERICA.”

    Other then collecting close to $2 million directly from utility companies (including the “hush-hush” transfer of $774,247, comprised of one installment of $5000 and another contribution of $769,247 from the Foundation which was never mentioned in the Foundation’s “newsroom” or by any other of its publications such as the California Bar Journal or by any of the newsletters and alerts published by CaliforniaALL), CaliforniaALL appears to have been be a sham, phantom entity from its inception in 2008 to the day it began to slowly be dissolved in approximately 2009, subsequent to the election of Barack Obama as president of the U.S. Its only alleged achievement was providing some money for the creation of the Saturday Academy of Law at UC Irvine (“SALUCI”) in approximately 2008-2009. Here too vast and intense suspicious circumstances exist as the funds from CaliforniaALL actually went to the UC Irvine Foundation, where the present executive director of the State Bar of California (Senator Joe Dunn) serves as a member of the audit committee, and it turns out that the SALUCI was actually already created in 2005 and was fully operational before CaliforniaALL arrived on the scene. In addition, some records seem to indicate that Verizon Wireless funneled the money directly to SALUCI , while CaliforniaALL took the credit.

    Specifically, the Foundation reported to the IRS that REVENUE LESS EXPENSES in 2007 equaled plus +$373.842.00. However, in 2008, the Foundation reported to the IRS that REVENUE LESS EXPENSES equaled minus -$537,712. In its 2008 Annual Report (See page 9 : http://www.scribd.com/doc/48712884/3-2008-Annual-Report-of-Foundation-of-the-State-Bar-of-California-Foundation ), the Foundation alludes to CaliforniaALL by stating:

    “In 2007-2008, the Foundation supported the launching of CaliforniaALL and, as the project filed for incorporation and 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status, served as CaliforniaALL’s fiscal sponsor. A collaboration between the California Public Employment Retirement System, the California Public Utilities Commission, the California Department of Insurance, and the State Bar of California, CaliforniaALL was created in an effort to close the achievement gap among California students from preschool to the profession and, specifically, to bolster the pipeline of young people of diverse backgrounds headed for careers in law, financial services, and technology. Once CaliforniaALL obtained its tax-exempt status and was able to function as a fully independent nonprofit organization, the foundation granted the balance of funds raised for the project – totaling $769,247 – to the new entity.”

    Also cleverly buried in the California Bar Foundation’s 2008 annual report was the following sentence :

    “We thank the following corporations for their gifts in support of CaliforniaALL:

    AT & T

    Edison International

    PG & E Corporation Foundation

    Verizon”

    See page 24 : http://www.scribd.com/doc/48712884/3-2008-Annual-Report-of-Foundation-of-the-State-Bar-of-California-Foundation

    While I was able to ascertain from California Bar Foundation’s tax records an “exit” of the $774,247 in 2008 (the apparent source of which was allegedly the above-referenced 4 utility companies), I was unable to ascertain when and where the Foundation reported to the IRS — either in 2008 or 2007 or 2006 or 2005 — an “entry” of those funds which it allegedly held in trust for CaliforniaALL.

    (Later, Jill Sperber of the State Bar of California, in a letter she sent to me dated July 28, 2011 claimed that “….No State Bar or California Bar Foundation funds were used for CaliforniaALL creation…The California Bar Foundation served as CaliforniaALL’s escrow holder only to hold fundraising funds before its formal incorporation… Once CaliforniaALL was formed as a non-profit entity, the funds were paid over to it…”

    Most troubling, however, is the fact that Verizon did not report to the IRS either in 2007 or 2008 that it had contributed any money to the California Bar Foundation or CaliforniaALL. See :

    http://www.scribd.com/doc/102325087/Verizon-Foundation-IRS-990-Year-2007
    http://www.scribd.com/doc/102325330/Verizon-Foundation-IRS-990-Year-2008

    As such, several days ago, on August 22, 2012, in search of the truth, Edison was duly served with a request for production of IRS Form 990, Form 990 Schedule A, and Form 1023. On August 30, 2012 Edison stated that it does not plan to comply with the request.

    In view of the above, I urge you to investigate this matter to determine whether Edison’s refusal violated IRS rules and regulations. I ask that you impose appropriate sanctions against any and all involved, if supported by the results of your investigation.

    I look forward to your response. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or need additional information.

  • Indicted Aaron Swartz Hires Keker & Van Nest

    Aaron Swartz, who faces up to 35 years in prison, recently hired San Francisco-based Keker & Van Nest to represent him, according to court documents filed with the United States District Court of Massachusetts.

    Attorney Matthias Kammber of Keker & Van Nest informed the court that Swartz’s local attorney, Martin Weinberg, “will be withdrawing as counsel” and will be replaced by Cody Harris, Daniel Purcell, and top gun Elliot Peters, all of Keker & Van Nest.

    Swartz, 25, is a fellow at Harvard University’s Safra Centre for Ethics and is charged with wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer, and recklessly damaging a protected computer. If convicted on these charges, Swartz faces up to 35 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, restitution, forfeiture and a fine of up to $1 million, according to a press release issued by United States Attorney Carmen Ortiz.

    In various declarations submitted to the court, Assistant U.S. Attorneys Stephen Heymann and Scott Garland alleged that Swartz — who is not a student, faculty member, or employee of MIT — gained physical access to MIT’s computer network through a laptop computer he installed in a restricted wiring closet in the basement of a research building, and that he intentionally masked his face with a bicycle helmet to avoid identification on a video camera as he entered the closet to remove the laptop; they also alleged that Swartz used fictitious names and manipulated computer identification information to get and maintain access to MIT’s computer network, and that he took repeated and affirmative steps to evade efforts by both MIT and JSTOR to lock him out of their computer networks.

    In somewhat related news, Swartz and Larry Lessig, also of Harvard University’s Safra Centre for Ethics, are presently also being scrutinized as part of an ongoing non-criminal inquiry conducted by the author stemming from myriad suspicious financial transactions in connection with circumstances surrounding Chris Young (presently an attorney with Keker & Van Nest), defunct non-profit entity CaliforniaALL, Mitchell and Freada Kapor (a director of CaliforniaALL) of The Kapor Center, Bettina Neuefeind (wife of Larry Lessig), and two non-profit entities bearing the same name of “Democracy Fund,Inc.” — EIN 27-2439840 and EIN 26-3088283 — with connections to Lessig and Swartz.

    Although other potential explanations certainly exist, as matters presently stand, it appears that in 2007-2008, Democratic party agents may have participated in what appears to be unexplained financial machinations relating to the California Bar Foundation and newly created non-profit entity CaliforniaALL with respect to funds originating from major utility companies and the California Bar Foundation, in order to promote the election of Barack Obama in general, and on behalf of those seeking to promote green energy in particular.

    Specifically:

    MORRISON & FOERSTER attorneys James Brosnahan (self-proclaimed “mastermind” behind the Democratic Party), Tony West (Barack Obama’s Chair of the California Finance Committee), Chris Young ("Obama for America" Northern California Deputy Finance Director), Annette Carnegie (2007-2008 director with the California Bar Foundation); Kamala Harris (co-chair, Obama for America and member of CaliforniaALL);

    MUNGER TOLLES & OLSON attorneys Jeffrey Bleich (president of the State Bar of California, director of the California Bar Foundation, founding member and Chair of OBAMA FOR AMERICA’s National Finance Committee who pushed for the creation of CaliforniaALL, as well as for the appointment of director Freada Klein Kapor), Brad Phillips (2007- 2008 Director of the California Bar Foundation which served as a “financial sponsor” to CaliforniaALL on behalf of Verizon Wireless and Southern California Edison, both clients of Munger Tolles & Olson) (examination of the IRS 990 Verizon Wireless submitted to the IRS shows absolutely no payments to either CaliforniaALL or the California Bar Foundation);

    WILSON SONSINI attorneys Mark Parnes (2007-2008 director and Secretary of the California Bar Foundation), John Roos (former CEO of Wilson Sonsini in Palo Alto; a personal friend of both President Obama and Jeffrey Bleich, currently serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Japan; similar to Ambassador Bleich, Ambassador Roos acted as a “bundler” and raised over $500,000 for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign);

    DLA PIPER attorney Steven Churchwell in Sacramento (Treasurer, draft committee of OBAMA FOR AMERICA); firm where CaliforniaALL resided free of charge;

    KAMALA HARRIS (co-chair, OBAMA FOR AMERICA ; member of CaliforniaALL); Harris is the sister of Maya Harris, who is married to Tony West, the chair of Barack Obama’s California Finance Committee who now serves as third in command within the United States Department of Justice below Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer;

    CaliforniaALL Director OPHELIA BASGAL of the Department of Housing and Urban Development ("HUD"): In around 2007-2008, Ms. Basgal was Vice President of Civic Partnership and Community Initiatives at PG&E, where she managed the company’s $18 million charitable contribution program, and oversaw its community engagement programs and partnerships with community-based organizations. Separately, around that time she also served as treasurer of the “California Supreme Court Historical Society.” In that role, she presumably had contact with many judges, including those who were handling matters dealing with PG&E, such as Justice (Ret.) Joseph Grodin who acted as the mediator in a case Attorney General Bill Lockyer advanced against PG&E, which Jerry Brown (cousin of Geoffrey Brown) later dismissed in his capacity as the new Attorney General for California;

    LARRY LESSIG, FREADA KLEIN KAPOR, MITCHELL KAPOR, BETTINA NEUEFEIND, AARON SWARTZ: Around 2007-2008, Jeffrey Bleich caused the appointment of Freada Klein Kapor as Director of then newly-established CaliforniaALL. In a press release, the public was misled to believe that Freada Kapor is a diversity expert who operates an entity known as the Level Playing Field Institute. There was no mention that Freada Kapor is the owner of The Kapor Center, located at 543 Howard St., 5th. Floor, in San Francisco, which was used as telephone bank by volunteers of OBAMA FOR AMERICA, and received frequent visits from Bettina Neuefeind — wife of Larry Lessig — who served as the Office Manager of OBAMA FOR AMERICA in San Francisco.

    Similarly, there was no mention, that tech-guru Mitchell Kapor — founder of Lotus 1-2-3 and the spouse of Freada Kapor, is part of OBAMA FOR AMERICA’s technical team.

    Also located at The Kapor Center at 543 Howard St., 5th. Floor, in San Francisco were two newly created non-profit entities launched by Larry Lessig, Aaron Swartz, Joe Trippi, and Monica Walsh (a friend of Bettina) known as “Change Congress” and “Change V2 Foundation.”

    Following the 2008 election of President Obama, Larry Lessig and his wife departed California. In 2010, Larry Lessig, Monica Walsh, and others launched a whole new Section 501(C) non-profit entity known as “Democracy Fund, Inc.”, EIN 27-2439840. On June 6, 2011, Larry Lessig, Monica Walsh, and others caused Change V2 Foundation (which was launched in 2008) to also operate under the name “Democracy Fund, Inc.” (EIN 26-3088283).

    The case against Aaron Swartz is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Stephen P. Heymann and Scott L. Garland of Ortiz’s Cybercrime Unit. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. AARON SWARTZ Criminal No. 11-10260-NMG . Contact the author yoloanrabbi@gamil.com

  • Amid Concerns of Cover-Up by DOJ’s Lanny Breuer YR Submit Narrative to FBI Re DOJ’s Tony West, Ambassador Jeffrey Bleich, HUD’s Ophelia Basgal, Keker & Van Nest’s Chris Young, Kamala Harris, Phantom Non-Profit CaliforniaALL, Obama for America :

    Per our telephone conversation, following is a narrative describing the suspicious circumstances relating to non-profit entity CaliforniaALL (FEIN Number 51-0656213), Ambassador Jeffrey Bleich, United States Department of Justice’s Tony West, Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Ophelia Basgal, California Attorney General Kamala Harris, James Brosnahan of Morrison & Foerster, and Chris Young of Keker & Van Nest.

    The narrative is divided to 4 parts: 1. General Introduction; 2. Introduction of Actors; 3. Fortuitous Discovery of CaliforniaALL; and 4. Factual Background Regarding CaliforniaALL.

    1. GENERAL INTRODUCTION:

    As described below, my inquiry began close to one year ago when I stumbled upon unusually large and highly peculiar financial transactions in conjunction with what appeared to me to be clear attempts to conceal and mislead. I immediately notified various entities, including submitting a tip to your agency. Due to circumstances which cannot be viewed as mere coincidence, I was under the impression that funds might have been misappropriated by Voice of OC — specifically, by its founders 1) Joe Dunn and 2) Martha Escutia (both former state senators who were overseeing utility companies and the CPUC and investigating the California energy crisis), and 3) Thomas Girardi and 4) James Brosnahan who were litigating cases involving the California energy crisis on opposite sides, and/or Geoffrey Brown, former Commissioner of the California Public Utilities Commission and 2007 Director of the California Bar Foundation (the “Foundation”) during the time of the suspicious transfer of funds to CaliforniaALL (an entity of which CPUC’s Peter Arth was one of the main initiators).

    However futile, I also asked the State Bar of California to investigate this matter. Within a few hours of sending the request, Geoffrey Brown sent me a demand to cease and desist from insisting that he had done anything wrong under threat of litigation. In essence, Brown wanted me to ignore the circumstances dealing with the fact that he was both a CPUC Commissioner and a Director with the Foundation when it quietly made the largest grant in its history to an entity that was conceived by CPUC’s Peter Arth to absorb hundreds of thousands of dollars from utility companies.

    While the Foundation alleges that the source of the (relatively) large sum of $774,247 which it transferred to CaliforniaALL was from four utility companies (AT&T, PG&E, Edison International, and Verizon Wireless — as reflected in the Foundation’s 2008 Annual Report and tax return showing contributions to CaliforniaALL), there is no corresponding entry in any Foundation tax return (for tax years 2007 or 2008), nor any mention in the Annual Report, showing the initial receipt of those funds. These facts raised suspicions that money may have been misappropriated from the Foundation, and places those individuals who controlled the Foundation (Jeffrey Bleich, Annette Carnegie, Douglas Winthrop, Ruthe Catolico Ashley, Geoffrey Brown, and others), who “legally” created CaliforniaALL (James Brosnahan, Tony West, Chris Young and the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster), who controlled the money (Ophelia Basgal of PG&E; Douglas Winthrop, attorney for PG&E; Jeffrey Bleich, attorney for Verizon Wireless; and Edison (client of James Brosnahan, Tony West, Chris Young, and Annette Carnegie), who controlled CaliforniaALL (Ruthe Ashley, Ophelia Basgal), and who controlled the finances for the Obama for America’s 2008 campaign (Jeffrey Bleich, Tony West, and Chris Young) in a very awkward position.

    Other then collecting close to $2 million directly from utility companies (including the “hush-hush” transfer of $774,247, comprised of one installment of $5000 and another contribution of $769,247 from the Foundation which was never mentioned in the Foundation’s “newsroom” or by any other of its publications such as the California Bar Journal or by any of the newsletters and alerts published by CaliforniaALL), CaliforniaALL appears to have been be a sham, phantom entity from its inception in 2008 to the day it began to slowly be dissolved in approximately 2009, subsequent to the election of Barack Obama as president of the U.S. Its only alleged achievement was providing some money for the creation of the Saturday Academy of Law at UC Irvine ("SALUCI") in approximately 2008-2009. Here too vast and intense suspicious circumstances exist as the funds from CaliforniaALL actually went to the UC Irvine Foundation, where the present executive director of the State Bar of California (Senator Joe Dunn) serves as a member of the audit committee, and it turns out that the SALUCI was actually already created in 2005 and was fully operational before CaliforniaALL arrived on the scene. In addition, some records seem to indicate that Verizon Wireless funneled the money directly to SALUCI , while CaliforniaALL took the credit.

    Nevertheless, I continued with the inquiry as large pieces of the puzzle were missing, and in fact stated so in a letter seeking information about one of the actor’s employment history. However, within the past several weeks, I believe that I finally managed to put all the pieces together. In my opinion, and based on the information I’ve discovered, it appears that funds were misappropriated and/or laundered through the California Bar Foundation by various individuals through the misuse of CaliforniaALL. Although other potential explanations certainly exist, based on these individuals’ involvement in the “Obama for America” 2008 presidential campaign (as discussed below), one likely possibility is that the funds were unlawfully misdirected to that campaign.

    PART 2: INTRODUCTION OF MAIN ACTORS:

    1. AMBASSADOR JEFFREY BLEICH — Mr. Bleich served as a director with the Foundation in approximately 2007-2008, as well as president of the State Bar of California.

    In 2007, Mr. Bleich established Barack Obama’s National Finance Committee and served as its Chair.

    He is a personal friend of President Obama, who served as President Obama’s personal attorney and subsequently was appointed as the U.S. Ambassador to Australia. Prior to joining the Obama administration, Mr. Bleich was a partner with the San Francisco office of Munger Tolles & Olson, which represents client Verizon Wireless.

    Out of close to 230,000 lawyers in California, also serving as a director with the Foundation in approximately 2007-2008 was another attorney from Munger Tulles Olsen, Mr. Bradley Phillips. Presently, Ms. Mary Ann Todd (also of Munger Tolles & Olson) is a director with the Foundation.

    2. DEREK ANTHONY WEST OF THE UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE — Mr. West, who goes by the name “Tony West,” presently serves as third in command within the Department of Justice below Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer.

    Around 2007-2008, Mr. Tony West also served as Chair of the “California Finance Committee” of “Obama for America.”

    Prior to joining the DOJ, Mr. West was a partner at the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster, the law firm which assisted with the legal aspects of creating CaliforniaALL.

    Along with attorneys Raj Chaterjee and Susan Mac Cormac, Mr. West was part of senior partner James Brosnahan’s clique. For example, it was Brosnahan, West, and Chaterjee who defended John Walker Lindh, who is more widely known as the “American Taliban.” (It should be noted that it was actually Mr. Brosnahan who initially agreed to the representation since he knows Lindh’s father — Frank Lindh — who served as in-house Chief Legal Counsel at PG&E; Mr. Lindh is presently the Chief Legal Counsel of the CPUC.)

    Mr. West is married to Maya Harris, sister of Kamala Harris, who was part of CaliforniaALL.

    3. JAMES J. BROSNAHAN OF MORRISON & FOERSTER - Mr. Brosnahan is presently a senior partner at the San Francisco office of Morrison & Foerster.

    He considers himself to be the “mastermind behind the Democratic Party.” CaliforniaALL was created by Morrison & Foerster, under the supervision of Mr. Brosnahan (known as the prosecutor of Caspar Weinberger). Specifically Susan Mac Cormac and Eric Tate assisted with the legal aspects of creating the entity. Mr. Brosnahan represented utility companies during California’s energy crisis (which Joe Dunn, Martha Escutia, and Geoffrey Brown were investigating) opposite Thomas Girardi.

    Later, Dunn, Escutia, Brosnahan, and Girardi launched the online publication known as Voice of OC.

    4. CHRISTOPHER JACOB YOUNG OF KEKER & VAN NEST — Mr. Young, commonly known as “Chris Young,” is currently listed on the State Bar of California’s database as an associate with Keker & Van Nest. Around 2007-2008, Mr. Young was an associate at Morrison & Foerster.

    Around 2007-2008, Mr. Young served as “Northern California Deputy Finance Director” for “Obama for America.”

    As noted above, State Bar of California records still show that Chris Young is an employee of Keker & Van Nest. However, very recently, Keker & Van Nest ( at the direction of partners John Keker and Jon Streeter, who also worked on the 2008 campaign as a “bundler” and is presently a director with the Foundation) abruptly removed Chris Young’s name from its web-site.

    5. ANNETTE CARNEGIE — Ms. Carnegie is presently employed at the Kaiser Foundation. Around 2007-2008, she was a partner at Morrison & Foerster and served as a director of the Foundation. In 2008, the Foundation poured into CaliforniaALL the large sum of $774,247; by comparison, most other donations were around $10,000 to $20,000. As shown below, the transfer of said money appears to be imbued with fraud and secrecy, especially in connection with four utility companies (Verizon, PG&E, Edison, and AT&T).

    6. KAMALA HARRIS — In around 2007-2008, Ms. Harris served as the District Attorney in San Francisco while at the same time she was also Co-Chair of “Obama for America.” Ms. Harris was part of CaliforniaALL’s “Advisory Council.” She is the sister of Maya Harris, who is married to Tony West. Media reports provide that parliamentarian Willie Brown served as mentor to both Tony West and Kamala Harris, and was Ms. Harris’s paramour. John Keker of Keker & Van Nest (known as the prosecutor of Oliver North) is also considered to be a “mentor” of Kamala Harris. (Incidentally, State Bar of California Board of Governor member Gwen Moore — also a “mentee” of Willie Brown — was honored by CaliforniaALL at a lavish dinner in a Sacramento hotel. Parliamentarian Moore is no stranger to your agency, having been the target of a sting operation known as Shrimpscam.)

    7. OPHELIA BASGAL OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT ("HUD") — In around 2007-2008 , Ms. Basgal was Vice President of Civic Partnership and Community Initiatives at PG&E, where she managed the company’s $18 million charitable contributions program, and oversaw its community engagement programs and partnerships with community-based organizations. Separately, around that time she surprisingly served as “Treasurer” with the “California Supreme Court Historical Society.” In that role, she presumably had contact with many judges, including those who were handling matters dealing with PG&E, such as Justice (Ret.) Joseph Grodin who acted as the mediator in a case Attorney General Bill Lockyer advanced against PG&E, which Jerry Brown (cousin of Geoffrey Brown) later dismissed in his capacity as the new Attorney General for California.

    Ms. Basgal served as a director of CaliforniaALL.

    8. VICTOR MIRMAONTES — Mr. Victor Miramontes, a resident of San Antonio, TX and business partner of former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros in an entity known as CityView, was the chairman of CaliforniaALL.

    Mr. Miramontes has various connections to Orange County, and is otherwise familiar with its various legal circles.

    9. SARAH E. REDFIELD — Ms. Redfield is presently a professor at the University of New Hampshire School of Law, and served as the interim director of CaliforniaALL. Events surrounding Redfield, as shown below, also appear to be imbued with fraud and deceit, and it appears her role was to create a subterfuge to justify the existence of CaliforniaALL. Since CaliforniaALL’s main achievement was the purported creation of a “Saturday Academy of Law” at UC Irvine ("SALUCI"), Ms. Redfield pretended to have engaged in Requests for Proposals ("RFP"), as well as falsely claiming that she “launched” SALUCI. For her services as interim executive director and an alleged consultant of CaliforniaALL, Professor Redfield was paid approximately $160,000 as an “independent contractor.” She gave very little, if anything, in return for the $160,000 she was paid. In fact, she took credit for the extremely hard work of others, especially that of Rob Vacario of Santa Ana who co-founded SALUCI several years earlier.

    10. JUDY JOHNSON – Ms. Johnson is the former Executive Director of the State Bar of California. Ms. Johnson (along with Robert Hawley and Starr Babcock) is no stranger to financial schemes. For the past 8 years, she has been quietly serving as the president of an entity with a misleading name (California Consumer Protection Foundation AKA “CCPF”). This entity absorbed close to $30 million in class action cy pres awards, as well as fines and settlements imposed by the CPUC on utility companies. CCPF forwarded those funds to mostly questionable ACORN-like entities in South Los Angeles or to an entity headed by Michael Shames known as UCAN — presently under federal grand jury investigation in San Diego. It appears that Ms. Johnson used her position as executive director of the State Bar of California (which is supposed to supervise and discipline lawyers) as “clout” to obtain cy pres awards from the settlement of class actions prosecuted and defended by various law firms in courts and before the CPUC. In addition, while never prosecuted for the scheme, some have speculated that Johnson and cohorts Hawley (whom Johnson labeled the “Wizard of OZ”) and Babcock were “in” on a financial scheme perpetrated by former State Bar employee Sharon Pearl, who was lightly prosecuted by then-attorney general Jerry Brown, cousin of Geoffrey Brown.

    Ms. Johnson was part of CaliforniaALL’s Advisory Council and was responsible for maintaining secrecy over the project by misleading the public, including a quadriplegic law-student, litigant Sara Granda.

    11. RUTHE CATOLICO ASHLEY — Ms. Ashley is a former employee of McGeorge School of Law who later served as a “Diversity Officer” at Cal PERS. Ms. Ashley also served as member of the State Bar of California Board of Governors alongside Mr. Bleich, and came up with the idea to create CaliforniaALL during a meeting with Sarah Redfield and Peter Arth, Jr. (the assistant to CPUC President Michael Peevey). After CaliforniaALL came into existence, Ms. Ashley, after a simulated search, was selected to serve as CaliforniaALL’s executive director.

    12. SONIA GONZALES — Ms. Gonzales presently serves as the Foundation’s executive director as of earlier this year, after the former executive director (Ms. Leslie Hatamyia) suddenly quit. Ms. Gonzales is a close friend and confidante of Ms. Maya Harris, the wife of Mr. Tony West.

    She presently serves the same function as current Foundation directors Mary Ann Todd of Munger Tolles & Olson, Jon Streeter of Keker & Van Nest, Douglas Winthrop of Howard Rice, and Raj Chatterjee of Morrison & Foerster.

     

    PART 2: FORTUTIOUS DISCOVERY OF CaliforniaALL

    At the outset, and to deflect potential allegations that I am motivated by politics, I wish to assure you and the agency that my inquiry into these issues was not and is not motivated by politics. In fact, the only actor referenced above that I have ever met is James Brosnahan, who I met once for a short period of time while a volunteer with BASF - VLSP, a volunteer organization that awarded me a volunteer of the year award. In fact, I initially suspected the misconduct described herein was committed primarily by various other people (i.e. Holly Fujie, Leslie Hatamiya, Ruthe Catolico Ashley, Robert Hawley, Starr Babcock, and Judy Johnson). However, the facts eventually led me to Mr. Brosnahan. Following is a brief overview describing how I stumbled upon this information.

    In 2010, the United States Federal Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit issued its final ruling in the disciplinary matter of In Re Girardi by imposing close to $500,000 in sanctions on Walter Lack of Engstrom Lispcomb & Lack and Thomas Girardi of Girardi & Keese stemming from an attempt to defraud the court and cause injury to Dole Food Company in the underlying litigation. You may have heard of Walter Lack and Thomas Girardi as they are the lawyers who were featured in the movie “Erin Brokovich” involving utility company PG&E.

    The court ruled that Walter Lack (who stipulated to special prosecutor Rory Little that his prolonged acts of misconduct were intentional) and Thomas Girardi intentionally and recklessly resorted to the use of known falsehoods for years. The Ninth Circuit ordered Girardi and Lack to report their misconduct to the State Bar of California.

    The State Bar of California disqualified itself from handling the matter since Howard Miller (of Girardi & Keese) served at that time as its president, and had also made the decision to hire then-chief prosecutor, James Towery.

    Mr. Towery, in turn, appointed Jerome Falk of Howard Rice (now Arnold & Porter) as outside “special prosecutor” to determine whether or not to bring charges against Girardi and Lack. (Mr. Falk is a colleague of Douglas Winthrop, and both represented PG&E in its massive bankruptcy proceedings.)

    Mr. Falk, in turn, exercised prosecutorial discretion and concluded that he did not believe Lack acted intentionally and that no charges will be brought against the two attorneys.

    Within days of Mr. Falk’s decision, I filed an ethics complaint with the State Bar of California against Jerome Falk, James Towery, Howard Miller, and Douglas Winthrop (managing partner of Howard Rice and then-elected president of the Foundation), alleging that it was improper for Mr. Towery to appoint Mr. Falk given the close personal relationship between Howard Miller and Douglas Winthrop. Specifically, Howard Miller — in his capacity as president of the State Bar — had appointed Douglas Winthrop as president of the California Bar Foundation, a foundation maintained and controlled by the State Bar. (Much later I also discovered that Jerome Falk is actually the personal attorney of Thomas Girardi, and that Howard Rice and Jerome Falk represented Walter Lack, Thomas Girardi, Engstrom Lispcomb & Lack, and Girardi & Keese in approximately 2007, and for a period of 2 years, in a malpractice action.)

    As such, while at the time I was not familiar with those individuals, I reviewed the Foundation’s annual reports to familiarize myself with the names of the Foundation’s board of directors, and to try to resolve various inconsistencies regarding who was serving as the Foundation’s president and why Robert Scott Wylie appeared to be the president when data showed that he had relocated to Indiana in 2006. I checked the Foundation’s tax returns and it was then that I fortuitously stumbled upon the fact that the Foundation ended 2008 close to $500,000 in the negative. Specifically, the Foundation reported to the IRS that REVENUE LESS EXPENSES in 2007 equaled plus +$373.842.00. However, in 2008, the Foundation reported to the IRS that REVENUE LESS EXPENSES equaled minus -$537,712.

    I was also troubled by the fact that the 2008 California Bar Journal Annual Report noted that the Foundation was the “fiscal sponsor” of CaliforniaALL, while the same report also mentioned that the source of the money was 4 utility companies.

    In its 2008 Annual Report ( See ), the Foundation alludes to CaliforniaALL by stating:

    “In 2007-2008, the Foundation supported the launching of CaliforniaALL and, as the project filed for incorporation and 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status, served as CaliforniaALL’s fiscal sponsor. A collaboration between the California Public Employment Retirement System, the California Public Utilities Commission, the California Department of Insurance, and the State Bar of California, CaliforniaALL was created in an effort to close the achievement gap among California students from preschool to the profession and, specifically, to bolster the pipeline of young people of diverse backgrounds headed for careers in law, financial services, and technology. Once CaliforniaALL obtained its tax-exempt status and was able to function as a fully independent nonprofit organization, the foundation granted the balance of funds raised for the project – totaling $769,247 – to the new entity.”

    Also cleverly buried in the California Bar Foundation’s 2008 annual report was the following sentence (which should be scrutinized by your agency):

    “We thank the following corporations for their gifts in support of CaliforniaALL:

    AT & T

    Edison International

    PG & E Corporation Foundation

    Verizon”

    *

     

    I believe that the statement that the Foundation granted “the balance” of funds raised for the project most likely refers to a previous $5000 sum which the Foundation awarded to CaliforniaALL for “research,” also in 2008. As such, $769,247 plus $5000 equals $774,247, which is the sum the Foundation reported to the IRS.

    However, I find mildly problematic the claim that the Foundation raised funds specifically for “the project” in 2007 (per the sentence “granted the balance of funds raised for the project”), especially in conjunction with a separate disclosure by which the Foundation thanks four utility companies (which are incidentally clients of Morrison & Foerster, Howard Rice, and Munger Tolles Olsen). In my opinion, this may reflect an attempt to engage in financial shenanigans through the Foundation — otherwise, why wouldn’t the four utility companies just give the funds to CaliforniaALL directly?

    Even more troubling, while I was able to ascertain from Foundation’s tax records an “exit” of the $774,247 in 2008 (the apparent source of which was allegedly the above-referenced 4 utility companies), I was unable to ascertain when and where the Foundation reported to the IRS — either in 2008 or 2007 or 2006 or 2005 — an “entry” of those funds which it allegedly held in trust for CaliforniaALL.

    (Later, Jill Sperber of the State Bar of California, in a letter she sent to me dated July 28, 2011 claimed that “....No State Bar or California Bar Foundation funds were used for CaliforniaALL creation...The California Bar Foundation served as CaliforniaALL’s escrow holder only to hold fundraising funds before its formal incorporation... Once CaliforniaALL was formed as a non-profit entity, the funds were paid over to it...”

    Ultimately, by conducting further research into the actors and events surrounding the Foundation, CaliforniaALL, and related entities, individuals, and events, I unearthed what appears to be a lengthy trail of attempts to mislead and defraud.

     

    PART 3: FACTUAL BACKGROUND

    In approximately 2007, Ruthe Catolico Ashley — an attorney from Sacramento and a member of the State Bar of California Board of Governors — was employed by Cal PERS as a “Diversity Officer.” Prior to her employment with Cal PERS, Ms. Ashley was employed as a career counsel at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento. While at McGeorge, Ms. Ashley met diversity expert Sarah Redfield. At that time, Jeffrey Bleich of Munger Tolles & Olson was serving as President of the State Bar. Both Bleich and Ashley are politically active, and were supporting the 2008 campaign of Barack Obama for President. Ruthe Ashley was involved in the Asian-Americans for Obama branch in Sacramento.

    In April 2007, Ashley and Sarah Redfield were urged to meet Peter Arth, Jr. of the California Public Utilities Commission at a restaurant in San Francisco. During that meeting, the idea to create CaliforniaALL (initially named CaAAL or CaALL) was conceived. Eventually, Cal PERS, the CPUC, and the State Bar of California endorsed in principle the creation of CaliforniaALL – a Section 501(c)(3) entity that would raise funds to be used to support a more diverse workforce in California.

    At that time, both Ashley and Redfield were also part of the State Bar of California’s Council on Fairness and Access, as well as a separate project by the State Bar of California known as The Diversity Pipeline Task Force, through which both presumably amassed vast amounts of data and information on the topic of diversity pipeline projects.

    Subsequent to the meeting with Peter Arth, on June 26, 2007 State Bar BOG member Ruthe Catolico Ashley and Patricia Lee presented to the entire BOG a proposal (see http://www.scribd.com/doc/48713393/1-In-June-26-2007-Member-of-State-Bar-Board-of-Governors-Ruthe-Ashley-Presen ) urging the BOG to support the creation of California Aspire Achieve Lead Pipeline Project (CaAAL), later named CaliforniaALL.

    Eventually, Cal PERS (Ashley’s employer), the CPUC, and the State Bar of California endorsed in principle the creation of CaAAL. For reasons that are not clear to me, CaAAL was apparently a secret project since the California Bar Journal never bothered to report about it, and a press release issued by the State Bar of California was only delivered to CaAAL. Specifically, on August 1, 2007, California Bar Journal’s editor Diane Curtis issued a very limited press release on behalf of the State Bar which I was only able to locate on CaAAL’s now defunct website (www.calall.org) stating:

    "STATE BAR JOINS DIVERSITY PARTNERSHIP

    San Francisco, August 01, 2007 — The State Bar of California is joining forces with the California Public Utilities Commission, the California Public Retirement System and the state Department of Insurance in a united effort to promote diversity in the workplace.

    California Aspire Achieve Lead Pipeline Project (CaAAL Pipeline Project) will focus on education and mentoring, starting as early as pre-school, to provide skills and instill motivation in young people who are not well represented in the legal, financial and information technology professions.

    “The real winners are the young people of California who will advance from these programs and the entire populace of California that will have the benefit of a diverse and vibrant pool of bright young people from all sectors of our diverse population,” said State Bar President Sheldon Sloan. Sloan beefed up a bar diversity pipeline project put in place by his predecessors that has been embraced by lawyers and jurists statewide.

    Bar Vice President Ruthe Ashley, who chairs the bar’s Pipeline Task Force and recently became Cal PERS’ Diversity Officer for External Affairs, “has done a fantastic job of moving this initiative forward,” added Sloan. “Now that she has brought in Cal PERS and CAL PUC, this program is here to stay for the foreseeable future.”

    In large part because of the bar’s experience and success in identifying programs that help young people move on to successful careers in law, CaAAL’s first-year focus will be on diversifying the legal profession. “We have relationships in place. We have best practices. We have done the research,” said Ashley. The second-year focus will be on financial institutions and the third year on information technology. Funding for the new nonprofit is expected to come from private partners and public sector grants.

    Ashley said the nonprofit will be the umbrella organization that will coordinate activities in five different geographic “centers of excellence.” She is hoping that the board for the new nonprofit will promote replication proven programs, such as Street Law, Pacific Pathways and the Council on Legal Education Opportunity, and that the new entity “will be a model for other states.”

    “The vision is that it will change the face of the future in the workplace and of our leaders,” said Ashley."

    Papers were filed with both state and federal agencies to allow CaliforniaALL to operate as a tax exempt entity. Victor Miramontes listed himself as Chairman of the Board, and Sarah E. Redfield served as CaliforniaALL’s interim executive director for a period of 6 months. Serving as CaliforniaALL’s legal counsel were Susan Mac Cormac and Eric Tate of Morrison & Foerster.

    Despite the fact that she served as interim executive director, and despite the fact that it was a given that Ruthe Catolico Ashley would be hired as the permanent CEO, Sarah Redfield nevertheless apparently engaged in an RFP (request for proposal) which was closed just as quickly as it started even before Ms. Ashley was hired as the permanent CEO.

    CaliforniaALL’s web site (www.calall.org) stated:

    “Saturday Law Academy RFP

    PLEASE NOTE:

    The application process for this RFP is closed. Please contact Sarah Redfield at sarah.redfield@gmail.com or (207) 752-1721.

    RFP PROPOSAL INFORMATION

    California ALL seeks proposals to implement its law career pathway starting with the 2008-09 academic year (AY).

    The following and attached document describes a program area in which California ALL has particular interest based on its initial research. An additional RFP will follow for college level prelaw work. Self generated proposal for other parts of the pipeline will also be considered, and another round of RFPs is possible. California ALL has not attached a specific dollar amount to the RFP, though cost effectiveness and the presence of a competitive match will be part of its consideration. California ALL has some funding in hand from a generous grant from Verizon for the Saturday Academy and intends to seek additional funding as needed to support programs selected. It is anticipated that funding will be provided for year one of the (3 year) proposal, with following years contingent on successful completion of the prior year(s).”

    The California Attorney General RCT reflects that CaliforniaALL obtained its “Charity” status on March 14, 2008 (FEIN Number 510656213). The address for CaliforniaALL is listed as 400 Capitol Mall, Suite 2400, Sacramento, California. This is actually the address of the law firm of DLA Piper, where CaliforniaALL resided free of charge courtesy of partner Gilles Attia — an attorney specialized in the representation of wi-fi companies.

    CaliforniaALL’s 2008 tax-return shows an expense of around $16,000 for “occupancy.” See http://www.scribd.com/doc/48714110/6-CaliforniaALL-2008-Tax-Return

    In June 2008, after a nationwide search and aided by a pro bono head-hunting firm in its search for a permanent CEO, CaliforniaALL not surprisingly hired Ruthe Catolico Ashley as its chief executive officer. (See Press Release http://www.scribd.com/doc/48717715/5-California-ALL-Announces-Hiring-of-Ruthe-Ashley-as-CEO-on-June-4-2008 )

    As the purpose of CaliforniaALL was to transfer funds forward, it did so by awarding small grants to the UCI Foundation (FEIN Number 952540117), where State Bar of California executive director Joe Dunn serves as trustee and chair of the Audit Committee, for the purported purpose of establishing a Saturday Law Academy at UC Irvine known as SALUCI.

    Sarah Redfield’s CV, which states (falsely) that she launched SALUCI, can be found at: http://www.scribd.com/doc/48772426/10-Resume-CV-of-University-of-New-Hampshire-School-of-Law-Professor-Sarah-E-

    In September 2009, Ruthe Catolico Ashley exited CaliforniaALL (http://www.scribd.com/doc/48713268/7-Ruthe-Ashley-Announces-Departure-from-CaliforniaALL-in-September-of-2009 ), the entity which she previously proclaimed to Diane Curtis that it “will change the face of the future in the workplace and of our leaders,” "will be a model for other states," and “is here to stay for the foreseeable future.”

    Ultimately, the following events prompted me to ask Voice of OC to make its tax returns available for my review, as required by IRS regulations: the sham RFP by Sarah Redfield, who pre-selected the UCI Foundation as the only recipient of funds from CaliforniaALL; Joe Dunn served as chair of the UCI Foundation audit committee; in September 2009 Ruthe Ashley abruptly exited CaliforniaALL; in September 2009 Joe Dunn (together with his business partner Martha Escutia, James Brosnahan — who created CaliforniaALL, and Thomas Girardi of In Re Girardi, Erin Brokovich, and the one who James Towery appointed his personal attorney (Jerome Falk of Howard Rice) to act as special prosecutor against him) launched an online “news agency” known as Voice of OC. I also suspected that James Brosnahan of Morrison & Foerster (who represented various utility companies during California’s energy crisis) may have engaged in a scheme with Joe Dunn, as Dunn was the person investigating those utility companies and California’s energy crisis. In fact, Dunn was discredited by the media for claiming that he was the one who “cracked” Enron.

    Voice of OC ignored my request for its tax records, whereupon I filed a complaint with the IRS. To date, I have not received a response from the IRS indicating that it has taken any steps to help me obtain those much needed records and impose the appropriate sanctions against Voice of OC.

    Nevertheless, I continued with the inquiry as large pieces of the puzzle were missing. Later, when Mr. Tony West was appointed third in command at the DOJ, I learned of his identity due to wide media coverage and his association with Morrison & Forester and James Brosnahan. From there, it became harder to ignore the common denominator of “Obama for America” involving Morrison & Foerster’s James Brosnahan, Tony West, Chris Young, Annette Carnegie, and Susan Mac Cormac, in conjunction with Geoffrey Bleich and Ruthe Ashley — which is that money was misappropriated or laundered through the Foundation.

    Thank you for your assistance. I will keep you updated if I obtain any further information. In the interim, please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.

  • Lanny Breuer — USDOJ’s Assistant Attorney General — Alleged Lack of Integrity Source (Yet Again) of Even Greater Concern Amid Newest Revelations Involving Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Ophelia Basgal — Board Member of CaliforniaALL

    TLR has learned that a recent abrupt move by a politically-connected litigation boutique firm is the subject of an intense and comprehensive examination that the septet of James Brosnahan, Tony West, Chris Young, Annette Carnegie, Ophelia Basgal, Judy Johnson, and Jeff Bleich was somehow involved in improperly transferring money from Cal Bar Foundation to Barack Obama’s coffers.

    As matters presently stand, prima facie evidence creates the appearance of a sophisticated financial scheme executed in 2008 involving Democratic party operatives James Brosnahan of Morrison & Foerster, Jeffrey Bleich of Munger Tulles & Olson (the current U.S. Ambassador to Australasia and friend of President Obama), Assistant Attorney General Derek Anthony West (aka Tony West), and Chris Young, as well as others to misuse the $780,000 originating from the California Bar Foundation.

    According to the sources, in 2007-2008:

    –James Brosnahan, the self proclaimed “mastermind behind the Democratic Party” (and former prosecutor of Caspar Weinberger), while associated with Morrison & Foerster executed from behind the scenes a scheme known as CaliforniaALL, which collected “hush-hush” sub rosa funds totaling approximately $780,000 from the Foundation of the State Bar of California.

    –Chris Young, while associated with Morrison & Foerster, served as Barack Obama’s Northern California Deputy Finance Director.

    –Tony West, while associated with Morrison & Foerster, served as Barack Obama’s California Co-Chair of the California Finance Committee.

    –Susan MacCormac, while associated with Morrison & Foerster, legally created the entity known as CaliforniaALL and served as its legal counsel.

    –Annette Carnegie, while associated with Morrison & Foerster, served as a board member of the California Bar Foundation during the period of the sub rosa transfer of the above-referenced $780,000.

    –Jeffrey Bleich, while associated with Munger Tolles & Olsen, served as a member of both the Board of Governors and the California Bar Foundation’s board during the period of the sub rosa transfer of $780,000. Bleich is a friend of President Obama who presently serves as the U.S. Ambassador to Australia. Verizon Communications (which heavily contributed to CaliforniaALL) is a client of Munger Tules & Olson, where Bleich serves as partner.

    Please continue @:
    http://lesliebrodie.wordpress.com/2012/06/30/lanny-breuer-usdojs-assistant-attorney-general-alleged-lack-

  • Bill Lockyer Hereby Asked to Disclose All Known Information as to Relationships Between PG & E’s Ophelia Basgal of CaliforniaALL , Howard Rice’s Amy Margolin, and Joseph Grodin

    Please observe that, rather than contacting former California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer directly, the query is being delivered publicly, here and now.

    Any opinion or observation can be sent to lesliebrodie@gmx.com

    Please see @:

    http://lesliebrodie.posterous.com/bill-lockyer-hereby-asked-to-disclose-all-kno#

  • Bien & Summers’ Amy Margolin (formerly of Howard Rice) Hereby Asked to Disclose Any and All Improper Contact She Ever Had with PG& E’s Ophelia Basgal and Joseph Grodin

    Amid concerns over disquieting circumstances surrounding Howard Rice, PG & E , Jospeh Grodin and PG & E ’s Ophelia Basgal, as part of a journalistic inquiry The Leslie Brodie Report hereby asks Bien & Summers’ Amy Margolin (formerly of Howard Rice) to disclose any and all non-confidential relevant information, including , but not limited to, any contact she might have had with PG & E’s Ophelia Basgal and Mr Joseph Grodin.

    Please observe that, rather than contacting Bien & Summers’ Amy Margolin (formerly of Howard Rice) directly, the query is being delivered publicly, here and now.

    Any information Ms Margolin wishes to to share, can be sent to lesliebrodie@gmx.com

    Please see @:
    http://lesliebrodie.posterous.com/bien-summers-amy-margolin-formerly-of-howard#