Andrew, (his real name) is married to a woman who is the target of litigation by attorney Jill Clark, filed on behalf of the woman's ex-husband who is a member of a freaky religious cult.
After Andrew and I exchanged emails, I asked him about publishing his account. But Andrew wanted to clean up the profanity just a bit (I was in favor of publishing it) and preferred to write an account that wouldn't scar his stepchildren if, one day, they read it.
So here's his account, word-for-word, except I did make a few corrections of single quotes that should be double quotes, and I added more paragraphs breaks and, well, OK, I acted out a lot of my grammar Nazi obsessions but the BASIC CONTENT is completely unchanged.
It should be noted: This is Andrew's point of view and Andrew's assertions, not mine...
Ok John - here's my story with more of a Clark/Trial focus, I can live with the step-kids potentially reading this one some day. It's a little longer, but does more to share the experience of going to trial as a witness.
Greetings to all the Jill Clark "fans" on the North side. My name is Andrew, born and raised in South Minneapolis - moved to the suburbs about 8 years ago. Just over a year ago I had the misfortune to run up against JC (I'll keep the nicknames clean for the family readers - Lets agree that officially J is for Jill and C is for Clark, NOT for a 'C' word that rhyme with punt) in an ongoing case between my wife and and her 'eccentric and misguided' ex-husband Dan (you may remember him from this article:
http://adventuresofjohnnynorthside.blogspot.com/2012/04/post-in-progress-strange-religious-cult.html
JC was "retained" by Dan to help with a criminal charge he was facing after he had a physical altercation with courtroom deputies.
Quick Aside: John, You lose your "dollars to doughnuts" bet on the charges stemming from interfering with the GAL. Turns out that not letting the GAL see your place is not a crime, it's just a stupid move that pretty much ensures you lose custody.
(JNS says: GAL equals "Guardian Ad Litem")
Basically, The incident went like this. First Dan decided that paying child support is optional and he would rather not, for a very long time, then the Judge sentenced him to 30 days in the workhouse and told him to stand up and be taken into custody. Instead of doing that he opted for plan B (lets call it wrestle for your freedom - only even if you win you still go to jail because 12 more sheriffs are on the way.) That plan did not work out very well for him. I was in the courtroom and witnessed the rumble, which earned me a subpoena for the subsequent criminal trial as a prosecution witness.
(JNS says: Oh, I sure did lose my bet. But it was WORTH it just to hear THIS)
The trial itself was a monumental tribute to wasting time in my opinion. The witness coordinator for the city attorney's office had to issue me multiple subpoenas because the pretrial motions took several days. Based on what I was told when I was being prepped - JC filed a metric shit-ton of motions to limit what I (and other witness I presume) could testify about on direct exam. She wanted to exclude discussion of Dan's religious choices, his financial history, his history of child support, previous motions filed in family court and god only knows what else. Since most of those things were not actually pertinent to the matter at hand, aside from painting a picture about the type of person that would attempt to wrestle a bailiff in a courtroom, my understanding is she was granted almost everything she asked for without much opposition. Despite that, the pretrial and jury selection took forever.
Finally, the big day arrives and I'm called over to the courthouse. I arrive and meet up with the new witness coordinator. See, the original witness coordinator was sequestered at JC's insistence. Why? Oh I have no idea, and I suspect nobody else does either. Mere mortals are apparently not capable of understanding the masterful legal wranglings of JC.
So, witness coordinator #2 takes me aside and tells me that I'm up next and there will probably be a short break before I go on. She also says that I should just keep to myself and make a point of not talking to the people milling around in the hallway. She is pretty sure that they are working for JC and that they have been trying to talk witnesses before and/or after they testify, probably recording them in hopes of tripping them up - or something. Again, only the brilliant JC really knows what the real intended point of these "operatives" actually is - but more about them in a minute.
I take the stand, the city attorney asks me who I am how I was involved and then just sticks to the facts of the day in question. She asks me the broad strokes of what I saw when and where ect. JC objects here and there, with no real cause or point (using the common sense measuring stick, I'm not a legal professional.) The direct exam wraps up and it's Jill's turn to uh... shine? I guess... She goes over the same ground as the city attorney, only delving way into the minutiae. How far away was I, was I on the right or the left blah blah blah... She spends a good 2 minutes just trying to discuss why I choose the term "resist," was I coached to say that, was I told the charge was resisting, why did I choose to phrase it that particular way...
Apparently her pass through the facts and analysis of my word choice didn't garner what she was after, so then she decided to try a different approach and delve into my personal bias.
Well, that, my friends, is moronic. All the pretrial motions to exclude testimony about religion, history, child support and whatever else, really only applies to direct exam. On cross, pretty much anything she asks me I can answer so long as I'm honest.
So if we assume it was some awesome legal maneuver to exclude all of the prejudicial information in the first place, it seems like it would be the definition of stupidity to then ask "So, uh is it sounds like you don't much like the defendant, Why is that?" Fortunately for myself, and the taxpayers of MN the prosecution objected to her asking that question because there is a chance my answer could still be in progress today.
Overall, I left with the same impression of JC as I've found on this blog - Lots of hot air and bluster, but when it comes right down to it, not much actually ability to back it all up.
Especially when you consider her "other" retarded trial strategy....
Remember those special undercover operatives I mentioned a couple paragraphs back.... Well Holy shit, Perry Mason your brilliance has obtained a entirely new level. During the trial JC had Dan's brother, who I have seen before on several occasions, and some old guy she called Peter who looks a bit like Vizzini from the Princess Bride (only with white hair) loitering around. Presumably they were her "legal team" but all they really did was spend a lot of time "checking their phones" which I'm sure was actually them recording everything that happened in the hall outside the courtroom. Well - I've read more of your blog , and I'm almost certain it was this guy:
http://adventuresofjohnnynorthside.blogspot.com/2010/05/bizarre-bus-incident-involving-peter.html
Which is brilliant obviously - there is of course no way the jury could pick up on her entourage or freaks milling around looking shady. I mean the old guy looked like a stereotypical dirty old man, and not knowing shit about him gave me a creepy vibe. Dan's brother who as far as I know is a "normal" cult peon, was in his finest cult garb of shitty, ill-fitting walmart "slacks" and plain dress shirt - which doesn't sound like it would stand out, but something about them (both him and Dan) just screams "Hey yo, I'm just not quite right in some way" They both have the furtive fidgety manner, always looking down at their feet and glancing around out of the corner of there eyes. It's just uncomfortable around them in a hard to describe way I guess.
Anyway only the brilliant legal mind of JC would think: "Hmmm, you know who I want pointlessly milling about the hall whenever the jury is coming to and from lunch and breaks, these two, Dan's odd brother, and my undercover pedophile..." Good god, the more I piece together the more absurd it all becomes. I actually spent a second thinking, am I the dumb ass here?? Is this so wonderfully well thought out I just can't grasp the strategic perfection? I eventually settled on no, it really is that idiotic.
Finally, as I was prepared for by Witness coordinator #2, "Vizzini," who I now know is Spanky Pete, did come up and try to strike up a conversation with me once my testimony was over. He came up and said some shit like: sometimes people remember things wrong, and then they actually convince themselves their own lie is really the truth.
Of course the whole time he was "struggling" to "fix" something on his phone (i.e. recording me "very secretly")...idiot...But know I suppose it seems legit in his mind, since he's almost certainly deluding himself over all kinds of shit he's done.
(End of email)
JNS says: Yeah, I've also noticed Spanky Pete's tendency to "hang around" Jill's cases. He was even at the Court of Appeals when the Jerry Moore v. Johnny Northside defamation lawsuit was argued. And we do know Jill Clark had a sex offender working for her at one time, the "chat line rapist."
Please keep me informed about the progress (and I use the term loosely) of Culty Dan's lawsuit, especially as it touches on Jill Clark. Needless to say...
I feel your pain.
6 comments:
How about NOT using the word retarded? www.r-word.org
I agree the word is harsh and hurtful. But I didn't want to strip my source's first-person account of the particular way he expressed himself.
Thank you for providing that link. In fact, I'm going to take that link and go into the body of the post and make the "r word" a live link to that website.
Classic.
Thanks for adding the live link!
Article about Jill Clark that appeared on MN Progressive Project.
In providing this link, I want to make clear that I believe there are some minor factual errors in the article linked.
http://www.mncampaignreport.com/diary/11899/before-the-primary-profiles-of-judicial-candidates
I certainly didn't set out to offended children with an intellectual disability by bringing them down to JC's level. I would apparently be a poor blogger because I write like I talk, and I don't always talk in the most PC terms - in large part because I feel the over "PC-ification" of our country is a pointless exercise in avoiding the real issue, the attitude people have towards each other.
I grew up calling Handi-capable people handicapped, African-Americans were black people, homosexuals were gay and those with intellectual disability were mentally retarded. Before the labels I grew up on were deemed the appropriate term, each of those groups had at least one, and probably more, prior labels that we would all finds more offensive, myself included. Someday our kids will probably be shocked that growing up your generation called a "Differently able mentally gifted special challenge overcoming hero of the universe" a person with an intellectual disability.
Point being that over time the offensive part isn’t the ever changing label, it is that attitude of the person using the label. The old people I knew that dislike people of different races are not racist because of the labels they used, they are racist because of their attitude that just because somebody was of a different race, they are inherently inferior. To that point I’ve have nothing against anybody based solely on their label. I don’t have a problem with JC because of her race, gender, sexual preference (shudder), abilities/disabilities. I’ve got a problem with her actions and choices and even more than that how those things directly impact my family. And conversely I don’t let my dislike of JC extend to all white women of undetermined orientation and ability/disability – they all get a chance to make an impression on their own merit if the situation arises; and almost certainly every one of them will end up in better standing with me than JC.
So, while I have no problem labeling JC's trail strategy as having an intellectual disability, I think that the exercise is pointless and may even be a step in the wrong direction. I would be taking the new 'preferred' label and sliding it into the same negative context as the old discarded label. So the happy go lucky positive attitude people making the best of the life they have on the website you referenced can certainly have their new label and I’ll do my part to not attach the old negative stereotypes. And, as a bonus that should free up the old label to describe my opinion of JC’s trial strategy.
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