CORRUPTION WATCH-China’s Liu Qiangdong, founder of China’s “Amazon,” variously known as Jongdong, JD.com or simply JD, provides insight as to why the American judicial system is making America non-functional.
Corruption destroys trust and without trust, society breaks down, as described by a piece in the July 22, 2018 issue of The New Yorker, “How E-Commerce Is Transforming Rural China,”by Jiayang Fan.
As Americans are learning, the judicial system is in shambles. California is especially bad, but it is not alone. See also this article. Unlike police officers, judges are free to do whatever they desire, hiding behind judicial immunity. (Mireles V. Waco (1991) 502 U.S. 9)
To add insult to the indignity of being preyed upon by corrupt judges, Californians have to endure the Commission of Judicial Performance [CJP], which is the watchdog agency where the wolves monitor the wolves who are feasting inside the hen house. Needless to say, this situation is lethal to justice, but due to judicial immunity, “us chickens” have no voice. While the CJP is supposed to discipline miscreant judges, it protects them.
The Role of Trust in Society
Because of corruption in the Chinese consumer market, no one trusted his on-line store. Hence, Liu was going bankrupt. However, when someone vouched for his honesty, people began to trust him. After a while his reputation for trustworthiness grew and people flocked to his website. Now JD.com stands right behind Amazon and Alphabet, Inc, (Google’s parent) as the world’s third largest company. Liu knew that actions do speak louder than words and America’s approach of offering lying platitudes about the great American legal system deceives few people. We need to restore integrity to our courts as Liu did to his online stores.
While China recognizes the need to end corruption, Americans have been encouraging it. When people tried to stop the corruption at Enron, the judges protected the fraud until the entire sham collapsed. Likewise, the courts protected the Wall Street criminals during the 2000s while they were destroying the world economy. After the Crash of 2008, there were no prosecutions. Meanwhile, China hands out life prison terms for corruption.
As I pointed out previously in CityWatch, one reason Donald Trump-a-Doddle is so upset with the courts’ not doing his bidding is that for decades he knew he could waltz into a court and emerge wealthier while his workers and suppliers would be shoved into bankruptcy.
Judicial Corruption is not Limited to the Billionaires
As most Californians who have been forced to deal with the California courts have learned, the rule of law has been supplanted by the avarice of judges. Talk with someone who has been in Family Court. The stories are unbelievable, but most likely correct. Children are abused and essentially held for ransom while parents have to undergo psychological counseling for “dual diagnoses.” Surprise, surprise, the psychologist is a friend of the judge. As Huff Post reported in 2017, judges make awards in favor of the unfit parent knowing that the fit parents will spend large sums of money to protect the children.
Some judges will have secret contact with attorneys who have ways to compensate the kindly judge. If a case should fail to go the way a judge desires, the judge can overrule the jury. If a jury returns a $10 million verdict against a corporation and the judge reduces it to $100,000, don’t be surprised when the judge’s house refinancing is paid by that corporation.
Judicial Immunity is a Judicial Evil
Judicial immunity has proven to be a total failure. It would be as ludicrous to give police officers immunity to commit crimes as long as they did it while on duty. Yet, judges may engage in criminal behavior as long as they claim it was part of their judicial duties. If a cop smashes you over the head you can sue him for excessive force but if a judge orders him to beat you, you cannot sue the judge. (Mireles V. Waco.) Duh! Truth Justice and the American way?
A judge can award huge costs against a citizen, whom the corporate world dislikes, with complete knowledge that the person has done nothing wrong. A false judgment can take years to correct – if the victim can ever obtain justice. The matter of Sharon Noon Kramer is one example how the courts attack decent people.
About the only way a judge can lose his immunity is to act outside “jurisdiction.” If the judge breaks into your house and steals $15,000, he has no immunity. That’s because his immunity extends only as far as his “jurisdiction.” A judge who acts without jurisdiction, let’s say, he uses his official judge stamp to give Mr. Jones’ property to the judge’s buddy Mr. Scoundrel, the judge will arrange for Mr. Jones to be prosecuted if he complains about the theft. The corrupt judges stick together, and the other judges are cowards.
The Republic Cannot Survive Dishonest Judges
“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely” (Lord Acton 1887), but corruption destroys! The Founding Fathers gave the courts great power to balance the power in the legislative and executive branches of government. Judges’ power rests in the public’s trust in their integrity. As Liu pointed out, a society without trust ceases to function. A major reason that American society is teetering on the brink of an abyss is a horrendously corrupt judicial system which oppresses the poor while catering to the rich and powerful.
A First Step – End Judicial Immunity
The simplistic answer that judges cannot do their jobs if they have to worry about the consequences of their actions is no longer satisfactory. A judiciary without integrity destroys the trust by which our Republic functions.
(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney and a CityWatch contributor. He can be reached at: Rickleeabrams@Gmail.com. Abrams’ views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
