Uncensored Justice System Discussion

SaberGal · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 349 Location: Oregon

www.judelacour.com

This case has it all - law enforcement, prosecutorial, & judicial misconduct, jury tampering, perjury, suborning of perjury, violation of due process, civil, and constitutional rights, corrupt defense attorneys, conflicts of interest, forced recusals....

This guy was just convicted for violating a law that didn't become effective until the middle of his trial!! The jury had declared themselves deadlocked twice but the judge then met with the jury in private and they came back out with a guilty verdict! The judge allowed the trial to go forward even though there was no dispute that jury tampering had occurred more than once.

LaCour was not allowed to present evidence to the jury that throughout the course of his business, he had obtained legal opinions from multiple attorneys and that they concluded the business was operating within the scope of the law. Essentially, he was barred from presenting a very valid "Advise of Counsel" defense. He's been incarcerated for a year because a government agent got on the stand and lied during his bond hearing. His testimony was blatantly false and the government's own discovery proved it - which means the prosecutor suborned the perjury.

The motions he filed in the case are available on his site. They are pdf but I will be converting them to docs and posting portions here soon.

More to come on this case...
_________________
"Evil triumphs when good men do nothing."
- E. Burke
__________________________________________
That's OK. I wasn't using my civil liberties anyway. (Insert rolly eye emoticon here)

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA

SaberGal · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 349 Location: Oregon

As fast as I can, I am getting the motions posted in this forum.

But in the meantime....a little back ground on the case...

LaCour owned a marketing company called Jive Network (Jive was short for Jude's internet ventures). A big part of Jive was the online pharmacy business. In short, a customer interested in obtaining a prescription for weight loss medication, sleeping aids, or Viagra type medication would fill out a medical questionnaire. The information entered by the customer then went through a series of internal procedures put in place to root out fraudulent orders or refills requested too soon, etc.

The questionnaire was then reviewed by a licensed (US) doctor. The doctor was paid a fee whether they approved the order or not so there was no incentive for the doctor to approve bad orders. If the doctor was concerned about the patient for any reason and declined the order, the doctor was still paid for reviewing the questionnaire. If the doctor approved the prescription, it was forwarded to a licensed US pharmacy and shipped to the customer. It is important to note that Lacour was not accused of breaking any state laws - and that is because he wasn't. The government also did not allege that anyone was adversely harmed because of this.

Throughout the course of his business, he obtained legal opinions from attorneys regarding the legality of his business. When doctors and pharmacies sought him out to become a part of Jive, they were always advised by Jive to first consult with their attorneys. The business was open and running from about 2001 - April 2005. During this time, he paid taxes, employed dozens of employees, rented a 10k square foot building - in short, he was not trying to hide anything. Major drug companies were even referring doctors and pharmacies to Jive!

Once the business became extremely profitable, the feds seized his assets and raided his business 'rambo-style.' They claim that he violated the Controlled Substance Act because the doctors did not meet face to face with the patient and therefore, the prescriptions were not legal/valid. However, the only problem with that is that the CSA, or any other federal law in effect at the time, did not define a face to face meeting as a requirement for a valid prescription. The CSA was amended (to regulate online pharmacies) and signed into law in October of 2008 (Ryan Haight Act)...and most of the law didn't even take effect until April 13, 2009 - right in the middle of Lacour's trial!

Lacour was not allowed to present to the jury any information about the Ryan Haight Act because of a ruling by the judge in the pretrial period. Further, the judge ruled that Lacour could not present evidence of government misconduct or the fact that he had advice of counsel to the jury. Basically, what it amounted to, is that Lacour wasn't allowed to put on a defense!

In spite of all of these obstacles, the jury still came back on two separate occasions declaring themselves as deadlocked. The judge had a private meeting with them and they came back two hours later with a guilty verdict.
_________________
"Evil triumphs when good men do nothing."
- E. Burke
__________________________________________
That's OK. I wasn't using my civil liberties anyway. (Insert rolly eye emoticon here)

SaberGal · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 349 Location: Oregon

So....why pro se?

For the first few months after Jude's initial incarceration, he was Pro Se. When it became apparent that his "Pro Se" status meant absolutely nothing to the Court, despite Supreme Court rulings on Pro Se defendants, Lacour hired private defense counsel. He hired a former United States Attorney who said all the right things, and agreed to file the motions that Lacour requested, including a major prosecutorial misconduct motion.

The first order of business that Lacour requested from his attorney, after being incarcerated for 5 months, was a bond motion. Lacour's first request for bond resulted in a bond hearing scheduled several days later. At the bond hearing, a government agent got on the stand and lied his hiney off. The lies and misrepresentations offered by this agent, and suborned by the prosecutor, were proven to be lies in the government's own discovery! And this was discovery that the prosecutor had in her possession long before the bond hearing.

As a result, the Magistrate found that Lacour was both a "danger to society" and a "flight risk." Both of those claims would be laughable, if it weren't such a disgusting violation of his right to reasonable bail. Lacour, in the three years between the time his business was raided and the indictment, had left the country numerous times but always returned. He never once let up on the fight to clear his name and was not about to run. The Magistrate's reasoning for finding Lacour to be a possible "danger to society" remains a mystery...Lacour had no prior criminal record and voluntarily withdrew from his business despite urgings from government agents to take his business "offshore."

Throughout the next 5-6 months of his private attorney's "employment" Lacour repeatedly begged him to file the motions he had promised to file...his attorney led him to believe the motions were being worked on. Approximately 2-3 weeks before trial, it became glaringly apparent that his attorney had done absolutely nothing to prepare for trial. Not only had he not interviewed a single witness, he had not served a single subpoena or prepared a single exhibit. In addition, and most egregiously, Lacour became aware that "his" attorney, despite obtaining an ethics opinion from another US Attorney that some of the prosecutor's actions in the case not only constituted misconduct, but was also criminal in nature, Lacour's attorney flat out refused to file the misconduct motion long promised, not only verbally but also in the retainer agreement. Apparently, his friendship with the prosecutor meant more to him than his client's defense. (This will become more clear once I post the misconduct motion that Lacour eventually filed on his own)

As a result, after Lacour confronted his attorney with all of this, his attorney filed a motion to withdraw from the case two weeks before trial. The Judge asked very few questions and the lead prosecutor didn't even show up for the hearing - they knew that Lacour's attorney was essentially an imposter merely impersonating a defense attorney. A Trojan horse in every sense.

Upon his attorney's dismissal, Lacour filed his one and only request for a continuance. Knowing that he couldn't possibly find an attorney who could be prepared for trial within two weeks, he felt a continuance was absolutely necessary. The Judge apparently didn't think so - as with nearly every motion Lacour filed, it was summarily denied.

Jude Lacour, incarcerated and once again pro se, was forced to go it "alone." Because of his incarceration, he had absolutely no access to a computer. The prosecutor, knowing this, provided him with "discovery" on computer disks. The jail authorities at some point confiscated those disks but that didn't even matter - he had no computer.

Lacour was forced to go to trial having never seen a single page of the 400,000+ pages of discovery, never having had the opportunity to interview a single witness, prepare a single exhibit, or serve a single subpoena.
_________________
"Evil triumphs when good men do nothing."
- E. Burke
__________________________________________
That's OK. I wasn't using my civil liberties anyway. (Insert rolly eye emoticon here)

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA

It's totally OUTRAGEOUS! And I also can't understand how a judge who deliberately violated the rules of criminal procedure can get away with saying Mr. LaCour is a "danger to society" when the charges don't even involve any type of harm or injury to anyone.

This is another frightening example of "law enforcement" officials out of control, and why we really do need more attorneys who QUESTION the things government does, not just go along with it.

J Cool

_________________
"We must remember, always, that accusation is not proof, and conviction depends on evidence and due process of law."
EDWARD R. MURROW, 1954

SaberGal · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 349 Location: Oregon

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA

Saber, I just wanted to ask; this case was in California, wasn't it? Or maybe it wasn't, I just wanted to clarify which state this so-called "trial" was held in.

I noticed that on the JudeLaCour website, our friend Bill Pavelic was the Defense Investigator. He usually handles CA cases, am I right?

J Cool

_________________
"We must remember, always, that accusation is not proof, and conviction depends on evidence and due process of law."
EDWARD R. MURROW, 1954

SaberGal · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 349 Location: Oregon

Hey J!

The case was out of Florida. Pavelic handles cases from all over although most of his high profile ones are naturally out of California. Zambeste

_________________
"Evil triumphs when good men do nothing."
- E. Burke
__________________________________________
That's OK. I wasn't using my civil liberties anyway. (Insert rolly eye emoticon here)

JUSTICE1st · Joined: 13 Dec 2007 Posts: 715 Location: USA