MOVEON'S SMEAR: A VILE NEW LOW
September 11, 2007 -- MOVEON.ORG's exploitation of the Internet misleads the public into thinking it's a breakthrough phenomenon. It isn't: Technology aside, MoveOn belongs to the first half of the 20th century, not to the 21st.
Pretending to represent grass-roots democracy, it is totalitarian in outlook and practice. Complete with on-line commissars to enforce party discipline, this neo-Stalinist group crushes dissent mercilessly.
Far from populist, MoveOn is elitist, made up of the same sort of pseudo-intellectual activists who "knew" that Bolshevism, Maoism or fascism was what was best for the common people.
And make no mistake, you are the common people these activists despise: In their lofty view, you're not qualified to choose presidents, senators or even alder-men. They mean to make your choices for you.
MoveOn has been a cancer within the Democratic Party for years now, and not one leading Dem has had the guts to recommend surgery. Indeed, Democrats are terrified of the group's much-exaggerated power - but, then, it's always been the illusion of power, the bravado, that put totalitarian minorities over the top.
Yesterday, MoveOn reached a new low. Unable to refute the changed facts on the ground in Iraq, the commissars questioned Gen. David Petraeus' personal integrity in a very expensive ad in The New York Times. (Nice "populism": an ad in a newspaper no working man or woman ever reads.)
In our democracy, it's fair to disagree with the general's analysis - hopefully, from an informed position. But attacking the man himself in a back-door bid to undercut his testimony is reminiscent of the Stalinist practices of the 1930s.
Gen. Petraeus is a thoroughly honorable man who has dedicated his life to protecting us. I feel particularly qualified to defend him - not only because I know him, but because he and I have disagreed ferociously on many issues in the past, in print and in public. But I never doubted his integrity. This is a man of whom every American, Democrat or Republican, should be proud.
And MoveOn's smear tactics should shame every conscientious American.
It's high time for the Democrats, who so love revisiting the McCarthy era and their myths of courageous resistance (in fact, it was a Pentagon lawyer, not a liberal pol, who stopped Tailgunner Joe), to stand up to this un-American tyranny of an intolerant minority.
Having seen MoveOn attack legislators who dared to deviate from its party line, Democrats are terrified of offending the Internet's "Ministry of Truth." But how can politicians who lack the courage to stand up to a pack of e-thugs be expected to lead our country in these perilous times? New York's Sen. Hillary Clinton projects an image of strength and resolution; will she condemn MoveOn's personal attack on Petraeus? Hasn't a single Democrat got the guts and decency to say, "Enough!"?
I'm always labeled a conservative, since I write about military affairs and foreign policy - fields where the Republicans, even at their worst, have been more convincing than the Democrats. But on many domestic issues, from conservation to women's rights, I'm distinctly left of center.
In other words, I'm a typical American - a political mongrel who votes on issues and the candidates' qualities, not the way party mandarins insist I should. But I couldn't bring myself to vote for any candidate so morally weak and cowardly that he or she won't stand up for our common values against MoveOn. And take warning, Democrats: There are tens of millions of voters just like me.
Oh, the political right holds plenty of intolerant, single-issue groups, too. I don't like them much, either. But MoveOn is in a neo-Stalinist class by itself, since cultural elitists fund and publicize it, and the media refuses to subject it to serious scrutiny (while happily dissecting conservative organizations).
Let's hope that MoveOn's vile attack on Gen. Petraeus marks a turning point - that Democrats of conscience will stand up and condemn such behavior carried out in their name.
New York Post - MOVEON'S SMEAR: A VILE NEW LOW - September 11, 2007
This one is worth including here because it speaks so clearly of the political climate today. What's happening in Humboldt County is smaller scale but mirrors that of MoveOn.org. Anyone who is remotely construed as conservative is attacked and marginalized, people who work and produce are attacked and marginalized, while those who do not are glorified, criminals are becoming revered, there is outpouring of sympathy for the criminals who have ended up shot by police but none expressed for the victims of crimes, and Gallegos rides this wave. His work ethic is deplorable, he has brought his office down to the lowest low, rather than built it up.
It's like the world is upside down, bad is good, good is bad. I hope it will right itself soon.
Showing posts with label Salzman's Plan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Salzman's Plan. Show all posts
9.11.2007
1.06.2007
ER - The Friends Of Paul Gallegos
The Friends Of Paul Gallegos Strive To Keep Gallegos In Office
by Christine Bensen The Eureka Reporter
12/10/03
Photo submitted by Ted Kirby
Richard Salzman, campaign manager for the Friends of Paul Gallegos poses with FOPG spokesmen Patrick Riggs and John Ford at the First Saturday Night Arts Alive! event held at the FOPG Headquarters.
Richard Salzman, campaign manager for the Friends of Paul Gallegos and an artist representative who helps publicize and sell artists works for advertising and other purposes, moved to Humboldt County in January 2000. He said he first heard Paul Gallegos in a 2002 radio debate with then Humboldt County District Attorney Terry Farmer.
“I liked very much what he had to say,” he said.
Salzman said he noticed right away that Gallegos didn’t seem to be a “seasoned politician” and called Gallegos with some suggestions for his next debate.
After meeting Gallegos, Salzman said he liked him and what he stood for and joined his campaign for the last six weeks before the election.
Patrick Riggs, Alice Birney Elementary School second-grade teacher, has lived in Humboldt County for 20 years and is one of the spokesmen for the Friends of Paul Gallegos.
“The FOPG is the political action committee formed under … (the) Fair Political Practices Commission to run Paul’s campaign to keep him in office,” he said.
Riggs said people began discussing the idea in late spring and FOPG was officially established in July.
Riggs said he feels the FOPG is worth his effort. The recall election, he said, will determine whether the people of Humboldt County will make the decision that will affect their future or if they will let the “Maxxam-owned Pacific Lumber Co.” make the decision for them.
Eureka Realtor John Ford, one of the spokesmen and fund-raising chairman for FOPG and an associate of the Humboldt County Republican Central Committee, has lived in Humboldt County for more than two years.
Ford said Gallegos and his wife were some of the first people he and his wife met when they moved here and one of the first things he noticed about Gallegos was how important his family is to him.
“We’re both family oriented; that means a lot to me,” Ford said.
He said he started getting involved with the FOPG because of the “whole David and Goliath aspect.”
Ford said someone involved in the timber industry told Gallegos The Pacific Lumber Co. had committed fraud and after they presented proof, “Paul went for it.”
He said it wasn’t until after the lawsuit was filed that people started talking about the need for a recall.
“We have a democratically elected District Attorney who is clearly doing the job he was elected to do,” Riggs said. “It is not about Paul Gallegos as an individual -- it is about principles.”
Salzman said Gallegos’ strong belief that all people are equal under the law is inspiring.
“It shouldn’t seem like an original concept,” he said.
Riggs said the recall drive started after Gallegos filed the lawsuit against The Pacific Lumber Co. and PL’s funding helped keep it going.
“We have a situation where a corporation is trying to remove a publicly elected official who is trying to prosecute them,” he said.
Riggs said if a bank robber were trying to do the same thing people would not take it seriously. He said the issue is about “preserving democracy here in Humboldt County.”
Ford likens the recall to a person who receives a speeding ticket and tries to get the police officer who wrote it fired.
The point is that no one is above the law, Riggs said.
He said this is about America and the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.
“Everyone should stand as an equal before the law,” Riggs said.
“Everything we’ve seen him doing are things he’d talked about (before he was elected),” Salzman said.
“It’s surprising how many people will step up and support you,” Ford said.
He said he believes local media is somewhat responsible for making people think the issue is black and white among community residents.
Ford said he knows many people with varying political beliefs who are against the recall. He said part of the reason he was chosen to be one of the spokesmen was to create some “diversity” in look and political affiliation.
“It’s not as divided as people think,” Ford said.
Ford said for now he is focusing on his fund-raising responsibilities “arraigning fund-raisers, different parties and events.”
He said after March 2 he plans to start helping with the 2006 re-election campaign for Gallegos.
Riggs said the possibility of keeping the FOPG going after the March 2 recall election has been discussed, but no decision has been made.
“Hopefully on March 2 we can have a party and go back to our normal lives,” he said.
“The idea that he can inspire so many people … it’s something we’d like to see more of in elected officials,” Salzman said.
“(The FOPG has) no other intention than to keep a decent, honest person in office,” Riggs said. “The man is doing the job he was elected to do -- there’s no question about that.”
For more information about the Friends of Paul Gallegos visit www.votegallegos.org.
by Christine Bensen The Eureka Reporter
12/10/03
Photo submitted by Ted Kirby
Richard Salzman, campaign manager for the Friends of Paul Gallegos poses with FOPG spokesmen Patrick Riggs and John Ford at the First Saturday Night Arts Alive! event held at the FOPG Headquarters.
Richard Salzman, campaign manager for the Friends of Paul Gallegos and an artist representative who helps publicize and sell artists works for advertising and other purposes, moved to Humboldt County in January 2000. He said he first heard Paul Gallegos in a 2002 radio debate with then Humboldt County District Attorney Terry Farmer.
“I liked very much what he had to say,” he said.
Salzman said he noticed right away that Gallegos didn’t seem to be a “seasoned politician” and called Gallegos with some suggestions for his next debate.
After meeting Gallegos, Salzman said he liked him and what he stood for and joined his campaign for the last six weeks before the election.
Patrick Riggs, Alice Birney Elementary School second-grade teacher, has lived in Humboldt County for 20 years and is one of the spokesmen for the Friends of Paul Gallegos.
“The FOPG is the political action committee formed under … (the) Fair Political Practices Commission to run Paul’s campaign to keep him in office,” he said.
Riggs said people began discussing the idea in late spring and FOPG was officially established in July.
Riggs said he feels the FOPG is worth his effort. The recall election, he said, will determine whether the people of Humboldt County will make the decision that will affect their future or if they will let the “Maxxam-owned Pacific Lumber Co.” make the decision for them.
Eureka Realtor John Ford, one of the spokesmen and fund-raising chairman for FOPG and an associate of the Humboldt County Republican Central Committee, has lived in Humboldt County for more than two years.
Ford said Gallegos and his wife were some of the first people he and his wife met when they moved here and one of the first things he noticed about Gallegos was how important his family is to him.
“We’re both family oriented; that means a lot to me,” Ford said.
He said he started getting involved with the FOPG because of the “whole David and Goliath aspect.”
Ford said someone involved in the timber industry told Gallegos The Pacific Lumber Co. had committed fraud and after they presented proof, “Paul went for it.”
He said it wasn’t until after the lawsuit was filed that people started talking about the need for a recall.
“We have a democratically elected District Attorney who is clearly doing the job he was elected to do,” Riggs said. “It is not about Paul Gallegos as an individual -- it is about principles.”
Salzman said Gallegos’ strong belief that all people are equal under the law is inspiring.
“It shouldn’t seem like an original concept,” he said.
Riggs said the recall drive started after Gallegos filed the lawsuit against The Pacific Lumber Co. and PL’s funding helped keep it going.
“We have a situation where a corporation is trying to remove a publicly elected official who is trying to prosecute them,” he said.
Riggs said if a bank robber were trying to do the same thing people would not take it seriously. He said the issue is about “preserving democracy here in Humboldt County.”
Ford likens the recall to a person who receives a speeding ticket and tries to get the police officer who wrote it fired.
The point is that no one is above the law, Riggs said.
He said this is about America and the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.
“Everyone should stand as an equal before the law,” Riggs said.
“Everything we’ve seen him doing are things he’d talked about (before he was elected),” Salzman said.
“It’s surprising how many people will step up and support you,” Ford said.
He said he believes local media is somewhat responsible for making people think the issue is black and white among community residents.
Ford said he knows many people with varying political beliefs who are against the recall. He said part of the reason he was chosen to be one of the spokesmen was to create some “diversity” in look and political affiliation.
“It’s not as divided as people think,” Ford said.
Ford said for now he is focusing on his fund-raising responsibilities “arraigning fund-raisers, different parties and events.”
He said after March 2 he plans to start helping with the 2006 re-election campaign for Gallegos.
Riggs said the possibility of keeping the FOPG going after the March 2 recall election has been discussed, but no decision has been made.
“Hopefully on March 2 we can have a party and go back to our normal lives,” he said.
“The idea that he can inspire so many people … it’s something we’d like to see more of in elected officials,” Salzman said.
“(The FOPG has) no other intention than to keep a decent, honest person in office,” Riggs said. “The man is doing the job he was elected to do -- there’s no question about that.”
For more information about the Friends of Paul Gallegos visit www.votegallegos.org.
1.01.2007
NCJ - Fund for Gallegos' PL case
Fund for Gallegos' PL case
March 20, 2003
Stymied in his attempt to hire an outside law firm for his suit against the Pacific Lumber Co., District Attorney Paul Gallegos may get a bit of help from local residents.
A Redway man has started a fund to help defray the county's legal expenses in connection with the lawsuit. Jared Rossman, a landlord and property manager, sent out an e-mail urging people to "put your money where your mouth is" and donate to his "Citizens' Fund for Equal Justice."
"I was so upset by the way the Board of Supervisors handled this," he said. They could have shown support for "this independent DA." Instead, they missed an opportunity. "If the county officials are going to drop the ball then the citizens are going to have to pick it up," he said. "When the law is applied evenhandedly, the truth will win out, and that's what America was built on."
The fund was established at the Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt in Garberville. It was unclear at press time whether it is legal for a citizens' group to earmark private donations for use by the county in a specific lawsuit.
Meanwhile, another local man has started a group called the Alliance for Ethical Business, a "citizens advocacy group concerned about corporate crime," said founder Richard Salzman. He said his group would support Gallegos' efforts to discover the truth in the Pacific Lumber case, and is organizing an event for April 9 at the Arcata Community Center in which Gallegos and Assistant DA Tim Stoen will answer questions about the lawsuit.
***
Note: Jared Rossman; Karin Rossman/Michael Shellenberger
March 20, 2003
Stymied in his attempt to hire an outside law firm for his suit against the Pacific Lumber Co., District Attorney Paul Gallegos may get a bit of help from local residents.
A Redway man has started a fund to help defray the county's legal expenses in connection with the lawsuit. Jared Rossman, a landlord and property manager, sent out an e-mail urging people to "put your money where your mouth is" and donate to his "Citizens' Fund for Equal Justice."
"I was so upset by the way the Board of Supervisors handled this," he said. They could have shown support for "this independent DA." Instead, they missed an opportunity. "If the county officials are going to drop the ball then the citizens are going to have to pick it up," he said. "When the law is applied evenhandedly, the truth will win out, and that's what America was built on."
The fund was established at the Community Credit Union of Southern Humboldt in Garberville. It was unclear at press time whether it is legal for a citizens' group to earmark private donations for use by the county in a specific lawsuit.
Meanwhile, another local man has started a group called the Alliance for Ethical Business, a "citizens advocacy group concerned about corporate crime," said founder Richard Salzman. He said his group would support Gallegos' efforts to discover the truth in the Pacific Lumber case, and is organizing an event for April 9 at the Arcata Community Center in which Gallegos and Assistant DA Tim Stoen will answer questions about the lawsuit.
***
Note: Jared Rossman; Karin Rossman/Michael Shellenberger
12.11.2006
Paul Gallegos viral email
For those coming to view this blog from outside Humboldt County, the lawsuit used here to generate money NEVER EVEN MADE IT INTO COURT, it NEVER PASSED DEMURRER, it was found to have NO MERIT. Three Years have passed, and Paul Gallegos has finally filed an APPEAL of that decision.
While he has dedicated his office to the pursuit of this case - the tilting at windmills - the "gallant" Gallegos has presdied over the complete decimation of his office, lost almost every single experienced prosecutor Humboldt County had, been unable to refill those positions, has lost many key grants that fund important programs that serve the people, the victims of real crimes in Humboldt County. The Humboldt County Grand Jury has issued a scathing report outlining his failure to do his job, there have been incidents of plagiarism on the part of Paul Gallegos (in fact you may want to google key phrases from his "My Word's"), there have been allegations of bribes and payoffs for having sentences reduced (he disputes that of course), if you have come onto this blog looking for answers, I hope the articles collected here help you. the new Blogger "LABEL" feature makes cross referencing easy, too.
You will find many many articles across the web about the "gallant: Gallegos and his fight against the Goliath Maxxam - this is the real story, not the PR orchestrated hype that you are used to seeing.
Salzman and Paul's handlers live and die online, and that is where they solicit money and support. The following is an example of Michael Shellenberger's favorite new tool, viral email:
***
back to corporations | rat haus | Index | Search | tree
( PDF | ASCII text formats )
From: Paul Cienfuegos
Date: Friday, May 02, 2003 12:28 PM
Subject: Humboldt County (California) urgently needs your help
Dear friends across the United States, from the people of Humboldt County struggling against Maxxam Corporation,
As many of you probably already know, we have a world-famous case here of corporate fraud and environmental destruction caused by Maxxam Corporation, which is headquartered in Texas (CEO: Charles Hurwitz) and is chartered in Delaware. In November of 2000, in an upset election that toppled the good-old-boy power structure here, a dissident District Attorney was elected by the people of our county to replace a D.A. who had been looking the other way for years as Maxxam Corp violated the law literally hundreds of times. Just weeks after taking office, Paul Gallegos stunned everyone by filing a major fraud lawsuit against the corporation. That event set off a firestorm across California's north coast. And because Maxxam still runs the county politically, its allies have responded by quickly organizing a recall campaign to oust our new D.A. as quickly as possible before he shakes things up too badly.
The reason that I'm writing to all of you is that we urgently need your help here to defend our new D.A. from the recall campaign while simultaneously supporting his bold move to sue Maxxam for fraud.
Below, you will find a brief note from Richard Salzman who is coordinating the local campaign to support the D.A. and his historic lawsuit. Justice will not be served in this county unless we can raise substantial amounts of money to at least try to match what the corporation's supporters are already raising in their already vicious media campaign against Gallegos. Thus I am asking you to consider making a generous donation toward this cause.
Also below, you'll be able to read an Op-Ed written by our D.A. in our local daily last week, followed by two major articles about the issue from the Los Angeles Times and the Daily Journal.
Please respond not to me, but to Richard Salzman.
Thanks in advance,
Paul Cienfuegos
Arcata, CA
Co-director, Democracy Unlimited of Humboldt County
A note from Richard Salzman to our supporters across the nation
Last year the residents of Humboldt county, on California's redwood coast, elected Paul Gallegos, a man of the people, not beholden to any special interest as District Attorney in an upset victory against the incumbent DA of 20 years, best known for his authorization of the use of pepper spray as a pain compliance technique on non-violent protesters. Eight weeks after taking office and one day before the four year statue of limitations ran out, he filed a lawsuit alleging fraud against Maxxam corporation's wholly owned subsidiary Pacific Lumber. Pacific Lumber's apologists have now launched a recall of the district attorney in hopes of removing him from office in order to avoid answering these charges in a court of law.
This is clearly a David and Goliath story when viewed from the national stage. A community faced with having exercised true democracy now being subverted in the most overt manner by an out-of-state corporation using all the worst tactics of instilling fear in their workers and promoting hate-mongering against any who dare oppose them. We will need the support of concerned citizens from throughout the country if we are to keep Maxxam from buying this election. We have invested all we have on producing a series of nine commercials which we are now putting into rotation.
In order to buy the air time to run the whole series, we will need to raise some $30,000 (what their campaign had already raised by the time they served Paul the notice of recall) over the next few weeks/months. In addition to financial support we are asking voters around the country to write to their representatives as well as to ours, urging their support of our beleaguered DA. We need elected officials nationwide to speak up in outrage over this attempt to circumvent justice and buy an election. This story has been covered in both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times as well as the San Francisco Chronicle and papers in DC and elsewhere. We encourage people to speak out wherever they live in opposition to this attempt to circumvent justice.
Yours in solidarity,
Thanks for your support.
Richard Salzman - coordinator
Alliance for Ethical Business
po box 387
Eureka Ca 95502
707.845.3700
aeb@inreach.com
"The Alliance for Ethical Business is a citizens group working to ensure that corporate fraud and illegal business practices are prosecuted in a court of law."
MY WORD
All people are equal under the law
by Paul Gallegos
27 April 2003
Eureka Times-Standard
To the people of Humboldt County:
One of the primary goals of our society is to realize the unfulfilled promise that all people are equal before the law. I was elected district attorney by the people of Humboldt County because they share my commitment to fulfilling this promise.
Shortly after taking office we became aware that Pacific Lumber Co. may have engaged in fraudulent conduct. We had a duty to investigate the matter and did. As a result of that investigation and the evidence we uncovered, we filed a lawsuit against them.
Because it is a matter which will be resolved in court, I do not wish to discuss the details of it here. Nor will I engage in a discussion about the possible outcomes. As with all court cases, the pleadings which have been filed are public records and are available for public inspection. For convenience we have placed a copy of the complaint and other documents of public interest at our web page at http://www.co.humboldt.ca.us/distatty/.
However, I would like to explain what this case is not about. It is not about whether Pacific Lumber Co. is being properly regulated by the government. Nor is it about forestry and water laws. It is not an attempt to put any company out of business or to end logging. Clearly the wealth of our county is tied to the wealth of our people. Rather, it is about fraud and, ultimately, whether our laws apply to all or just some of us.
It has been suggested that we should not have filed this case against the biggest business in Humboldt County. This suggestion is troubling and perplexing, as it implies that we either do or should have different rules for people based on their wealth or political power. Clearly, this cannot be.
Nobody is above the law. This fundamental principle was at the heart of the American Revolution more than 200 years ago. As American citizens, we are not bound by race or religion but by the beliefs enshrined in our Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. I know we all share these beliefs and a commitment to their fulfillment. I also know that it is our individual conduct that gives meaning to these beliefs and that they will only be realized by our commitment to fulfilling them.
Some people say that our suit against Pacific Lumber defined me. My response is that it has not defined me, it is defining US. We are all in this together. It is a painful process. But we will come through it together and be better for it because all people will know that in Humboldt County all people are equal under the law and no one, not even the most rich or most powerful, gets preferential treatment.
As your DA, I know where I stand. It is where I have always stood: for equal treatment before the law. As readers of this paper know, I wasn't the candidate predicted to win the election. I didn't have nearly as much money as my opponent. I wasn't well-connected. I had never before run for public office. However, I won because the people of Humboldt County elected me. They elected me for the very change that some seek to prevent.
I am honored and privileged to have the responsibility of serving the people of Humboldt County. I am honored and privileged to have the opportunity to work with the people at this office, who work tirelessly to serve this community. I know that I can comfortably speak for all of them when I say that we feel fortunate to have the opportunity to work for you.
Thank you.
Paul Gallegos was elected district attorney in March 2002 and took office in January. He lives in Eureka.
Copyright © 2003 Eureka Times-Standard
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
D.A. in Hot Water After Taking on Logger
by Kenneth R. Weiss
Los Angelese Time Staff Writer, April 27, 2003
EUREKA, Calif. -- Barely three months in office, Dist. Atty. Paul V. Gallegos faces a recall campaign, threats of lawsuits and court sanctions -- all after he brought civil fraud charges against a powerful timber company that has become a symbol of a beleaguered way of life.
An emigre from Southern California, Gallegos is a political neophyte in a north coast county that, since the mid-1980s, has been a battleground over logging practices that imperil some of California's last giant redwoods.
Although he doesn't view himself as an environmentalist and was elected last year with broad support, he now finds himself undercut by a local establishment that links him to the anti-logging counterculture.
"Mr. Gallegos is stirring up trouble," said Robin Arkley Sr., a former timber mill owner who pledged $5,000 to launch the recall campaign. "He's threatening our way of life."
Arkley, 78, said he and other "good ole boys" are fed up with Gallegos and his kind. "It's us against them," he said. "We're going to take back the county from the ardent environmentalists, the college community and the hippies."
Lawyers for the timber company, Pacific Lumber Co., known here as "Palco," say the D.A.'s suit has no merit and have threatened to countersue if he doesn't drop it. Officials of the two state agencies responsible for overseeing logging practices also have questioned the merits of the suit.
Gallegos said he thought he was doing what he had been elected to do when he charged Pacific Lumber Co. in a civil action with deceiving the California Department of Forestry by failing to disclose that its timber-cutting plans could cause landslides.
Having concealed that information, Gallegos contended, Pacific Lumber was allowed to cut 100,000 giant redwoods, profiting handsomely at the expense of wildlife and downstream neighbors who have suffered from mud flows, flooding streams and other damaging effects of stripping redwoods off steep, unstable slopes.
In leveling such accusations, Gallegos has stepped into a long-running fight in this community and taken on a formidable adversary. Pacific Lumber has been engaged in a herculean struggle to log as it sees fit on its own land -- 211,000 acres that are home to the largest stands of ancient redwood trees that are not in parks or preserves.
Pacific Lumber's owner, Houston financier Charles Hurwitz, has made one major concession to anti-logging forces, and that was for a handsome price. In 1999, the state and federal governments paid Pacific Lumber $480 million to set aside a 7,500-acre Headwaters grove of ancient redwoods. Gallegos' lawsuit may turn on language in that deal that dictated how the company could log the rest of its land.
Gallegos, 41, a USC graduate, moved to Eureka nine years ago after he and his wife fell in love with the sparkling air and the beauty of Humboldt Bay, with its backdrop of towering trees.
The upbeat district attorney, whose youthful exuberance puts a bounce in his stride, is part of the latest wave of white-collar newcomers to arrive in what was once a county dominated by fishing and logging.
Humboldt County's economy today is driven by jobs in government, tourism and service industries. Even Pacific Lumber's payroll is down to 800 employees -- from a peak of 1,500 -- as it continues to lay off workers and shift logging work to outside contractors.
Gallegos practiced criminal defense law, took up surfing and coached T-ball and soccer in Eureka, where he lives with his wife and three young children. Then he decided to run for district attorney last year.
He insists that he hadn't fallen in with any faction in Humboldt County: the third-generation loggers, the Green Party and other left-leaning interests associated with Humboldt State University or the aging hippies who arrived during the 1970s' back-to-the-land movement and established deep roots as small-business owners or backwoods pot growers.
Gallegos opposed a recently stepped-up tree-sitting campaign, and he prosecutes trespassing activists who try to save old redwoods from Pacific Lumber's chainsaws by scampering up the massive trunks and locking themselves to the trees' boughs.
Gallegos refrains from calling himself an environmentalist, although he said he is concerned about the sustainability of "lifeboat Earth" and the "need to do everything in a sustainable fashion so our kids will have a place to live."
His campaign for district attorney focused on a fair and practical application of the law, and didn't bring up the environment -- although his campaign did receive some assistance from Green Party members. He upset 20-year incumbent D.A. Terry Farmer and won 52% of the vote.
Within days of taking office in January, say Gallegos and his top assistant, Timothy Stoen, they were presented information by a local landowner about Pacific Lumber that raised a suspicion of corporate malfeasance rather than violations of environmental law.
According to the D.A.'s lawsuit, Pacific Lumber submitted false data showing that intensive logging on steep slopes would not cause landslides and lobbied the director of the California Department of Forestry to allow more logging on unstable slopes. Under the terms of the Headwaters deal, logging that could cause such damage was prohibited.
The deception, the lawsuit said, helped Pacific Lumber step up the rate of harvest and earn an extra $40 million a year. Prosecutors seek $250 million in damages for the allegedly illegal harvesting of an estimated 100,000 trees on unstable slopes.
Jared Carter, Pacific Lumber's longtime attorney, said, "No effort was made to suppress" information. "There has been no harvesting on these unstable areas." The district attorney, Carter said, is being "misled" by a group of environmental activists on a crusade to halt Pacific Lumber from harvesting timber on its own land. "What do you expect us to do, other than take every action to defend ourselves?"
The D.A.'s defenders scoff at the idea that the lawsuit is merely a tool of tree-sitters or less radical activists bent on saving every last ancient redwood.
"We're not eco-environmental freaks," said Kristi Wrigley, a third-generation apple farmer. "We've never spoken out against logging. We're speaking up for clean water."
She seethes over the silt and mud flowing down the Elk River that has sullied her source of fresh water, flooded her farm five times this past winter and smothered the roots of what were once her most productive apple trees.
The district attorney, she said, is "right on the mark," but she fears "he will be strangled by politics, just as politics have strangled us. Money is going to win."
Pacific Lumber's detractors say the company has a history of reckless logging practices. Twice in the late 1980s, the state Department of Forestry suspended the firm's license to cut timber, citing more than 100 violations of the state Forestry Practices Act. Most were for careless logging operations during wet weather and a failure to control erosion.
For Gallegos, the first sign of a backlash came when he arrived at work one day last month and found the Humboldt County courthouse surrounded by logging trucks and a picket line of loggers carrying placards that read: "Recall the D.A."
It was later that day in mid-March that the county Board of Supervisors, in an auditorium full of rowdy loggers, rejected the district attorney's attempt to hire a lawyer from out of town to help prosecute the civil fraud case.
Supervisor Roger Rodoni, a cattle rancher who leases 2,000 acres of grazing land from Pacific Lumber, led the 4-1 majority against paying the expenses of Joseph W. Cotchett, a Burlingame attorney with a record of winning corporate fraud cases.
Since then, the district attorney has received a letter from another firm on Pacific Lumber's legal team, threatening to sue him and the county. He recently was served with legal papers saying Pacific Lumber would seek court-imposed sanctions to recover legal bills that, Carter said, have climbed quickly to more than $100,000.
To Cotchett, who still wants to join the prosecution, the scene is unfolding like a Jimmy Stewart movie in which a fresh-faced reformer confronts powerful vested interests.
"It's clear they are trying to intimidate him," said Cotchett, who believes the case has a lot of merit. "If those facts, as alleged, are true," he said, "then Pacific Lumber has a big problem."
But the company also has allies.
Recently, both the California Department of Forestry and the state Department of Fish and Game, in letters sent to the Humboldt County supervisors, have questioned the D.A.'s fundamental assertions.
Both agencies assert that the steep slopes most susceptible to landslides have been protected under other provisions of the Headwaters deal, and thus the incorrect information didn't put these areas in jeopardy.
Yet both of these agencies, which approved the Headwaters deal, acknowledge they are bound by a paragraph-long "mutual defense pact" tucked inside the voluminous document by Pacific Lumber's lawyers. It requires them to join with the firm to defend the Headwaters deal, including the company's timber harvesting plans, which have been targeted by other lawsuits from environmental and labor groups.
Blocked from hiring outside legal help, Humboldt's district attorney approached California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer for assistance in the prosecution. That help has yet to materialize.
Lockyer declined to comment, but aides pointed out a conflict he faces because of his duty to represent the two agencies -- Forestry and Fish and Game -- that have been taking issue with the case.
"We like to help local prosecutors, but we must take direction from our client agencies," said Tom Dresslar, spokesman for Lockyer. "It's not a very comfortable situation for anyone in this office."
Gallegos said he will not drop the lawsuit, even if it costs him his job.
He characterized the unfolding events as politics interfering with justice in a region that needs to shake its habit of subservience to timber interests.
"This is a test for this community," Gallegos said. "Some people think they should be exempt from the law because of how much money they have or how much they contribute to the community. I do not."
Times researcher Maloy Moore contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2003 Los Angeles Times
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
TAKING ON TIMBER
A Recall Drive is the Latest Development in The Case of the Humboldt County D.A. Suing Pacific Lumber
By Dennis Pfaff
Daily Journal Staff Writer, April 24, 2003
SAN FRANCISCO - Paul Gallegos knew he was taking a political risk by going after Humboldt County timber giant Pacific Lumber Co. just weeks after taking office as the county's top prosecutor.
"I would have had to have been blind, deaf and dumb not to know that it would be the end of any political career I might have," said Gallegos, against whom a recall attempt was poised to be launched today.
The veteran defense lawyer-turned-Humboldt County district attorney may be causing political discomfort outside his jurisdiction, as well. Both state Attorney General Bill Lockyer and the Gov. Gray Davis could find themselves drawn into the suit Gallegos filed in February against Pacific Lumber.
He's seeking as much as a quarter-billion dollars in civil penalties from the timber giant for allegedly hiding information in connection with the 1999 Headwaters agreement.
Under that deal, Pacific Lumber agreed to cede thousands of acres of old-growth forests to government control in exchange for regulatory certainty in operating on its remaining acreage.
Gallegos' civil fraud case is among a trio of parallel courtroom dramas. Just completed last month was a trial of a lawsuit brought by environmentalists alleging state officials didn't do their jobs properly in scrutinizing the plans that govern Pacific Lumber's logging practices under the Headwaters deal.
Coming up May 12 in Eureka is the retrial of a federal police-brutality complaint against sheriff's deputies who pepper-sprayed activists protesting the company's practices.
Coincidentally, the next day in the same city, a key hearing in the Gallegos lawsuit is scheduled in Humboldt County Superior Court.
The community, according to various accounts, is roiling.
"When it comes to timber and environmental activists, Eureka is the center of a war zone," attorneys for the pepper-sprayed protesters said recently, in arguing against holding the trial there.
While some county residents see Gallegos as a troublemaker, others point to Pacific Lumber, which since its takeover by a Texas conglomerate in the mid-1980s has been at the center of near-constant controversy.
"These guys have distorted almost every aspect of life up here - the political, the environmental, the social and the judicial," said Eureka attorney William Bertain, who has represented property owners and pensioners in cases against Pacific Lumber.
Gallegos' lawsuit, brought under Business and Professions Code Section 17200, says Pacific Lumber secured state approvals to log under the Headwaters deal by submitting an environmental report containing false information regarding the potential hazards, such as erosion from its hillside operations.
Logging on unstable slopes "resulted in major landslides causing destruction to ancient redwoods, serious harm to Humboldt Bay and serious harm to streams, bridges, roads, homes and property rights of the people of Humboldt County," the complaint alleges.
Although Pacific Lumber eventually came forward with corrected information, according to the lawsuit, that data was delivered only to a local representative of the California Department of Forestry, and not until just before the Headwaters deal was finalized. Gallegos said that prevented the information from being included in the decision-making process.
Pacific Lumber officials have denied any wrongdoing, saying Gallegos' lawsuit rests heavily on the findings of a government researcher whose work lacks "scientific credibility."
Gallegos has requested a court order to stop the company from logging in some areas, including those potentially unstable hillsides. He also seeks $2,500 for each tree harvested illegally. By some estimates, that could reap $250 million in penalties, although any actual recovery likely would be far lower.
Gallegos' own demeanor in pursuing the litigation suggests a combination of defiance and optimism, notwithstanding the recall effort funded by a retired timber executive, a serious slap-down by the county's board of supervisors and a legal counter-attack by Pacific Lumber that threatens Gallegos and the county itself with sanctions.
"If I put that ahead of doing my duty then I couldn't do this job," Gallegos said. He is fond of saying that the prosecutor's position is "a job to do, not a job to have."
State Could Co-defend Case
His job, assuming Gallegos keeps it, could get even tougher if agents of Lockyer and Davis choose - or are forced - to become involved on the company's behalf.
That could happen as a result of a 1996 agreement that paved the way for the eventual Headwaters deal. Pacific Lumber and the state and federal governments pledged to "preserve diligently" the Headwaters agreement against any "third party challenge."
Stanley Young, a spokesman for the California Resources Agency, the chief environmental arm of the Davis administration, said the 1996 agreement allows Pacific Lumber to demand legal help from the state. He said the joint-defense pact could be triggered because Gallegos' lawsuit is an attack on the environmental documents "underpinning the [Headwaters] agreement."
Young said the company has not yet asked for help under the agreement. But some agency officials, including an attorney for the Department of Fish and Game, have formally expressed reservations about the Gallegos lawsuit.
The situation is forcing Lockyer, who represents those state agencies in litigation and who also has crafted a pro-environmental image, to do a delicate balancing act.
The attorney general has decided against providing any help to Gallegos, according to a spokesman. At the same time, Lockyer's office puts the onus for calling the shots squarely on the Davis administration.
"Our office has made it very clear to the Humboldt County district attorney that we have a clear, ethical duty to represent our clients, and that doesn't leave us any wiggle room to join or assist the DA in the lawsuit against Pacific Lumber," Lockyer spokesman Tom Dresslar said Wednesday.
He said the state agencies involved believe in the adequacy of the environmental report at issue in Gallegos' lawsuit.
"Misrepresentations, even if they did occur, wouldn't have affected the adequacy of the EIR, and the decision wouldn't have changed," Dresslar said.
The district attorney said he doesn't need Lockyer's help, but insists Lockyer has no business defending Pacific Lumber.
"I would certainly be surprised if the attorney general's office finds itself in the position of defending fraudulent conduct ... [and] interpreting the agreement they signed as requiring them to defend lying to the government," Gallegos said.
Dresslar insisted the attorney general never would "defend anybody who lied to the state."
"We're not defending [Pacific Lumber]," Dresslar said. "We're defending client agencies and the adequacy of the EIR."
Pacific Lumber, in an April 1 demurrer motion, asked a Humboldt County judge to dismiss Gallegos' lawsuit partly on grounds that the state and federal governments were "indispensable" to the case, yet had not been named as defendants.
The company speculated Gallegos left them out because government agencies cannot be sued under Section 17200.
"There are numerous cases involving challenges to agency decisions, just like this one, where courts have dismissed the action because an indispensable party was not or could not be joined," the company said in its motion.
Pacific Lumber raised several other grounds for throwing the case out, including a sweeping right to communicate with the government.
"Plaintiff alleges Pacific Lumber engaged in wrongful conduct by providing the government misleading information as to the effects of its timber operations and by promoting its objectives in the Headwaters agreement," the company's attorneys wrote. "Such conduct is protected under the First Amendment and the Noerr-Pennington Doctrine and cannot serve as a basis for liability" under the Business and Professions Code.
The Noerr-Pennington doctrine, the brief said, gives immunity to those trying to influence the government.
"Their position is, they are allowed to lie," said Gallegos. "That's an interesting position to take."
"The privilege goes pretty far," said Pacific Lumber attorney Edgar Washburn. He asserted, in fact, that it would apply even if the company lied - which he insisted it did not.
Washburn, of San Francisco's Stoel Rives, said if the relevant state agencies could be drawn into the case, "the AG would come in to defend them."
In a letter to Gallegos dated March 20, Washburn pointedly noted that Lockyer's aides already have defended the Headwaters agreement in court in response to litigation brought by environmentalists.
In that case, environmental groups objected to state agencies' approval of the company's long-term logging plans under the Headwaters deal. They claim state officials dramatically boosted the amount of timber the company could cut and illegally gave Pacific Lumber assurances about what it would have to do to comply with environmental laws. [Environmental Protection Information Center v. California Department of Forestry, CV990445.]
That case was tried in March before retired Lake County Superior Court Judge John Golden, sitting by assignment. Golden, who has asked for additional briefing on some aspects of the dispute, may not rule on the logging plans for months.
In the letter, Washburn demanded of Gallegos, "How can you claim to be representing the people of the state of California making claims directly contrary to those denied and defended by the attorney general" and other state agencies.
Jim Branham, a Pacific Lumber spokesman, said the company has kept both the attorney general's office and state environmental agencies informed about the fraud case.
He said the company has not asked for any specific action, such as invoking the defense agreement, but added, "We are concerned that the county, as an agency of the state, be aware of the state's commitments."
'We are going to be aggressive'
Washburn had threatened to seek sanctions against the district attorney and the county if Gallegos proceeded with the suit. Pacific Lumber made good on that threat, filing a sanctions motion that is scheduled to be heard along with the demurrer May 13.
Aggressive defense tactics are not unusual for the company. In the past, it has sought large sanctions from plaintiffs who lost environmental cases against it, once unsuccessfully attempting to assess $670,000 against one organization.
Washburn made no apologies for the company's hard-nosed approach in the current case.
"We made a concerted effort to get [Gallegos] to dismiss the case before we got into heavy-duty litigation," Washburn said. "We are going to be aggressive in defending it."
State fish and game officials wrote a letter March 10 to Assistant Humboldt County District Attorney Tim Stoen, who is spearheading the litigation, expressing concern about the case. The letter cited "errors in fact" in the county's complaint and denied that the information provided by Pacific Lumber resulted in permission for the company to cut trees in unstable areas.
Stoen said he felt ambushed by the letter, which was dated the day before the county supervisors met to consider hiring prominent Burlingame litigator Joseph Cotchett to assist Gallegos in the case.
Young said the state Resources Agency was merely being responsive.
"The D.A. asked [state officials] to put their concerns in writing. They did. That's it," he said.
According to local press reports, county supervisors cited the letter in voting not to hire Cotchett.
On the day the proposal for outside counsel was heard, timber workers ringed the county building with log trucks, and supporters and opponents of Gallegos jammed the meeting.
Cotchett, of Cotchett, Pitre, Simon & McCarthy, had offered to take the case on contingency, asking for 14.5 percent of any money collected from the company plus minimal expenses.
Stoen estimated the arrangement would cost the county no more than $9,000, an amount he called a "pittance" for the involvement of such a high-powered firm.
But the supervisors voted 4-1 against the deal. The majority included the wife of the former district attorney Gallegos defeated and a man who leases land from Pacific Lumber.
"There was no way we were going to let that happen, given the questionable circumstances surrounding the lawsuit," Supervisor Roger Rodoni, who opposed the request, told reporters after the hearing. Although Rodoni rents land from Pacific Lumber, he said the state Fair Political Practices Commission had given him the green light to vote on the matter, according to press accounts of the hearing.
Stoen said that the rejection of "a free attorney" left the county with its own, limited resources to pursue the case. Cotchett, for example, would have traveled to Houston to depose Charles Hurwitz, who heads Pacific Lumber's parent company - a trip the county cannot afford.
Stoen insists the setback won't stop the county's litigation, but he acknowledged it will hurt.
"It prevents us from expanding the pool of truth," he said.
Cotchett, meanwhile, is still spoiling to get in the case. He said environmental groups have contacted him about filing a companion lawsuit on their behalf. That would get him into the proceedings - and enable him to consult with Gallegos - even if he's not retained by the county.
"The legal issue is whether those groups have standing to come in and file an action on behalf of the people," Cotchett said.
Recall campaign
Gallegos took office in January after upsetting 20-year veteran District Attorney Terry Farmer, who lost despite Lockyer's endorsement. Now, Gallegos' major problem may be whether he can retain his job for the four-year term.
Retired timber executive Robin Arkley Sr. has openly solicited support for a recall campaign, salting the effort with $5,000 of his own money. His beef with Gallegos is the lawsuit.
"It would simply put the largest private employer in our area out of business," Arkley said of the 17200 lawsuit. Pacific Lumber, he said, is innocent of any wrongdoing.
Organizers said they planned to deliver a 200-word official notice to Gallegos this morning, formally launching the recall. Gallegos will have a week to prepare an argument in his own defense. County officials then will prepare a petition for a recall election, and organizers can begin collecting signatures.
Arkley, who said he is working with an unnamed partner to recall Gallegos, suggested money is no object.
"I keep pungling up money, me and another guy, all the time," said Arkley, a self-described "good old boy."
Directing the recall is Rick Brazeau, the Arcata political consultant who helped run Farmer's unsuccessful campaign, Arkley said. Providing legal advice to the effort is Eureka attorney Tom Herman, a former Pacific Lumber vice president.
Branham said Pacific Lumber is not currently involved in the recall effort. "I don't want to speculate on what may happen in the future," he said.
Stoen has little doubt the company wants Gallegos out of office.
"Pacific Lumber knows the only way they are going to get me off the case is to get rid of my boss," he said.
Stoen has also had a spotlight focused on his past.
For example, local news stories routinely mention Stoen's work decades ago as a legal adviser to Jim Jones. Stoen broke with the cult leader prior to the horrific Jonestown mass suicide, which claimed the life of Stoen's young son, whom Stoen had tried to free from Jones' clutches.
Stoen said that while he has never concealed the association, he wishes critics would point out that "I was the one [Jones] blamed for his downfall."
In later life, Stoen's politics have shifted, as well. Far from the young man who was drawn to Jones' utopian socialist ideals, Stoen ran unsuccessfully last year as a Republican for the state Assembly (he carried Humboldt County).
For his part, Gallegos rejects accusations that his litigation is endangering the county's economy.
"If they are found out to have violated the law and people lose their jobs because of it, it's Pacific Lumber that didn't care about their employees, not me," Gallegos said. "No one would ever say I should let all sorts of poor people get away with fraud."
Copyright © 2003 Daily Journal
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
back to corporations | rat haus | Index | Search | tree
While he has dedicated his office to the pursuit of this case - the tilting at windmills - the "gallant" Gallegos has presdied over the complete decimation of his office, lost almost every single experienced prosecutor Humboldt County had, been unable to refill those positions, has lost many key grants that fund important programs that serve the people, the victims of real crimes in Humboldt County. The Humboldt County Grand Jury has issued a scathing report outlining his failure to do his job, there have been incidents of plagiarism on the part of Paul Gallegos (in fact you may want to google key phrases from his "My Word's"), there have been allegations of bribes and payoffs for having sentences reduced (he disputes that of course), if you have come onto this blog looking for answers, I hope the articles collected here help you. the new Blogger "LABEL" feature makes cross referencing easy, too.
You will find many many articles across the web about the "gallant: Gallegos and his fight against the Goliath Maxxam - this is the real story, not the PR orchestrated hype that you are used to seeing.
Salzman and Paul's handlers live and die online, and that is where they solicit money and support. The following is an example of Michael Shellenberger's favorite new tool, viral email:
***
back to corporations | rat haus | Index | Search | tree
( PDF | ASCII text formats )
From: Paul Cienfuegos
Date: Friday, May 02, 2003 12:28 PM
Subject: Humboldt County (California) urgently needs your help
Dear friends across the United States, from the people of Humboldt County struggling against Maxxam Corporation,
As many of you probably already know, we have a world-famous case here of corporate fraud and environmental destruction caused by Maxxam Corporation, which is headquartered in Texas (CEO: Charles Hurwitz) and is chartered in Delaware. In November of 2000, in an upset election that toppled the good-old-boy power structure here, a dissident District Attorney was elected by the people of our county to replace a D.A. who had been looking the other way for years as Maxxam Corp violated the law literally hundreds of times. Just weeks after taking office, Paul Gallegos stunned everyone by filing a major fraud lawsuit against the corporation. That event set off a firestorm across California's north coast. And because Maxxam still runs the county politically, its allies have responded by quickly organizing a recall campaign to oust our new D.A. as quickly as possible before he shakes things up too badly.
The reason that I'm writing to all of you is that we urgently need your help here to defend our new D.A. from the recall campaign while simultaneously supporting his bold move to sue Maxxam for fraud.
Below, you will find a brief note from Richard Salzman who is coordinating the local campaign to support the D.A. and his historic lawsuit. Justice will not be served in this county unless we can raise substantial amounts of money to at least try to match what the corporation's supporters are already raising in their already vicious media campaign against Gallegos. Thus I am asking you to consider making a generous donation toward this cause.
Also below, you'll be able to read an Op-Ed written by our D.A. in our local daily last week, followed by two major articles about the issue from the Los Angeles Times and the Daily Journal.
Please respond not to me, but to Richard Salzman.
Thanks in advance,
Paul Cienfuegos
Arcata, CA
Co-director, Democracy Unlimited of Humboldt County
A note from Richard Salzman to our supporters across the nation
Last year the residents of Humboldt county, on California's redwood coast, elected Paul Gallegos, a man of the people, not beholden to any special interest as District Attorney in an upset victory against the incumbent DA of 20 years, best known for his authorization of the use of pepper spray as a pain compliance technique on non-violent protesters. Eight weeks after taking office and one day before the four year statue of limitations ran out, he filed a lawsuit alleging fraud against Maxxam corporation's wholly owned subsidiary Pacific Lumber. Pacific Lumber's apologists have now launched a recall of the district attorney in hopes of removing him from office in order to avoid answering these charges in a court of law.
This is clearly a David and Goliath story when viewed from the national stage. A community faced with having exercised true democracy now being subverted in the most overt manner by an out-of-state corporation using all the worst tactics of instilling fear in their workers and promoting hate-mongering against any who dare oppose them. We will need the support of concerned citizens from throughout the country if we are to keep Maxxam from buying this election. We have invested all we have on producing a series of nine commercials which we are now putting into rotation.
In order to buy the air time to run the whole series, we will need to raise some $30,000 (what their campaign had already raised by the time they served Paul the notice of recall) over the next few weeks/months. In addition to financial support we are asking voters around the country to write to their representatives as well as to ours, urging their support of our beleaguered DA. We need elected officials nationwide to speak up in outrage over this attempt to circumvent justice and buy an election. This story has been covered in both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times as well as the San Francisco Chronicle and papers in DC and elsewhere. We encourage people to speak out wherever they live in opposition to this attempt to circumvent justice.
Yours in solidarity,
Thanks for your support.
Richard Salzman - coordinator
Alliance for Ethical Business
po box 387
Eureka Ca 95502
707.845.3700
aeb@inreach.com
"The Alliance for Ethical Business is a citizens group working to ensure that corporate fraud and illegal business practices are prosecuted in a court of law."
MY WORD
All people are equal under the law
by Paul Gallegos
27 April 2003
Eureka Times-Standard
To the people of Humboldt County:
One of the primary goals of our society is to realize the unfulfilled promise that all people are equal before the law. I was elected district attorney by the people of Humboldt County because they share my commitment to fulfilling this promise.
Shortly after taking office we became aware that Pacific Lumber Co. may have engaged in fraudulent conduct. We had a duty to investigate the matter and did. As a result of that investigation and the evidence we uncovered, we filed a lawsuit against them.
Because it is a matter which will be resolved in court, I do not wish to discuss the details of it here. Nor will I engage in a discussion about the possible outcomes. As with all court cases, the pleadings which have been filed are public records and are available for public inspection. For convenience we have placed a copy of the complaint and other documents of public interest at our web page at http://www.co.humboldt.ca.us/distatty/.
However, I would like to explain what this case is not about. It is not about whether Pacific Lumber Co. is being properly regulated by the government. Nor is it about forestry and water laws. It is not an attempt to put any company out of business or to end logging. Clearly the wealth of our county is tied to the wealth of our people. Rather, it is about fraud and, ultimately, whether our laws apply to all or just some of us.
It has been suggested that we should not have filed this case against the biggest business in Humboldt County. This suggestion is troubling and perplexing, as it implies that we either do or should have different rules for people based on their wealth or political power. Clearly, this cannot be.
Nobody is above the law. This fundamental principle was at the heart of the American Revolution more than 200 years ago. As American citizens, we are not bound by race or religion but by the beliefs enshrined in our Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. I know we all share these beliefs and a commitment to their fulfillment. I also know that it is our individual conduct that gives meaning to these beliefs and that they will only be realized by our commitment to fulfilling them.
Some people say that our suit against Pacific Lumber defined me. My response is that it has not defined me, it is defining US. We are all in this together. It is a painful process. But we will come through it together and be better for it because all people will know that in Humboldt County all people are equal under the law and no one, not even the most rich or most powerful, gets preferential treatment.
As your DA, I know where I stand. It is where I have always stood: for equal treatment before the law. As readers of this paper know, I wasn't the candidate predicted to win the election. I didn't have nearly as much money as my opponent. I wasn't well-connected. I had never before run for public office. However, I won because the people of Humboldt County elected me. They elected me for the very change that some seek to prevent.
I am honored and privileged to have the responsibility of serving the people of Humboldt County. I am honored and privileged to have the opportunity to work with the people at this office, who work tirelessly to serve this community. I know that I can comfortably speak for all of them when I say that we feel fortunate to have the opportunity to work for you.
Thank you.
Paul Gallegos was elected district attorney in March 2002 and took office in January. He lives in Eureka.
Copyright © 2003 Eureka Times-Standard
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
D.A. in Hot Water After Taking on Logger
by Kenneth R. Weiss
Los Angelese Time Staff Writer, April 27, 2003
EUREKA, Calif. -- Barely three months in office, Dist. Atty. Paul V. Gallegos faces a recall campaign, threats of lawsuits and court sanctions -- all after he brought civil fraud charges against a powerful timber company that has become a symbol of a beleaguered way of life.
An emigre from Southern California, Gallegos is a political neophyte in a north coast county that, since the mid-1980s, has been a battleground over logging practices that imperil some of California's last giant redwoods.
Although he doesn't view himself as an environmentalist and was elected last year with broad support, he now finds himself undercut by a local establishment that links him to the anti-logging counterculture.
"Mr. Gallegos is stirring up trouble," said Robin Arkley Sr., a former timber mill owner who pledged $5,000 to launch the recall campaign. "He's threatening our way of life."
Arkley, 78, said he and other "good ole boys" are fed up with Gallegos and his kind. "It's us against them," he said. "We're going to take back the county from the ardent environmentalists, the college community and the hippies."
Lawyers for the timber company, Pacific Lumber Co., known here as "Palco," say the D.A.'s suit has no merit and have threatened to countersue if he doesn't drop it. Officials of the two state agencies responsible for overseeing logging practices also have questioned the merits of the suit.
Gallegos said he thought he was doing what he had been elected to do when he charged Pacific Lumber Co. in a civil action with deceiving the California Department of Forestry by failing to disclose that its timber-cutting plans could cause landslides.
Having concealed that information, Gallegos contended, Pacific Lumber was allowed to cut 100,000 giant redwoods, profiting handsomely at the expense of wildlife and downstream neighbors who have suffered from mud flows, flooding streams and other damaging effects of stripping redwoods off steep, unstable slopes.
In leveling such accusations, Gallegos has stepped into a long-running fight in this community and taken on a formidable adversary. Pacific Lumber has been engaged in a herculean struggle to log as it sees fit on its own land -- 211,000 acres that are home to the largest stands of ancient redwood trees that are not in parks or preserves.
Pacific Lumber's owner, Houston financier Charles Hurwitz, has made one major concession to anti-logging forces, and that was for a handsome price. In 1999, the state and federal governments paid Pacific Lumber $480 million to set aside a 7,500-acre Headwaters grove of ancient redwoods. Gallegos' lawsuit may turn on language in that deal that dictated how the company could log the rest of its land.
Gallegos, 41, a USC graduate, moved to Eureka nine years ago after he and his wife fell in love with the sparkling air and the beauty of Humboldt Bay, with its backdrop of towering trees.
The upbeat district attorney, whose youthful exuberance puts a bounce in his stride, is part of the latest wave of white-collar newcomers to arrive in what was once a county dominated by fishing and logging.
Humboldt County's economy today is driven by jobs in government, tourism and service industries. Even Pacific Lumber's payroll is down to 800 employees -- from a peak of 1,500 -- as it continues to lay off workers and shift logging work to outside contractors.
Gallegos practiced criminal defense law, took up surfing and coached T-ball and soccer in Eureka, where he lives with his wife and three young children. Then he decided to run for district attorney last year.
He insists that he hadn't fallen in with any faction in Humboldt County: the third-generation loggers, the Green Party and other left-leaning interests associated with Humboldt State University or the aging hippies who arrived during the 1970s' back-to-the-land movement and established deep roots as small-business owners or backwoods pot growers.
Gallegos opposed a recently stepped-up tree-sitting campaign, and he prosecutes trespassing activists who try to save old redwoods from Pacific Lumber's chainsaws by scampering up the massive trunks and locking themselves to the trees' boughs.
Gallegos refrains from calling himself an environmentalist, although he said he is concerned about the sustainability of "lifeboat Earth" and the "need to do everything in a sustainable fashion so our kids will have a place to live."
His campaign for district attorney focused on a fair and practical application of the law, and didn't bring up the environment -- although his campaign did receive some assistance from Green Party members. He upset 20-year incumbent D.A. Terry Farmer and won 52% of the vote.
Within days of taking office in January, say Gallegos and his top assistant, Timothy Stoen, they were presented information by a local landowner about Pacific Lumber that raised a suspicion of corporate malfeasance rather than violations of environmental law.
According to the D.A.'s lawsuit, Pacific Lumber submitted false data showing that intensive logging on steep slopes would not cause landslides and lobbied the director of the California Department of Forestry to allow more logging on unstable slopes. Under the terms of the Headwaters deal, logging that could cause such damage was prohibited.
The deception, the lawsuit said, helped Pacific Lumber step up the rate of harvest and earn an extra $40 million a year. Prosecutors seek $250 million in damages for the allegedly illegal harvesting of an estimated 100,000 trees on unstable slopes.
Jared Carter, Pacific Lumber's longtime attorney, said, "No effort was made to suppress" information. "There has been no harvesting on these unstable areas." The district attorney, Carter said, is being "misled" by a group of environmental activists on a crusade to halt Pacific Lumber from harvesting timber on its own land. "What do you expect us to do, other than take every action to defend ourselves?"
The D.A.'s defenders scoff at the idea that the lawsuit is merely a tool of tree-sitters or less radical activists bent on saving every last ancient redwood.
"We're not eco-environmental freaks," said Kristi Wrigley, a third-generation apple farmer. "We've never spoken out against logging. We're speaking up for clean water."
She seethes over the silt and mud flowing down the Elk River that has sullied her source of fresh water, flooded her farm five times this past winter and smothered the roots of what were once her most productive apple trees.
The district attorney, she said, is "right on the mark," but she fears "he will be strangled by politics, just as politics have strangled us. Money is going to win."
Pacific Lumber's detractors say the company has a history of reckless logging practices. Twice in the late 1980s, the state Department of Forestry suspended the firm's license to cut timber, citing more than 100 violations of the state Forestry Practices Act. Most were for careless logging operations during wet weather and a failure to control erosion.
For Gallegos, the first sign of a backlash came when he arrived at work one day last month and found the Humboldt County courthouse surrounded by logging trucks and a picket line of loggers carrying placards that read: "Recall the D.A."
It was later that day in mid-March that the county Board of Supervisors, in an auditorium full of rowdy loggers, rejected the district attorney's attempt to hire a lawyer from out of town to help prosecute the civil fraud case.
Supervisor Roger Rodoni, a cattle rancher who leases 2,000 acres of grazing land from Pacific Lumber, led the 4-1 majority against paying the expenses of Joseph W. Cotchett, a Burlingame attorney with a record of winning corporate fraud cases.
Since then, the district attorney has received a letter from another firm on Pacific Lumber's legal team, threatening to sue him and the county. He recently was served with legal papers saying Pacific Lumber would seek court-imposed sanctions to recover legal bills that, Carter said, have climbed quickly to more than $100,000.
To Cotchett, who still wants to join the prosecution, the scene is unfolding like a Jimmy Stewart movie in which a fresh-faced reformer confronts powerful vested interests.
"It's clear they are trying to intimidate him," said Cotchett, who believes the case has a lot of merit. "If those facts, as alleged, are true," he said, "then Pacific Lumber has a big problem."
But the company also has allies.
Recently, both the California Department of Forestry and the state Department of Fish and Game, in letters sent to the Humboldt County supervisors, have questioned the D.A.'s fundamental assertions.
Both agencies assert that the steep slopes most susceptible to landslides have been protected under other provisions of the Headwaters deal, and thus the incorrect information didn't put these areas in jeopardy.
Yet both of these agencies, which approved the Headwaters deal, acknowledge they are bound by a paragraph-long "mutual defense pact" tucked inside the voluminous document by Pacific Lumber's lawyers. It requires them to join with the firm to defend the Headwaters deal, including the company's timber harvesting plans, which have been targeted by other lawsuits from environmental and labor groups.
Blocked from hiring outside legal help, Humboldt's district attorney approached California Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer for assistance in the prosecution. That help has yet to materialize.
Lockyer declined to comment, but aides pointed out a conflict he faces because of his duty to represent the two agencies -- Forestry and Fish and Game -- that have been taking issue with the case.
"We like to help local prosecutors, but we must take direction from our client agencies," said Tom Dresslar, spokesman for Lockyer. "It's not a very comfortable situation for anyone in this office."
Gallegos said he will not drop the lawsuit, even if it costs him his job.
He characterized the unfolding events as politics interfering with justice in a region that needs to shake its habit of subservience to timber interests.
"This is a test for this community," Gallegos said. "Some people think they should be exempt from the law because of how much money they have or how much they contribute to the community. I do not."
Times researcher Maloy Moore contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2003 Los Angeles Times
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
TAKING ON TIMBER
A Recall Drive is the Latest Development in The Case of the Humboldt County D.A. Suing Pacific Lumber
By Dennis Pfaff
Daily Journal Staff Writer, April 24, 2003
SAN FRANCISCO - Paul Gallegos knew he was taking a political risk by going after Humboldt County timber giant Pacific Lumber Co. just weeks after taking office as the county's top prosecutor.
"I would have had to have been blind, deaf and dumb not to know that it would be the end of any political career I might have," said Gallegos, against whom a recall attempt was poised to be launched today.
The veteran defense lawyer-turned-Humboldt County district attorney may be causing political discomfort outside his jurisdiction, as well. Both state Attorney General Bill Lockyer and the Gov. Gray Davis could find themselves drawn into the suit Gallegos filed in February against Pacific Lumber.
He's seeking as much as a quarter-billion dollars in civil penalties from the timber giant for allegedly hiding information in connection with the 1999 Headwaters agreement.
Under that deal, Pacific Lumber agreed to cede thousands of acres of old-growth forests to government control in exchange for regulatory certainty in operating on its remaining acreage.
Gallegos' civil fraud case is among a trio of parallel courtroom dramas. Just completed last month was a trial of a lawsuit brought by environmentalists alleging state officials didn't do their jobs properly in scrutinizing the plans that govern Pacific Lumber's logging practices under the Headwaters deal.
Coming up May 12 in Eureka is the retrial of a federal police-brutality complaint against sheriff's deputies who pepper-sprayed activists protesting the company's practices.
Coincidentally, the next day in the same city, a key hearing in the Gallegos lawsuit is scheduled in Humboldt County Superior Court.
The community, according to various accounts, is roiling.
"When it comes to timber and environmental activists, Eureka is the center of a war zone," attorneys for the pepper-sprayed protesters said recently, in arguing against holding the trial there.
While some county residents see Gallegos as a troublemaker, others point to Pacific Lumber, which since its takeover by a Texas conglomerate in the mid-1980s has been at the center of near-constant controversy.
"These guys have distorted almost every aspect of life up here - the political, the environmental, the social and the judicial," said Eureka attorney William Bertain, who has represented property owners and pensioners in cases against Pacific Lumber.
Gallegos' lawsuit, brought under Business and Professions Code Section 17200, says Pacific Lumber secured state approvals to log under the Headwaters deal by submitting an environmental report containing false information regarding the potential hazards, such as erosion from its hillside operations.
Logging on unstable slopes "resulted in major landslides causing destruction to ancient redwoods, serious harm to Humboldt Bay and serious harm to streams, bridges, roads, homes and property rights of the people of Humboldt County," the complaint alleges.
Although Pacific Lumber eventually came forward with corrected information, according to the lawsuit, that data was delivered only to a local representative of the California Department of Forestry, and not until just before the Headwaters deal was finalized. Gallegos said that prevented the information from being included in the decision-making process.
Pacific Lumber officials have denied any wrongdoing, saying Gallegos' lawsuit rests heavily on the findings of a government researcher whose work lacks "scientific credibility."
Gallegos has requested a court order to stop the company from logging in some areas, including those potentially unstable hillsides. He also seeks $2,500 for each tree harvested illegally. By some estimates, that could reap $250 million in penalties, although any actual recovery likely would be far lower.
Gallegos' own demeanor in pursuing the litigation suggests a combination of defiance and optimism, notwithstanding the recall effort funded by a retired timber executive, a serious slap-down by the county's board of supervisors and a legal counter-attack by Pacific Lumber that threatens Gallegos and the county itself with sanctions.
"If I put that ahead of doing my duty then I couldn't do this job," Gallegos said. He is fond of saying that the prosecutor's position is "a job to do, not a job to have."
State Could Co-defend Case
His job, assuming Gallegos keeps it, could get even tougher if agents of Lockyer and Davis choose - or are forced - to become involved on the company's behalf.
That could happen as a result of a 1996 agreement that paved the way for the eventual Headwaters deal. Pacific Lumber and the state and federal governments pledged to "preserve diligently" the Headwaters agreement against any "third party challenge."
Stanley Young, a spokesman for the California Resources Agency, the chief environmental arm of the Davis administration, said the 1996 agreement allows Pacific Lumber to demand legal help from the state. He said the joint-defense pact could be triggered because Gallegos' lawsuit is an attack on the environmental documents "underpinning the [Headwaters] agreement."
Young said the company has not yet asked for help under the agreement. But some agency officials, including an attorney for the Department of Fish and Game, have formally expressed reservations about the Gallegos lawsuit.
The situation is forcing Lockyer, who represents those state agencies in litigation and who also has crafted a pro-environmental image, to do a delicate balancing act.
The attorney general has decided against providing any help to Gallegos, according to a spokesman. At the same time, Lockyer's office puts the onus for calling the shots squarely on the Davis administration.
"Our office has made it very clear to the Humboldt County district attorney that we have a clear, ethical duty to represent our clients, and that doesn't leave us any wiggle room to join or assist the DA in the lawsuit against Pacific Lumber," Lockyer spokesman Tom Dresslar said Wednesday.
He said the state agencies involved believe in the adequacy of the environmental report at issue in Gallegos' lawsuit.
"Misrepresentations, even if they did occur, wouldn't have affected the adequacy of the EIR, and the decision wouldn't have changed," Dresslar said.
The district attorney said he doesn't need Lockyer's help, but insists Lockyer has no business defending Pacific Lumber.
"I would certainly be surprised if the attorney general's office finds itself in the position of defending fraudulent conduct ... [and] interpreting the agreement they signed as requiring them to defend lying to the government," Gallegos said.
Dresslar insisted the attorney general never would "defend anybody who lied to the state."
"We're not defending [Pacific Lumber]," Dresslar said. "We're defending client agencies and the adequacy of the EIR."
Pacific Lumber, in an April 1 demurrer motion, asked a Humboldt County judge to dismiss Gallegos' lawsuit partly on grounds that the state and federal governments were "indispensable" to the case, yet had not been named as defendants.
The company speculated Gallegos left them out because government agencies cannot be sued under Section 17200.
"There are numerous cases involving challenges to agency decisions, just like this one, where courts have dismissed the action because an indispensable party was not or could not be joined," the company said in its motion.
Pacific Lumber raised several other grounds for throwing the case out, including a sweeping right to communicate with the government.
"Plaintiff alleges Pacific Lumber engaged in wrongful conduct by providing the government misleading information as to the effects of its timber operations and by promoting its objectives in the Headwaters agreement," the company's attorneys wrote. "Such conduct is protected under the First Amendment and the Noerr-Pennington Doctrine and cannot serve as a basis for liability" under the Business and Professions Code.
The Noerr-Pennington doctrine, the brief said, gives immunity to those trying to influence the government.
"Their position is, they are allowed to lie," said Gallegos. "That's an interesting position to take."
"The privilege goes pretty far," said Pacific Lumber attorney Edgar Washburn. He asserted, in fact, that it would apply even if the company lied - which he insisted it did not.
Washburn, of San Francisco's Stoel Rives, said if the relevant state agencies could be drawn into the case, "the AG would come in to defend them."
In a letter to Gallegos dated March 20, Washburn pointedly noted that Lockyer's aides already have defended the Headwaters agreement in court in response to litigation brought by environmentalists.
In that case, environmental groups objected to state agencies' approval of the company's long-term logging plans under the Headwaters deal. They claim state officials dramatically boosted the amount of timber the company could cut and illegally gave Pacific Lumber assurances about what it would have to do to comply with environmental laws. [Environmental Protection Information Center v. California Department of Forestry, CV990445.]
That case was tried in March before retired Lake County Superior Court Judge John Golden, sitting by assignment. Golden, who has asked for additional briefing on some aspects of the dispute, may not rule on the logging plans for months.
In the letter, Washburn demanded of Gallegos, "How can you claim to be representing the people of the state of California making claims directly contrary to those denied and defended by the attorney general" and other state agencies.
Jim Branham, a Pacific Lumber spokesman, said the company has kept both the attorney general's office and state environmental agencies informed about the fraud case.
He said the company has not asked for any specific action, such as invoking the defense agreement, but added, "We are concerned that the county, as an agency of the state, be aware of the state's commitments."
'We are going to be aggressive'
Washburn had threatened to seek sanctions against the district attorney and the county if Gallegos proceeded with the suit. Pacific Lumber made good on that threat, filing a sanctions motion that is scheduled to be heard along with the demurrer May 13.
Aggressive defense tactics are not unusual for the company. In the past, it has sought large sanctions from plaintiffs who lost environmental cases against it, once unsuccessfully attempting to assess $670,000 against one organization.
Washburn made no apologies for the company's hard-nosed approach in the current case.
"We made a concerted effort to get [Gallegos] to dismiss the case before we got into heavy-duty litigation," Washburn said. "We are going to be aggressive in defending it."
State fish and game officials wrote a letter March 10 to Assistant Humboldt County District Attorney Tim Stoen, who is spearheading the litigation, expressing concern about the case. The letter cited "errors in fact" in the county's complaint and denied that the information provided by Pacific Lumber resulted in permission for the company to cut trees in unstable areas.
Stoen said he felt ambushed by the letter, which was dated the day before the county supervisors met to consider hiring prominent Burlingame litigator Joseph Cotchett to assist Gallegos in the case.
Young said the state Resources Agency was merely being responsive.
"The D.A. asked [state officials] to put their concerns in writing. They did. That's it," he said.
According to local press reports, county supervisors cited the letter in voting not to hire Cotchett.
On the day the proposal for outside counsel was heard, timber workers ringed the county building with log trucks, and supporters and opponents of Gallegos jammed the meeting.
Cotchett, of Cotchett, Pitre, Simon & McCarthy, had offered to take the case on contingency, asking for 14.5 percent of any money collected from the company plus minimal expenses.
Stoen estimated the arrangement would cost the county no more than $9,000, an amount he called a "pittance" for the involvement of such a high-powered firm.
But the supervisors voted 4-1 against the deal. The majority included the wife of the former district attorney Gallegos defeated and a man who leases land from Pacific Lumber.
"There was no way we were going to let that happen, given the questionable circumstances surrounding the lawsuit," Supervisor Roger Rodoni, who opposed the request, told reporters after the hearing. Although Rodoni rents land from Pacific Lumber, he said the state Fair Political Practices Commission had given him the green light to vote on the matter, according to press accounts of the hearing.
Stoen said that the rejection of "a free attorney" left the county with its own, limited resources to pursue the case. Cotchett, for example, would have traveled to Houston to depose Charles Hurwitz, who heads Pacific Lumber's parent company - a trip the county cannot afford.
Stoen insists the setback won't stop the county's litigation, but he acknowledged it will hurt.
"It prevents us from expanding the pool of truth," he said.
Cotchett, meanwhile, is still spoiling to get in the case. He said environmental groups have contacted him about filing a companion lawsuit on their behalf. That would get him into the proceedings - and enable him to consult with Gallegos - even if he's not retained by the county.
"The legal issue is whether those groups have standing to come in and file an action on behalf of the people," Cotchett said.
Recall campaign
Gallegos took office in January after upsetting 20-year veteran District Attorney Terry Farmer, who lost despite Lockyer's endorsement. Now, Gallegos' major problem may be whether he can retain his job for the four-year term.
Retired timber executive Robin Arkley Sr. has openly solicited support for a recall campaign, salting the effort with $5,000 of his own money. His beef with Gallegos is the lawsuit.
"It would simply put the largest private employer in our area out of business," Arkley said of the 17200 lawsuit. Pacific Lumber, he said, is innocent of any wrongdoing.
Organizers said they planned to deliver a 200-word official notice to Gallegos this morning, formally launching the recall. Gallegos will have a week to prepare an argument in his own defense. County officials then will prepare a petition for a recall election, and organizers can begin collecting signatures.
Arkley, who said he is working with an unnamed partner to recall Gallegos, suggested money is no object.
"I keep pungling up money, me and another guy, all the time," said Arkley, a self-described "good old boy."
Directing the recall is Rick Brazeau, the Arcata political consultant who helped run Farmer's unsuccessful campaign, Arkley said. Providing legal advice to the effort is Eureka attorney Tom Herman, a former Pacific Lumber vice president.
Branham said Pacific Lumber is not currently involved in the recall effort. "I don't want to speculate on what may happen in the future," he said.
Stoen has little doubt the company wants Gallegos out of office.
"Pacific Lumber knows the only way they are going to get me off the case is to get rid of my boss," he said.
Stoen has also had a spotlight focused on his past.
For example, local news stories routinely mention Stoen's work decades ago as a legal adviser to Jim Jones. Stoen broke with the cult leader prior to the horrific Jonestown mass suicide, which claimed the life of Stoen's young son, whom Stoen had tried to free from Jones' clutches.
Stoen said that while he has never concealed the association, he wishes critics would point out that "I was the one [Jones] blamed for his downfall."
In later life, Stoen's politics have shifted, as well. Far from the young man who was drawn to Jones' utopian socialist ideals, Stoen ran unsuccessfully last year as a Republican for the state Assembly (he carried Humboldt County).
For his part, Gallegos rejects accusations that his litigation is endangering the county's economy.
"If they are found out to have violated the law and people lose their jobs because of it, it's Pacific Lumber that didn't care about their employees, not me," Gallegos said. "No one would ever say I should let all sorts of poor people get away with fraud."
Copyright © 2003 Daily Journal
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.
back to corporations | rat haus | Index | Search | tree
12.03.2006
Salzman's Plan
Do you think it is ok to PRIVATELY fund a PUBLIC prosecution? More than that - to SOLICIT, accept and use SPECIAL INTEREST MONEY to privately fund a public prosecution?
"There have been rumors Gallegos supporters are launching a community fund-raising effort to fund the Palco suit. Gallegos and his staff say while they are open to such a proposal, they're not aware such a fund exists." ..."Salzman says he's heard some talk of a community fund, but he's not involved in that effort." April 30, 2004 Times Standard Front page story by James Tressler
Rumors? Open to such a proposal? How about orchestrating such a Fund.
On March 29, 2004, exactly one month before he made that statement, Paul Gallegos submitted a formal 'Request for Opinion' to the Attorney General's office to pave the way for Richard Salzman and Tim Stoen's plan to solicit special interest money to privately fund a public prosecution.
That plan is posted below.
Before you read it, ask yourself this question: If Stoen and Gallegos were prosecuting Kobe Bryant, and Gallegos' backers and handlers were the Aryan Brotherhood, who were contributing money to fund the prosecution of Kobe Bryant - to "get that black man" - would that be ok? I contend that no same person would say yes.
And should District Attorney Paul Gallegos be acting at the behest of his Campaign Manager to use his public office in the name of a cause?
***
The memo included below, dated April 14, 2003, references an attached document given to County CAO Loretta Nickolaus by Tim Stoen. The document, included here is a Memorandum to Richard Salzman dated March 31, 2003. It is available as a public records act request.
In this document RICHARD SALZMAN, GALLEGOS' CHIEF CAMPAIGN FUNDRAISER (March primary 2002) and then CAMPAIGN MANAGER (Recall election, March 2004) and acting head of the so-called "Alliance for Ethical Business" (one of many groups targeting Pacific Lumber Company) is soliciting an opinion for Stoen/Gallegos.
****
Cover page:
Interoffice Memo
Date: April 14, 2003
To: Tim Stoen, Assistant District Attorney
CC: Paul Gallegos, District Attorney
Board of Supervisors
Tammy Falor, County Counsel
From: Loretta Nickolaus, CAO
Re: Request for establishment of a Trust Fund expenditure anticipated in the Pacific Lumber Company (Palco) lawsuit.
Last week you stopped by my office to give a "heads up" stating that you were planning to prepare an item for Board approval. You referred to a memo (copy attached) that outlined a proposal. The proposal would include a recommendation to establish a trust fund that would supplement the DAs budget for costs associated with the fraud case you have recently filed against Palco. The memo suggests calling the new trust the Headwaters Litigation Fund.
The memo also points out that the Board has established other trust funds for special purposes and needs. Examples would include a trust fund to widen the Buckhorn Grade or the DAs environmental trust fund used to clean up contaminated properties. The Board has also accepted private donations to cover the cost of buying library books and a gift of funds to study the housing needs in the community.
I am not in a position to weigh in on the Palco case and cannot support establishing this trust fund any more than I could recommend that the Board accept Donations from Palco for the sole purpose of prosecuting tree sitters (for example). However, given these tough budget times and the probability that it is going to get a lot worse before it gets better, why don't you explore (with the assistance of the Attorney General's Office and County Counsel) the creation of a more flexible fund called the DAs Prosecution Fund to be used to supplement the DAs budget not only for fraud cases but also drug, abuse and homicide cases.
I hope this feedback is helpful.
***********************
ATTACHED DOCUMENT
***********************
Page 1 of 7:
MEMORANDUM
To: Richard Salzman "Alliance for Ethical Business"
From: Gail Holder
Re: Legal guidelines for possible fundraising to supplement the District
Attorney's budget for anticipated costs involved in the PL lawsuit
Date: March 31, 2003
QUESTIONS PRESENTED
I. Whether a District Attorney, as a sitting elected official can solicit for, and accept donations to supplement his Agency's budget for anticipated costs associated with the public purpose of prosecution, and if so, what legal guidelines regulate the solicitation, acceptance, and disbursement of such contributions?
II. Whether the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) created by the Political Reform Act of 1974 (Proposition 9) exerts authority or jurisdiction over fundraising not associated with pre-election candidate, campaign fundraising, but rather for expenditures for public purposes, as designated by a sitting public official in executing his legal duties?
III. Whether a District Attorney's acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorneys, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District attorney in the instant matter of the PL lawsuit?
BRIEF ANSWERS
I. Yes. Contributions designated for the public purpose of proceeding with the PL lawsuit may be accepted by the District Attorney's office, via establishment of an Agency-fun approved by the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, which Board is empowered to approve or deny the District Attorney's proposal. If denied, an alternative plan for acceptance of contributions will be the formulation of an Agency fund held in trust through an Escrow account.
II. Probably not. The FPPC is a bipartisan, independent body which administers and enforces the Political Reform Act's rules on conflicts of interest, campaign contributions and expenditures, and lobbying disclosure, while the commission exerts...
Pg. 2 of 7:
...jurisdiction over *Conflicts of interests *Mass mailing violations *Campaign disclosure violations *State lobbying violations *Personal use campaign funds and *Money laundering, all but the latter have relevance exclusively to issues related to candidates for office, and campaign fundraising issues. California Government Code _82015 addressing payments made "at the behest " of an elected official to be used for legislative or governmental purposes may be an FPPC issue and will be discussed below.
III. No. Pro bono assistance presents no conflicts of interest, as such assistance constitutes a benefit to the county, and to the people, rather than to the elected official personally. Pro bono assistance does not constitiute a "gift," "bequest," or "devise," within the meaning of FPPC rules.
STATEMENT OF FACTS:
On February 24, 2003, Paul V. Gallegos, District Attorney of Humboldt County (DA) acting to protect the general public from unfair business practices, filed a complaint for civil penalties, injunction and restitution against THE PACIFIC LUMBER COMPANY (PL), and its subsidiaries, in the Superior Court of California, County of Humboldt. Complaint: People v. Pacific Lumber Company on behalf of The PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, pursuant to sections 17204 and 17206 of the Business and Professions Code.
District Attorney Gallegos and Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen subsequently appeared before the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors (March 12, 2003) for the purpose of requesting permission of the Board for the DA's office to retain outside counsel to assist with the PL litigation. The Board opposed the allocation of any County monies to the PL lawsuit. Standing alone, Third District Supervisor, John Wooley put forth a motion to allow the District Attorney to present a finalized proposal supporting his request, but the rest of the Board voted the motion down. Although the Board rejected the DA's request for special counsel, Mr. Gallegos stands by his decsion to proceed with the lawsuit, and now seeks to supplement his budget for anticipated costs of the suit, inclusive of witness fees, travel expenditures, depositions, et cetera. Presently, the District Attorney's office is engaged in pursuing a lawful course by which to solicit, accept, and utilize contributions so crucial to supplementation to the Agency's budget, and to the success of the PL litigation. The District Attorney's office seeks now to delineate and resolve all of the issues involved in establishing a lawful procedure for accepting, reporting, depositing, and disbursing monetary contributions to support the PL lawsuit.
pg 3 of 7:
DISCUSSION:
I. Whether a District Attorney, as a sitting elected official can solicit for, and accept donations to supplement his Agency's budget for anticipated costs associated with the public purpose of prosecution, and if so, what legal guidelines regulate the solicitation, acceptance and disbursement of such contributions?
As an elected official, acting within the scope of his official duties, and to satisfy a public purpose such as proceeding with the Pacific Lumber Company Lawsuit, the District Attorney may accept contributions from both individual and organizational donors. the preferred method is the establishment of a Trust Fund through the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors.
AUTHORITY FOR LEGAL GUIDELINES:
AUTHORITY: SUBJECT:
Government Code Section 25355 Acceptance of gifts by the Board
Government Code Section 25356 Treatment of specified and unspecified donations
California Government Code Section 25355, West 2003,
"The Board may accept or reject any gift, bequest, or devise made to or in favor of the County, or to or in favor of the Board in trust for any public purpose. The Board may delegate to any County officer or employee the power to accept any gift, bequest, or devise made to or in favor of the County. The officer or employee shall file with the Board each quarter a report that describes the source and value of each gift valued in excess of ten thousand dollars ($10,000) or any other amount as determined by the Board. The Board may hold and dispose of the property and the income and increase thereof for those lawful uses and purposes as are prescribed in the terms of the gift, bequest or devise. In accounting for or inventorying gifts, bequests, or devises, the officer or employee shall follow the appropriate procedures contained in the State Controller's manual entitled "Accounting Standards and Procedures for Counties.:
California Government Code Section 25356, West 2003,
"If any gift, bequest or devise is unaccompanied by any provision prescribing or limiting the uses and purposes to which the property is received, or the income or increase
pg 4 of 7:
Page four is missing. No one seems to have a copy of this except perhaps Tim Stoen, Salzman or Holder
pg 5 of 7
...first step to be undertaken by the DA's office is to formalize a request to the Board of Supervisors for the establishment of a Trust Fund for expenditures anticipated in the PL lawsuit.
PROCEDURE TO BE USED BY DISTRICT ATTORNEY IN REQUESTING TRUST FUND.
As per instructions of County Treasurer, Steve Stawn (sp) offered via phone conference March 20, 2003, the following process must be followed: Initially, three (3) weeks before the proposal is made before the Board, the Clerk of the Board of Supervisors must be notified of intent of DA's office to present a proposal for establishment of agency/trust fund to be used for the PL lawsuit. the clerk will make this request a future Agenda Item.
Secondly, the DA appears before the Board with a formalized, written proposal delineating the necessity of a Trust Fund to supplement anticipated costs associated with the Pl lawsuit. A working title of the Trust Fund might be Headwaters Litigation Fund (HLF). The DA requests approval of the Board for the proposed HLF.
Thirdly, after consideration of the proposal, the Board will do a status report which is a recommendation for approval or denial of the proposal; (see attached documents (A) Agenda Item No. E-5; and (B) Agenda Item No. C-3) In both cases, the Board approved. Also see Times Standard article, Trust Fund to Widen Buckhorn Grade Backed March 26, 2003 for clarification of Trust Funds.
Lastly, after approval (1) the Trust Fund is set up, and (2) the Agency is oriented on how funds will be accessed. Mr Strawn stated that the Auditor/Controller's office oversees the disbursement of all County monies, and as such, will monitor the disbursement of the HLF. (3) the DA's office will be advised on budgeting matters, and of how to access the HLF Funds. Generally, after approval and establishment of the Trust Fund, expenditures are accessed via presentation of a budget.
In the event that the Board of supervisors denies the District Attorney's proposal for a trust fund to be established as per Government Code _ 25355, for the public purpose of the PL litigation, the alternative plan will be a trust fund set up as an Escrow account. Escrow law is contained in Division California Finance Code commencing with the regulations, are contained in Subchapter 9, title 10 of the California Code of Regulations with section 1700 (10 C.C.R. _1700 et seq).
!!. Whether the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) created by the Political Reform Act of 1974 (Proposition 9) exerts authority or jurisdiction over fundraising not associated with pre-election candidate, campaign fundraising, but rather for expenditures for public purposes, as designated by a sitting public official in executing his official duties?
According to FPPC spokesperson and researcher, "Trish," via phone conference on April 1, 2003, the FPPC, the FPPC almost exclusively oversees fundraising issues associated with candidates, and pre-election fundraising. Trish's response to an inquiry regarding...
pg 6 of 7
...Government Code _ 82015 (B) (iii), was that this section is a "relatively new" and "gray area" of the law, which "should not be a problem or an issue in the instant matter."
Government Code _ 82015 (B) (iii), reads
"A payment not covered by clause (i), made principally for legislative, governmental or charitable purposes, in which case it is neither a gift nor a contribution. However, payments of this type that are made at the behest of a candidate who is an elected officer shall be reported within 30 days following the date on which the payment or payments equal or exceed five thousand dollars ($5,000) in the aggregate from the same source in the calendar year in which they are made..." (see attached document marked "C" to review section 82015.)
FPPC spokesperson Trish conjectures that if the HLF is set up through the County' Government Code 82015 regulations may be negated by the stringent County trust fund regulations. This further research on Government Code 82015 (B) (iii) is forthcoming. Trish will determine whether or not, once the HLF is set up, the District Attorney himself, may lawfully solicit for funding via phone calls and personal letters to perspective (sp) donors. According to the FPPC representative, however, it si established that others in the Agency may solicit for funding on behalf of a public purpose (HLF), which solicitation is outside the scope of the FPPC authority.
III. Whether a District Attorney''s acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorney's, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District Attorney in the instant matter of the Pl lawsuit?
A phone conference with FPPC representative Adrian on March 28, 2003 revealed that pro bono assistance offered to a sitting elected official for a public purpose, benefit the County and the people of the County, but not the official personally. Such assistance does not constitute a "gift" or "bequest" within the meaning of FPPC regulations, and may, therefore, be accepted without reservation, by the sitting District Attorney in the instant matter. Adrian stated that such acceptance by the Da of pro bono assistance does not constitute a "conflict of interest" within the meaning of FPPC regulations.
CONCLUSION:
Although the District Attorney's prior bid for County approval for the hiring of outside counsel to assist in the PL lawsuit, was rejected by the Board of Supervisors it is herein suggested that the Da go before the Board with a proposal which constitutes an offer the...
pg 7 of 7
...Board 'cannot refuse.' Emphasis should be placed upon the fact that the District Attorney's Office seeks no money, either directly, or indirectly, from the General Fund, but rather requests the establishment of a trust fund whose coffers will abound with contributions from individuals and organizations some of whom have already come forward with spontaneous offers of monetary donations.
It is prudent to make the HLF proposal clear, and comprehensible to the Board, and to render the process of approving and setting up the trust fund as simple as possible. In the improbable event that the Board denies the proposal, the backup plan of the Escrow account should be implemented.
It is concluded that the District Attorney of Humboldt County may lawfully accept contributions for the public purpose of budget supplementation to proceed with the PL lawsuit. The rule of law is California Government Code Sections 25355 and 23556 addressing acceptance of gifts by the Board of Supervisors and treatment of specified and unspecified donations. FPPC Regulations, California Government Code 82015 addressing "behested payments" in excess of five thousand dollars ($5,000) from a single source, are satisfied by simply filling out a form and filing that form with the County Clerk. Applying the relevant rules of law to the facts contained therein, the District Attorney, after lawfully establishing the trust fund, may solicit, accept and utilize unlimited contributions for the public purpose of the PL litigation.
Once the trust fund is established, fundraising plans could include calls and letters to environmentally involved celebrities, and to organizations such as the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League. Full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle could attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause. Although local radio, television and newspaper releases might serve to clarify the DA's position on the lawsuit, and perhaps win some measure of support, a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area.
Gail Holder
****
"There have been rumors Gallegos supporters are launching a community fund-raising effort to fund the Palco suit. Gallegos and his staff say while they are open to such a proposal, they're not aware such a fund exists." ..."Salzman says he's heard some talk of a community fund, but he's not involved in that effort." April 30, 2004 Times Standard Front page story by James Tressler
Rumors? Open to such a proposal? How about orchestrating such a Fund.
On March 29, 2004, exactly one month before he made that statement, Paul Gallegos submitted a formal 'Request for Opinion' to the Attorney General's office to pave the way for Richard Salzman and Tim Stoen's plan to solicit special interest money to privately fund a public prosecution.
That plan is posted below.
Before you read it, ask yourself this question: If Stoen and Gallegos were prosecuting Kobe Bryant, and Gallegos' backers and handlers were the Aryan Brotherhood, who were contributing money to fund the prosecution of Kobe Bryant - to "get that black man" - would that be ok? I contend that no same person would say yes.
And should District Attorney Paul Gallegos be acting at the behest of his Campaign Manager to use his public office in the name of a cause?
***
The memo included below, dated April 14, 2003, references an attached document given to County CAO Loretta Nickolaus by Tim Stoen. The document, included here is a Memorandum to Richard Salzman dated March 31, 2003. It is available as a public records act request.
In this document RICHARD SALZMAN, GALLEGOS' CHIEF CAMPAIGN FUNDRAISER (March primary 2002) and then CAMPAIGN MANAGER (Recall election, March 2004) and acting head of the so-called "Alliance for Ethical Business" (one of many groups targeting Pacific Lumber Company) is soliciting an opinion for Stoen/Gallegos.
****
Cover page:
Interoffice Memo
Date: April 14, 2003
To: Tim Stoen, Assistant District Attorney
CC: Paul Gallegos, District Attorney
Board of Supervisors
Tammy Falor, County Counsel
From: Loretta Nickolaus, CAO
Re: Request for establishment of a Trust Fund expenditure anticipated in the Pacific Lumber Company (Palco) lawsuit.
Last week you stopped by my office to give a "heads up" stating that you were planning to prepare an item for Board approval. You referred to a memo (copy attached) that outlined a proposal. The proposal would include a recommendation to establish a trust fund that would supplement the DAs budget for costs associated with the fraud case you have recently filed against Palco. The memo suggests calling the new trust the Headwaters Litigation Fund.
The memo also points out that the Board has established other trust funds for special purposes and needs. Examples would include a trust fund to widen the Buckhorn Grade or the DAs environmental trust fund used to clean up contaminated properties. The Board has also accepted private donations to cover the cost of buying library books and a gift of funds to study the housing needs in the community.
I am not in a position to weigh in on the Palco case and cannot support establishing this trust fund any more than I could recommend that the Board accept Donations from Palco for the sole purpose of prosecuting tree sitters (for example). However, given these tough budget times and the probability that it is going to get a lot worse before it gets better, why don't you explore (with the assistance of the Attorney General's Office and County Counsel) the creation of a more flexible fund called the DAs Prosecution Fund to be used to supplement the DAs budget not only for fraud cases but also drug, abuse and homicide cases.
I hope this feedback is helpful.
***********************
ATTACHED DOCUMENT
***********************
Page 1 of 7:
MEMORANDUM
To: Richard Salzman "Alliance for Ethical Business"
From: Gail Holder
Re: Legal guidelines for possible fundraising to supplement the District
Attorney's budget for anticipated costs involved in the PL lawsuit
Date: March 31, 2003
QUESTIONS PRESENTED
I. Whether a District Attorney, as a sitting elected official can solicit for, and accept donations to supplement his Agency's budget for anticipated costs associated with the public purpose of prosecution, and if so, what legal guidelines regulate the solicitation, acceptance, and disbursement of such contributions?
II. Whether the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) created by the Political Reform Act of 1974 (Proposition 9) exerts authority or jurisdiction over fundraising not associated with pre-election candidate, campaign fundraising, but rather for expenditures for public purposes, as designated by a sitting public official in executing his legal duties?
III. Whether a District Attorney's acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorneys, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District attorney in the instant matter of the PL lawsuit?
BRIEF ANSWERS
I. Yes. Contributions designated for the public purpose of proceeding with the PL lawsuit may be accepted by the District Attorney's office, via establishment of an Agency-fun approved by the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, which Board is empowered to approve or deny the District Attorney's proposal. If denied, an alternative plan for acceptance of contributions will be the formulation of an Agency fund held in trust through an Escrow account.
II. Probably not. The FPPC is a bipartisan, independent body which administers and enforces the Political Reform Act's rules on conflicts of interest, campaign contributions and expenditures, and lobbying disclosure, while the commission exerts...
Pg. 2 of 7:
...jurisdiction over *Conflicts of interests *Mass mailing violations *Campaign disclosure violations *State lobbying violations *Personal use campaign funds and *Money laundering, all but the latter have relevance exclusively to issues related to candidates for office, and campaign fundraising issues. California Government Code _82015 addressing payments made "at the behest " of an elected official to be used for legislative or governmental purposes may be an FPPC issue and will be discussed below.
III. No. Pro bono assistance presents no conflicts of interest, as such assistance constitutes a benefit to the county, and to the people, rather than to the elected official personally. Pro bono assistance does not constitiute a "gift," "bequest," or "devise," within the meaning of FPPC rules.
STATEMENT OF FACTS:
On February 24, 2003, Paul V. Gallegos, District Attorney of Humboldt County (DA) acting to protect the general public from unfair business practices, filed a complaint for civil penalties, injunction and restitution against THE PACIFIC LUMBER COMPANY (PL), and its subsidiaries, in the Superior Court of California, County of Humboldt. Complaint: People v. Pacific Lumber Company on behalf of The PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, pursuant to sections 17204 and 17206 of the Business and Professions Code.
District Attorney Gallegos and Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen subsequently appeared before the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors (March 12, 2003) for the purpose of requesting permission of the Board for the DA's office to retain outside counsel to assist with the PL litigation. The Board opposed the allocation of any County monies to the PL lawsuit. Standing alone, Third District Supervisor, John Wooley put forth a motion to allow the District Attorney to present a finalized proposal supporting his request, but the rest of the Board voted the motion down. Although the Board rejected the DA's request for special counsel, Mr. Gallegos stands by his decsion to proceed with the lawsuit, and now seeks to supplement his budget for anticipated costs of the suit, inclusive of witness fees, travel expenditures, depositions, et cetera. Presently, the District Attorney's office is engaged in pursuing a lawful course by which to solicit, accept, and utilize contributions so crucial to supplementation to the Agency's budget, and to the success of the PL litigation. The District Attorney's office seeks now to delineate and resolve all of the issues involved in establishing a lawful procedure for accepting, reporting, depositing, and disbursing monetary contributions to support the PL lawsuit.
pg 3 of 7:
DISCUSSION:
I. Whether a District Attorney, as a sitting elected official can solicit for, and accept donations to supplement his Agency's budget for anticipated costs associated with the public purpose of prosecution, and if so, what legal guidelines regulate the solicitation, acceptance and disbursement of such contributions?
As an elected official, acting within the scope of his official duties, and to satisfy a public purpose such as proceeding with the Pacific Lumber Company Lawsuit, the District Attorney may accept contributions from both individual and organizational donors. the preferred method is the establishment of a Trust Fund through the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors.
AUTHORITY FOR LEGAL GUIDELINES:
AUTHORITY: SUBJECT:
Government Code Section 25355 Acceptance of gifts by the Board
Government Code Section 25356 Treatment of specified and unspecified donations
California Government Code Section 25355, West 2003,
"The Board may accept or reject any gift, bequest, or devise made to or in favor of the County, or to or in favor of the Board in trust for any public purpose. The Board may delegate to any County officer or employee the power to accept any gift, bequest, or devise made to or in favor of the County. The officer or employee shall file with the Board each quarter a report that describes the source and value of each gift valued in excess of ten thousand dollars ($10,000) or any other amount as determined by the Board. The Board may hold and dispose of the property and the income and increase thereof for those lawful uses and purposes as are prescribed in the terms of the gift, bequest or devise. In accounting for or inventorying gifts, bequests, or devises, the officer or employee shall follow the appropriate procedures contained in the State Controller's manual entitled "Accounting Standards and Procedures for Counties.:
California Government Code Section 25356, West 2003,
"If any gift, bequest or devise is unaccompanied by any provision prescribing or limiting the uses and purposes to which the property is received, or the income or increase
pg 4 of 7:
Page four is missing. No one seems to have a copy of this except perhaps Tim Stoen, Salzman or Holder
pg 5 of 7
...first step to be undertaken by the DA's office is to formalize a request to the Board of Supervisors for the establishment of a Trust Fund for expenditures anticipated in the PL lawsuit.
PROCEDURE TO BE USED BY DISTRICT ATTORNEY IN REQUESTING TRUST FUND.
As per instructions of County Treasurer, Steve Stawn (sp) offered via phone conference March 20, 2003, the following process must be followed: Initially, three (3) weeks before the proposal is made before the Board, the Clerk of the Board of Supervisors must be notified of intent of DA's office to present a proposal for establishment of agency/trust fund to be used for the PL lawsuit. the clerk will make this request a future Agenda Item.
Secondly, the DA appears before the Board with a formalized, written proposal delineating the necessity of a Trust Fund to supplement anticipated costs associated with the Pl lawsuit. A working title of the Trust Fund might be Headwaters Litigation Fund (HLF). The DA requests approval of the Board for the proposed HLF.
Thirdly, after consideration of the proposal, the Board will do a status report which is a recommendation for approval or denial of the proposal; (see attached documents (A) Agenda Item No. E-5; and (B) Agenda Item No. C-3) In both cases, the Board approved. Also see Times Standard article, Trust Fund to Widen Buckhorn Grade Backed March 26, 2003 for clarification of Trust Funds.
Lastly, after approval (1) the Trust Fund is set up, and (2) the Agency is oriented on how funds will be accessed. Mr Strawn stated that the Auditor/Controller's office oversees the disbursement of all County monies, and as such, will monitor the disbursement of the HLF. (3) the DA's office will be advised on budgeting matters, and of how to access the HLF Funds. Generally, after approval and establishment of the Trust Fund, expenditures are accessed via presentation of a budget.
In the event that the Board of supervisors denies the District Attorney's proposal for a trust fund to be established as per Government Code _ 25355, for the public purpose of the PL litigation, the alternative plan will be a trust fund set up as an Escrow account. Escrow law is contained in Division California Finance Code commencing with the regulations, are contained in Subchapter 9, title 10 of the California Code of Regulations with section 1700 (10 C.C.R. _1700 et seq).
!!. Whether the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) created by the Political Reform Act of 1974 (Proposition 9) exerts authority or jurisdiction over fundraising not associated with pre-election candidate, campaign fundraising, but rather for expenditures for public purposes, as designated by a sitting public official in executing his official duties?
According to FPPC spokesperson and researcher, "Trish," via phone conference on April 1, 2003, the FPPC, the FPPC almost exclusively oversees fundraising issues associated with candidates, and pre-election fundraising. Trish's response to an inquiry regarding...
pg 6 of 7
...Government Code _ 82015 (B) (iii), was that this section is a "relatively new" and "gray area" of the law, which "should not be a problem or an issue in the instant matter."
Government Code _ 82015 (B) (iii), reads
"A payment not covered by clause (i), made principally for legislative, governmental or charitable purposes, in which case it is neither a gift nor a contribution. However, payments of this type that are made at the behest of a candidate who is an elected officer shall be reported within 30 days following the date on which the payment or payments equal or exceed five thousand dollars ($5,000) in the aggregate from the same source in the calendar year in which they are made..." (see attached document marked "C" to review section 82015.)
FPPC spokesperson Trish conjectures that if the HLF is set up through the County' Government Code 82015 regulations may be negated by the stringent County trust fund regulations. This further research on Government Code 82015 (B) (iii) is forthcoming. Trish will determine whether or not, once the HLF is set up, the District Attorney himself, may lawfully solicit for funding via phone calls and personal letters to perspective (sp) donors. According to the FPPC representative, however, it si established that others in the Agency may solicit for funding on behalf of a public purpose (HLF), which solicitation is outside the scope of the FPPC authority.
III. Whether a District Attorney''s acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorney's, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District Attorney in the instant matter of the Pl lawsuit?
A phone conference with FPPC representative Adrian on March 28, 2003 revealed that pro bono assistance offered to a sitting elected official for a public purpose, benefit the County and the people of the County, but not the official personally. Such assistance does not constitute a "gift" or "bequest" within the meaning of FPPC regulations, and may, therefore, be accepted without reservation, by the sitting District Attorney in the instant matter. Adrian stated that such acceptance by the Da of pro bono assistance does not constitute a "conflict of interest" within the meaning of FPPC regulations.
CONCLUSION:
Although the District Attorney's prior bid for County approval for the hiring of outside counsel to assist in the PL lawsuit, was rejected by the Board of Supervisors it is herein suggested that the Da go before the Board with a proposal which constitutes an offer the...
pg 7 of 7
...Board 'cannot refuse.' Emphasis should be placed upon the fact that the District Attorney's Office seeks no money, either directly, or indirectly, from the General Fund, but rather requests the establishment of a trust fund whose coffers will abound with contributions from individuals and organizations some of whom have already come forward with spontaneous offers of monetary donations.
It is prudent to make the HLF proposal clear, and comprehensible to the Board, and to render the process of approving and setting up the trust fund as simple as possible. In the improbable event that the Board denies the proposal, the backup plan of the Escrow account should be implemented.
It is concluded that the District Attorney of Humboldt County may lawfully accept contributions for the public purpose of budget supplementation to proceed with the PL lawsuit. The rule of law is California Government Code Sections 25355 and 23556 addressing acceptance of gifts by the Board of Supervisors and treatment of specified and unspecified donations. FPPC Regulations, California Government Code 82015 addressing "behested payments" in excess of five thousand dollars ($5,000) from a single source, are satisfied by simply filling out a form and filing that form with the County Clerk. Applying the relevant rules of law to the facts contained therein, the District Attorney, after lawfully establishing the trust fund, may solicit, accept and utilize unlimited contributions for the public purpose of the PL litigation.
Once the trust fund is established, fundraising plans could include calls and letters to environmentally involved celebrities, and to organizations such as the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League. Full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle could attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause. Although local radio, television and newspaper releases might serve to clarify the DA's position on the lawsuit, and perhaps win some measure of support, a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area.
Gail Holder
****
Gallegos' REQUEST FOR OPINION
Attempting to implement Salzman's Plan:
The complete text of Paul Gallegos' REQUEST FOR OPINION, which he submitted to the Attorney General's Office.
As you read it, consider this: THE REAL QUESTION. No matter how carefully couched in legalese, the real question is whether or not the Humboldt County District Attorney can SOLICIT and accept SPECIAL INTEREST MONEY to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company.
It is my contention that allowing politically motivated activist groups to hijack the public judicial system, using similarly inclined public officials to act on their behalf in pursuit of their political agendas should never be permitted. Allowing a District Attorney to pursue a specific case above all others, funded by special interest groups, in pursuit of fulfillment of campaign backer's political agendas should never be permitted. The detrimental effects on society and on the public judicial system are immeasurable.
Note: While Gallegos withdrew his Request on September 23, 2004. I am told that this may be because he was given a heads up that the Opinion to be rendered would not be in his favor. Nevertheless, if you read Salzman's Plan (complete text on previous post) you will see that Gallegos continued to set about implementing portions of that plan, specifically the plan to bring in "pro-bono" attorneys to work on the PL case.
***
The Request for Opinion:
Off ice of the District Attorney of Humboldt County letterhead
pg. 1 of 3
To:
Honorable Bill Lockyer Date: March 29, 2004
Attorney General of California
P.O. Box 944255
Sacramento, CA 94244-2550
Re: Request for Formal Opinion - Authority of a board of supervisors to establish a trust fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases.
Dear Mr. Attorney general:
Our office is considering the making of a request to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors to establish a Trust Fund under Government Code section 23555 for the purpose of receiving donations from the public to subsidize district attorney operations. In addition to general gifts, that section authorizes a board to dispose of such property "for those lawful uses and purposes as are prescribed in the terms of the gift, bequest, or devise."
Because we anticipate that some members of the public will be making gifts earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases, including both criminal actions and Unfair Competition Law civil actions, we are requesting a formal opinion from you as to whether this is acceptable.
I.
Question presented
Does a board of supervisors have the authority to establish a Trust Fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular criminal and civil cases?
pg.2 of 3
Honorable Bill Lockyer
March 29, 2004
Re: Trust Fund
Page 2
II.
Discussion
Our reading of the law is that such earmarked gifts would be upheld under the leading case of Hambarian v. Superior Court (2002) 27 Cal.4th 826. In that case the California Supreme Court refused to recuse a district attorney from a case where it received $450,000 worth of forensic accounting services from a victim city. In our situation, it appears there would be even less possibility of undue influence when the financial assistance comes from members of the general public who will not be direct victims in the earmarked case.
In Hambarian the Supreme Court adopted, as the test for recual, the same as it had used in People v. Eubanks (1996) 14 Cal.4th 580: whether the financial assistance if of "a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decisionmaking within the influence or control of an interested party" (Hambarian, at p. 835) In doing so, it distinguished its holding from Eubanks, in which it had ordered recusal:
Our decision in Eubanks did not purport to fix a limit on the financial assistance that may be provided by an aggrieved victim. Rather we stated that the trial court would have been within its discretion to find a likelihood of unfairness where the crime victim, Borland International (Borland), was asked to pay for substantial investigative expenses already incurred by the prosecutor. The problem was not the 'fact' of the investigatory assistance itself, but the 'potential bias arising out of the district attorney's sense of obligation to Borland...."
***
"In discussing the existence of the disabling conflict, we did not rely merely on 'the fact of investigatory assistance itself" and consequently declined to hold that a victim's financial assistance of any amount 'necessarily subjects the defendant to unfair prosecutorial treatment.' [Citation] We required the defendant instead to show that the financial assistance is of a "nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decisionmaking within the influence or control of an interested party." [Citation] That likelihood existed in Eubanks from 'the...
pg. 3 of 3
Honorable Bill Lockyer
March 29, 2004
Re: Trust Fund
Page 3
... possible sense of obligation the district attorney would feel for Borland's payment of a debt owed by the district attorney's office,' an obligation derived from the fact that the district attorney had asked Borland to discharged a sizable debt the office had already incurred. [Citation]
***
In Eubanks, the victim, Borland, was a competitor of the Symantec Corporation, whose president and chief executive officer was one of the defendants in the criminal prosecution. [Citation] One risk of Borland's involvement in the district attorney's prosecution was that the prosecution itself could be used as a strategic weapon to disrupt and distract competitor fro reasons wholly unrelated to the public administration of justice."
(Hambarian, 27 Cal4th at pp. 834, 835, 837, italics as in the opinion.)
III.
Conclusion
Based on Hambarian, it appears that our board of supervisors could establish a trust account able to accept earmarked funds for particular cases from members of the general public, who would not, either under that case or Eubanks, be deemed "an interested party," To make sure there could be no possible "interested party" issue, we would propose that such an ordinance prohibit earmarked gifts from any direct competitors of the persons being prosecuted.
We would greatly appreciate your being willing to provide us a formal opinion at your earliest convenience.
Very truly yours,
Paul V. Gallegos
District Attorney
*******
The complete text of Paul Gallegos' REQUEST FOR OPINION, which he submitted to the Attorney General's Office.
As you read it, consider this: THE REAL QUESTION. No matter how carefully couched in legalese, the real question is whether or not the Humboldt County District Attorney can SOLICIT and accept SPECIAL INTEREST MONEY to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company.
It is my contention that allowing politically motivated activist groups to hijack the public judicial system, using similarly inclined public officials to act on their behalf in pursuit of their political agendas should never be permitted. Allowing a District Attorney to pursue a specific case above all others, funded by special interest groups, in pursuit of fulfillment of campaign backer's political agendas should never be permitted. The detrimental effects on society and on the public judicial system are immeasurable.
Note: While Gallegos withdrew his Request on September 23, 2004. I am told that this may be because he was given a heads up that the Opinion to be rendered would not be in his favor. Nevertheless, if you read Salzman's Plan (complete text on previous post) you will see that Gallegos continued to set about implementing portions of that plan, specifically the plan to bring in "pro-bono" attorneys to work on the PL case.
***
The Request for Opinion:
Off ice of the District Attorney of Humboldt County letterhead
pg. 1 of 3
To:
Honorable Bill Lockyer Date: March 29, 2004
Attorney General of California
P.O. Box 944255
Sacramento, CA 94244-2550
Re: Request for Formal Opinion - Authority of a board of supervisors to establish a trust fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases.
Dear Mr. Attorney general:
Our office is considering the making of a request to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors to establish a Trust Fund under Government Code section 23555 for the purpose of receiving donations from the public to subsidize district attorney operations. In addition to general gifts, that section authorizes a board to dispose of such property "for those lawful uses and purposes as are prescribed in the terms of the gift, bequest, or devise."
Because we anticipate that some members of the public will be making gifts earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases, including both criminal actions and Unfair Competition Law civil actions, we are requesting a formal opinion from you as to whether this is acceptable.
I.
Question presented
Does a board of supervisors have the authority to establish a Trust Fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular criminal and civil cases?
pg.2 of 3
Honorable Bill Lockyer
March 29, 2004
Re: Trust Fund
Page 2
II.
Discussion
Our reading of the law is that such earmarked gifts would be upheld under the leading case of Hambarian v. Superior Court (2002) 27 Cal.4th 826. In that case the California Supreme Court refused to recuse a district attorney from a case where it received $450,000 worth of forensic accounting services from a victim city. In our situation, it appears there would be even less possibility of undue influence when the financial assistance comes from members of the general public who will not be direct victims in the earmarked case.
In Hambarian the Supreme Court adopted, as the test for recual, the same as it had used in People v. Eubanks (1996) 14 Cal.4th 580: whether the financial assistance if of "a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decisionmaking within the influence or control of an interested party" (Hambarian, at p. 835) In doing so, it distinguished its holding from Eubanks, in which it had ordered recusal:
Our decision in Eubanks did not purport to fix a limit on the financial assistance that may be provided by an aggrieved victim. Rather we stated that the trial court would have been within its discretion to find a likelihood of unfairness where the crime victim, Borland International (Borland), was asked to pay for substantial investigative expenses already incurred by the prosecutor. The problem was not the 'fact' of the investigatory assistance itself, but the 'potential bias arising out of the district attorney's sense of obligation to Borland...."
***
"In discussing the existence of the disabling conflict, we did not rely merely on 'the fact of investigatory assistance itself" and consequently declined to hold that a victim's financial assistance of any amount 'necessarily subjects the defendant to unfair prosecutorial treatment.' [Citation] We required the defendant instead to show that the financial assistance is of a "nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decisionmaking within the influence or control of an interested party." [Citation] That likelihood existed in Eubanks from 'the...
pg. 3 of 3
Honorable Bill Lockyer
March 29, 2004
Re: Trust Fund
Page 3
... possible sense of obligation the district attorney would feel for Borland's payment of a debt owed by the district attorney's office,' an obligation derived from the fact that the district attorney had asked Borland to discharged a sizable debt the office had already incurred. [Citation]
***
In Eubanks, the victim, Borland, was a competitor of the Symantec Corporation, whose president and chief executive officer was one of the defendants in the criminal prosecution. [Citation] One risk of Borland's involvement in the district attorney's prosecution was that the prosecution itself could be used as a strategic weapon to disrupt and distract competitor fro reasons wholly unrelated to the public administration of justice."
(Hambarian, 27 Cal4th at pp. 834, 835, 837, italics as in the opinion.)
III.
Conclusion
Based on Hambarian, it appears that our board of supervisors could establish a trust account able to accept earmarked funds for particular cases from members of the general public, who would not, either under that case or Eubanks, be deemed "an interested party," To make sure there could be no possible "interested party" issue, we would propose that such an ordinance prohibit earmarked gifts from any direct competitors of the persons being prosecuted.
We would greatly appreciate your being willing to provide us a formal opinion at your earliest convenience.
Very truly yours,
Paul V. Gallegos
District Attorney
*******
SUBMISSION TO THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
SUBMISSION TO THE ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OPINIONS DEPARTMENT regarding Gallegos' Request for Opinion and Salzman's Plan
Re: Opinion No. 04-406 Re: Request for Formal Opinion - Authority of a board of supervisors to establish a trust fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases.
submitted via e-mail: Gregory.Gonot@doj.ca.gov
Dear Mr. Gonot,
Please consider the following input when considering the Request before you.
I. THE REAL QUESTION. No matter how carefully couched in legalese, the real question before you is whether or not the Humboldt County District Attorney can SOLICIT and accept special interest money to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company.
The answer should be an immediate and resounding "No!" A "Trust Fund" such as this is unconstitutional in that it violates the spirit of "equal protection under the law." The District Attorney's Office belongs to the people, and should remain pure. No District Attorney's office should ever SOLICIT or accept special interest resources or funding for the public purpose of prosecuting ANY person, entity or firm, particularly in pursuit of a politically motivated agenda.
That this question is even being given serious consideration is disturbing. The extreme potential for corruption of public officials and public office alone demands that this request be denied. The fact that this very request indicates that corruption may have already occurred is even more troubling, and warrants further investigation on the part of the Attorney General's office, in addition to the denial of this request.
II. AS EVIDENCE of District Attorney Paul Gallegos' intent to solicit special interest money to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company, see Humboldt County Interoffice Memo, dated April 14, 2003, a portion of which is referred to herein as "Salzman's document" (transcribed below, see EXHIBIT A) in which, Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos' chief fundraiser, turned Campaign Manager Richard Salzman, has procured a paralegal's read on whether or not the District Attorney may solicit, accept and use "donations" to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company. Focused primarily on whether or not this violates FPPC rules, the paralegal concludes that Gallegos may, in fact, solicit and accept "donations" to "contribute significantly to the cause" by establishing a "Trust Fund" to be called "The Headwaters Litigation Fund."
The document details the procedure by which Gallegos can circumvent the Humboldt County Board of Supervisor's anticipated denial of the establishment of the "Trust Fund."
Then, the plan of political action is described: (paragraph 4, pg 7 of 7 of Salzman's document, attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) "Once the trust fund is established, fundraising plans could include calls and letters to environmentally involved celebrities, and to organizations such as the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League. Full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle could attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause. Although local radio, television and newspaper releases might serve to clarify the DA's position on the lawsuit, and perhaps win some measure of support, a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area."
The plan also allows Gallegos to thwart the Board of Supervisor's decision to deny Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen's request to hire an outside law firm to "assist" in the prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company. (Section III, pg 1 of 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) "...Whether a District Attorney's acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorneys, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District attorney in the instant matter of the PL lawsuit? "
This plan, apparently procured on behalf of Paul Gallegos and Tim Stoen by Richard Salzman as head of the "Alliance for Ethical Business," has been in the works for over a year, and is now before you in the form of a "Request for opinion" by Paul Gallegos.
Evidence will show that this "Trust Fund" will serve to further the actions and agenda of Gallegos' campaign backers and contributors who have been involved in a decade or more long effort to destroy Pacific Lumber Company. With this District Attorney now acting on their behalf, and at their behest, this long-standing agenda will be fulfilled.
To compare this case to Borland is deceptive and inadequate.
III. SOLICITATION: In paragraph 2 of the request before you, it is stated that "we anticipate that some members of the public will be making gifts earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases, including both criminal actions and Unfair Competition Law civil actions"
This statement is deceptive, designed to hide the fact the the District Attorney and his Assistant District Attorney, with the assistance of Gallegos' campaign backers, plan to SOLICIT these "gifts" (call it what it is, special interest money) to fund ONE case, and one case only, not, as they imply "particular cases," plural. From paragraph 3 Pg 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo "...It is concluded that the District Attorney of Humboldt County may lawfully accept contributions for the public purpose of budget supplementation to proceed with the PL lawsuit."
What's more, the District Attorney (the chief law enforcement officer of Humboldt County) intends to go out of his way to solicit these "gifts" by placing "full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and San Francisco Chronicle."
(Note that while the cost of a full page ad in the Los Angeles Times, at open rate is $103,200.00. ($800.00 per inch) $129,000.00 if the ad runs on Sunday ($1,000.00 per inch) and the cost of a full page ad in the San Francisco Chronicle, at open rate is $73,788.00. ($572.00 per inch) $77,529.00 if the ad runs on Sunday ($601.00 per inch), the cost of an ad in the local paper, The Times Standard is $30.50 per inch, or $3,934.50.
But an ad in the local paper would not "attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause." To pretend that "significant monetary donations" would be coming in from members of the "general public" is therefore false and misleading.
IV. UNDUE INFLUENCE: Pg 2 section II paragraph 1 of the request in front of you states "In our situation, it appears there would be even less possibility of undue influence when the financial assistance comes from members of the general public who will not be direct victims in the earmarked case." (Note that this remark appears to have abandoned the pretense of several cases benefiting from the "Trust Fund")
What's more, Pg 2 section II paragraph 1 of the request in front of you mentions the test as whether the financial assistance is of "...a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decision making within the influence or control of an interested party..." as being an important part of the question before you.
Again, this is deceptive and seeks to hide the true source and magnitude of the funds Gallegos intends to solicit accept and use. In their own words, (paragraph 4, pg 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) citing "... a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area."
In fact, though some degree of small "donations" from the "general public" will be solicited and accepted, the intent of this "Trust Fund" is outlined in Salzman's document. The intent is to solicit large "gifts" from "environmentally involved celebrities" such as Woody Harrelson and Bonnie Raitt. The potential also exists for "significant budgetary supplementation" to come from the likes of George Soros, as Gallegos' lead campaign consultant (see Exhibit C, below), besides being intensely involved in anti-Pacific Lumber Company activities for an extended period of time has links to Soros. Salzman's document also mentions "significant budgetary supplementation" to come from outside sources such as "Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League."
Even Salzman's document is deceptive in that it chooses the "respectable" members of the environmental activist community in order to elevate the nature of their intent. Left out are Earth First!, E.P.I.C., Salmon Forever and Humboldt Watershed Council, less respectable, more controversial, and significantly more vested in the ongoing attack on Pacific Lumber Company, and, in at least one case, specifically instrumental in the filing of the specific case in question.
The "financial assistance" or "significant budgetary supplementation" in this case can be expected to run into the millions. And it most definitely is of "a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decision making within the influence or control of an interested party"
Based on the statement that the planned full page ads would be designed to "...attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause." I believe the facts and an investigation will prove that this District Attorney and his Assistant District Attorney are already acting under "undue influence." acting on behalf campaign backers and contributors representing the extreme arm of the environmental activist community - interested parties with a political agenda, who have secured in Paul Gallegos and Tim Stoen a vehicle allowing them to pursue their specific goals.
Specifically, interested parties are represented by Ken Miller of Humboldt Watershed Council, Salmon Forever, and BACH (Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters) who, evidence will show, helped Stoen draft the Pacific Lumber Company lawsuit; Michael Shellenberger of Lumina Strategies, Gallegos' lead campaign consultant, and public relations activist (see exhibit C below for his many a.k.a.'s, links to Earth First!, Salmon Forever, Ken Miller, and Richard Salzman and the "Alliance for Ethical Business").
The extent to which these and other politically motivated special interest groups are involved should be the subject of a full-scale investigation by the Attorney General's Office. The longevity and extent of the ongoing attack on Pacific Lumber Company by these interested parties should be part of this investigation and should be considered when rendering an opinion in this matter.
V. INTERESTED PARTIES: In the Conclusion of the Request before you, the District Attorney stipulates that "... To make sure there could be no possible "interested party" issue, we would propose that such an ordinance prohibit earmarked gifts from any direct competitors of the persons being prosecuted."
In other words, in an attempt to pretend that this office will not be corrupted by these "donations" they will not accept money from other timber companies (The District Attorney sees competitors as "interested parties"), but they are free to solicit "significant budgetary supplementation" from interested parties he chooses not to mention; Earth First! E.P.I.C. Humboldt Watershed Council, Sierra Club, political entities with a political agenda, the very entities who have been hell-bent on destroying the company, and overturning the Headwaters Agreement. These are the "interested parties" which must be considered in the context of this Request and that Gallegos hopes you will not be aware of as you formulate your Opinion.
Do not be deceived. It is not the competitors of Pacific Lumber Company who are to fear, for they are next on the activists' agenda, and allowing this "Trust Fund" to be established will set legal precedent.
To grant this request - or to register an Opinion in the affirmative - has the effect of turning the District Attorney's office over to the special interest groups which have increasingly come to use the Court system as a weapon, through numerous civil lawsuits that they themselves have instigated. Now, they're seeking to add an even more powerful weapon to their arsenal, the ability to use the public prosecutorial system when they are successful in placing their sympathizers in publicly elected positions.
This situation is somewhat unique. At this time, no other industry is under such dedicated and concerted attack as the timber industry. Gallegos' backers have been involved in the ongoing efforts against Pacific Lumber Company as well as Boise Cascade, and other timber interests. Yet other politically motivated activist groups stand waiting in the wings, hoping to see legal precedent set in this case. Groups such as ELF (Earth Liberation Front), ALF, (Animal Liberation Front) and others, probably including many of Michael Shellenberger's groups, Rainforest Action Network for example.
VI. CONFLICT OF INTEREST: A full investigation of the gross conflict of interest between the "Alliance for Ethical Business" and District Attorney Paul Gallegos and Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen is necessary to fully determine the extent of corruption this request represents. Specifically, examining the money trail between the "Alliance for Ethical Business" and Public Relations activist/lead campaign consultant Michael Shellenberger and his firm Lumina Strategies, and the many entities he manages and under which he co-exists, and the relationship with Gallegos and Stoen should be very revealing. (see exhibit B and C below)
VII. IN CLOSING: While there is no doubt that a Board of Supervisors can establish a Trust Fund to allow people to contribute funds to build a neighborhood playground, or improve a road, for example, there can also be no doubt that this Request cannot and should not be equated with that.
Nor should the Board of Supervisors be put in a position whereby they are forced to allow Gallegos to establish this "Trust Fund," when it is designed to contradict and circumvent their expressed wishes.
Paul Gallegos stated numerous times in the course of the recent 'Recall Paul' campaign that the District Attorney's office belongs to the people, and that the District Attorney's office is not for sale - in fact, the memo below, the request before you, and the facts indicate that he does not understand what those statements mean - and does not care.
The District Attorney's Office must treat all people, and all entities equally. If this request is approved, and this "Trust Fund" is established there will no longer be equitable treatment for all; undue resources and energy will be spent on one case above all others. This "Trust Fund" violates Equal protection statutes, and should be considered unconstitutional.
Allowing politically motivated activist groups to hijack the public judicial system, using similarly inclined public officials to act on their behalf in pursuit of their political agendas should never be permitted. Allowing a District Attorney to pursue a specific case above all others, funded by special interest groups, in pursuit of fulfillment of campaign backer's political agendas should never be permitted. The detrimental effects on society and on the public judicial system are immeasurable.
I thank you for your time and consideration. I have included supporting documents and relevant supportive information. Hopefully, this will aid you in making your determination, and in your investigations.
Re: Opinion No. 04-406 Re: Request for Formal Opinion - Authority of a board of supervisors to establish a trust fund to receive gifts from the public earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases.
submitted via e-mail: Gregory.Gonot@doj.ca.gov
Dear Mr. Gonot,
Please consider the following input when considering the Request before you.
I. THE REAL QUESTION. No matter how carefully couched in legalese, the real question before you is whether or not the Humboldt County District Attorney can SOLICIT and accept special interest money to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company.
The answer should be an immediate and resounding "No!" A "Trust Fund" such as this is unconstitutional in that it violates the spirit of "equal protection under the law." The District Attorney's Office belongs to the people, and should remain pure. No District Attorney's office should ever SOLICIT or accept special interest resources or funding for the public purpose of prosecuting ANY person, entity or firm, particularly in pursuit of a politically motivated agenda.
That this question is even being given serious consideration is disturbing. The extreme potential for corruption of public officials and public office alone demands that this request be denied. The fact that this very request indicates that corruption may have already occurred is even more troubling, and warrants further investigation on the part of the Attorney General's office, in addition to the denial of this request.
II. AS EVIDENCE of District Attorney Paul Gallegos' intent to solicit special interest money to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company, see Humboldt County Interoffice Memo, dated April 14, 2003, a portion of which is referred to herein as "Salzman's document" (transcribed below, see EXHIBIT A) in which, Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos' chief fundraiser, turned Campaign Manager Richard Salzman, has procured a paralegal's read on whether or not the District Attorney may solicit, accept and use "donations" to fund the public prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company. Focused primarily on whether or not this violates FPPC rules, the paralegal concludes that Gallegos may, in fact, solicit and accept "donations" to "contribute significantly to the cause" by establishing a "Trust Fund" to be called "The Headwaters Litigation Fund."
The document details the procedure by which Gallegos can circumvent the Humboldt County Board of Supervisor's anticipated denial of the establishment of the "Trust Fund."
Then, the plan of political action is described: (paragraph 4, pg 7 of 7 of Salzman's document, attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) "Once the trust fund is established, fundraising plans could include calls and letters to environmentally involved celebrities, and to organizations such as the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League. Full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and the San Francisco Chronicle could attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause. Although local radio, television and newspaper releases might serve to clarify the DA's position on the lawsuit, and perhaps win some measure of support, a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area."
The plan also allows Gallegos to thwart the Board of Supervisor's decision to deny Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen's request to hire an outside law firm to "assist" in the prosecution of Pacific Lumber Company. (Section III, pg 1 of 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) "...Whether a District Attorney's acceptance of pro bono legal assistance tendered by attorneys, law firms, or paralegals constitutes the acceptance of "gifts" or "bequests" by a sitting elected official and if so, what legal authority, if any may regulate, limit, or prohibit acceptance of such pro bono assistance by the District attorney in the instant matter of the PL lawsuit? "
This plan, apparently procured on behalf of Paul Gallegos and Tim Stoen by Richard Salzman as head of the "Alliance for Ethical Business," has been in the works for over a year, and is now before you in the form of a "Request for opinion" by Paul Gallegos.
Evidence will show that this "Trust Fund" will serve to further the actions and agenda of Gallegos' campaign backers and contributors who have been involved in a decade or more long effort to destroy Pacific Lumber Company. With this District Attorney now acting on their behalf, and at their behest, this long-standing agenda will be fulfilled.
To compare this case to Borland is deceptive and inadequate.
III. SOLICITATION: In paragraph 2 of the request before you, it is stated that "we anticipate that some members of the public will be making gifts earmarked for the district attorney to use in the prosecution of particular cases, including both criminal actions and Unfair Competition Law civil actions"
This statement is deceptive, designed to hide the fact the the District Attorney and his Assistant District Attorney, with the assistance of Gallegos' campaign backers, plan to SOLICIT these "gifts" (call it what it is, special interest money) to fund ONE case, and one case only, not, as they imply "particular cases," plural. From paragraph 3 Pg 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo "...It is concluded that the District Attorney of Humboldt County may lawfully accept contributions for the public purpose of budget supplementation to proceed with the PL lawsuit."
What's more, the District Attorney (the chief law enforcement officer of Humboldt County) intends to go out of his way to solicit these "gifts" by placing "full page ads in the Los Angeles Times and San Francisco Chronicle."
(Note that while the cost of a full page ad in the Los Angeles Times, at open rate is $103,200.00. ($800.00 per inch) $129,000.00 if the ad runs on Sunday ($1,000.00 per inch) and the cost of a full page ad in the San Francisco Chronicle, at open rate is $73,788.00. ($572.00 per inch) $77,529.00 if the ad runs on Sunday ($601.00 per inch), the cost of an ad in the local paper, The Times Standard is $30.50 per inch, or $3,934.50.
But an ad in the local paper would not "attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause." To pretend that "significant monetary donations" would be coming in from members of the "general public" is therefore false and misleading.
IV. UNDUE INFLUENCE: Pg 2 section II paragraph 1 of the request in front of you states "In our situation, it appears there would be even less possibility of undue influence when the financial assistance comes from members of the general public who will not be direct victims in the earmarked case." (Note that this remark appears to have abandoned the pretense of several cases benefiting from the "Trust Fund")
What's more, Pg 2 section II paragraph 1 of the request in front of you mentions the test as whether the financial assistance is of "...a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decision making within the influence or control of an interested party..." as being an important part of the question before you.
Again, this is deceptive and seeks to hide the true source and magnitude of the funds Gallegos intends to solicit accept and use. In their own words, (paragraph 4, pg 7 of attachment to Humboldt Co. Interoffice Memo) citing "... a controversial, even hostile local environment and the facts appear to indicate that significant budgetary supplementation will likely come from out of the immediate area."
In fact, though some degree of small "donations" from the "general public" will be solicited and accepted, the intent of this "Trust Fund" is outlined in Salzman's document. The intent is to solicit large "gifts" from "environmentally involved celebrities" such as Woody Harrelson and Bonnie Raitt. The potential also exists for "significant budgetary supplementation" to come from the likes of George Soros, as Gallegos' lead campaign consultant (see Exhibit C, below), besides being intensely involved in anti-Pacific Lumber Company activities for an extended period of time has links to Soros. Salzman's document also mentions "significant budgetary supplementation" to come from outside sources such as "Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Wilderness Society Planning and Conservation League."
Even Salzman's document is deceptive in that it chooses the "respectable" members of the environmental activist community in order to elevate the nature of their intent. Left out are Earth First!, E.P.I.C., Salmon Forever and Humboldt Watershed Council, less respectable, more controversial, and significantly more vested in the ongoing attack on Pacific Lumber Company, and, in at least one case, specifically instrumental in the filing of the specific case in question.
The "financial assistance" or "significant budgetary supplementation" in this case can be expected to run into the millions. And it most definitely is of "a nature and magnitude likely to put the prosecutor's discretionary decision making within the influence or control of an interested party"
Based on the statement that the planned full page ads would be designed to "...attract powerful allies to contribute significantly to the cause." I believe the facts and an investigation will prove that this District Attorney and his Assistant District Attorney are already acting under "undue influence." acting on behalf campaign backers and contributors representing the extreme arm of the environmental activist community - interested parties with a political agenda, who have secured in Paul Gallegos and Tim Stoen a vehicle allowing them to pursue their specific goals.
Specifically, interested parties are represented by Ken Miller of Humboldt Watershed Council, Salmon Forever, and BACH (Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters) who, evidence will show, helped Stoen draft the Pacific Lumber Company lawsuit; Michael Shellenberger of Lumina Strategies, Gallegos' lead campaign consultant, and public relations activist (see exhibit C below for his many a.k.a.'s, links to Earth First!, Salmon Forever, Ken Miller, and Richard Salzman and the "Alliance for Ethical Business").
The extent to which these and other politically motivated special interest groups are involved should be the subject of a full-scale investigation by the Attorney General's Office. The longevity and extent of the ongoing attack on Pacific Lumber Company by these interested parties should be part of this investigation and should be considered when rendering an opinion in this matter.
V. INTERESTED PARTIES: In the Conclusion of the Request before you, the District Attorney stipulates that "... To make sure there could be no possible "interested party" issue, we would propose that such an ordinance prohibit earmarked gifts from any direct competitors of the persons being prosecuted."
In other words, in an attempt to pretend that this office will not be corrupted by these "donations" they will not accept money from other timber companies (The District Attorney sees competitors as "interested parties"), but they are free to solicit "significant budgetary supplementation" from interested parties he chooses not to mention; Earth First! E.P.I.C. Humboldt Watershed Council, Sierra Club, political entities with a political agenda, the very entities who have been hell-bent on destroying the company, and overturning the Headwaters Agreement. These are the "interested parties" which must be considered in the context of this Request and that Gallegos hopes you will not be aware of as you formulate your Opinion.
Do not be deceived. It is not the competitors of Pacific Lumber Company who are to fear, for they are next on the activists' agenda, and allowing this "Trust Fund" to be established will set legal precedent.
To grant this request - or to register an Opinion in the affirmative - has the effect of turning the District Attorney's office over to the special interest groups which have increasingly come to use the Court system as a weapon, through numerous civil lawsuits that they themselves have instigated. Now, they're seeking to add an even more powerful weapon to their arsenal, the ability to use the public prosecutorial system when they are successful in placing their sympathizers in publicly elected positions.
This situation is somewhat unique. At this time, no other industry is under such dedicated and concerted attack as the timber industry. Gallegos' backers have been involved in the ongoing efforts against Pacific Lumber Company as well as Boise Cascade, and other timber interests. Yet other politically motivated activist groups stand waiting in the wings, hoping to see legal precedent set in this case. Groups such as ELF (Earth Liberation Front), ALF, (Animal Liberation Front) and others, probably including many of Michael Shellenberger's groups, Rainforest Action Network for example.
VI. CONFLICT OF INTEREST: A full investigation of the gross conflict of interest between the "Alliance for Ethical Business" and District Attorney Paul Gallegos and Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen is necessary to fully determine the extent of corruption this request represents. Specifically, examining the money trail between the "Alliance for Ethical Business" and Public Relations activist/lead campaign consultant Michael Shellenberger and his firm Lumina Strategies, and the many entities he manages and under which he co-exists, and the relationship with Gallegos and Stoen should be very revealing. (see exhibit B and C below)
VII. IN CLOSING: While there is no doubt that a Board of Supervisors can establish a Trust Fund to allow people to contribute funds to build a neighborhood playground, or improve a road, for example, there can also be no doubt that this Request cannot and should not be equated with that.
Nor should the Board of Supervisors be put in a position whereby they are forced to allow Gallegos to establish this "Trust Fund," when it is designed to contradict and circumvent their expressed wishes.
Paul Gallegos stated numerous times in the course of the recent 'Recall Paul' campaign that the District Attorney's office belongs to the people, and that the District Attorney's office is not for sale - in fact, the memo below, the request before you, and the facts indicate that he does not understand what those statements mean - and does not care.
The District Attorney's Office must treat all people, and all entities equally. If this request is approved, and this "Trust Fund" is established there will no longer be equitable treatment for all; undue resources and energy will be spent on one case above all others. This "Trust Fund" violates Equal protection statutes, and should be considered unconstitutional.
Allowing politically motivated activist groups to hijack the public judicial system, using similarly inclined public officials to act on their behalf in pursuit of their political agendas should never be permitted. Allowing a District Attorney to pursue a specific case above all others, funded by special interest groups, in pursuit of fulfillment of campaign backer's political agendas should never be permitted. The detrimental effects on society and on the public judicial system are immeasurable.
I thank you for your time and consideration. I have included supporting documents and relevant supportive information. Hopefully, this will aid you in making your determination, and in your investigations.