On September 16, 2019, in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, DoJ Appellate Attorney Anthony T. Sheehan filed, in Case 19-5127, Doc 1806747 DoJ Motion to Hold Robert A. McNeil in Contempt of Court. This arose from consolidated cases #17-1720 McNeil, et al v Harvey, et al and #17-2602 McNeil, et al v Brown, et al, which we filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in August 2017 and November 2017, respectively. Both cases were assigned to Judge Rudolph Contreras.
Please know that I'm not the least bit concerned about this Motion because it is just another example of the false and misleading documents filed in the D.C. Circuit Court by DoJ appellate attorney Anthony T. Sheehan.
The underlying issue is this.
In 17-1720, we sued two District Court judges (Christopher R. Cooper and Dale A. Drozd) and one Magistrate judge (G. Michael Harvey). In 17-2602, we sued one Appeals Court judge (Janice Brown). All were sued in personal capacity, seeking declaratory judgement involving a number of issues listed in the complaints. All four Defendant judges failed to respond to their Summonses within 60 days, as required, and, therefore, defaulted. After they defaulted, Judge Contreras, unlawfully solicited the Department of Justice to represent the Defendants. Shortly thereafter, a DoJ attorney (James Yu) was assigned to do so and filed a motion compelling us to stop mailing our pleadings to the home addresses of the judges and, instead, mail them ONLY to DoJ counsel.
[NOTE: With your generous donations, we hired Same Day Process, in Washington, D.C. to serve the judges. The process server attempted to serve the judges at their offices in the courthouse, but, U.S. Marshals turned him away and told him not to return.]
We challenged Judge Contreras' unlawful solicitation of counsel on the grounds that 28 C.F.R. 50.15 requires a government employee sued in personal capacity to submit an application to the Administrative Office of the United States Courts (AOUSC) justifying appointment of DoJ counsel. In fact, we filed a discovery motion to compel the Defendants to provide copies of their applications, which Mr. Yu opposed, and Judge Contreras denied.
So, in July 2018, we filed suit against the AOUSC seeking copies of the applications. See case #18-1746. DoJ Tax Division Trial Attorney Megan E. Hoffman-Logsdon was assigned to the case. This suit is still pending, and Judge Tanya Chutkan has not moved since December 2018. Until that case is resolved, we continue to mail our pleadings to the Defendant judges' homes, much to their consternation. Some even claim they feel "harassed" and "threatened" by the mailings. The bottom line is this. We have reason to believe, and do believe, that the Defendant judges never submitted applications requesting counsel, therefore violating 28 C.F.R. 50.15. Because of this, we have continued to mail pleadings to the judges' homes, as well as to Mr. Yu, even though we don't recognize him as duly authorized counsel.
In June 2019, DoJ attorney Sheehan filed Doc 1791148 DoJ Motion to Require Appellants to Serve in This Appeal Only the Lead Appellate Counsel.
And, on August 23, 2019, a three-judge appellate panel issued Doc 1803472 USCA Per Curiam Order Requiring Appellants to Serve Only Counsel for Appellees.
Of course, with case 18-1746 unresolved, the Appeals Court Order was premature, so, when we filed our next set of pleadings, we continued to mail copies of the pleadings to the Defendant judges' homes. (See Doc 1806210 Appellants' Motion for Appointment of Assistance of Counsel and Doc 1806221 Appellants' Notice of SC Filing of Application to Stay and Remove 19-5127 from DC Circuit, both filed on September 10, 2019.
Shortly thereafter, on September 16, 2019, Mr. Sheehan filed Doc 1806747 DoJ Motion to Hold Robert A. McNeil in Contempt of Court.
With that Motion not ruled upon by the Court, on September 23, 2019, we filed our next pleading (Doc 1807925 Appellants' Motion for Summary Reversal and Application for Assistance of Counsel), again mailing copies to the Defendant judges' homes.
In response, on September 26, 2019, Mr. Sheehan filed Doc 1808167 DoJ Motion to Strike Appellants' Motion for Summary Reversal. In that document, he states "This action by McNeil indicates that he will continue to disobey this Court’s order and will continue to harass the defendant judges unless there are consequences for his disobedience."
On September 30, 2019, we filed Doc 1809097 Appellants' Motion to Strike Unauthorized Sheehan Filings, Terminate Sheehan, and Appoint Counsel.
Then, on October 4, 2019, in response to our September 30, 2019 motion, Mr. Sheehan filed Doc 1809418 DoJ Motion to Strike Appellants' Motion to Strike Unauthorized Sheehan Filings.
Finally, on October 9, 2019, we filed Doc 1810315 Appellants' Opposition to Unauthorized Sheehan Motion to Strike Appellants' Motion for Summary Reversal. Our position is now, and always will be this: Until the DoJ produces the four judges’ applications to the AOUSC, along with subsequent approvals, for representation to be provided by Government attorneys, we will continue to claim that DoJ attorney Anthony Sheehan is unauthorized to serve as counsel for the Defendant judges, and is in violation of 28 CFR 50.15.
As of this date, the Court has been mute. But, no matter what it rules, rest assured, we will challenge it.
Stay tuned.