Voters fear ongoing negligence in Charlotte Family Court may have cost Adam Bennett his life
-Blog comments are silenced by Charlotte Observer-
A brief history:
An organized group of highly concerned and influential Charlotte voters who follow the ongoing disturbing patterns of purported judicial misconduct in the Charlotte Family Court System are worried and outraged at the number of deaths that are linked to contentious litigation and perceived chronic judicial negligence. The problem is so bad that multiple concerned voters (AKA "Disgruntled Litigants" a term coined by The Charlotte Observer), have documented the disturbing patterns with blog articles and even mockumentary-style videos depicting incriminating behaviors of who is believed to be two District Court Judges, Lisa Bell and Rebecca (Becky) Tin. Incidences of corruption and attorney favortism are the key complaints in the tounge-in-cheek videos seen here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DENMPdtgY7M and here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp5zPBWsy0Y&feature=related
Also of great concern is the lack of media attention surrounding these suspicious deaths, and the recent mishandling of an incident occurring at an AME Zion Church political meet and greet. The deaths of Sonia Long http://oncrime.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=print&thread=13, Adam Bennett, Christa Chidester and Sarah Higginshttp://www.wsoctv.com/news/15017367/detail.html are all connected to the Charlotte Family Court system and involve cases where ruling judges are repeatedly perceived and alleged to have failed to heed the concerns of "disgruntled" litigants while the courts repeately and negligently failed to protect them and their children either in an already existing dangerous situation, or, creating and fueling an entirely new one by enabling, accommodating and encouraging malicious prosecution in the courtroom with prefferred lawyers, who are campaign funders, and failing to recuse themselves in a direct conflict of interest.
Christa Chidester's case is most disturbing because The Charlotte Observer has deep-sixed all coverage. They broke the story, but have seemingly removed it from the archives. JMD attorney Jonathan Feit was attorney of record for Marke Chidester who opposed Christa Chidester and her daughter Sarah Higgins. Questions remain as to how petite and devoted mother could go through with a murder suicide, and manage to physically overcome a 9 year old. Suspicions have risen in regard to the true nature of Chidester's and Higgin's death, due to the lack of coverage and possible cover-up of media, namely The Charlotte Observer who broke the story.
The original news piece is not in the archives, a strange anomaly in such a high profile case.
The Charlotte Observer reported that family court Judge Lisa Bell exited the meeting after a clash over a highly controversial court ruling she upheld, which is purported to have directly or indirectly influenced the health and safety of a disgruntled litigant's child, who is now dead due to an improperly treated medical illness. Observer readers commenting on the incident were shut down from blogging comments and important questions such as "Who will die next?" in reference to the disturbing number of deaths perceived by many to be directly associated with ongoing bad rulings in the Charlotte Family Court involving a select group of Judges including Lisa Bell, Becky Tin and lawyers from the James, McElroy and Diehl or JMD law firm, long-time political contributors to both judges.http://www.judgelisabell.com/Judge_Lisa_Bell/Supporters.html
Another landmark case involving Jonathan Feit and Judge Tin is the case of Lisa Pennington, who lost all parental and maternal rights with custody of her two young boys. Lisa is a highly regarded PhD Child Psychologist who works with leading hospitals, and consults on many court cases, but her own rights were terminated because she believed her sons when they told her they were being abused. A gag order was issued by Judge Tin, and Lisa fought it. Her rights were revoked completely and she has absolutely no contact with her children. http://rightsformothers.com/2010/08/16/north-carolina-family-courts-you-will-never-find-a-more-wretched-hive-of-scum-and-villainy/
The highly disturbing case of Angelique Landry also involves Jonathan Feit of JMD.
Disgruntled readers are suspicious of the ongoing censorship practiced by The Charlotte Observer regarding coverage of issues relating the Charlotte District Court.
JMD partner William K. Deihl is known to have participated in brokering a covert deal with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg County Sherriff's Department and the Mecklenburg County Bar Association for supplying and administering special courthouse access cards, allowing cardholders to enter the court house through restricted judiciary hallways closed to the public and to attorneys. This new access puts card-carrying attorneys in hallways with robed judges while court is in session proving ample opportunity for forbidden ex-parte communication. No coverage by the Charlotte Observer is available on this topic. See Link: http://www.meckbar.org/newsevents/news_detail.cfm?cont_id=6806
The Mecklenburg County Bar Courthouse Liasion Committee published the following:
During the construction of the new Mecklenburg County Courthouse, a committee was formed to determine the issue of lawyer access toprivate corridors behind the courtrooms in the newfacility. This Court Security Committee wascomposed of Senior Resident Superior Court JudgeRobert Johnston, Chief District Court Judge FritzMercer, District Attorney Peter Gilchrist, TrialCourt Administrator Todd Nuccio, Clerk of CourtMartha Curran, County Commissioner ChairJennifer Roberts, and Sheriff Jim Pendergraph.Initially, it decided that Mecklenburg Countylawyers should not be given special access into or within the new courthouse. In effect, lawyers were not to have any greater or easier access in the courthouse than the general public. Luckily, this decision was just a preliminary one, to remain inplace only during the first four months of the new courthouse operation. Nevertheless, concern arose among the lawyers that this initial “no” could become the policy long term and that lawyers would never be treated any differently than the general public. This presented a number of problems; for alot of lawyers, the courthouse is where the majority of their work is done.In response to that concern, the MecklenburgCounty Bar (MCB) formed the Courthouse Access Committee. Our job was to convince the Court Security Committee that Mecklenburg County lawyers were entitled to special access into and within the courthouse and that lawyers could be given that special access while the courthouse still maintained appropriate security and operated without unnecessary interruptions.Our Committee did its job and did it well. As a result, Mecklenburg County lawyers were granted special access into and within the new courthouse.Over 900 access cards have been applied for or already issued. Now, our attorneys have access to the new courthouse through the shorter employees’ security line and have cards that provide us withelectronic access to the hallways and offices behind most of the courtrooms. Contact with judges, sheriffs, and court officials is much easier now.Our jobs and work within the courthouse can be more efficient. Special thanks go to Nelson Casstevens, Bill Diehl, Ron Gibson, Ed Hinson, Mitchell Kelling,Tony Lathrop, Ray Owens, Eben Rawls, Tony Scheer, and John Wester of our Bar’s Courthouse Access Subcommittee (now a subcommittee of the Courthouse Liaison Committee). Special thanks also goes to the Court Security Committee for its time and thoughtful deliberations.We are fortunate to have these access cards. Remember that having these cards is a privilege, not a right. Honor the access card, use it properly, and, at all times, be civil and courteous in our court house facility.
While under the care of his mother Sherry Bennett, Adam was under strict medical supervision by world class medical specialists at Duke University, who were treating him for what was believed to be Multiple Sclerosis, which is rare in young persons. According to Bennett family sources, JMD attorney Jonathan Feit who represented Duane Bennet-Adam's father, in a highly contested divorce and custody case, and who was also investigated for bribing a political official documented in Creative Loafing article "Sex, Lies and Technicalities"Link:http://charlotte.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/sex_bribes_and_technicalities/Content?oid=29581 by Tara Servatius, had successfully de-bunked Duke University Medical Doctor's diagnosis and treatment protocols, and had them replaced with his client's dubious "kitchen" protocol seen here: http://www.mscures.com
Neither Mr. Feit nor Mr. Bennett are medical doctors, yet it seems that Judge Lisa Bell, who is not a medical doctor either chose to override Duke University doctor's orders by handing Adam over to his father's kitchen protocol care and removing parenting rights from disgruntled litigant Mrs. Bennett, and forbade treatment from Duke University, or somehow gravely undermined and compromised Adam's safety by her ruling. Now, Adam Bennet is dead. He was twenty years old.
Mrs. Bennett, clearly grieving and disgruntled by the tragic and unnecessary loss of her precious son is seeking closure. A meet and greet in an open political forum provides an excellent opportunity to ask serious and important questions to incumbent candidates who are asking for the public's trust and tax dollars.
In a repeat reaction, reminiscent of another forum where Lisa Bell temperamentally indicated distress because another disgruntled litigant named Danita Mitchell was "staring at her" during testimony at Judicial Standards Committee hearing in Raleigh, where she "felt threatened" by then colleague and former Judge Bill Belk during what is affectionately known as "THALHEIMERGATE" http://domesticjustice.blogspot.com/2009/10/continuing-legal-educational-saga-for.html, whom she reported and had removed by the Judicial Standards Committee for raising his voice in disagreement with her, and for failing to resign from the Board of Sonic Automotive. Lisa likes drama, it seems.
During that case Judge Bell ordered the bailiff to remove Belk supporter, Ms. Mitchell from the courtroom, and the bailiff denied her request citing that Ms. Mitchell had done nothing wrong because staring was enforceable. In fact, many people in the room were staring at her due to the strange waste of taxpayer money the frivolous hearings were costing them. Days later, Ms. Mitchell was arrested and held in prison for 90 days, without bond, and without charges.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/24061117/2009-12-07-STATE-of-NC-v-DANITA-MITCHELL-Affidavit-of-Angelique-Landry-4-Pgs-With-Exhibit-a-4-Pgs-8-Pgs-Total
and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0Mcp1qb1bY
Judge Bell is commonly regarded for her confidence, assertiveness and tenatious committment to her own convinctions, no matter how ill-informed or misguided. She is also well known for being spoiled, demanding, skittish and teary at times as documented in the comedic videos circulating the web. Perhaps she has sufferred trauma in her life, and has a certain hyper-sensitivity. No one knows for sure. Voters claim to have repeatedly witnessed an unwillingness for her to address the sincere concern of her constituency, particularly in grave circumstances such as Ms. Bennett's tragic loss of her son.
It would have been the decent thing to do for Judge Bell to graciously take questions from Mrs. Bennett and offer a private audience with her regarding the ruling and its resulting tragedy.
Charlotte voters are worried. They are counting the deaths in family court, now numbered at 4 since 2008.
see article here:
Judge Bell exits forum after clash over family court ruling
Police are summoned after woman confronts chief district court judge over family court ruling.
- Hollingsworth
- Bell
Mecklenburg Chief District Court Judge Lisa Bell left a political candidates' forum under police protection after a heated confrontation Thursday night with a woman who said she was upset about a family court ruling Bell made years ago.
The confrontation happened about 6:30 p.m. at a reception before the NAACP-sponsored forum at Little Rock AME Zion Church uptown - and Bell's departure drew criticism from her opponent.
As 50 or so people mingled with the candidates for judgeships and district attorney, Sharon Bennett walked up to Bell waving a photo of her son, Adam, who died last year in China at age 20.
Bennett says she simply asked the judge questions about a ruling she'd made in a case involving Bennett's family. Bell says Bennett accused her of killing Adam.
After the two had words, Bell walked away and asked NAACP officials to remove Bennett from the event.
"I'm not going to come to events and continue to be attacked," Bell told organizers in a hallway at the church. "I want security, and I want it now."
Bell walked out to the parking lot and waited outside while organizers escorted Bennett to a meeting room. Within minutes, two Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officers arrived.
One of Bell's campaign staffers told the officers that the judge wasn't physically attacked, but that a verbal confrontation had escalated to a point where Bell felt threatened.
Organizers asked Bell to stay. They told her they could make sure Bennett remained quiet during the forum, but that they wouldn't bar any member of the public from the event.
"This is supposed to be a forum to learn about candidates, and it has turned into a circus," Bell told them, standing among a half-dozen people. "I'm not staying. I've just been accused of killing a child."
She asked the two officers to walk her to her car.
"I am shaking right now," Bell said.
The officers suggested she take a few minutes to calm down before driving, and Bell stood outside with campaign staff and reporters.
Bell's opponent, Charlotte lawyer Twyla Hollingsworth, questioned Bell's resolve after the judge left the forum.
"I think Mecklenburg County needs a judge who's strong, who's not gonna cry or storm out when someone asks a question," Hollingsworth said.
It was the second time in a week Bell has been accosted by angry litigants at a political forum, according to Bell and people who attended Saturday's Black Political Caucus meeting.
Bennett is one of a number of litigants who have accused family court judges of bias in certain bitter custody disputes. They have accused Bell and other judges of inappropriate connections with some lawyers.
Bell and Judge Becky Tin, another judge under fire, have vehemently denied any bias or wrongdoing.
Last month, the Observer detailed ongoing controversies in family court, including litigants' efforts to fight back against judges.
Judge Bell has come under fire partly because of her contentious relationship with former District Judge Bill Belk. He resigned last year and was banned from the bench in April after the N.C. Supreme Court ruled he'd violated the judicial code by serving on a paid board of directors while he was a judge.
An ethics investigation found that Belk had an angry confrontation with Bell. He called her a "political hack," the investigation found, and claimed that her appointment as chief had been "bought and paid for" so she could "screw him over."
Also attending Thursday's forum were other litigants - including Lisa Pennington and Natalie Bingham - who have widely criticized local judges for their domestic rulings.
Some litigants have sought to recruit candidates to run against judges they dislike.
In February, just two days before Mecklenburg's filing deadline, Pennington's sister, Rhonda Patt, sent a text message to Hollingsworth asking her to run.
"We r looking for candidates to run for district court judge against becy tin and lisa bell...," the messages said. "We have ... a bank account full of donations but need a candidate by tomorrow. Would u have any interest in running?" On the last day of filing, Hollingsworth signed up to run in November against Judge Bell.
Hollingsworth, who attended Thursday's forum, won't discuss the text message but her campaign has said it had nothing to do with her candidacy.
Patt acknowledges she sent a text to Hollingsworth but couldn't recall the details. If she wrote about a bank account full of donations, she said, she only meant that many people were willing to donate.
On Thursday, Hollingsworth said she's running because of injustices in the court system and a tendency of some judges to rule based on factors outside the evidence or the law. She chose Bell to run against because she's the chief judge and change is most likely if Bell is unseated.
She said she's heard the rumors that she's running as a revenge candidate and may be connected to Belk.
"I know there's talk of me being a 'warm body,'" Hollingsworth said. "I don't know Bill Belk, I've never met him. If the man walked into a room, I wouldn't know who he is."
The confrontation happened about 6:30 p.m. at a reception before the NAACP-sponsored forum at Little Rock AME Zion Church uptown - and Bell's departure drew criticism from her opponent.
As 50 or so people mingled with the candidates for judgeships and district attorney, Sharon Bennett walked up to Bell waving a photo of her son, Adam, who died last year in China at age 20.
Bennett says she simply asked the judge questions about a ruling she'd made in a case involving Bennett's family. Bell says Bennett accused her of killing Adam.
After the two had words, Bell walked away and asked NAACP officials to remove Bennett from the event.
"I'm not going to come to events and continue to be attacked," Bell told organizers in a hallway at the church. "I want security, and I want it now."
Bell walked out to the parking lot and waited outside while organizers escorted Bennett to a meeting room. Within minutes, two Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officers arrived.
One of Bell's campaign staffers told the officers that the judge wasn't physically attacked, but that a verbal confrontation had escalated to a point where Bell felt threatened.
Organizers asked Bell to stay. They told her they could make sure Bennett remained quiet during the forum, but that they wouldn't bar any member of the public from the event.
"This is supposed to be a forum to learn about candidates, and it has turned into a circus," Bell told them, standing among a half-dozen people. "I'm not staying. I've just been accused of killing a child."
She asked the two officers to walk her to her car.
"I am shaking right now," Bell said.
The officers suggested she take a few minutes to calm down before driving, and Bell stood outside with campaign staff and reporters.
Bell's opponent, Charlotte lawyer Twyla Hollingsworth, questioned Bell's resolve after the judge left the forum.
"I think Mecklenburg County needs a judge who's strong, who's not gonna cry or storm out when someone asks a question," Hollingsworth said.
It was the second time in a week Bell has been accosted by angry litigants at a political forum, according to Bell and people who attended Saturday's Black Political Caucus meeting.
Bennett is one of a number of litigants who have accused family court judges of bias in certain bitter custody disputes. They have accused Bell and other judges of inappropriate connections with some lawyers.
Bell and Judge Becky Tin, another judge under fire, have vehemently denied any bias or wrongdoing.
Last month, the Observer detailed ongoing controversies in family court, including litigants' efforts to fight back against judges.
Judge Bell has come under fire partly because of her contentious relationship with former District Judge Bill Belk. He resigned last year and was banned from the bench in April after the N.C. Supreme Court ruled he'd violated the judicial code by serving on a paid board of directors while he was a judge.
An ethics investigation found that Belk had an angry confrontation with Bell. He called her a "political hack," the investigation found, and claimed that her appointment as chief had been "bought and paid for" so she could "screw him over."
Also attending Thursday's forum were other litigants - including Lisa Pennington and Natalie Bingham - who have widely criticized local judges for their domestic rulings.
Some litigants have sought to recruit candidates to run against judges they dislike.
In February, just two days before Mecklenburg's filing deadline, Pennington's sister, Rhonda Patt, sent a text message to Hollingsworth asking her to run.
"We r looking for candidates to run for district court judge against becy tin and lisa bell...," the messages said. "We have ... a bank account full of donations but need a candidate by tomorrow. Would u have any interest in running?" On the last day of filing, Hollingsworth signed up to run in November against Judge Bell.
Hollingsworth, who attended Thursday's forum, won't discuss the text message but her campaign has said it had nothing to do with her candidacy.
Patt acknowledges she sent a text to Hollingsworth but couldn't recall the details. If she wrote about a bank account full of donations, she said, she only meant that many people were willing to donate.
On Thursday, Hollingsworth said she's running because of injustices in the court system and a tendency of some judges to rule based on factors outside the evidence or the law. She chose Bell to run against because she's the chief judge and change is most likely if Bell is unseated.
She said she's heard the rumors that she's running as a revenge candidate and may be connected to Belk.
"I know there's talk of me being a 'warm body,'" Hollingsworth said. "I don't know Bill Belk, I've never met him. If the man walked into a room, I wouldn't know who he is."
Read more: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2010/09/17/1698162/judge-exits-forum-after-clash.html#ixzz0znFtr1om
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