Clarence Thomas corruption

[Loren Pechtel]

Maybe for some ordinary Joe, this could just be dismissed as sloppy paperwork.

I don't think it's particularly constructive to go after someone if something ethically questionable happened once.

However, it appears a very clear pattern of impropriety is happening with regards to Thomas. Sustained over many years. Not good.

But something something whatabout Pelosi, I guess.

This. People overlook things. When people quit doing something they should be doing that's almost certainly deliberate. (And if it's not it's a pretty good indication that he's no longer with it enough to be on the bench.)

 

[Copernicus]

Maybe for some ordinary Joe, this could just be dismissed as sloppy paperwork.

I don't think it's particularly constructive to go after someone if something ethically questionable happened once.

However, it appears a very clear pattern of impropriety is happening with regards to Thomas. Sustained over many years. Not good.

But something something whatabout Pelosi, I guess.

This. People overlook things. When people quit doing something they should be doing that's almost certainly deliberate. (And if it's not it's a pretty good indication that he's no longer with it enough to be on the bench.)

That's true in principle, but Patooka's point is that this comes amidst a whole slew of information about Thomas's dealings with Crow, so it doesn't look at all like just sloppy paperwork. My point was that Thomas's power and position make this a far more serious lapse than if it were someone who had just been careless. Thomas is a Supreme Court justice who is supposed to have superior skills in the ethics and law departments than an ordinary Joe. He seemed to have a better grasp of his ethical responsibilities before the gifts got really lavish. Initially, he made an effort to comply with the disclosure rules.

 

[marc]

Well gee, ain't that a coincidence

 

[ZiprHead]

Jane Roberts, who is married to Chief Justice John Roberts, made $10.3 million in commissions from elite law firms, whistleblower documents show

New documents reveal Jane Roberts made $10.3 million from elite firms, raising questions about the Supreme Court justices' conflicts of interest.

news.yahoo.com

Two years after John Roberts' confirmation as the Supreme Court's chief justice in 2005, his wife, Jane Sullivan Roberts, made a pivot. After a long and distinguished career as a lawyer, she refashioned herself as a legal recruiter, a matchmaker who pairs job-hunting lawyers up with corporations and firms.

Roberts told a friend that the change was motivated by a desire to avoid the appearance of conflicts of interest, given that her husband was now the highest-ranking judge in the country. "There are many paths to the good life," she said. "There are so many things to do if you're open to change and opportunity."

And life was indeed good for the Robertses, at least for the years 2007 to 2014. During that eight-year stretch, according to internal records from her employer, Jane Roberts generated a whopping $10.3 million in commissions, paid out by corporations and law firms for placing high-dollar lawyers with them.

That eye-popping figure comes from records in a whistleblower complaint filed by a disgruntled former colleague of Roberts, who says that as the spouse of the most powerful judge in the United States, the income she earns from law firms who practice before the Court should be subject to public scrutiny.

 

[ZiprHead]

Sam Alito Says Criticism of Supreme Court Is 'Unfair': 'Practically Nobody Is Defending Us'

"We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in some of these instances," the justice complained to the

jezebel.com

Justice Samuel Alito would like everyone to know that in the wake of the Supreme Court revoking 50 years of abortion rights and then being plagued by corruption scandal after corruption scandal, our criticism of him and his institution is very much hurting his feelings.


Alito told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published Friday that attacks on the “legitimacy” of the high court are “new during [his] lifetime.”

“We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in a lot of instances. And nobody, practically nobody, is defending us,” he said. “The idea has always been that judges are not supposed to respond to criticisms, but if the courts are being unfairly attacked, the organized bar will come to their defense.” But “if anything,” the justice continued, “they’ve participated to some degree in these attacks.”

Let’s briefly roll through some of the Supreme Court ethics scandals that have surfaced just in the past two weeks: Clarence Thomas, whose wife Ginni tried to overturn a presidential election, is being financed by a billionaire GOP megadonor who literally collects Hitler memorabilia and has a garden full of dictator statues (oh, and who doesn’t charge Thomas’ mother rent). Neil Gorsuch, who discloses gifts as small as cowboy boots and a fishing rod, did not disclose that he sold a 40-acre Colorado property he co-owned to the CEO of a law firm that often argues cases before the court. And Insider reported Friday that Chief Justice John Roberts’ wife, Jane, was paid 10.3 million in commissions from “elite law firms” that, of course, also had business before the court.

Somebody get that man a kitten, STAT!

 

[Jarhyn]

Sam Alito Says Criticism of Supreme Court Is 'Unfair': 'Practically Nobody Is Defending Us'

"We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in some of these instances," the justice complained to the

jezebel.com

Justice Samuel Alito would like everyone to know that in the wake of the Supreme Court revoking 50 years of abortion rights and then being plagued by corruption scandal after corruption scandal, our criticism of him and his institution is very much hurting his feelings.


Alito told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published Friday that attacks on the “legitimacy” of the high court are “new during [his] lifetime.”

“We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in a lot of instances. And nobody, practically nobody, is defending us,” he said. “The idea has always been that judges are not supposed to respond to criticisms, but if the courts are being unfairly attacked, the organized bar will come to their defense.” But “if anything,” the justice continued, “they’ve participated to some degree in these attacks.”

Let’s briefly roll through some of the Supreme Court ethics scandals that have surfaced just in the past two weeks: Clarence Thomas, whose wife Ginni tried to overturn a presidential election, is being financed by a billionaire GOP megadonor who literally collects Hitler memorabilia and has a garden full of dictator statues (oh, and who doesn’t charge Thomas’ mother rent). Neil Gorsuch, who discloses gifts as small as cowboy boots and a fishing rod, did not disclose that he sold a 40-acre Colorado property he co-owned to the CEO of a law firm that often argues cases before the court. And Insider reported Friday that Chief Justice John Roberts’ wife, Jane, was paid 10.3 million in commissions from “elite law firms” that, of course, also had business before the court.

Somebody get that man a kitten, STAT!

I would prefer someone gave him a subpoena, instead, but a kitten is a good start I suppose

 

[Elixir]

Is he brain dead or just thinks everyone else is?

”The Court’s reputation is in the dumper because people say bad things about us!”

How about just a TINY bit of introspection, Sam? Why the FUCK do you think they say bad things about you? Maybe they don’t like what you do?

 

[Elixir]

of course these are not political gifts, just friends hanging out on trips that would cost millions to charter.

You misspelled “bribes”.

 

[laughing dog]

Sam Alito Says Criticism of Supreme Court Is 'Unfair': 'Practically Nobody Is Defending Us'

"We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in some of these instances," the justice complained to the

jezebel.com

Justice Samuel Alito would like everyone to know that in the wake of the Supreme Court revoking 50 years of abortion rights and then being plagued by corruption scandal after corruption scandal, our criticism of him and his institution is very much hurting his feelings.


Alito told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published Friday that attacks on the “legitimacy” of the high court are “new during [his] lifetime.”

“We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in a lot of instances. And nobody, practically nobody, is defending us,” he said. “The idea has always been that judges are not supposed to respond to criticisms, but if the courts are being unfairly attacked, the organized bar will come to their defense.” But “if anything,” the justice continued, “they’ve participated to some degree in these attacks.”

Let’s briefly roll through some of the Supreme Court ethics scandals that have surfaced just in the past two weeks: Clarence Thomas, whose wife Ginni tried to overturn a presidential election, is being financed by a billionaire GOP megadonor who literally collects Hitler memorabilia and has a garden full of dictator statues (oh, and who doesn’t charge Thomas’ mother rent). Neil Gorsuch, who discloses gifts as small as cowboy boots and a fishing rod, did not disclose that he sold a 40-acre Colorado property he co-owned to the CEO of a law firm that often argues cases before the court. And Insider reported Friday that Chief Justice John Roberts’ wife, Jane, was paid 10.3 million in commissions from “elite law firms” that, of course, also had business before the court.

Somebody get that man a kitten, STAT!

Justice Alito has the power to ameliorate the criticism that is so hurtful. Either come up with better reasoned opinions (especially when overturning precedents) or resign.

 

[Jarhyn]

Sam Alito Says Criticism of Supreme Court Is 'Unfair': 'Practically Nobody Is Defending Us'

"We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in some of these instances," the justice complained to the

jezebel.com

Justice Samuel Alito would like everyone to know that in the wake of the Supreme Court revoking 50 years of abortion rights and then being plagued by corruption scandal after corruption scandal, our criticism of him and his institution is very much hurting his feelings.


Alito told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published Friday that attacks on the “legitimacy” of the high court are “new during [his] lifetime.”

“We are being hammered daily, and I think quite unfairly in a lot of instances. And nobody, practically nobody, is defending us,” he said. “The idea has always been that judges are not supposed to respond to criticisms, but if the courts are being unfairly attacked, the organized bar will come to their defense.” But “if anything,” the justice continued, “they’ve participated to some degree in these attacks.”

Let’s briefly roll through some of the Supreme Court ethics scandals that have surfaced just in the past two weeks: Clarence Thomas, whose wife Ginni tried to overturn a presidential election, is being financed by a billionaire GOP megadonor who literally collects Hitler memorabilia and has a garden full of dictator statues (oh, and who doesn’t charge Thomas’ mother rent). Neil Gorsuch, who discloses gifts as small as cowboy boots and a fishing rod, did not disclose that he sold a 40-acre Colorado property he co-owned to the CEO of a law firm that often argues cases before the court. And Insider reported Friday that Chief Justice John Roberts’ wife, Jane, was paid 10.3 million in commissions from “elite law firms” that, of course, also had business before the court.

Somebody get that man a kitten, STAT!

Justice Alito has the power to ameliorate the criticism that is so hurtful. Either come up with better reasoned opinions (especially when overturning precedents) or resign.

But then how else would he live outside his means as a SCOTUS judge?

 

[lpetrich]

Billionaire Harlan Crow Bought Citizenship in Island Tax Haven - "Leaked documents reveal the GOP megadonor held dual citizenship in St. Kitts and Nevis as he lavished the Supreme Court justice with gifts."

St. Kitts and Nevis are two Caribbean islands that are part of one nation, though a very small one.

In 2012, Crow and his family were granted passports for St. Kitts and Nevis, a tax haven known for impenetrable financial secrecy, through a cash-for-citizenship scheme. Documents provided to the Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation by a whistleblower as part of its Passport Papers investigation and reviewed by the Project on Government Oversight, or POGO, and The Intercept suggest Crow and his brother Trammell S. Crow paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the passports. Financial transparency experts say the island’s tax regime would make tracking Crow’s assets, including gifts to Supreme Court justices, extremely difficult.

The documents were leaked from Henley and Partners, a London-based firm known for assisting the ultra-wealthy in obtaining “golden passports,” which allow the holders to shield assets from their home country’s tax authorities.

...
Even among tax havens, St. Kitts and Nevis is considered high risk by regulators, once even appearing on a Financial Stability Forum list of countries that were “non-cooperative” with global efforts to fight money laundering and financial crime. In 2018, the European Union moved the nation to a list of “non-cooperative jurisdictions,” citing its “harmful preferential tax regime.” A 2018 investigation in The Guardian dubbed it “the world’s most secretive offshore haven.” Even when tens of thousands of St. Kitts and Nevis business documents appeared in the “Paradise Papers” leak, company ownership was still hidden because the jurisdiction keeps so little information filed.

“International business tycoons and politicians, who have looted the assets of their nations — and other high wealth individuals — have used the dubious network of offshore tax havens across the world, which includes St. Kitts and Nevis, to hide their assets and income,” said Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., ranking member of the House Judiciary subcommittee overseeing courts.

...
Crow oversees several financial entities in another small Caribbean island nation also known for its tax avoidance policies. Three investment funds belonging to Crow Holdings — the real estate conglomerate on which Crow serves as chair — are located in the Cayman Islands, according to the IRS’s foreign financial institution list. One of the entities is an offshore feeder fund, a type of foreign investment fund that shields investors from certain domestic taxes. (A company founded by Crow’s late father, Trammell Crow, also lists a subsidiary in the Cayman Islands.)

 Saint Kitts and Nevis

• St. Kitts: length 29 km (18 mi), width 8 km (5 mi), area 174 km^2 (67 sq mi)
• Nevis: area 93 km^2 (36 sq mi)

 Cayman Islands

• Grand Cayman: length 35 km (22 mi), width 13 km (8 mi), area: 196 km^2 (76 sq mi)
• Cayman Brac: length 19 km (12 mi). width 2 km (1.2 mi)
• Little Cayman: length 16 km (10 mi), width 1.6 km (1 mi)

 

[blastula]

Clarence Thomas Had a Child in Private School. Harlan Crow Paid the Tuition.

Crow paid for private school for a relative Thomas said he was raising “as a son.” “This is way outside the norm,” said a former White House ethics lawyer.

www.propublica.org

In 2008, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas decided to send his teenage grandnephew to Hidden Lake Academy, a private boarding school in the foothills of northern Georgia. The boy, Mark Martin, was far from home. For the previous decade, he had lived with the justice and his wife in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Thomas had taken legal custody of Martin when he was 6 years old and had recently told an interviewer he was “raising him as a son.”

Tuition at the boarding school ran more than $6,000 a month. But Thomas did not cover the bill. A bank statement for the school from July 2009, buried in unrelated court filings, shows the source of Martin’s tuition payment for that month: the company of billionaire real estate magnate Harlan Crow.

The payments extended beyond that month, according to Christopher Grimwood, a former administrator at the school. Crow paid Martin’s tuition the entire time he was a student there, which was about a year, Grimwood told ProPublica.

Before and after his time at Hidden Lake, Martin attended a second boarding school, Randolph-Macon Academy in Virginia. “Harlan said he was paying for the tuition at Randolph-Macon Academy as well,” Grimwood said, recalling a conversation he had with Crow during a visit to the billionaire’s Adirondacks estate.

Thomas did not report the tuition payments from Crow on his annual financial disclosures. Several years earlier, Thomas disclosed a gift of $5,000 for Martin’s education from another friend. It is not clear why he reported that payment but not Crow’s.

 

[Copernicus]

It looks like Thomas was careful to keep Crow off of his disclosure forms under the pretense that all of his lavish gifts were from a close personal friend and therefore not reportable. That would be his pretextual excuse for taking bribes.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Man, either Thomas is bought off or really good at oral sex.

 

[Ford]

Man, either Thomas is bought off or really good at oral sex.

Well at least now we know why he was silent for so many years on the bench. He had something in his mouth that kept him from speaking.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

No wonder lawyers get excited when he asks them to approach the bench.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Billionaire Harlan Crow Bought Citizenship in Island Tax Haven - "Leaked documents reveal the GOP megadonor held dual citizenship in St. Kitts and Nevis as he lavished the Supreme Court justice with gifts."

St. Kitts and Nevis are two Caribbean islands that are part of one nation, though a very small one.

I wouldn't automatically consider this dirty. At that level of wealth having a backup passport is a form of insurance--and the number of places you can simply buy citizenship is limited. I believe St Kitts is one of the cheaper options.

However, the Republicans have de-facto admitted some of their justices are corrupt:

Conservatives criticize liberal Supreme Court justices for ethics issues

Conservatives are criticizing the liberal Supreme Court justices over ethics issues following the series of reports of the ties between Justice Clarence Thomas and a major Republican donor. T…

thehill.com

When the Republicans go to a they-do-it-also they are effectively admitting it.

 

[Copernicus]

Billionaire Harlan Crow Bought Citizenship in Island Tax Haven - "Leaked documents reveal the GOP megadonor held dual citizenship in St. Kitts and Nevis as he lavished the Supreme Court justice with gifts."

St. Kitts and Nevis are two Caribbean islands that are part of one nation, though a very small one.

I wouldn't automatically consider this dirty. At that level of wealth having a backup passport is a form of insurance--and the number of places you can simply buy citizenship is limited. I believe St Kitts is one of the cheaper options.

Insurance against what? It seems more likely that he purchased the passport in order to leave and enter at will so that he could stash some of his wealth illegally hidden away from the taxman. There might be some less dirty interpretation of what he was doing, but I find it hard to imagine a plausible one. Nobody actually seems to know how wealthy Crow is, and he seems to want to stay off of the Forbes list.

However, the Republicans have de-facto admitted some of their justices are corrupt:

Conservatives criticize liberal Supreme Court justices for ethics issues

Conservatives are criticizing the liberal Supreme Court justices over ethics issues following the series of reports of the ties between Justice Clarence Thomas and a major Republican donor. T…

thehill.com

When the Republicans go to a they-do-it-also they are effectively admitting it.

Yes, and Republicans would probably also point out that everyone else also uses the "they-do-it-also" tactic to excuse themselves using the tactic.

 

[blastula]

Man, either Thomas is bought off or really good at oral sex.

Well at least now we know why he was silent for so many years on the bench. He had something in his mouth that kept him from speaking.

Who put the pubic hair in his mouth?

 

[blastula]

Yeah, there's more.

Leonard Leo directed fees to Clarence Thomas’s wife, urged ‘no mention of Ginni’ - The Washington Post.

Conservative judicial activist Leonard Leo arranged for the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to be paid tens of thousands of dollars for consulting work just over a decade ago, specifying that her name be left off billing paperwork, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post.

In January 2012, Leo instructed the GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill a nonprofit group he advises and use that money to pay Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, the documents show. The same year, the nonprofit, the Judicial Education Project, filed a brief to the Supreme Court in a landmark voting rights case.