Bad judges or bad judgment that’s the question today that Spokane area residents need to have answered.
This article is the first in a two part story that will go in depth into how a suspected violent rapist was placed back on the streets for less than a tenth of what the normal bond would start at.
More importantly what role was played by his sister in-law a setting municipal court judge for Airway Heights in securing his release on such ridiculously low bond?
Did Judge Jennifer L. Fassbender use her position as a setting court judge for the City of Airway Heights, to get her friend and mentor from Gonzaga Law School, Superior Court Judge the Honorable Ellen Clark, to give her brother in-law a ridiculously low bond on a first degree violent rape charge?
People put their faith in judges to be honest, above board, people that are there in-part supposedly to protect the people within their jurisdiction.
So what happens then when it all goes horribly wrong? Who protects the people when two judges, also from the same law school leave everyone with a bad taste due to their appearance of improprieties?
Are they criminals, conspiring to circumvent the criminal justice system or just exercising the old practice of Quid Pro Quo, Latin that translates to “something for something?†I scratch your back you scratch mine!
Judges are supposed to act in a manner that avoids even the appearance of improprieties. Otherwise like these two may have acted, they lose credibility.
People also look to the news agencies to keep them informed on important issues. What happens when the media either fail miserably to recognize a story, or worse recognize it but bury it because they have endorsed the judge three times for re-election?
The Spokesman Review had a reporter setting in Judge Ellen Clark’s courtroom when she arraigned Michael Fassbender on 1st degree rape charge. The reporter wrote an article saying this individual had been released on $20,000 bond.
From the start bells should have started ringing but either didn’t or was simply ignored. But then the same newspaper has also endorsed her three times for re-election.
The Spokesman Review covered Judge Fassbender’s appointment was just three months ago. On Aug 20,2009 they ran a story regarding her appointment.
Fassbender is not a name that rolls off your tongue in Spokane everyday say like Smith, Jones, Williams, or even Clark. There can be exact two found in the phone book one the suspects brother and two the judges the suspects sister in-law.
Contact was made with the columnist Doug Clark of the Spokesman Review to see if he and one of the judges involved in this travesty were related. While he was not advised what this story was about he was polite, and courteous. He stated while he has known John Clark, Ellen Clark’s husband for many years he was not related in any manner.
Judge Ellen Clark set the unusually low bond of $20,000.00 for the 1st degree rape charge. This means the suspect comes up with $2,000.00 dollars he’s back on the street. He pays a bail bondsman the $2,000.00 they put up the rest.
Someone would have to use their real property as collateral for the $20,000.00 since Michael lived with his brother and sister in-law the judge, he would not have the real property to put up. Did they secure the bond with their property? The bail bondsman alludes to as much before suddenly clamming up.
Judges normally look at a suspect’s prior criminal record if any. The officers report as to what occurred, the possibility of the person re-offending while out on bail. The danger to the community this suspect would pose. The suspect’s record we don’t know about it so let’s assume for discussion it was clean.
The officer’s report is very clear that this was a very violent rape, one that could easily have escalated to murder. There is nothing ambiguous about the officer’s report. Any judge that has as much experience as the Honorable Judge Ellen Clark should know that rape suspects frequently re-offend.
Unless Judge Clark’s many years of marriage to a well known defense attorney has left her so jaded, she should give some credence to the officer’s reports.
The judge should know that a suspected violent rapist where the evidence is very consistent with the victim’s statements of what occurred; could pose a significant danger to the victim, as well as every female in this area. People like this suspect are in fact the poster children for high bonds!
The people of Spokane need to remember that because a suspect is related to someone considered to be important does not mean they’re not extremely dangerous.
Kevin Coe was the son of the Spokesman Reviews Editor and Chief while he was raping women all over the South Hill of Spokane. He also had no arrest record prior to being arrested as a serial rapist.
See part 2 . Bad Judges or Bad Judgment?
Just to let you know
I have recently had a stroke that has resulted in some seizures. At times I make grammar errors as I don’t always have someone available to proof read these articles, before I have to submit them.
I try to do my best to keep the information fresh. The old brain doesn’t connect the dots as it once might have. The stroke dusted some of the dots of my dice I’m afraid. Thank you for being so understanding, as the wisdom goes “We do not write as we want, but as we can.†– W Somerset Maugham
Please feel free to point these errors out to me as I review all comments and try to use the information to give you a better article.
12 users commented in " Spokane WA. Two Area Judges Involved in Possible Judicial Misconduct? "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackI am a Spokane attorney and have known Judge Ellen Kalama Clark for well over twenty years, way before she was a sitting judge. Judge Clark was approached in the mid nineties to take a vacated Superior Court judgeship, even though she had only been a Superior Court family law commissioner for about three months. Ellen Clark turned down that “opportunity” because she did not feel that she had sufficiently earned it. It was then offerred to Terry Eitzen, who had been heading up the Gonzaga Student Lawyers association. Terry took the position, and has been a sitting judge since. Ellen felt that she needed to earn her shot at being a Superior Court Judge without her qualifications beening soley determined by the status of her sex, and several years later, after a very successful term as Superior Court Judge, Ellen Clark had another opportunity to fill a vacating judge’s position, and she did so. Ellen Clark is one of the finest, if not the finest Superior Judge that is sitting on the Spokane bench, and knowing her as well as I have for so many years, there is absolutely no question in my mind that she would never, NEVER, allow her position to be influenced by any ethical behavior less than that to which she was sworn. No way.
That very interesting I guess we see how she or some other judge handles his bond now the charges have been ammended to be three counts of rape one count of assault.
Still the Spokesman Review has not done anything but that does not suprise me in the least.
There is absolutely no way she could not have recognized the name, that in and of itself should have sent up a red flag.
On the day you wake up and say I think I’ll put a 1st degree rapist back on the street for $2,000.00
Hers is the kind of decision that gets victims killed. What she go to school with the judge that lowered Clemmons bond?
Second Part is at
http://www.bloggernews.net/123133
Quote from post.
“The old brain doesn’t connect the dots as it once might have. The stroke dusted some of the dots of my dice I’m afraid. Thank you for being so understanding, as the wisdom goes “We do not write as we want, but as we can.” – W Somerset Maugham”
Please don’t be too disheartened by some of the missing dots. You’ve had a double whammy, first the stroke, then the seizures, both of which affect your thinking.
I just wanted to drop you a line wishing you the very best. I have no doubt that with time…all your dots will reappear.
Cynthia V said,
Thank you for you comment I appreciate the support. Each day that I write it gets a little easier, it exercises my mind much the way a brisk walk exercises the body.
Thanks again
There can be exact two found in the phone book one the suspects brother and two the judges the suspects sister in-law.
I’m sorry, the sentence above was a bit confusing. It needs some periods and commas. Other than that, it was fine. You’re doing a great job!
We have the Center For Justice, because spokane isnt the Center of Justice.
There are more crooks in robes and uniforms than there are in the community.
Keep your eyes closely on this story but not so closely that you don’t ask more questions about the SERE/JPRA sites in Spokane and these private contractors. Drive past the SERE sites to take a look yourself. Don’t forget that the CIA, other secret U.S. government agencies, private contractors, and foreign governments are involved in these contracts and these facilities. And most importantly, understand that some of the activity at the SERE locations are pretty much identical to what you have seen in some of the pictures of Abu Ghraib and heard descibed about Bagram, i.e., SERE students being subjected to waterboarding, pummelings, blinded-folded and marched up and down the halls naked, sexual humilitaion and other barbarities. Call it training to survive capture and to learn resistance and evasion if you want. However, I would suggest finding some folks involved with the whole operation and talking to them about their disgust at seeing these private contractors, outside the accountability of the government yet earning earning incredibly more than our soldiers, abusing the process, turning these operations into circuses, and, at this point, having turned the U.S. into a global pariah, what is properly called a torture state (Abu Ghraib, Bhagram, Guantanamo, Diego Garcia, and our secret CIA black sites all over the world.) The program at SERE is intended to break guys down as fast as they can be, that is why it was used as a laboratory to reverse engineer the SERE training to produce infallible torture techniques. Type “Abu Ghraib photos” into Google to get an idea of what it is all about and to understand what is being “simulated” at SERE in Spokane and its other locations around the country. Type “Mitchell and Jessen” to find out about the CIA psychologist who had their offices at Riverside and Washington until not long ago.
Following these links to the reporting are some comments that might be of interest.
http://www.kxly.com/news/21386664/detail.html
http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2009/oct/22/in-brief-woman-reports-rape-at-survival-center/
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/tools/story_breakingnews_pf.asp?ID=10496
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagram_torture_and_prisoner_abuse
What is the latest on the Fassbender case? Sounds like everyone clammed-up on updating the case, both at the Spokesman and with blogs. When is his trial date? Or is it already over? Is he back on the job teaching interrogation techniques?
The court date is set for June 8th for all of you who would like to know.
FOSSBENDER CAN ROTT IN HELL WITH THE REST OF HIS ACCOMPLIENCE SCUM BAGS!!!!!!!!
Leave A Reply