Category: Legal Commentary

Exoneration projects prove our justice system has an epidemic of bad prosecutors. So the POS responsible for my illegal conviction is not a minority, but perhaps the majority.

Regardless, the Eighth Circuit rejected my petition (26-1808). I’m sending a “Motion for Clarification” today, but they’ll probably ignore it. So I feel that I should NOW explain why §2255(h)(1) is deeply unconstitutional.

FYI, a §2255 petition is one of the last ways a federally convicted person (like myself) can ask a court to fix a wrongful conviction. But since I have already filed a §2255, the rules for a second petition become much harder thanks to AEDPA. Under §2255(h)(1), I have to prove that I’ve obtained “new evidence” that proves that no reasonable person could still vote to convict me.

That sounds fair in theory, but in real life scenarios (like mine) it can become a HUGE unconstitutional obstacle. If (as in my case) the government hid evidence and someone (like me) only later got access to records that prove the case was built on lies (which I have done), the court can still refuse to grant the petition. Thus, I end up in a “procedural trap” because the evidence came too late, even though it proves my conviction was wrongfully obtained.

In other words, §2255 cares more about finality than truth. That means that even though I have irrefutable proof of serious wrongdoing, I still may not get a real chance at exoneration. If you’re a normal person -outside our corrupt judicial system- that is obviously ridiculously unfair.

So, at this point, my hopes rest in the WDNY court doing the right thing and un-redacting the email in Exhibit H. Since the 8th Circuit doesn’t have to tell me why they rejected my petition (thus my motion for clarification), I have to speculate. I’ve determined (with the help of AI and AUSA Tessie Smith’s perjurious response) that they justified the denial on their opinion that: “the petitioner relies on redacted FOIA documents (e.g Exhibit H) to allege unconstitutional collusion between the government and his defense team. Speculation regarding what the un-redacted documents might contain does not meet the clear and convincing evidence standard required to overcome the government’s presumption of regularity. Furthermore, allegations of attorney collusion must be proven concretely. Therefore, this Court will not overturn a conviction based on documentary inferences; the petitioner must prove the collusion through concrete evidence and the redacted documents do not meet this standard.”

If this makes you say “this shit is crazy!”, you are a sane person. The government has redacted the information that will get my case overturned. Talk about a conflict of interest! Speaking of conflicts of interests, would you be surprised to learn that Jospeh Leo Howard is in possession of an unreacted copy of Exhibit H? You shouldn’t be because he has (as documented on this blog) refused to supply a single page from my case file AND the Nebraska Counsel for Discipline has also failed to provide me with any acknowledgment of my complaint against him for not providing me with my case file. You should also not be surprised that my case file also contains emails from me to him on July 30, 2015 ordering him to prepare for trial. Proving that he went behind my back to negotiated a conditional plea with POS Becker without my permission. Worse, an email I got from the public defenders office proves that Howard and my public defender (who I trusted in 2015) conspired on July 30, 2015 to coerce me into taking that unauthorized conditional plea.

Howard is also in possession of emails (starting on August 4, 2015) proving that I wanted him to file paperwork to withdraw my plea. Howard ignored my requests from August until November, when he negotiated with POS Becker to do a “reverse proffer” to convince me not to withdraw my plea. When I arrived for the proffer, Joe thanked him for doing it and Becker replied “Sure, we have nothing to hide” That is when I knew Becker was lying. I just glowered at Becker during the proffer, Joe was like “could you try to hide your disdain for him a little?” I said “NO!” But after the proffer, Howard still refused to file the paperwork to withdraw the plea and only did so after I wrote the judge indicating that I didn’t trust Howard or POS Becker.

As this blog documents, during my incarceration in 2016 to 2018 I realized that I had been railroaded. Joe refused to provide me with my case file while incarcerated because it was “sealed” and I’m pretty sure he didn’t give Megan the whole file (but I’ve written that her former firm is also uncooperative). HUGE SIGH! Anyway, the bottom line is that I need un-redacted exhibits to win.

So in 2022 I tried to get the shills to answer questions. They refused and do not inform me of their 2016 report that contradicts their 2015 report. I do not find their 2016 report until 2023… So now I’ve proven that the shills were a part of Becker’s Conspiracy.

Now, I know that my lawyers were also a part of that conspiracy (instead of being confused by the shills lies). Their role included proffering the shills nonsense (that just confirmed the government’s lies) to the Court and coercing me to accept a conditional plea. Here are the events that lead up to my railroading: 

July 29, 2015: I view the evidence book with my Attorney, Mr. Howard and his “expert”, Mr. Kasel. I’m not impressed and order Mr. Howard to prepare for the Daubert hearing and trial. (If I won the Daubert hearing the case was over, if I lost the hearing we would proceed to trial, both scheduled for August 3, 2015.) I fly back to Rochester that evening and return to work the next day.

July 30, 2015 (8am to 4pm): Mr. Howard e-mails me all day, trying to get me to agree to allow him to negotiate a plea I’d enter into if we lost the Daubert hearing on August 3, 2015. I repeatedly order Mr. Howard to prepare for trial and that he did not have permission to negotiate any plea deal. He then tries to call me on the phone, I refuse to answer.

July 30, 2015 (4pm to 6pm): A little after 4pm, Mr. Slawinski e-mails me and asks if I would come to his office, I agree. Once there I’m ambushed by him, Mr. Howard and Mr. Gross to accept a “conditional plea” deal, that none of them had permission to negotiate. They coerce me into agreeing to the conditional plea by convincing me that it was like a “Nolo contendere” plea, when they knew that it wasn’t.

Now this recently disclosed passage from a previously posted e-mail chain confirms their participation in Becker’s conspiracy:

“I don’t want to drop it on him without one of us there… If he is in your presence, I think we may have more influence on him, and I think he needs the in person encouragement and advice.”

So he admits he will be “dropping” the plea agreement on me. That confirms he knows that I don’t know that it’s coming (because I repeatedly told him to prepare for trial). In the second sentence Howard admits he coerced me to take the plea because he knew I would reject the agreement unless they “encouraged” me to take it.