By Aaron Kesel

Bernie Sanders, John Cornyn and Elizabeth Warren are three very outspoken United States senators concerning bad faith judicial rulings and failures of our watchdog agencies to do their jobs in arresting and prosecuting the perpetrators of Wall Street frauds – including issues of bankruptcy court corruption.

Unfortunately, justice is hindered due to standards of political correctness and way too much (undeserved) respect for lawyers, judges and federal agents, trusted far more than they should be.

The fact of the matter is, the senators are not allowed to speak out about other states’ individual cases; which is resulting in the senators barking and not taking any bites out of Wall Street crimes.

Another factor that the senators are too gentle to speak about is the dynamic that, in 2016, Transparency International named Delaware as one of the world’s worst examples of grand corruption (see Salon reporter Robert Hennelly “How Delaware became an American haven for ‘grand corruption’”).

There’s more going on than ordinarily meets the eye, and the senators aren’t going to resolve the problems with kid gloves. They need to put on the boxing gloves if they hope to fix the corruption problem plaguing everyday Americans that is Wall St.

Venue Shopping Bill is Little Action with Kid Gloves

Wall Street racketeering stalwarts are emboldened by the weakness of the soft touching “professional courtesy”; and the bad guys continue to make progress with their incestuous and systemic infiltration of our federal systems of justice through revolving doors.

You won’t defeat organized crime by ignoring it exists!

Being far too nice is what brought America Trump. Nice people believed that a pathological bullshitter, a touter of misogyny, hate, and bigotry had no chance of winning the election.

Similarly, senators addressing the dynamics of corruption as being mere results of – venue shopping – is obtuse to the very serious nationally significant and important economic threats.

Senator John Cornyn worked with Elizabeth Warren before she became the spearhead for the Consumer Fraud Protection Bureau (“CFPB”). At that time, Senator Cornyn spoke out in 2005 on the Blog of Legal Times about the fact that picking a venue (Forum Shopping) was the same thing as picking a verdict.

Way back then, Senators Cornyn and Elizabeth Warren also worked with UCLA Law Professor, Lynn LoPucki. Professor LoPucki has published a book and papers of the fact that competition for large fee bankruptcy cases is corrupting our courts.

Professor LoPucki also co-authored a paper on “Routine Illegality,” which details the sagas of judges who are – routinely – ruling contrary to the law (most times, to grant local firms, success in schemes and artifice to defraud).

There are a more than a million bankruptcy cases each year, which adds up to a hundred billion dollars in highly lucrative revenues; and many cases with questionable rulings.

Somehow, the senators seek to upset the status quo; but they aren’t pointing out the real reasons why a “shake-up” is warranted.

For instance, 20 years ago Goldman Sachs partnered up with Bain Capital in “The Learning Company” saga, which defrauded Mattel of $4 billion. (See the details in my story – here.)

Around the same time, Goldman Sachs scammed their client (eToys) for hundreds of millions of dollars.

Prior to that time, Mitt Romney was allowed to keep hundreds of millions of dollars from Michael Milken junk bonds fraud for Stage Stores’ dealings. It appears the funds may have remained (unusually so) in place, because the judge presiding on Milken’s case had his wife as a key executive of the Stage Stores deals (see Matt Taibbi’s Rolling Stone story “Greed and Debt”).

Resultant of the success of Romney and Goldman Sachs’s success in their racketeering enterprise – it is expanding.

One of the keys to the racket’s success is undue power and influence over our courts and the federal systems of justice, and it is not only an issue of corruption in Delaware.

Colm Connolly was a bad faith federal prosecutor who breached his fiduciary duty in his betrayal of the public’s trust, as a “revolving door” federal agent/racketeer (see my detailed story on Colm Connolly – here).

Sadly, a whistleblower (Laser Haas) in the eToys bankruptcy case was tricked by Romney’s gangs, including United States Attorney Colm Connolly.

For 7 years Laser Haas continued to blow the whistle on the Mattel, KB, Stage Stores, Fingerhut and eToys cases to Colm Connolly’s federal prosecutor’s office in Delaware. Ironically, Laser found out in 2007 that Colm Connolly was a partner of Bain Capital and Goldman Sachs’ Delaware law firm of MNAT (and MNAT was colluding with Paul Traub).

The thing is, MNAT was both eToys & Laser’s court-approved counsel; which means MNAT has no compunction about betraying a client’s trust.

Do the senators really believe that the switching of venue choices will stop lawyers from doing wrong and breaking their oaths, when billions of dollars are at stake?

As reported by Taibbi’s “Greed and Debt” story, KB’s CEO, Michael Glazer paid himself $18 million and KB $83 million prior to Glazer filing bankruptcy of KB.

Surely the senators don’t believe Delaware is the only state where bribes may occur!

Inexplicably, everybody is turning a blind eye to these serious issues of judges and federal prosecutors’ staunch refusals to do their jobs, which has spawned a “Bankruptcy Ring.”

Mitt Romney is able to count upon his roaming managers like Barry Gold, Paul Traub, Michael Glazer and Jack Bush.

The rackets Bankruptcy Ring is spearheaded by Paul Traub and abetted by Goldman Sachs/Bain Capital Delaware law firm of Morris Nichols Arsht & Tunnell (MNAT) partner, Colm Connolly, who Trump has nominated for a federal judgeship.

Colm Connolly was a partner of MNAT in 2001 when multi-billion-dollar frauds were being covered up and perpetrated; including, but not limited to, KB, Mattel, Fingerhut and the eToys case.

One of my more recent articles, while I was near deathly ill, is the report concerning Senators Elizabeth Warren and John Cornyn’s cosponsored Bankruptcy Venue BILL. This BILL is concerning forum shopping of cases (see my January 2018 article “Will Bankruptcy Venue BILL Bankrupt Delaware”); and now we have the bad faith of undue power and influence of lobbyists rallying forces to block the senators’ Bill.

Back in 2005, Senator Cornyn had joined in accord with rising star Elizabeth Warren and UCLA Law Professor, Lynn LoPucki, about how Delaware and New York were getting unfair advantage amounts of large fee bankruptcy cases.

At that time, it was remarked upon by Senator John Cornyn, in his 2005 posting of “They Owe Us” at the Blog of Legal Times, where Senator Cornyn specifically stated:

Corporate debtors are able to pick a venue that us likely to rule in their favor.

Just in case you are thinking that remark is unclear, Senator Cornyn went on further, to clarify – stating:

after all, picking a venue isn’t far from picking a verdict.

Obviously, this isn’t right; and a corrective measure is needed.

Judges swear an oath to serve and protect the Constitution of the United States. As the Supreme Court has ruled, in Cooper v. Aaron (here), judges who rule against the Constitution are making war with it, in direct contravention of a justice’s oath to protect the Constitution of the United States.

UCLA Law Professor, Lynn LoPucki, was chosen by Senator Cornyn because Professor LoPucki has empirical case proof of points. Professor LoPucki wrote a book, Courting Failure: How Competition for Big Fee Cases is Corrupting Our Courts.

Judges who “routinely” ruling against the law are impeachable!

Recently, the U.S. Courts website publicized former U.S. AG John Ashcroft, stating that there is a problem with high-ranking members of the Justice Department colluding with corrupt federal justices.

It boggles the mind on how the mainstream media is being obtuse (near duplicitous) in keeping silent on the U.S. Courts’ website posting of this extremely important statement of our nation’s former top law enforcement agent.

Bankruptcy court corruption is not just a matter of bankruptcy trustees in collusion with corrupt bankruptcy judges. The corruption is supported, and justice hindered by high ranking officials in the United States Trustee Program. The corruption has advanced to punishing any and all who mention the criminal acts of trustees and organized crime operating through the United States Bankruptcy Courts. As though greed is not enough, the trustees, in collusion with others, intentionally go forth to destroy lives. Exemptions provided by law are denied, debtors. Cases are intentionally, and unreasonably kept open for years. Parties in cases are sanctioned to discourage them from pursuing justice. Contempt of court powers are misused to coerce litigants into agreeing with extortion demands. This does not ensure integrity and restore public confidence.

“The American public, victimized and held hostage by bankruptcy court corruption, have nowhere to turn,” former U.S. AG John Ashcroft said. (archived)

If the senators are aware of USAG Ashcroft’s nationally significant and important – alarming – remarks, they have not bothered to mention the shocking court record.

Recently, other facts have come to light. As noted by Congress, the bankruptcy laws were changed to put a stop to lawyers and firms manipulating federal estate cases by “Bankruptcy Rings”; but the judges in Delaware are ignoring Congressional mandates.

It is significant that Congress chose to place the requirement of court approval for the employment of an attorney, accountant, or other professional by the creditors committee directly in the Bankruptcy Code in 1978. 11 U.S.C. § 1103(a). The legislative history makes clear that the 1978 Code was designed to eliminate the abuses and detrimental practices that had been found to prevail. Among such practices was the cronyism of the “bankruptcy ring” and attorney control of bankruptcy cases. In fact, the House Report noted that ” [i]n practice … the bankruptcy system operates more for the benefit of attorneys than for the benefit of creditors.” H.R. No. 595, 95th Cong., 2d Sess. 92, reprinted in 1978 U.S. Code Cong. & Ad. News 5787, 5963, 6053.

Beyond the obvious question of what any justice might be “earning” (beyond career advancements) for betrayal of the public’s trust, there are compounding issues. Assisting the corruption includes, but is not limited to, intolerable waste of taxpayer dollars, where good faith parties, victimized by the manifest injustice, must plague our court systems in there legitimate pursuits against dark forces.

Beyond the fact Trump has nominated the crony/corrupt Colm Connolly to become a federal judge, Trump has already stacked the deck in favor of Bain Capital and Goldman Sachs with the president’s nomination and confirmation of Jay Clayton to be head of the SEC.