Jack Thompson Disbarred

Sockatume writes "The Florida Supreme Court has approved Judge Dava Tunis' recommendations for the permanent disbarment of John B. "Jack" Thompson, with no leave to reapply and $43,675.35 in disciplinary costs. The ruling is a step up from the enhanced disbarment that had been suggested by the prosecution, which would have forbidden him from reapplying for ten years. Thompson has 30 days to appeal the ruling before the disbarment is permanent. Thompson responds to the ruling."

Comments

Hallelujah!

[tergvelo]

It's about damn time this poor excuse for a human being was disbarred.
Maybe now we won't have to hear about him all the damn time.
~t

Re:Hallelujah!

[uberjack]

It's about damn time this poor excuse for a human being was disbarred. Maybe now we won't have to hear about him all the damn time. ~t

Fat chance. Now he'll have his own talk show on Fox

Re:Hallelujah!

[Hairy Heron]

Conduct unbecoming a member of the Bar.

Re:Hallelujah!

[Dorkmaster Flek]

You mean aside from recklessly ignoring court orders and abuse of his position as a lawyer? Perhaps you should read up on his activities.

Re:Hallelujah!

[KillerBob]

Read the Kotaku link on it... as of this writing, it's still up, while the other one is slashdotted...

http://kotaku.com/5054772/jack-thompson-disbarred

The document they posted is quite brief, but for those who don't feel like reading the whole thing, the paragraph that answers your question is paragraph 4:

Among the extensive findings of fact presented in the report, the Court takes particular note of the following which occurred during the three-year period at issue in five counts in these cases: (1) respondent made false statements of material fact to courts and repeatedly violated a court order; (2) respondent communicated the subject of representation directly with clients of opposing counsel; (3) respondent engaged in prohibited ex parte communications; (4) respondent publicized and sent hundreds of pages of vitriolic and disparaging missives, letters, faxes, and press releases, to the affected individuals; (5) respondent targeted an individual who was not involved with respondent in any way, merely due to "the position [the individual] holds in state and national politics;" (6) respondent falsely, recklessly, and publicly accused a judge as being amenable to the "fixing" of cases; (7) respondent sent courts inappropriate and offensive sexual materials; (8) respondent falsely and publicly accused various attorneys and their clients of engaging in a conspiracy/enterprise involving "the criminal distribution of sexual materials to minors" and attempted to get prosecuting authorities to charge these attorneys and their clients for racketeering and extortion; (9) respondent harassed the former client of an attorney in an effort to get the client to use its influence to persuade the attorney to withdraw a defamation suit filed by the attorney against respondent; and (10) respondent retaliated against attorneys who filed Bar complaints against him for his unethical conduct by asserting to their clients, government officials, politicians, the media, female lawyers in their law firm, employees, personal friends, acquaintances, and their wives, that the attorneys were criminal Case Nos. SC07-80 and SC07-354 Page Three pornographers who objectify women.

Quoted, unmodified. Every paragraph of the filing is pertinent... it's only about a page's worth of text, so well worth the read. And IMHO, it's well worth disbarring him. And the only way he's affected *me* personally was that, thanks to one of his initiatives, I had to ask the staff at EB Games to sell me a copy of Bully, because they didn't have it actually *on* the shelves.

Re:Hallelujah!

[Foobar of Borg]

If what Fox News wasn't popular with Christians and therefore reflective of modern Christian belief they wouldn't be popular or influential. Jack Thompson and people like him represent modern Christianity even if a few fringe Christians disapprove.

American fundamentalists != modern Christianity
The rest of the Christian world != a few fringe Christians
I guess by your type of assessment, Catholicism is a fringe Christian group and Eastern Orthodoxy doesn't even exist. There is a whole world outside of the U.S. In some parts of it, they even speak languages other than English.

Re:Hallelujah!

[Daimanta]

"In 1992, Thompson asked a Florida judge to declare the Florida Bar Association unconstitutional. He said that the bar was engaged in a vendetta against him because of his religious beliefs, which he said conflicted with what he called the bar's pro-gay, humanist, liberal agenda. He also said that the "wedding of all three functions of government into the Florida Bar, the 'official arm' of the Florida Supreme Court, is violative of the bedrock constitutional requirement of the separation powers and the 'checks and balances' which the separation guarantees."[121] Thompson accepted a $20,000 out-of-court settlement.[122]"

Ouch. It looks like he really did hit a sweet spot. Otherwise they wouldn't have given him the 20k. But why is nobody on /. mentioning this?

Re:Hallelujah!

[arth1]

American fundamentalists != modern Christianity

That depends on your point of view. If you're an "American fundamentalist" or "modern Christian", I am sure you'll think you're miles apart, but seen from e.g. a pagan point of view, the two are as close as to be near indistinguishable.

Or, to use the obligatory car analogy, you may think that your Honda Civic Hybrid is very different from a Ford Explorer, but for someone normally flying a plane, the difference is minor. And from the point of view of someone walking or using a bicycle, none of them are eco-friendly.

A "modern Christian" walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and even floats, so what colour the feathers are is rather irrelevant. He's still a monotheist with a Judeo-Christian belief system that he claims also applies to those not sharing the faith. Show me one Christian that's open to believe that I won't be judged because I don't believe, and I'll be open to change my classification. Until then, I only see various Christian denominations as different flavors of ice cream, and I don't want ice cream, whether it's pistachio or rotten herring flavoured.

Re:Hallelujah!

[uberjack]

There is a whole world outside of the U.S. In some parts of it, they even speak languages other than English.

Fry: "What do we care? We live in the United States."

Leela: "The United States is part of the world."

Fry: "Wow, I have been gone a long time."

Re:Hallelujah!

[LithiumX]

Are any hardcore religion fanatics "entirely sane"

As long as they understand that their beliefs are based on faith, they can be. Then again, "fanatics" usually don't seem able to think that way - and like everyone who believes in something, it's hard for them to imagine anything else.

Think religion is whacked? Do you believe in things like "justice", "morality", "liberty", or even a difference between "right and wrong"? All of these are based on millenia of philosophy, but are still abstracts based on truths we only hold as articles of faith. And just like religious beliefs, all logical arguments in support of them end up circular arguments (ie all arguments in support of a need for justice depend on an implicit assumption that it's desirable, ditto just about every other abstract we hold dear).

Then again, I just got done arguing that "white" is effectively the same thing as "black" with a coworker - and taking the framework of the entire EM spectrum, you have to admit it's true. :)

Now if I could only convince him that the Terminator storyline is totally incompatible with parallel realities...

Re:Hallelujah!

[Endo13]

Precisely. You can't legislate true Christianity, it completely goes against the definition of what Christianity is. (For proof, you need look no further than the Catholic church in history to see what the result is of legislated Christianity.) Christianity is about choosing the right path (which is never the easy path). This is also why as a Christian I cannot support religious people (Christian or otherwise) as government officials. It puts a true Christian in a no-win situation. As a Christian, it is your duty to do everything you can to try to show others the way... but at the same time you have to let them choose their own way.

Re:Hallelujah!

[Original Replica]

American fundamentalists != modern Christianity The rest of the Christian world != a few fringe Christians

Thank you. As a Christian living and practicing my faith in modern America, I often find myself frustrated and dismayed at damage done to the public perception of the Christian faith by groups like the Christian Coalition; and by those who would rather point to carefully selected parts of scripture as an attempt to justify hatred, violence, and nationalism than to truly embrace and grow into what is really a faith of love, hope, and compassion.
I am persistently puzzled by how the Republican Party came to be associated with Christianity in the US. Looking at the actual actions taken by Jesus (the miracles) he seemed to be in favor of lots of free medical care, and a fair amount of feeding of hungry masses, and being rather forgiving of debts. That looks to be far more in line with policies associated with the Democratic Party than with traditional Republican policies. My Bible doesn't have "The Miracle of the Multi-National" or "The Blessing of the Interventionist Army".

Bad news for GTA

[Gorm the DBA]

In related news, sales of Grand Theft Auto took a nose dive, as the free publicity engine Mr. Thompson had given them no longer functions...

Not that I see that as a bad thing...

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[eln]

He was disbarred in Florida. Doesn't this mean he can still take the exam and be re-barred (okay, probably not the word, although anything involving Thompson and rebar sounds like fun) in any other state?

Kind of a shitty link, sorry guys

[Sockatume]

The Gamepolitics link is to the recommendation, not the approval. My bad. The correct link is this.

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[Hairy Heron]

No, it takes filing tons and tons of frivolous lawsuits and wasting countless hours of court time and taxpayer money to get where he is at.

Re:What's next?

[Sockatume]

Permanent Disbarment with Extreme Prejudice. It involves some sort of laser cannon.

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[philspear]

All it takes is pissing of the Bar and a few judges, and you've lost what you made with 12 years of college.

To be fair, he did more than that, he did his darndest to further the stereotype of lawyers as being rabid, idiotic, greedy, power hungry attack dogs. More significantly, he was tying up a lot of time and wasting a lot of other people's money by using completely frivolous lawsuits as a soapbox. Then he was blatantly disrespectful to everyone else, even those who disagreed with him.

This isn't like being fired because you beat your boss at golf, this is like being fired because you lost your temper, took out an ad in the local newspaper saying your company kills puppies, and then took a shit on your boss' desk.

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[j0nb0y]

Every state bar requires a background check before allowing anyone to sit for the bar exam. The background check of Jack Thompson would reveal the Florida disbarment, and there is approximately a zero percent chance that any state bar association would let him sit for the exam.

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[santiagoanders]

He did what with the piss of some judges?

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[gstoddart]

This isn't like being fired because you beat your boss at golf, this is like being fired because you lost your temper, took out an ad in the local newspaper saying your company kills puppies, and then took a shit on your boss' desk.

You sound like you've thought this through. ;-)

Cheers

This will be a day long remembered.

[Anonymous Coward]

It has seen the end of Jack Thompson,
It has seen the end of a RIAA lawsuit,
The end of copyright cops,
The end of Comcast's forging of RST packets,
It will soon see the end of the Empire itself!

He doesn't know when to quit...

[Coopjust]

In his response, he accuses the bar of acting against him to protect the "unethical" conduct of the State Attorney general against one of his clients. He goes on to insinuate that one of the justices didn't actually know anything about the case (scratch that, it's an outright accusation:

it is fascinating that Justice Cannady, who has undoubtedly reviewed absolutely nothing about this disciplinary case, has put his name to this disbarment order on the day that he was served with the federal civil rights action. What a coincidence.

Sucks when actions have consequences

[spun]

Maybe you think everyone should be able to do whatever the hell they want whenever they want, and if people don't like it, they can piss off?

Actions have consequences. When you screw up, you have to pay the price. I know, making people pay for their mistakes is taking away their freedom to be douchebags. Obviously these professional associations, by holding their members to certain standards, must hate our freedoms.

Re:Hrmmm.. I dont like this.

[The Only Druid]

I want to be really clear here: disbarrment is beyond uncommon. It's happened a handful of times, nation wide, in the last few years. Even suspensions are difficult to get. Most bar proceedings that go anywhere result in, at most, a public slap on the wrist and a note on your record.

Even suspensions are survivable.

Jack Thompson, among other things, submitted porn to the courts, accused multiple judges of bribery in open court and public filings, violated numerous ethical rules regarding practice without a license, good character, etc. He falsely represented himself as being the lawyer for criminal victims, profited off their suffering, and then lied in court about it. He accused other lawyers of just as bad offenses, without a shred of evidence. On a more personal level, I can confirm that years ago, he physically broke into at least one lawyer's office to drop of papers and "scare" them (I know the lawyer personally).

Jack Thompson is a festering boil on the hide of the law.

Same rule in health care

[querist]

I don't know about law, but in various health care professions (I keep my chiropractic license for pro bono patients) and licensed engineers (I know a few), one of the first questions they ask on any application for a license is something along the lines of

"Has your license to practice ever been suspended or revoked in this or any other jurisdiction, or has any [insert profession] board taken disciplinary action against you? If yes, please provide a detailed explaination."

That usually means that if you were booted in one jurisdiction, your chances of being licensed in another jurisdiction are sufficiently close to zero to be indistinguishable from zero for all practical purposes.

Oh, and if you are found out to have LIED on that question, your license is automatically revoked (at least in SC) and you're fined heavily. For some professions, that's even a felony and includes jail time.

Now they need to add this to the next GTA.

[jameskojiro]

Have a Bar called "Jack's Bar" and as you walk in there is a white haired lawyer that the bouncer is int he process of throwing out.

Bouncer: Sir you are being a nuisance to the customers please leave.

Lawyer: But.... I am a prominent lawyer in the community, I was on nationwide TV for crying out loud!

Bouncer: Shutup and get out, NOW!!!

Bouncer then throws the lawyer out on his his ass, get it, "Dis-Bar-ed" LOLZ!

There is a God.

[Sasayaki]

Jack Thompson disbarred. On my birthday.

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me...