State Attorney is granted yet another extension to respond to my appeal

February 23, 2009 @ 12:30AM

State Attorney is granted yet another extension to respond to my appeal

By Carlos Miller -...

Ignacio Vazquez Jr., the high-brow prosecutor who was never at a loss of words during my trial, has proven to be unable to respond to my appeal brief.

The proud son of a cop who accused me of being biased against cops filed another motion for extension last week, asking for an additional 45 days in which to respond to my appeal brief.

Ignacio J. Vazquez Jr.

Apparently, law school did not prepare the 29-year-old how to respond to a pro se appellant appealing a single misdemeanor conviction of resisting arrest without violence. Not exactly uncharted legal territory.

The court granted his motion on the same day he filed it, denying me the chance to file a response in opposition where I would have asked the court to refuse his request on the basis that it would cause unnecessary delays.

As if two years of unnecessary delays is not enough.

Although it is normal procedure to notify the opposing party before filing a motion, Vazquez never informed me, explaining in his motion that the “appellant is proceeding pro se and therefore has not been contacted regarding the relief requested herein.”

I’m not sure why the fact that I am representing myself would allow him to break procedure. It’s not like my address and phone number are not clearly stated on the front page of my appeal brief.

This is the second motion for extension he has filed since I filed my 30-page appeal in late November. He now has until April 3rd to respond to my brief. That is unless the courts grant him another extension.

This happens to be the latest delay in a long series of delays since my February 21, 2007 arrest for photographing a group of Miami cops against their wishes; a case that should have been dropped from the onset.

My initial trial was scheduled two months after my arrest, but it was postponed indefinitely when the original judge assigned to the case, a colorful, outspoken woman named Karen Mills-Francis, began taping episodes that would eventually become a nationally syndicated TV show called Judge Karen.

A few months before announcing her retirement from the Miami-Dade County bench, she removed all trials from her calendar that would have forced her to do her job, including mine, to prevent them from interfering with her new career as a TV judge. As if we needed any more of those.

Then in December 2007, the original prosecutor in this case, Daniel Zuniga, was fired in what was described as a “toys for case dismissal” scandal, but appeared to be an internal case of retaliation because those types of deals occur on a regular basis, according to many insiders.

Before he was fired, Zuniga had offered me several plea deals – none which involved exchanging toys for a case dismissal – so I rejected them outright because they would have required me to plead guilty to at least one of the original nine charges I was slapped with.

My trial was finally rescheduled for May 5, 2008, but then one of the cops had called in sick that day – not to mention another one of the arresting officers had been shipped off to the war in Iraq and another had been shot to death on the streets of Miami – leaving only two of the original five arresting officers to take the witness stand that day. So it was postponed again.

When it finally went to trial in June 2008, Vazquez Jr. and a new judge had been assigned to my case; a Judge Jose L Fernandez who did not possess nearly the pizazz that earned Judge Mills-Francis a TV show. Judge Fernandez ended up retaliating against me because I had refused to show remorse after my conviction. As if I should show remorse for crimes I did not commit.

Vazquez Jr. is most likely thinking that by continuing to file motions for extensions, he will wear me out to the point where I complete my community hours and probation before this even goes before the appeal judges. But I can assure you, this is beyond that.

This lengthy legal battle is not only to clear my name from an unlawful arrest and conviction but to clear the way for the civil suit I plan to file against the city of Miami for violating my First Amendment rights and for causing me two years of lost wages due to damage to my professional reputation as a journalist.

This battle is also to eventually force the Miami Police Department to implement training procedures that would teach their officers that photography is not a crime. Judging by the “Miami Model”, which is the term used to describe the unconstitutional method Miami police used in cracking down on protesters and journalists during the 2003 FTAA meetings, this training is long overdue.

So go for it, Iggy. File all the motions for extensions you want. I’m a patient man.

Vazquez Jr. – the man known as “Iggy” among friends - graduated from Southwest Senior High where at 6-foot, 6-inches, he helped lead the basketball team to its first winning season in 30 years in 1996. After attending Florida State University, he obtained his law degree from St. Thomas University in Miami and was admitted to the Florida bar in 2005.

He is the son of Ignacio Vazquez Sr., who spent 32 commendable years with the Miami-Dade Police Department before taking over as police chief of the Sweetwater Police Department in 2003, which at the time, was mired in a controversial scandal involving four police officers who beat a teenager so severely he needed surgery to repair internal organs. Vazquez Sr. resigned a year later. The City of Sweetwater ended up settling for $2 million in the beating of the teen.

So it is obvious that if anybody has bias regarding police officers, it is Vazquez Jr.

Nevertheless, Vazquez Jr. tried to convince the jury that I had a “history of hating police” during my trial because of a blog post I wrote where I compared a group of thuggish Los Angeles police officers to Nazi soldiers. The LAPD officers were caught on video bashing the legs of children and trampling over journalists during a peaceful demonstration in 2007 in an incident that resulted in a $13 million dollar settlement and disciplinary action against the officers.

Although my attorney, Arnold Trevilla, argued that this was improper character evidence and tried to prevent the judge from admitting it as evidence, Judge Fernandez allowed Vazquez Jr. to proceed, telling my attorney that the blog post proves I had “a bias against police officers” at the time of my arrest.

However, the article was written more than two months after my arrest, so it hardly proves I had a history of anything prior to my arrest. And considering the jury convicted me of resisting arrest without violence but acquitted me of refusing a lawful order and disorderly conduct, it is obvious that this improper character evidence swayed them into believing I would resist a police officer when I did not.

But that is only one of three arguments I outlined in my appeal.

Although Vazquez Jr. describes himself as a conservative on his Facebook page, he includes quotes from Robert Kennedy and Mojandas Ghandi.

Ignacio Vazquez's Facebook page

But most unforeseen is the following quote from Theodore Roosevelt:

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”

Unfortunately, Vazquez Jr. has refused to step into the arena.

-30-

I am a multimedia journalist who has been fighting a lengthy legal battle after having photographed Miami police against their wishes in Feb. 2007. Please help the fight by donating to my Legal Defense Fund in the top left sidebar. And join my Facebook blog network to keep updated on the latest articles.

Comments

Anonymous

2 years ago

Amazing Article. Brilliantly written.
I am a fan. We will remind these individuals who are the real threats to the Republic and the Constitution that WE THE PEOPLE will stand up for our rights and the pillars of our Nation… God bless Liberty,
Ricky

Anonymous

2 years ago

This is such an example of every negative stereotype of “Miami Justice” – at every level.

I can see this case becoming one of those that people refer to on a daily basis (baker act, homeless lawsuit from the 90′s). I could think of no better result than to force the city to include that kind of training for police officers.

Are you planning on doing the civil suit pro se as well? I’m not sure if giving up a third of the proceeds would be worth it in the end.

Anonymous

2 years ago

he doesn’t look like the brightest bulb in the pack…

by law he was require to contact you even if you are pro se..

i hope you will in court..

Anonymous

2 years ago

John,

The civil suit will definitely not be pro se.

The Society of Professional Journalists had actually acquired a very good First Amendment attorney who had agreed to represent me pro bono during the civil suit.

This was two years ago so he may have changed his mind, but either way, I will find somebody.

I had to do this pro se because I was pretty much wiped out after the trial.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Think I told you this before but I used to work in the Miami city managers office. It stunned me how many lawsuits the city settled on a regular basis. Things like people tripping over a crack in the sidewalk and settling for $25,000 were not at all unusual. The only, ONLY way they will pay any attention is if it involves money. I’m putting the over/under on your settlement at $150K. Hope I’m way low.

Anonymous

2 years ago

I can’t believe it’s been two years already.
My guess is Ignacio J. Vazquez Jr. knows you were in the right, but this has went on so long that he and his department can’t just drop it now.

And the last thing we need is more of those stoopid court/judge shows!

Keep up the good work, Carlos.

Anonymous

2 years ago

The law is different in every state, but I believe you can appeal the decision to grant an extension simply by filing your own motion for the judge to rescind the extension, and citing the procedural violation on the prosecutor’s part and the delay caused by the repeated extensions. Even if you lose, you still preserve the error for future appeals. Get advice from an actual attorney before proceeding, however. I think you are more than past the point where the advice of an attorney is warranted. Often, you can remain the lead “attorney” in your own case, and have a licensed attorney act as “second chair.” Since they’re not spending as much time as they would if they were taking the lead, they don’t charge as much. But you get the benefit of having good advice on navigating the myriad of procedural trap doors and roadblocks that make it difficult for ordinary men and women to represent themselves.

God speed, Mr. Miller!

Anonymous

2 years ago

You know, Carlos, I wasnt a big fan of you making a big stink about this case in the beginning because I felt you couldve avoided it by swallowing some pride pills and moving on. While I still sorta feel that way, today I admire your determination to stand up to our local government whose allegations and charges appear to be false.

If there is one thing I cannot stand about Miami its how people just bend over and take it when it comes to the government imposing their will on its citizens. This is definitely the most corrupt city in the country and a large part of that has to do with the fact that its citizens allow it to happen. Good luck with your appeal and civil suit.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Carlos,

I have to say about the same as what El Ojo said.

I’m sure you are able to file your own motion asking that the motion for more time be vacated with prejudice because of the ex-parte communication with the court. I think you can also ask the court to sanction the state because of this procedural error. Perhaps even blocking them from providing a response to your appeal.

I think you need to consult a lawyer on these procedural rules of spend the time looking them up.

I was once in landlord tenant court and the landlord contacted the court like this. The judge punished the landlord for it. So go for it.

duane

Anonymous

2 years ago

If you take on a Civil Rights Action you better be ready to do most of the work involved yourself. I’m involved in one at this time and I have milled over the evidence we requested in Discovery – Told the Lawyer what to ask for in Discovery – Made out list of questions for each of those defendants we deposed – looked up case law – noted page, line numbers of inconsistencies in testimony in relation to other evidence supplied by defence.
It’s a daughting task and one that is very time consuming and taxing on ones patients.

I refuse to settle out of court or off the record. Nothing gets accomplished that way, it’s pretty much pushed under the rug by your consent by settling with non disclosure agreements.

My incident happened 2/06/2007 and is now just making it to a court date in April – Summery Judgment was filed by defendants and we filed a cross motion for Summery Judgement on Liability only, it was granted and we are getting the motion ready to submit.

Mine can only go three ways:
I win – They win – Or we go to bench trial in April 2009.
I’ll accept what ever the Judge rules and go on with my life, since the time of my incident I have been harassed by them (DOCUMENTED) – I have not been charged with a crime although they attempted filing Federal Cyberstalking Charges on me five days prior to a pretextual traffic stop for an expired DL, I was moved six miles from the scene of the stop to a place more comfortable for the agents (I swear one agent testifies to this in Deposition) and questioned for over two hours concerning Free Speech Issues not related to an expired DL. [A picture of a marked patrol unit sitting in an unobstructed front lawn, shot from a public road with no cops around - receiving documents they allege were stolen that were posted on the Internet and downloaded over 14,400 times from nine countries]

Its been a nightmare – but one fight worth fighting I believe.

Anonymous

2 years ago

“A defendant who proceeds pro se [...] does not waive his or her right to counsel, and [...] he or she may exercise that right at any stage of the action.”

Hey Carlos, i don’t know much about miami or even court cases in general – is there a way to see all of vasquez’s rulings; similar to how you can see supreme court rulings?

If there was somehow prior trial logs of him saying similar things, you could prove that he is unable to be impartial – which may or may not prevent him from doing this in the future.

Anonymous

2 years ago

are you facebook friends?

Anonymous

2 years ago

Its time to file suit. You need to sue those cops for wrongful arrest, and violation of your constitutional rights.

You should let the prosecutors know that under federal law it is a felony for anyone to deny a citizen their constitutional rights “under color of law”.

All of those cops should be facing 4-10 years in jail.

You should sue the estate of the cop that died. And you should sue the cop in Iraq as well.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Carlos,

File the protest motion with the advice of an attorney. Can’t let them get away with breaking the rules when dealing with pro se appellants.

Good luck–keep us in the loop!

Anonymous

2 years ago

Hey now Joe, I’m all for Carlos suing the department, and maybe the arresting officer’s, but if you read his post about the one who died, that was the one who didn’t show him hostility.

But really Carlos, you need to file the motion, one of this country’s founding principles is that a man should be able to prove himself innocent, with or without an attorney. You’ve got to take this down now, or it’ll just keep going.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Motions for enlargement are granted routinely in state court. The decision is not one that will be reconsidered or that is appealable.

The reality is that the prosecutors as well as public defenders have an overwhelming caseload. It is impossible for them to handle a brief without putting all their other work aside.

That being said, on this simple case, one enlargement is sufficient. In federal appeals, they rarely grant more than one enlargement. In state court, it’s pretty much anything goes. It’s within the judge’s discretion.

I think you have some good arguments. Let’s see how they respond. And just keep in mind, even after everything has been briefed and argued, you can end up waiting a long time for a decision. I’ve waited years sometimes to get a decision from the courts. Sadly, that’s our system. It’s far from perfect, but still better than what other folks have to deal with.

Anonymous

2 years ago

I agree with Joe.

Maybe it is time to file suit against the city. It has been close to two years and I would be worried about a statute of limitations type of situation developing. Perhaps it is time to bring in the bigger guns.

Plus it is always better to be on offense than on defense.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Post your brief! I want to see this atrocity.

Anonymous

2 years ago

I’ll be glad to post it once Vazquez submits his response.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Why does it matter when he responds? If you think you are in the right post it. I can’t wait to read the post you will write when you lose.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Well to be honest with you, I would love to post it, but I’ve been advised not to post it.

Four attorneys have read my brief and they’ve all been impressed by it. They’ve also advised not to post it right now.

The way I see it, once it’s been filed, it shouldn’t be a problem to post it. But even I’m not one to push my luck that far if four attorneys advise against it.

Anonymous

2 years ago

I saw a dog piss on a cat once. I guess impressive is a relative term.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Well don’t knock it until you read it. Then knock it all you want.

But if it were that full of holes, then you would think Vazquez would have filed a quick answer brief just to get it out the way and move on to more serious cases.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Best of luck Carlos. I actually feel pity for Vazquez for being saddled with this pathetic case. Seeing as he’s being a prick and not responding right away I hope he ends up having a loss to an amateur on his resume.

Anonymous

2 years ago

You’re the lowest level of scum, posting the personal, irrelevant information for a proud civil servant. You fucked up, but can’t take responsibility for your self-serving actions. I would ask how you sleep at night, but with an inflated ego like yours, it’s easy to take shelter.

I hope you learn this world doesn’t revolve around you.

- Alex

Anonymous

2 years ago

Alex,

I wonder if you’ll feel that way when the jackboots are kicking your face in. What an idiot. Carlos didn’t post anything about that proud civil servant that isn’t public record. Get a grip for fuck’s sake.

Anonymous

2 years ago

Henry,

Ooo, the jackboots? Wow, nice. What are you going to scare me with next? The brownshirts, or the gestapo? Truth is, Carlos fancies himself a modern-day Woodward, or Bernstein. The truth? Carlos ignored a police officer who was working a scene. And Carlos has a vendetta now against the prosecutor for doing the job he was given.

I can’t wait until someone at McDonalds screws up Carlos’ next happy meal order. His face will be all over his blog as “revenge”.

Take your nose out of his ass, and you might see what a fool Carlos really is.

Alex

Anonymous

2 years ago

Alex,

I have nothing against Vazquez. He actually seems like a decent guy.

I just wanted him to file the response already because I want to get this case behind me.

I have no vendetta against anybody. All I want to do is clear my name.

I was never standing in the street as the cops claim and the picture in my header image proves that because the street is behind them.

I could have easily accepted “time served” the morning after my arrest and be stuck with nine criminal convictions on my record.

This would have made everybody happy, right?