Case Dismissed - Kevin Ryan v. Underwriters Labs

[LashL]

I disagree. I doubt there are many, if any, truther lawyers. For one thing, if there were, wouldn't they be doing things like suing the government to disclose information not covered under FOIA? The fact that Twoofers have lawyers should not be interpreted to mean that the lawyers believe. Lawyers are (generally) paid advocates; it's their JOB to advance their clients' claims.

I agree with you that twoofers having lawyers should not necessarily be interpreted to mean that the lawyers are themselves twoofers.

Sadly, however, there are at least a few twoofer lawyers. Phil Berg (who represented Willie Rodriguez) is a full-blown twoofer, as is that John Ekonomou fellow who posted here (very briefly) when he wrote a woo "letter" on the Scholars for Woo site.

In the latter case, he was posting here right at the time that he was writing his "letter" to the "journal" and right when he was subject to disciplinary action regarding neglecting his legal practice. The disciplinary action related to events spanning a lengthy period beginning in 2003, in which he failed to show up for hearings on behalf of a client, which resulted in his client's claim being dismissed for want of prosecution THREE times! In his defence to the disciplinary action, he said that he had a recently diagnosed psychiatric problem that interfered with his ability to properly manage his practice.

Berg, at one time, was pretty normal, too. I'm not sure when his cheese slid off his cracker.

I'd like to think that anyone smart enough to pass a bar exam would be smart enough to realize that the Twoofy claims are nonsense. I would like to think that. Really I would. Don't burst my bubble.

I suspect (and certainly hope) that back when they were in law school, they were indeed smart enough and stable enough not to buy into the tinhat nonsense, and that things happened in the intervening years (Berg looks to be around 70 and Ekonomou is 50) to turn them into woos. However, no profession is immune from it. On the up side, there appear to be very, very few twoofer lawyers.

 

[LashL]

Well, I went with "written whitsleblowing reports in writing that blew whistles within the report," bu tthey tightened it a little.

 

[~enigma~]

Go figure...I know one doctor that is a woo (not about 9/11) and three full blown OMFG woo pharmacists (again not about 9/11).

 

[LashL]

I just think they are bad lawyers. I mean, if you read their submissions in the other thread, how could you think otherwise? Someone with a communications degree, or a philosophy degree, and no legal expertise whatsoever could have written a much more compelling (and gramatically correct) argument.

Agreed.

Why not? Surely the roster of full-blown truthers includes plenty of lawyers; wouldn't they jump at the chance to rep Ryan? And wouldn't Ryan look for lawyers who've drunk the kool-aid, and are inclined to believe his nonsense?

Remember, we're talking delusional people here - lawyers included. IMO, the only way they could've ever presented such a preposterous case is if they had also broken from reality, and actually believed in Ryan. Assuming they have the truther ability to disregard reality, just sweep it aside, all bets are off as to what they were actually thinking.

Sometimes the results of such a delusional mindset are quite embarrassing, obviously.

I agree with you that there are some twoofer lawyers (I posted about Berg and Ekonomou before reading the rest of this thread, sorry for the repetition), but I don't get the impression that these particular lawyers are all woo. Someone posted info about them on another thread earlier in the year and I looked into them a bit (not a lot). I think that one of them might be a twoofer (the one who kept screwing everything up with the court filings, using password access to the electronic filing system that he was not authorized to use, and "forgetting" to obtain permission from the court to even act on Ryan's behalf in Indiana). It appears that the second one is definitely into anti-government type cases, so perhaps that is not too far a stretch to twooferism, but I still don't see any evidence of that on his part. The third one, I think she is a junior who is just doing what she is told.

As I mentioned in another post, I agree that no profession is immune from twoofer-itis. I have not, however, seen evidence of large numbers of lawyers drinking the kool aid.

Some people are just broken. Once they leave reality behind, how educated or intelligent they once were becomes irrelevant.

Agreed

Take Philip J. Berg, Esq., for example...

Yes, he is a very good example of a split from reality, indeed.

 

[LashL]

Hmmm. That site hasn't been updated since January. When was Rodriguez' suit dismissed?

Rodriguez' case was dismissed as against The United States of America, Department of Homeland Security and FEMA on June 26, 2006, and dismissed as against the remaining 153 defendants on July 17, 2006.

(Note that this is contrary to Rodriquez' assertion that the case was not dismissed, and contrary to Rodriguez' assertion that he had distanced himself from Berg long before. In fact, Rodriquez swore an affidavit in early 2006 in which he re-asserted the outrageous, egregious and disgusting claims from his 2004 lawsuit, and he did not distance himself from Berg until after his lawsuit was dismissed last summer.)

I'd agree with BRV in principle that anyone, no matter how highly educated, can go wacky. I'd like to think though that such occurrences are rare among the really smart folks. Rare, but not unheard of.

Ditto.

 

[Alt+F4]

Sadly, however, there are at least a few twoofer lawyers. Phil Berg (who represented Willie Rodriguez) is a full-blown twoofer, as is that John Ekonomou fellow who posted here (very briefly) when he wrote a woo "letter" on the Scholars for Woo site.

Don't forget to add James Gourley to the list of twoofer lawyers. He's the moron that authored a Request for Correction petition to NIST on behalf of Steven Jones, Richard Gage, Kevin Ryan & Scholars for 9/11 Truth and Justice.

In regard to Ryan specifically, Gourley writes:

Ryan, a chemist and laboratory manager, was fired by UL in 2004 for publically questioning the contents of the WTC Report, which at the time was still being drafted by NIST. Ryan felt obligated to defend the good name and reputation of UL, his employer, which certified the steel assemblies used in the WTC Towers, against NIST's claims that the steel had softened and failed due to the briefly burning fires within the Twin Towers.

NIST'S complete disregard for Ryan's legitimate scientific concerns about the substance of the WTC Report, and NIST's subsequent dissemination of the flawed WTC Report damaged Ryan's good name, standing and reputation in the community and within UL, and caused him to lose his job at UL.

Bolding mine.
This guy should be disbarred

 

[TjW]

Don't forget to add James Gourley to the list of twoofer lawyers. He's the moron that authored a Request for Correction petition to NIST on behalf of Steven Jones, Richard Gage, Kevin Ryan & Scholars for 9/11 Truth and Justice.

In regard to Ryan specifically, Gourley writes:



Bolding mine.
This guy should be disbarred

It wouldn't matter. He'd just be 3 inch rebarred on 4 foot centers.

 

[Civilized Worm]

LashL, would you be able to find out if Rodriquez has taken legal action against Troy from WV? Troy was whining about how he had been sued over the abusive e-mails he'd sent him and how Rodriquez had "ruined his life", but now he says he made that up.

 

[LashL]

Don't forget to add James Gourley to the list of twoofer lawyers. He's the moron that authored a Request for Correction petition to NIST on behalf of Steven Jones, Richard Gage, Kevin Ryan & Scholars for 9/11 Truth and Justice.

In regard to Ryan specifically, Gourley writes:



Bolding mine.
This guy should be disbarred

This James Gourley?

Is this the lawyer who reportedly drafted that RFC? I cannot find anything about an attorney named James Gourley other this fellow who graduated in 2005.

If it is, he's obviously down the mentally incompetent road of twooferism, and he likely get disbarred soon enough. Not for his 9/11 Twoof involvement, of course, but because if he is so mentally challenged as to buy into the woo, he will also likely screw up in a major way in his new practice. Then again, he looks pretty young, so perhaps he will grow out of it before long.

BTW, I noticed that his name does not appear anywhere on that RFC posted by the twoofers. Gee, I wonder why.

 

[LashL]

It wouldn't matter. He'd just be 3 inch rebarred on 4 foot centers.

Now, that is a good one!

 

[LashL]

LashL, would you be able to find out if Rodriquez has taken legal action against Troy from WV? Troy was whining about how he had been sued over the abusive e-mails he'd sent him and how Rodriquez had "ruined his life", but now he says he made that up.

Possibly, but I would need more information, and we should probably take it to PM, at least initially.

 

[LashL]

Another Loss Leader prediction comes true

I personally believe Ryan will file an amended complaint that tries to shoehorn itself into the judge's instructions. His goal is and always was to survive long enough to get to the discovery phase. And he and his lawyers are clearly stupid enough to disregard all the warnings about sanctions.

Whether his amended complaint will survive the inevitable motion to dismiss is another story.

As Loss Leader predicted, Kevin Ryan has filed a Second Amended Complaint in which he does, indeed, try to shoehorn his allegations into the judge's instructions.

I will send the pdf document to ~enigma~ and ask that he host it on the site he created for the Aquaman documents.

Basically, in order to try to fit within the guidelines that the judge gave in his reasons for dismissing Ryan's First Amended Complaint, Ryan now alleges that his letter to NIST was actually an allegation of UL's mishandling of its contract with NIST because UL was in a conflict position and somehow in violation of various statutes pertaining to conflicts viz government contracts.

Of course, his letter to NIST contains no such allegations, and I will make my own prediction here: Ryan's Second Amended Complaint will also be dismissed when UL's inevitable motion to dismiss is heard, and Ryan and his lawyers will be sanctioned by way of costs orders.

Oh, and guess what? The Second Amended Complaint still includes this gem:

Mr. Ryan was fired by UL because he made written whistleblowing reports in writing...

 

[Calcas]

Lash, in lawyer lingo, isn't that additional charge equivalent to "my boss grabbed my breasts...?"

I mean it's a pretty serious charge and one that a judge wouldn't just arbitrarily dismiss...

 

[~enigma~]

The saga continues

http://enigmanwoliaison.googlepages.com/home

 

[LashL]

Lash, in lawyer lingo, isn't that additional charge equivalent to "my boss grabbed my breasts...?"

I mean it's a pretty serious charge and one that a judge wouldn't just arbitrarily dismiss...

I think that it will be arbitrarily dismissed. The problems Ryan will have are identified in the judgment dismissing his previous claim, namely these:

3) nothing in the letter that Ryan sent to NIST provided the basis for any inference of the existence of any violation of law or misuse of public resources by UL (which is a prerequisite to successfully invoking the 'whistleblower' statute that Ryan sought to rely upon);

The court has already held that Ryan's letter to NIST did not provide the basis for any inference of any violation of the law by UL. In the absence of some other letter, therefore, the court is not going to come to any different conclusion when the inevitable motion to dismiss by UL is brought.

4) the whistleblower statute is not aimed at protecting plaintiffs who believe that the conduct of an employer might reveal violations of law or regulation or misuse of public resources, but rather it seeks to protect employees who report that an employer has, in the execution of a public contract, broken the law or misused public resources;

Similarly, the court has already held that Ryan's letter did not amount to a written report of misconduct by UL. I cannot imagine that the court will reverse itself on this point.

5) Ryan's complaint is not about allegations of misconduct by UL or the misuse of public funds at all, but rather it is about the competency of the investigations following September 11, 2001 and an alleged failure by NIST (and potentially UL) to uncover or consider evidence that other, as yet unknown, conspirators were involved;

As above. I do not see the court reversing itself on its prior interpretation of the Ryan letter to NIST.

6) the Ryan complaint provided no reasonable basis for inferring that UL broke the law or spent public money for any unallowed purpose, nor did it provide any basis for inferring that Ryan reported any such conduct to either UL or NIST.

Ditto.

Given the possibility, however remote, that Mr. Ryan can allege facts showing, or at least from which it can be inferred, that UL violated laws or regulations, or misused public resources, in its execution of a public contract, and that he reported such facts to UL and NIST, the dismissal will be WITHOUT PREJUDICE subject to the filing of an amended complaint within fifteen days.

Ditto.

The missing (and critical) ingredient here is the absence of Ryan reporting to UL or NIST any allegation that UL violated the law or misused public resources in execution of a public contract. The court has already determined that Ryan's communications with UL and NIST did not constitute any such allegation, and Ryan has not referred to any new or different communications in his Second Amended Complaint.

 

[LashL]

The saga continues

http://enigmanwoliaison.googlepages.com/home

Wow, you're fast!

Thanks, ~enigma~

 

[~enigma~]

Considering the rather strong warning they got from the judge isn't this complaint very risky?

 

[LashL]

Considering the rather strong warning they got from the judge isn't this complaint very risky?

As I said above, I think that Ryan and his lawyers will be sanctioned with costs orders when the Second Amended Claim is tossed, as I expect it will be. Even with the benefit of the roadmaps provided by the judge previously, they have failed to state a legitimate cause of action, in my view, and I would expect that the judge will not look upon this kindly when it comes to the next motion to dismiss.

 

[~enigma~]

As I said above, I think that Ryan and his lawyers will be sanctioned with costs orders when the Second Amended Claim is tossed, as I expect it will be. Even with the benefit of the roadmaps provided by the judge previously, they have failed to state a legitimate cause of action, in my view, and I would expect that the judge will not look upon this kindly when it comes to the next motion to dismiss.

Man...I totally missed that. Guess you answered my question before I asked

 

[Loss Leader]

Holy crap, he's going to jail.

As I suspected, in order to meet the judge's burden, Ryan has told two lies: 1) that the President of UL communicated to him that UL had tested the steel; and 2) that his letter to NIST which clearly did not state that UL had a conflict of interest somehow by staring intently at it and letting one's eyes cross actually did state that UL had a conflict of interest.

Ryan's only hope is that the judge finds that his Complaint is ridiculous on its face because the letter obviously doesn not say, "My employer is violating law by taking on a contract in which it has a conflict of interest." This is a pretty dim hope because the actual letter is not quoted or attached to the Complaint. LashL thinks the judge will toss the Complaint based on a reading of the clear words of the letter; I'm not so sure.

If a dismissal doesn't come on that ground, I think Ryan will survive a motion to dismiss and get to discovery. After all, UL's only defense would be, "Our president didn't tell him anything about steel," and that is an issue of fact. If Ryan gets to discovery, UL is going to find out that Ryan received no communication from the president of UL stating that they had
certified the steel or anything else. At that point, there's going to be a motion for sanctions, contempt, legal fees and who knows what else. UL will win that motion because it's obvious that Ryan is flat-out lying about what he was told (and he said in his complaint that he kept the letter, God help him). UL's legal fees will be in the area of $100,000.00 by that point - much, much higher if they have to produce any discovery. And Ryan will be sent to jail for, say, 30 days.

This thing is going to get much, much worse before it gets better.