Incredibly, if you thought this story could not get worse, it just took a turn that would make a wired jaw drop. Now enters District Clerk Gilbert Sanchez who is adding his name to the already long list of El Paso Public Officials working overtime and committing illegal acts to cover for Esparza and his friends. Sanches is refusing to follow a lawful order in the Ocegeuda case.
For those of you who are new readers please see the blog before this one to get a fuller picture of the background. In short, District Attorney Jaime Esparza has a friend named Alberto Ocegueda (the brother of his personal secretary Amy Ocegueda Lujan whom he pays $84,000 year to and who goes to Mexico City on "business" for the El Paso taxpayer). Mr. Ocegueda was a coach at Lujan Chavez school where a six year old girl accused him of molesting her (please see documents on the face of my website, including the arrest affidavit which will give you the gruesome facts). Illegally, DA Esparza handpicked his friend Chris Bradley to be the special prosecutor of Ocegueda. Bradley in turn dumped the case and never even took it before a grand jury. Ocegueda was a free man. (nice to have friends in power) Esparza's other good friend attorney Joe Spencer (whose sister works for Esparza) then filed a petition to expunge Ocegueda's arrest. That petition contained falsehoods. Judge Angie Barill of the 346th signed the order of expunction eventhough it contained falsehoods and Ocegueda's arrest records evaporated from law enforcement systems across the state. According to the law, Ocegueda could not even have filed his petition for expunction for another THIRTY-TWO years. This was nothing short of the illegal destruction of public records. Channel 7 reporter Ashlie Hardway who had been hoping publicly that her husband would get a job as a police officer at the El Paso Police department did a story in the middle of early voting (I was running for DA against Esparza) and accused me of violating this illegal expunction order by dissimenating poor Mr. Ocegueda's arrest records (which I had obtained through an open records request through the SO prior to the illegal expunction). Later when questioned why she didn't report on the illegality of the order in the first place, she said it was "irrelevant to her story." Hardway also failed to appear in court on a prior ocassion about this false story of hers even though she was court ordered to do so and and personally signed for the order. Hardway is very scared of something.
On August 13, 2008 Judge Pendergrass from Del Rio, Texas came to El Paso to consider whether or not Ocegueda's expunction should be reversed (Stuart Leeds had filed pleadings asking for this to be done). Judge Pendergrass ordered that the petition for expunction filed by Joe Spencer on behalf of Ocegueda was a "legal malady" and that it could not have even been filed for 32 years. He ordered the expunction reversed and that the District Clerk send out Ocegueda's arrest records to be put back into the public file.
Unbelievably, yesterday, El Paso District Clerk Gilbert Sanchez an suspect in the FBI corruption probe (he is being investigated for bypassing his own case assignment system and making sure that certain special attorneys get their cases set in friendly courts) told me that he had recieved Judge Pendergrass' WRITTEN order ordering him to send out Ocegueda's records to law enforcement and that HE WAS PERSONALLY and ABSOLUTELY REFUSING TO FILE Judge Pendergrass' ORDER AND HE FURTHERMORE WAS REFUSING TO GIVE ME A COPY OF THE WRITTEN ORDER.
The District Clerk is an elected official whose job it is is to maintain the court files by filing all documents and following judge's orders. The District Clerk cannot pick and choose what orders and motions he will file and what orders he will not file and follow. If an inmate at the jail files a motion on a dirty napkin, the clerk MUST file it. It is unheard of, unthinkable, unreal and very dangerous to see that Gilbert Sanchez is refusing to file an order from a duly designated and presiding district court judge because he feels like it and wants to protect his friends. The District Clerk of El Paso County has personally taken my case off the desk of the regular expunction clerk and has it on his desk and openly states that he is refusing to FILE the judge's order and to follow its instructions and is refusing to give me, an ATTORNEY of record on the case, a copy of my own order on my own case that I helped draft for the judge's signature. One of his pathetic reasons for doing this is "because someone may want to appeal." Does Sanchez hold every file that someone may want to appeal? And you can't appeal an order that hasn't been filed anyway because you can't SEE it. Sanchez is a liar and a crook to the highest degree. Also keep in mind that as of yesterday there were no orders ordering him not to file the order and no stays or injunctions preventing from doing his job. This was of his own volition.
This is breathtaking! Esparza and Spencer and Ocegueda and Judge Barill couldn't fix Mr. Ocegueda's problem by having a crooked judge (which is they way they usually do it around here) because Judge Pendergrass is honest and ordered the right thing. Esparza et. al. were going crazy over Pendergrass' honesty and this is the solution they have come up with. The solution is to keep the filth contained at the local court house and JUST REFUSE TO FILE AND FOLLOW PENDERGRASS' LAWFUL ORDER. After all Judge Pendergrass is all the way in Del Rio. In the meantime, alleged child molester, Alberto Ocegueda continues to work at the SISD around little children and his records are not available to the public or to the school district, his own employers, due to the fantastic, illegal efforts of the DA of this community and the other line of sorry characters we have seen fit to bestow with power, i.e. Judge Angie Barill and Gilbert Sanchez. Remember that when we informed Judge Barill that she had signed an illegal order of expunction she refused to correct the order by undoing it as she is mandated to do by law. She refused to correct her illegal order just as Gilbert Sanchez is refusing to file Judge Pendergrass' order. Judge Pendergrass had to come to town to do Barill's work. Who will come to do Gilbert Sanchez'? To add insult to injury, we just gave DA Esparza a raise to $172,000 A YEAR TO RAPE AND PILLAGE US. As Gilbert Sanchez was refusing to follow a lawfull order to help Esparza out, we were voting to give Esparza the raise. Both happened yesterday.
Staurt Leeds and I in less that 24 hours have filed a motion to have Gilbert Sanchez held in criminal and civil contempt of court. We have filed an open records request. We have contacted the FBI and Judge Pendergrass and I am writing this blog. We are doing everything we can to fight this but you need to know what is going on and to spread the word and to make calls to everyone including Gilbert Sanchez. The press is stupid and compromised. You think Ashlie Hardway is going to report to you any of this. We see how she thinks the law is irrelevant. Did her husband ever get that job with PD? My sources say he did. The El Paso Times isn't going to report this to you for reasons elaborated on in earlier blogs but primarily because Esparza lets them go on their DWIS and they knew I would throw the book at them the same as everyone else if I had been DA.
If this isn't a cover up at the highest levels I don't know what is. As Stuart Leeds said, this appears to be the final stages of a cover up of a reported rape of a child at the hands of the friend of the District Attorney who is the brother of his assitress. This is a true story. Stay tuned.
What follows is a an open records request I made of Gilbert Sanchez this morning.
THERESA CABALLERO
ATTORNEY AT LAW
300 E. MAIN ST., SUITE 1136
EL PASO, TEXAS 79901
915.565.3550
915.562.5250 FAX
September 4, 2008
District Clerk Gilbert Sanchez
500 E. San Antonio St. Cause Numbers: 2008-1016 2207-2768
El Paso, Texas 79901
Re: Open Records Request
Dear Mr. Sanchez:
Yesterday, attorney Stuart Leeds, your assistant Coronado and I were in your office. I requested a copy of Judge Pendergrass’ order vacating an expunction in cause number 2008-1016. While you allowed us to look at the order, you refused to give us a copy of it even though we are the attorneys of record and had in fact drafted it for the judge’s signature. You also told us that you were refusing to file Judge Pendergrass’order and to follow its instructions. I asked you on what authority you were acting and you could provide none. I asked you what orders you had preventing you from handing me an order in my own case and you said you had none. Your only answer was to say that the county attorney and assistant county attorney Joanne Bernal had instructed you to not file the order or give us a copy because someone may want to appeal. Your behavior is illegal and incredible.
How many files do you have on your desk and are refusing to file the final order because “someone may want to appeal?” How many Mr. Sanchez? How would someone appeal an order that the District Clerk himself is refusing to file? Are you giving the order to other people? Have you given the order to the County Attorney’s Office, Joe Spencer, who? And if so why?
Please provide me with a copy of any written authority you are using as a basis to not give me a copy of Judge Pendergrass’order. This would include written orders from a judge and written directives from any lawyer as well as stays, injunctions, etc.
Please provide me with a copy of any written authority you are using as a basis to not file Judge Pendergrass’ order. This would include written orders from a judge as well as written directives from any lawyer as well as copies of any stays, injunctions, etc.
I want a copy of the entire file in cause number 2007-2768 as I am an attorney of record on that case as Judge Pendergrass ordered this case be consolidated with 2008-1016.
As you know, the FBI is investigating you for court fixing. That is the FBI is investigating you for bypassing your computer case assignment system and putting certain lawyer’s cases into friendly courts. Attorney Joe Spencer has two original petitions for expunction in 2007-2768, one where the court is already affixed and one where it is handwritten in. They are both time stamped at exactly the same time. Stuart Leeds and Bobby Coronado saw the petitions and noted the same exact time on both petitions. Since you are obstructing justice and refusing to follow a lawful order by a judge (which is your mandate to do), I have no doubt you will start pulling documents from these files that incriminate you and your friends and destroy them. I want copies of both of those petitions to take to the FBI.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Cc: Margaret Leachman U.S. Attorney’s Office; David Glickler Texas Attorney General, Judge Carl Pendergrass,
The Crooks Line Up, District Clerk Gilbert Sanchez re: Alberto Ocegueda
September 4, 2008, 9:14 amCriminal Complaint against Jaime Esparza, Joe Spencer and Alberto Ocegueda
August 31, 2008, 3:53 pm
August 31, 2008
District Attorney Jaime Esparza
500 E. San Antonio St., 2nd Floor
El Paso, TX 79901
Hand Delivered with file stamped copy on September 2, 2008
Re: Formal Criminal Complaint against District Attorney Jaime Esparza, El Paso Attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer and Alberto Ocegueda
Dear Mr. Esparza:
By this letter I am filing a formal criminal complaint against you, attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer and Alberto Ocegueda. I am filing this complaint with you as you are the chief prosecutor in this jurisdiction and according to the Texas Attorney General’s White Collar Crime and Public Integrity Unit, it is my understanding that in order for their unit to open an investigation, the complaint must be sent up by law enforcement. Naturally, as this complaint involves you and your best friends, Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda, you cannot personally investigate it, and you must pass it on. Please forward this complaint on to David Glickler at the Texas Attorney General’s Office as he is working on different aspects of this case and is already aware of the facts surrounding this case.
I am specifically complaining against you and Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda for the crime of Tampering with Government records, Texas Penal Code 37.10. Being Board certified in criminal law, you are aware that it is against the law to illegally cause the destruction of public records. Being board certified in criminal law you are also aware of the case entitled The State of Texas vs. James Vasilas, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. Lexis 579 (May 7, 2008); 187 SW3rd 486 and 153 SW3rd 725. This is a case where Attorney Vasilas moved for the expunction of his client’s criminal records and in so doing stated grounds in his petition for expunction which were not true. The District Attorney found about the false petition filed by Attorney Vasilas and being an honest district attorney (which we are sorely lacking here in El Paso), he actually brought charges against and prosecuted Attorney Vasilas for the crime of Tampering with Government Records.
To summarize the facts of my criminal complaint, your good friend Alberto Ocegueda was arrested in November of 2006 for aggravated sexual assault of a child. The accusation was that he had digitally penetrated the vagina of a six year old girl, a student at the school where he was the coach. Mr. Ocegueda is also the brother of your personal assistant, Amy Ocegueda Lujan, a secretary you pay the obscene amount of $84,000 a year to of tax payer money (we live in one of the poorest counties in the state) and a woman whom you send to Mexico City allegedly on government business also on the taxpayer dime. (It is important to note that Amy Ocegueda Lujan is not a lawyer and yet she earns far more that most lawyers in your office do.)
You then disqualified yourself from Ocegueda’s case and wrongly hand selected your successor to handle the case, Attorney Chris Bradley, who by no small coincidence is married to the former head of the El Paso police union, Chris McGill. It should also be noted that the brother of Alberto Ocegueda is Pete Ocegueda a police veteran who was also very active in the same El Paso police union. To the great dismay of Mr. and Mrs. Olvera, parents of the child in question, Chris Bradley declined the case. I have school documents which record that the Olveras were very upset about their daughter’s case being declined and were willing to do anything to make sure that Mr. Ocegueda is not around other children. (Sadly, they had to pull their daughter out of the school and my information is that they now home school her). The documents also state that the Olveras were shocked to have heard about the decline from the therapist and to have read about the case in the media. According to my documents, Ms. Bradley did not inform the Olvera family of her decision to decline the case until two weeks after she did it. What many people also do not know is that Bradley’s decision to decline the case came right after you found out that I had found out about the Ocegueda case and I had already publicly commenced my bid for DA against you. The crux of my platform was that you are corrupt and that you do illegal favors for your friends to the very great detriment of the law and this community and our court system. If you will recall, I had filed pleadings in a case on behalf of a client of mine wherein I mentioned the Ocegueda case and almost overnight Chris Bradley declined Ocegueda’s case.
Subsequently, during my campaign for District Attorney against you, there was a tv news report in February 2008 wherein you appeared and attorney Jeff Rey (ostensibly Ocegueda’s civil attorney) appeared talking about the Ocegueda case and the fact that Mr. Ocegueda’s records had been expunged. According to channel 7 reporter Ashlie Hardway, Ocegueda’s criminal and expungement Attorney Joe Spencer, your other good friend, showed her his petition for expungement and an order of expungement of Mr. Ocegueda’s criminal records. Being Board certified in criminal law, Mr. Esparza, you know that an arrest cannot be expunged until the statute of limitations has run when there is no “indictment” or “information” and no “dismissal for mistake or lack of probable cause.” Since Chris Bradley had declined Mr. Ocegueda’s case and therefore there was no indictment or information or dismissal, Mr. Ocegueda legally has to wait 32 years before he could even file a petition to expunge. However, contrary to statutory law and case law regarding expungements, Mr. Ocegueda and his attorney Joe Spencer did indeed charge forward and without fear of prosecution from you, filed a petition for expungement and worse yet, obtained an order of expungement. That illegal order of expungement led to the illegal destruction of government records. Both the petition and the order were filed in direct conflict with the law.
I am enclosing a copy of Mr. Spencer’s petition for expungement which I was fortunate enough to obtain. You may be interested to know that it was through information obtained from you at the UTEP debate that enabled me to get this most valuable document which is damning evidence of the crimes of which I am complaining. (I want to thank you for inadvertently pointing Stuart Leeds and me in the right direction). As you will see, in Spencer’s petition for expungement, he states that there was an “information” in Ocegueda’s case, which there was not. (I have Chris Bradley’s decline letter). Spencer also states that there was a “dismissal,” which there was not as it was never assigned to a court because it was DECLINED. And Spencer further states that the case is no longer pending which is also false since the statute of limitations has not run (that being 32 years from November 2006).
Furthermore, I am formally asking that Mr. Ocegueda be investigated and prosecuted for the crime of perjury as he swore to the truth of the contents of the petition as evidenced by his notarized signature on the petition. These contents we know were not true.
As for your involvement in these crimes Mr. Esparza, it was through the misuse of your position as District Attorney, your help, your aiding, your abetting and your conspiring with your friends, that valuable government records were illegally destroyed. It will not be hard to prove that you were aware of the illegal petition for expunction as you publicly stated on at least two occasions during campaign functions that you knew about every aspect of the case. It is also a reasonable inference that you sent your good friend Ocegueda to your good friend Spencer for legal representation. In fact, Mr. Spencer’s sister Deanna Spencer has worked for you for years and was the head of the “Victim Assistance Unit” for many years. How ironic the Victim’s Assistance Unit. Did the little Olvera girl receive any of the benefits of your victim’s assistance unit run by Deanne Spencer sister of Joe Spencer and friend of Amy Ocegueda Lujan sister of the alleged child molester Alberto Ocegueda and your best friend? Furthermore, you talked about the expungement and were aware of it and being not only a criminal attorney but board certified in criminal law, you knew that that expunction was illegal and your job was/is to make sure that as District Attorney, Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda never get prosecuted like Attorney Vasilas did. In fact, on August 15, 2008 channel 7 news reported that they spoke to Mr. Ocegueda in reference to his records being UNexpunged and remarkably they said "Ocegeuda said he was OUTRAGED and that he and his lawyer are definitley going to appeal." Only with your criminal conspiracy and involvement would Ocegueda be so brazen as to publicly say he was outraged that his illegal expunction was not only discovered but undone.
As you also know, attorney Stuart Leeds and I recently successfully litigated a petition to undo Mr. Ocegueda’s illegal expungement. For reasons unknown, Judge Barill did not want to hear the case, so an out of town judge, Judge Carl Pendergrass, came to El Paso to preside. It was refreshing to say the least to see an honest judge in action and so easily and so simply follow the law. Judge Pendergrass who is obviously not impressed with Mr. Ocegueda’s connections, agreed with Mr. Leeds and me and granted our pleadings. He followed the law and stated that Mr. Ocegueda could not have legally filed the petition for expungement for 32 years and that the order of expungement Spencer obtained was a “legal malady.” He decreed that the order be set aside as void and he further decreed that Alberto Ocegueda’s records regarding the aggravated sexual assault of a child be reinstated in City, County and State records including records held at your office..
Mr. Spencer unbelievably and arrogantly argued to the court that even if the judge were to order the records back in there were no records to put in because they had been destroyed. Fortunately, I have copies of Mr. Ocegueda’s records which are intact, clean and without redactions containing all of the necessary identifying information such as his social security number, and Texas Driver’s license number. This is identifying information necessary to tie these records to Mr. Ocegueda and properly identify him in law enforcement systems. The greatest irony of all in this story is that it is my copy of Mr. Ocegueda’s records which Judge Pendergrass has ordered be redistributed to law enforcement agencies across the state and to replenish the public files.
Please refer this complaint to the White Collar Crime Unit of the Texas Attorney General’s Office, Mr. David Glickler.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Cc: David Glickler, Greg Allen, Chief of Police of the El Paso Police Department, Chris Pacheco of the El Paso Sheriff’s Department
Dear Chief Allen and Ms. Pacheco:
By copying you, I am hereby making a formal request of both of your offices to formally receive this complaint and forward it to David Glickler of the Texas Attorney General’s Office. Please do not shirk your duties by sending this letter back to me citing the dishonest and anemic excuse that you are the wrong agency. Please send it up.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Dear Mr. Glickler:
Please put this letter in your file.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
District Attorney Jaime Esparza
500 E. San Antonio St., 2nd Floor
El Paso, TX 79901
Hand Delivered with file stamped copy on September 2, 2008
Re: Formal Criminal Complaint against District Attorney Jaime Esparza, El Paso Attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer and Alberto Ocegueda
Dear Mr. Esparza:
By this letter I am filing a formal criminal complaint against you, attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer and Alberto Ocegueda. I am filing this complaint with you as you are the chief prosecutor in this jurisdiction and according to the Texas Attorney General’s White Collar Crime and Public Integrity Unit, it is my understanding that in order for their unit to open an investigation, the complaint must be sent up by law enforcement. Naturally, as this complaint involves you and your best friends, Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda, you cannot personally investigate it, and you must pass it on. Please forward this complaint on to David Glickler at the Texas Attorney General’s Office as he is working on different aspects of this case and is already aware of the facts surrounding this case.
I am specifically complaining against you and Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda for the crime of Tampering with Government records, Texas Penal Code 37.10. Being Board certified in criminal law, you are aware that it is against the law to illegally cause the destruction of public records. Being board certified in criminal law you are also aware of the case entitled The State of Texas vs. James Vasilas, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. Lexis 579 (May 7, 2008); 187 SW3rd 486 and 153 SW3rd 725. This is a case where Attorney Vasilas moved for the expunction of his client’s criminal records and in so doing stated grounds in his petition for expunction which were not true. The District Attorney found about the false petition filed by Attorney Vasilas and being an honest district attorney (which we are sorely lacking here in El Paso), he actually brought charges against and prosecuted Attorney Vasilas for the crime of Tampering with Government Records.
To summarize the facts of my criminal complaint, your good friend Alberto Ocegueda was arrested in November of 2006 for aggravated sexual assault of a child. The accusation was that he had digitally penetrated the vagina of a six year old girl, a student at the school where he was the coach. Mr. Ocegueda is also the brother of your personal assistant, Amy Ocegueda Lujan, a secretary you pay the obscene amount of $84,000 a year to of tax payer money (we live in one of the poorest counties in the state) and a woman whom you send to Mexico City allegedly on government business also on the taxpayer dime. (It is important to note that Amy Ocegueda Lujan is not a lawyer and yet she earns far more that most lawyers in your office do.)
You then disqualified yourself from Ocegueda’s case and wrongly hand selected your successor to handle the case, Attorney Chris Bradley, who by no small coincidence is married to the former head of the El Paso police union, Chris McGill. It should also be noted that the brother of Alberto Ocegueda is Pete Ocegueda a police veteran who was also very active in the same El Paso police union. To the great dismay of Mr. and Mrs. Olvera, parents of the child in question, Chris Bradley declined the case. I have school documents which record that the Olveras were very upset about their daughter’s case being declined and were willing to do anything to make sure that Mr. Ocegueda is not around other children. (Sadly, they had to pull their daughter out of the school and my information is that they now home school her). The documents also state that the Olveras were shocked to have heard about the decline from the therapist and to have read about the case in the media. According to my documents, Ms. Bradley did not inform the Olvera family of her decision to decline the case until two weeks after she did it. What many people also do not know is that Bradley’s decision to decline the case came right after you found out that I had found out about the Ocegueda case and I had already publicly commenced my bid for DA against you. The crux of my platform was that you are corrupt and that you do illegal favors for your friends to the very great detriment of the law and this community and our court system. If you will recall, I had filed pleadings in a case on behalf of a client of mine wherein I mentioned the Ocegueda case and almost overnight Chris Bradley declined Ocegueda’s case.
Subsequently, during my campaign for District Attorney against you, there was a tv news report in February 2008 wherein you appeared and attorney Jeff Rey (ostensibly Ocegueda’s civil attorney) appeared talking about the Ocegueda case and the fact that Mr. Ocegueda’s records had been expunged. According to channel 7 reporter Ashlie Hardway, Ocegueda’s criminal and expungement Attorney Joe Spencer, your other good friend, showed her his petition for expungement and an order of expungement of Mr. Ocegueda’s criminal records. Being Board certified in criminal law, Mr. Esparza, you know that an arrest cannot be expunged until the statute of limitations has run when there is no “indictment” or “information” and no “dismissal for mistake or lack of probable cause.” Since Chris Bradley had declined Mr. Ocegueda’s case and therefore there was no indictment or information or dismissal, Mr. Ocegueda legally has to wait 32 years before he could even file a petition to expunge. However, contrary to statutory law and case law regarding expungements, Mr. Ocegueda and his attorney Joe Spencer did indeed charge forward and without fear of prosecution from you, filed a petition for expungement and worse yet, obtained an order of expungement. That illegal order of expungement led to the illegal destruction of government records. Both the petition and the order were filed in direct conflict with the law.
I am enclosing a copy of Mr. Spencer’s petition for expungement which I was fortunate enough to obtain. You may be interested to know that it was through information obtained from you at the UTEP debate that enabled me to get this most valuable document which is damning evidence of the crimes of which I am complaining. (I want to thank you for inadvertently pointing Stuart Leeds and me in the right direction). As you will see, in Spencer’s petition for expungement, he states that there was an “information” in Ocegueda’s case, which there was not. (I have Chris Bradley’s decline letter). Spencer also states that there was a “dismissal,” which there was not as it was never assigned to a court because it was DECLINED. And Spencer further states that the case is no longer pending which is also false since the statute of limitations has not run (that being 32 years from November 2006).
Furthermore, I am formally asking that Mr. Ocegueda be investigated and prosecuted for the crime of perjury as he swore to the truth of the contents of the petition as evidenced by his notarized signature on the petition. These contents we know were not true.
As for your involvement in these crimes Mr. Esparza, it was through the misuse of your position as District Attorney, your help, your aiding, your abetting and your conspiring with your friends, that valuable government records were illegally destroyed. It will not be hard to prove that you were aware of the illegal petition for expunction as you publicly stated on at least two occasions during campaign functions that you knew about every aspect of the case. It is also a reasonable inference that you sent your good friend Ocegueda to your good friend Spencer for legal representation. In fact, Mr. Spencer’s sister Deanna Spencer has worked for you for years and was the head of the “Victim Assistance Unit” for many years. How ironic the Victim’s Assistance Unit. Did the little Olvera girl receive any of the benefits of your victim’s assistance unit run by Deanne Spencer sister of Joe Spencer and friend of Amy Ocegueda Lujan sister of the alleged child molester Alberto Ocegueda and your best friend? Furthermore, you talked about the expungement and were aware of it and being not only a criminal attorney but board certified in criminal law, you knew that that expunction was illegal and your job was/is to make sure that as District Attorney, Mr. Spencer and Mr. Ocegueda never get prosecuted like Attorney Vasilas did. In fact, on August 15, 2008 channel 7 news reported that they spoke to Mr. Ocegueda in reference to his records being UNexpunged and remarkably they said "Ocegeuda said he was OUTRAGED and that he and his lawyer are definitley going to appeal." Only with your criminal conspiracy and involvement would Ocegueda be so brazen as to publicly say he was outraged that his illegal expunction was not only discovered but undone.
As you also know, attorney Stuart Leeds and I recently successfully litigated a petition to undo Mr. Ocegueda’s illegal expungement. For reasons unknown, Judge Barill did not want to hear the case, so an out of town judge, Judge Carl Pendergrass, came to El Paso to preside. It was refreshing to say the least to see an honest judge in action and so easily and so simply follow the law. Judge Pendergrass who is obviously not impressed with Mr. Ocegueda’s connections, agreed with Mr. Leeds and me and granted our pleadings. He followed the law and stated that Mr. Ocegueda could not have legally filed the petition for expungement for 32 years and that the order of expungement Spencer obtained was a “legal malady.” He decreed that the order be set aside as void and he further decreed that Alberto Ocegueda’s records regarding the aggravated sexual assault of a child be reinstated in City, County and State records including records held at your office..
Mr. Spencer unbelievably and arrogantly argued to the court that even if the judge were to order the records back in there were no records to put in because they had been destroyed. Fortunately, I have copies of Mr. Ocegueda’s records which are intact, clean and without redactions containing all of the necessary identifying information such as his social security number, and Texas Driver’s license number. This is identifying information necessary to tie these records to Mr. Ocegueda and properly identify him in law enforcement systems. The greatest irony of all in this story is that it is my copy of Mr. Ocegueda’s records which Judge Pendergrass has ordered be redistributed to law enforcement agencies across the state and to replenish the public files.
Please refer this complaint to the White Collar Crime Unit of the Texas Attorney General’s Office, Mr. David Glickler.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Cc: David Glickler, Greg Allen, Chief of Police of the El Paso Police Department, Chris Pacheco of the El Paso Sheriff’s Department
Dear Chief Allen and Ms. Pacheco:
By copying you, I am hereby making a formal request of both of your offices to formally receive this complaint and forward it to David Glickler of the Texas Attorney General’s Office. Please do not shirk your duties by sending this letter back to me citing the dishonest and anemic excuse that you are the wrong agency. Please send it up.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Dear Mr. Glickler:
Please put this letter in your file.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Joe Spencer & Alberto Ocegueda's Illegal Petition Documents
August 22, 2008, 9:05 am
Joe Spencer & Alberto Ocegueda's Illegal Petition Documents Archive.
These are the documents regarding the Petition for Expunction for Alberto Ocegueda.
File: admin_Barill03.pdf is Judge Barill's 08/20/2008 letter to Theresa.
File: admin_Barill04.pdf is Judge Barill's 05/05/2008 Ex-parte letter to Judge Ables.
File: admin_ExpungPet02.pdf is Joe Spencer's & Alberto Ocegueda's illegal Petition for Expunction which Judge Barill granted.
These are the documents regarding the Petition for Expunction for Alberto Ocegueda.
File: admin_Barill03.pdf is Judge Barill's 08/20/2008 letter to Theresa.
File: admin_Barill04.pdf is Judge Barill's 05/05/2008 Ex-parte letter to Judge Ables.
File: admin_ExpungPet02.pdf is Joe Spencer's & Alberto Ocegueda's illegal Petition for Expunction which Judge Barill granted.
Judge Angie Barill's Void Order of Expunction/Joe Spencer/Alberto Ocegueda
August 20, 2008, 5:21 pm
Note: I will get back to our Pulitzer prize winning journalist Ashlie Hardway later. There is a lot happening regarding Judge Barill who granted the original order of expunction that you need to know about. What follows is a letter I wrote and sent to her yesterday. As Judge Barill is no longer the judge on the case, this is not an ex-parte communication. Read the letter, as it will explain many things about this case. It will especially make clear what Ashlie Hardway wilfully failed to tell you, what Spencer did, what the judge did and how they all reek. It will also help you to understand what may happen in the future. Of course your comments are always appreciated.
Theresa Caballero
Attorney at Law
300 E. Main St., Suite 1136
El Paso, Texas 79901
915. 565.3550
Fax 915.562.5250
August 19, 2008
The Honorable Angie Juarez Barill
346th Judicial District Court
500 E. San Antonio St.
El Paso, TX 79901
Re: Void Expunction Order and Attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer.
Dear Judge Barill:
On May 22, 2007, attorney Joe Spencer filed a Petition for Expunction on behalf of his client Alberto Ocegueda, aka Osegueda. Mr. Ocegueda had been arrested for aggravated sexual assault of a child in the fall of 2006. The petition was filed in your court when you were the presiding judge. Based on knowledge and belief you signed the order granting the petition sometime in August 2007.
Attorney Spencer had represented Mr. Ocegueda on the underlying aggravated sexual assault of a child charges and was therefore aware of all steps taken or not taken by the special prosecutor in his client’s case. After the special prosecutor Chris Bradley declined Ocegeuda’s case, attorney Spencer went on to prepare, file and litigate a Petition for Expunction. In his petition for expunction, Mr. Spencer stated that Mr. Ocegueda’s case had been brought forward by an “information.” There was never an information in Mr. Ocegueda’s case. Attorney Spencer also stated in his petition that Mr. Ocegueda’s case had been “dismissed.” That is also not true. His case had been declined. He also “failed to disclose facts to your tribunal when disclosure was necessary to avoid assisting a criminal or fraudulent act and, as this was an ex parte proceeding, he failed to disclose to your tribunal unprivileged facts which should have been known by you for you to make an informed decision.” (State Bar Rule 3.03). Attorney Spencer failed to state in his petition that the statute of limitations had not yet run in his client’s case. Mr. Spencer presented these false pleadings to his client Ocegueda to sign under penalty of perjury. Mr. Ocegueda signed to the truth of the above even though it was not true.
The Petition was then filed in your court. When attorneys file original petitions, they do not know what the cause number will be or what court it will land in so they leave those items blank and fill them in at the Clerk’s office once a court and a case number have been assigned. What is interesting and I have yet to get an explanation for this troublesome question, is that my copy of Ocegeuda’s original petition for expunction that Spencer filed shows that your court number, the 346th, appears to have been typed into the style of the case before it was filed . However the cause number was handwritten in. How could that be? As you are also aware, there is a huge public corruption FBI investigation into forum fixing, that is, attorneys fixing matters so that their cases fall into certain friendly courts. Could you please shed light on this question? I have enclosed a copy of the Spencer’s original petition for your review.
Furthermore, when it came to my attention that you had ordered the records in this case destroyed, Stuart Leeds and I became concerned. We knew that based on the information we had that this could not have been done in compliance with the law. We also came to find out that many valuable, governmental records regarding allegations of the rape of a six year old female child had been destroyed as result of your order and were being kept from the public. Relying on case law and statutory law, Mr. Leeds then filed a Petition to undo your order of expunction of Ocegueda’s records. Mr. Leeds’ petition fell in your court and your court set it for hearing on April 30, 2008. Since Attorney Leeds was seeking the reinstatement of records you had previously ordered law enforcement to destroy, he served all of those law enforcement agencies with notice about the hearing. Not one of them opposed his petition.
Anticipating that standing might be an issue, we subpoenaed a witness to prove standing, Channel 7 reporter Ashlie Hardway. She was personally served and paid through the process server to be present in your court on April 30, 2008 at 11:00 a.m.
On April 30, 2008, we appeared before you. You had the clerk’s file with Mr. Leeds’ pleadings outlining his case and why he was asking you to vacate your previous order. As a judge, you are aware of the following cases: the Mosier case, the James H. Thomas v. Judge Miller case, the Diel v. U.S. case and the Metropolitan Transit Authority v. Jackson case which state that you not only had jurisdiction to hear our case but an absolute duty to do so and to set aside your previous order as void. The Judge Miller case stands for the proposition that the court has no discretion to refuse to set aside a void order once it is brought to the court’s attention.
On April 30, when you had the opportunity to right a wrong, a wrong that you yourself had authorized, you failed to do so. You also tried to back out of your responsibility by blaming it on your predecessor as though he would have to come do it. You stated,
“And I don’t remember doing this, so it may have been done by my predecessor.” (Pg. 6 of the transcript)
Mr. Leeds responded, “Right. And that’s why as an officer of the court I have a duty to bring this to the court’s attention. I don’t think it was done under your predecessor, I think, because the motion was filed after you took office.”
Your response was to skirt the issue and begin the process of closing down the hearing.
Then when we brought it to your attention that our witness, Ashlie Hardway had failed to appear in violation of a validly served subpoena you did not have her attached as we requested. We knew that Hardway would disobey the subpoena and fail to appear and so in advance we had prepared a writ of attachment for you signature to bring her in. However, you refused to sign it. You then cancelled the hearing.
The next thing you did was to refer the case to an out of town judge, Stephen Ables. Again you refused to follow the law and correct not only a mistake that was brought to your attention but one that was your own error. Additionally, instead of just transferring the case without comment meant to influence the successor judge, you wrote a memo on May 5, 2008 telling Judge Ables that the case was political. Instead of telling the judge that you had ordered the destruction of government documents based on incorrect pleadings, you tried to feign ignorance as to what it was all about by saying ,
“However, in examining the pleadings in ths case, this is not an Expunction, but rather this case deals with campaign accusations that arose regarding an elected official here in our county and the candidate in that county race.”
However in court on April 30 you said,
“But before we start, Mr. Leeds, I remember when you filed your motion, I thought, What is this? And let me tell you the concerns that I had–and I didn’t even know it had been set for a hearing until just, I guess, recently when I saw it was on my docket.” (pg. 5 of transcript).
My question is, how could you write that when the pleadings mention no politics or campaigns and speak directly to the law of expunction. And the more important question is, why in the world would you write such a thing to a judge you were referring the case to for him to decide if not to improperly influence him to dismiss the legal questions as political? You spent more time and effort getting out of your duties then you did addressing your wrong doings and fixing them.
Furthermore, in this note to Judge Ables, you never cited any reason for your disqualification or your recusal, which is the only reason for a Judge “not to hear and decide matters assigned to her.” See Canon 3. What was the reason for your recusal? What do you know that we don’t know?
On August 13, 2008, Judge Carl Pendergrass without much ado, traveled from Del Rio to hear this case and stated that,
“The pleadings speak for themselves. There is no pleading that the limitation has run, or the offense to which the party who has been charged with the offense is seeking the expunction...Limitations require that the petition for expunction not be filed until 20 years after that child reaches the age of 18 years. The court is of the understanding that the alleged victim in this case was six years at the time of the offense.
Clearly, limitation did not occur. And not having occurred, the petition for expunction should not have been filed. As such the order of expunction, which resulted from these pleadings is a legal malady, it is void and hereby ordered vacated....
It is further ordered that the name of Mr. Ocegueda and the records of his arrest be reinstated in all applicable city, county and state records.”
To say the least, it was very refreshing to see a judge who has the moral fiber to come in and hear a case and rule according to the law and without concern as to who is friends with whom. Why couldn’t you have done that? Why did it take hundreds of tax payer dollars to bring an out of town judge in to fix your mistake when you had the opportunity and the absolute obligation to do it yourself?–And while justice was left pending while we waited for out of town people to travel here to do your job, valuable records were being withheld from the public and perhaps were still being destroyed regarding the accusation of a little girl who said she had been raped by a coach at school. Attached please find a letter from the counselor at SISD documenting the child’s family’s anguish.
Recently, a lawyer named James Vasilas was charged with Tampering With Governmental Records in violation of Texas Penal Code Sec. 37.10. He had filed a petition for expunction stating false grounds. The Vasilas facts are eerily the same as those in the Spencer/Ocegueda case. Please see The State of Texas vs. James Vasilas, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. Lexis 579 (May 7, 2008); 187 SW 3rd 486 and 153 SW 3rd 725.
You as the judge either knew about the defects in the pleadings Mr. Spencer presented to you or you were duped. If you were duped, please see State Bar Rules of Professional Conduct, Rule 3.03 and Rule 8.03 and Code of Judicial Conduct, Canon 3 D(2), second sentence.
We gave Mr. Spencer the opportunity to “take reasonable remedial measures, including disclosure of the true facts.” See Rule 3.03, entitled Candor Toward the Tribunal. Spencer not only did not disclose the true facts, he filed pleadings and argued that the court had no jurisdiction to vacate your void order. Canon 3 states in pertinent part that:
“A judge who receives information clearly establishing that a lawyer has committed a violation of the Texas Rules of Professional Conduct should take appropriate action. A judge having knowledge that a lawyer has committed a violation of the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct that raises a substantial question as to the lawyer’s honesty, trustworthiness or fitness as a lawyer in other respects shall inform the Office of the General Counsel of the State Bar of Texas or take other appropriate action.”
Canon 3 also states that “A judge shall hear and decide matters assigned to the judge except those in which disqualification is required or recusal is appropriate.”
Your staff has indicated to me that you were duped by Mr. Spencer’s pleadings. You now have another opportunity to do the right thing in this case. The rules of ethics require a judge who has knowledge that a lawyer has not been candid toward the tribunal (in this case I remind you that attorney Spencer handled his client’s underlying criminal offense and knew all of its details including that it had not been dismissed and that limitations had not run and that an information had not been filed. He is the same attorney who prepared the expunction and litigated it which led you to enter an order destroying governmental records) to report him to the State Bar.
Please let me know by no later than 5:00 p.m. on Friday, August 22, 2008 if you plan to report Mr. Spencer to the State Bar. If you read Rule 8.03 you will see that I also have an absolute duty to report those lawyers and judges who do not comply with the Bar and judicial rules. If I do not hear from you in written form, I will assume that your position is that Joe Spencer was candid to you when he presented his pleadings for expunction on Ocegueda to you and that you concur with what he did and that you believe that the order of expunction that you sent out to law enforcement agencies to destroy governmental records was fine, proper and legal.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Theresa Caballero
Attorney at Law
300 E. Main St., Suite 1136
El Paso, Texas 79901
915. 565.3550
Fax 915.562.5250
August 19, 2008
The Honorable Angie Juarez Barill
346th Judicial District Court
500 E. San Antonio St.
El Paso, TX 79901
Re: Void Expunction Order and Attorney Joe Aureliano Spencer.
Dear Judge Barill:
On May 22, 2007, attorney Joe Spencer filed a Petition for Expunction on behalf of his client Alberto Ocegueda, aka Osegueda. Mr. Ocegueda had been arrested for aggravated sexual assault of a child in the fall of 2006. The petition was filed in your court when you were the presiding judge. Based on knowledge and belief you signed the order granting the petition sometime in August 2007.
Attorney Spencer had represented Mr. Ocegueda on the underlying aggravated sexual assault of a child charges and was therefore aware of all steps taken or not taken by the special prosecutor in his client’s case. After the special prosecutor Chris Bradley declined Ocegeuda’s case, attorney Spencer went on to prepare, file and litigate a Petition for Expunction. In his petition for expunction, Mr. Spencer stated that Mr. Ocegueda’s case had been brought forward by an “information.” There was never an information in Mr. Ocegueda’s case. Attorney Spencer also stated in his petition that Mr. Ocegueda’s case had been “dismissed.” That is also not true. His case had been declined. He also “failed to disclose facts to your tribunal when disclosure was necessary to avoid assisting a criminal or fraudulent act and, as this was an ex parte proceeding, he failed to disclose to your tribunal unprivileged facts which should have been known by you for you to make an informed decision.” (State Bar Rule 3.03). Attorney Spencer failed to state in his petition that the statute of limitations had not yet run in his client’s case. Mr. Spencer presented these false pleadings to his client Ocegueda to sign under penalty of perjury. Mr. Ocegueda signed to the truth of the above even though it was not true.
The Petition was then filed in your court. When attorneys file original petitions, they do not know what the cause number will be or what court it will land in so they leave those items blank and fill them in at the Clerk’s office once a court and a case number have been assigned. What is interesting and I have yet to get an explanation for this troublesome question, is that my copy of Ocegeuda’s original petition for expunction that Spencer filed shows that your court number, the 346th, appears to have been typed into the style of the case before it was filed . However the cause number was handwritten in. How could that be? As you are also aware, there is a huge public corruption FBI investigation into forum fixing, that is, attorneys fixing matters so that their cases fall into certain friendly courts. Could you please shed light on this question? I have enclosed a copy of the Spencer’s original petition for your review.
Furthermore, when it came to my attention that you had ordered the records in this case destroyed, Stuart Leeds and I became concerned. We knew that based on the information we had that this could not have been done in compliance with the law. We also came to find out that many valuable, governmental records regarding allegations of the rape of a six year old female child had been destroyed as result of your order and were being kept from the public. Relying on case law and statutory law, Mr. Leeds then filed a Petition to undo your order of expunction of Ocegueda’s records. Mr. Leeds’ petition fell in your court and your court set it for hearing on April 30, 2008. Since Attorney Leeds was seeking the reinstatement of records you had previously ordered law enforcement to destroy, he served all of those law enforcement agencies with notice about the hearing. Not one of them opposed his petition.
Anticipating that standing might be an issue, we subpoenaed a witness to prove standing, Channel 7 reporter Ashlie Hardway. She was personally served and paid through the process server to be present in your court on April 30, 2008 at 11:00 a.m.
On April 30, 2008, we appeared before you. You had the clerk’s file with Mr. Leeds’ pleadings outlining his case and why he was asking you to vacate your previous order. As a judge, you are aware of the following cases: the Mosier case, the James H. Thomas v. Judge Miller case, the Diel v. U.S. case and the Metropolitan Transit Authority v. Jackson case which state that you not only had jurisdiction to hear our case but an absolute duty to do so and to set aside your previous order as void. The Judge Miller case stands for the proposition that the court has no discretion to refuse to set aside a void order once it is brought to the court’s attention.
On April 30, when you had the opportunity to right a wrong, a wrong that you yourself had authorized, you failed to do so. You also tried to back out of your responsibility by blaming it on your predecessor as though he would have to come do it. You stated,
“And I don’t remember doing this, so it may have been done by my predecessor.” (Pg. 6 of the transcript)
Mr. Leeds responded, “Right. And that’s why as an officer of the court I have a duty to bring this to the court’s attention. I don’t think it was done under your predecessor, I think, because the motion was filed after you took office.”
Your response was to skirt the issue and begin the process of closing down the hearing.
Then when we brought it to your attention that our witness, Ashlie Hardway had failed to appear in violation of a validly served subpoena you did not have her attached as we requested. We knew that Hardway would disobey the subpoena and fail to appear and so in advance we had prepared a writ of attachment for you signature to bring her in. However, you refused to sign it. You then cancelled the hearing.
The next thing you did was to refer the case to an out of town judge, Stephen Ables. Again you refused to follow the law and correct not only a mistake that was brought to your attention but one that was your own error. Additionally, instead of just transferring the case without comment meant to influence the successor judge, you wrote a memo on May 5, 2008 telling Judge Ables that the case was political. Instead of telling the judge that you had ordered the destruction of government documents based on incorrect pleadings, you tried to feign ignorance as to what it was all about by saying ,
“However, in examining the pleadings in ths case, this is not an Expunction, but rather this case deals with campaign accusations that arose regarding an elected official here in our county and the candidate in that county race.”
However in court on April 30 you said,
“But before we start, Mr. Leeds, I remember when you filed your motion, I thought, What is this? And let me tell you the concerns that I had–and I didn’t even know it had been set for a hearing until just, I guess, recently when I saw it was on my docket.” (pg. 5 of transcript).
My question is, how could you write that when the pleadings mention no politics or campaigns and speak directly to the law of expunction. And the more important question is, why in the world would you write such a thing to a judge you were referring the case to for him to decide if not to improperly influence him to dismiss the legal questions as political? You spent more time and effort getting out of your duties then you did addressing your wrong doings and fixing them.
Furthermore, in this note to Judge Ables, you never cited any reason for your disqualification or your recusal, which is the only reason for a Judge “not to hear and decide matters assigned to her.” See Canon 3. What was the reason for your recusal? What do you know that we don’t know?
On August 13, 2008, Judge Carl Pendergrass without much ado, traveled from Del Rio to hear this case and stated that,
“The pleadings speak for themselves. There is no pleading that the limitation has run, or the offense to which the party who has been charged with the offense is seeking the expunction...Limitations require that the petition for expunction not be filed until 20 years after that child reaches the age of 18 years. The court is of the understanding that the alleged victim in this case was six years at the time of the offense.
Clearly, limitation did not occur. And not having occurred, the petition for expunction should not have been filed. As such the order of expunction, which resulted from these pleadings is a legal malady, it is void and hereby ordered vacated....
It is further ordered that the name of Mr. Ocegueda and the records of his arrest be reinstated in all applicable city, county and state records.”
To say the least, it was very refreshing to see a judge who has the moral fiber to come in and hear a case and rule according to the law and without concern as to who is friends with whom. Why couldn’t you have done that? Why did it take hundreds of tax payer dollars to bring an out of town judge in to fix your mistake when you had the opportunity and the absolute obligation to do it yourself?–And while justice was left pending while we waited for out of town people to travel here to do your job, valuable records were being withheld from the public and perhaps were still being destroyed regarding the accusation of a little girl who said she had been raped by a coach at school. Attached please find a letter from the counselor at SISD documenting the child’s family’s anguish.
Recently, a lawyer named James Vasilas was charged with Tampering With Governmental Records in violation of Texas Penal Code Sec. 37.10. He had filed a petition for expunction stating false grounds. The Vasilas facts are eerily the same as those in the Spencer/Ocegueda case. Please see The State of Texas vs. James Vasilas, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. Lexis 579 (May 7, 2008); 187 SW 3rd 486 and 153 SW 3rd 725.
You as the judge either knew about the defects in the pleadings Mr. Spencer presented to you or you were duped. If you were duped, please see State Bar Rules of Professional Conduct, Rule 3.03 and Rule 8.03 and Code of Judicial Conduct, Canon 3 D(2), second sentence.
We gave Mr. Spencer the opportunity to “take reasonable remedial measures, including disclosure of the true facts.” See Rule 3.03, entitled Candor Toward the Tribunal. Spencer not only did not disclose the true facts, he filed pleadings and argued that the court had no jurisdiction to vacate your void order. Canon 3 states in pertinent part that:
“A judge who receives information clearly establishing that a lawyer has committed a violation of the Texas Rules of Professional Conduct should take appropriate action. A judge having knowledge that a lawyer has committed a violation of the Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional Conduct that raises a substantial question as to the lawyer’s honesty, trustworthiness or fitness as a lawyer in other respects shall inform the Office of the General Counsel of the State Bar of Texas or take other appropriate action.”
Canon 3 also states that “A judge shall hear and decide matters assigned to the judge except those in which disqualification is required or recusal is appropriate.”
Your staff has indicated to me that you were duped by Mr. Spencer’s pleadings. You now have another opportunity to do the right thing in this case. The rules of ethics require a judge who has knowledge that a lawyer has not been candid toward the tribunal (in this case I remind you that attorney Spencer handled his client’s underlying criminal offense and knew all of its details including that it had not been dismissed and that limitations had not run and that an information had not been filed. He is the same attorney who prepared the expunction and litigated it which led you to enter an order destroying governmental records) to report him to the State Bar.
Please let me know by no later than 5:00 p.m. on Friday, August 22, 2008 if you plan to report Mr. Spencer to the State Bar. If you read Rule 8.03 you will see that I also have an absolute duty to report those lawyers and judges who do not comply with the Bar and judicial rules. If I do not hear from you in written form, I will assume that your position is that Joe Spencer was candid to you when he presented his pleadings for expunction on Ocegueda to you and that you concur with what he did and that you believe that the order of expunction that you sent out to law enforcement agencies to destroy governmental records was fine, proper and legal.
Sincerely,
Theresa Caballero
Ashlie Hardway Testifies the Law is Irrelevant and Puts KVIA in Harms Way
August 18, 2008, 12:53 pm
Ashlie Hardway is a reporter for channel 7, KVIA news, an ABC affiliate. As Americans, we have been taught to rely on the press for information. We have been taught that the press is the "Fourth Estate" and that it willl act as a watchdog on the government. We have been told that the members of the press will set aside their personal animosity and bias when reporting the news. The news stations in turn go to the government, specifically the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and apply for licenses to operate on the airwaves. Because these licenses are limited due to limited space, stations have to prove that they are doing a public service in order to obtain or maintain their licenses. Is KVIA doing a public service and informing the public of the truth when it employs a reporter who falsely accuses a citizen with a squeaky clean record of violating a law that she cannot violate? That citizen violating the law is a legal impossibility. Ashlie Hardway did all this in the MIDDLE of Early voting, days before the primary day, March 4, 2008 when I was running for the office of District Attorney.
Ashlie Hardway accused me on tv of being a criminal. She said that I could be prosecuted for violating the Texas expunction law for disseminating SISD coach Alberto Ocegueda's arrest records of aggravated sexual assault of a child. I told her that I did not know anything about an expunction order, that I had never been served with an expunction order and not being a government actor am not subject to such an order. Hardway preferred to run with the story Ocegueda's attorney Joe Spencer handed to her anyway, even though she had no proof that I had ever been served with an expunction order. What makes Hardway's actions more deplorable is that Hardway testified on August 13, 2008, that she had READ the expunction statute and she even held it up on TV for her viewers to see. What Hardway failed to tell her viewers was that the expunction petition and order Ocegueda had given her to do her story COULD NOT HAVE BEEN legally granted. Here is what Art 55.01 (Expunction statute) of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure says:
"A person who has been placed under a custodial or non-custodial arrest for commission of either a felony or misdemeanor is entitled to have all records and files relating to the arrest expunged if:
(A) an indictment or information charging the person with commission of a felony has not been presented against the person for an offense arising out of the transaction for which the person was arrested or, if an idictment or information charging the person with commission of a felony was presented...and the limitations period expired before the date on which a petition for expunction was filed under Article 55.02;
Hardway knew from her own story that the "Special Prosecutor" Chris Bradley did not take the case before a grand jury and therefore there was no indictment and no information (Bradley said she had declined the case). This means then under the above law, that Ocegueda would have to wait for the limitations to pass before he could file for an expunction (32 years in this case). Ocegueda filed for and obtained an expunction in less than two years. This isn't even the limitations for a misdemeanor. Anyone else in this town woud have had to have waited 32 years. Can we say "special treatment?"
It was ASTOUNDING to me that Ashlie Hardway and Channel 7 did not report that Alberto Ocegueda could never have gotten his records legally expunged just by using the information they provided in THEIR OWN REPORT. Their story should have been about how the expunction was illegal, another example of my campaign platform: District Attorney Jaime Esparza's friends get special treatment under the law that no else gets!
Here are some verbatim excerpts from the transcript of the August 13, 2008 hearing where a judge agreed that the expunction was a "legal malady" and ordered it vacated as being a void order. Ashlie Hardway testified at that hearing. I am doing the questioning.
Q. Ms. Hardway, did you not in your report say that I could be prosecuted for publishing expunged records?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you looked at the expungement law?
A. I did at the time. I don't recall exactly what it says.
Q. Have you been shown any evidence that I have been served with an expunction order?
A. No.
Q. Okay. Have you ever been served with an expungement order?
A. No.
Q. Okay. And how do you know that these records are expunged?
A. I received a copy of--I beleive it was Mr. Spencer's, after the fact, a motion or something he has filed that he requested this case be expunged. And I received a copy after the fact saying, yes, these were indeed expunged.
Q. Okay. And did you look at the petition Mr. Spencer sent you?
A. Yes.
...
Q. Are you aware that the statute of limitations for sexual assault is 20 years after the child turns 18, or life, depending on what year the offense had been committed?"
A. No
Q. And you didn't cover any of that in your reports either, did you?
A. It wasn't relevant to my report at the time. The report was about the document that was published.
Q. You didn't cover any of that in your report?
A. No, because it was not relevant.
Hardway testifies under oath that the expunction law that she is accusing me of violating, "..was not relevant" to her report. Why wasn't her report that the expungement law would not permit Mr. Ocegueda's expungement? Under the expungement law, Ocegueda and his attorney could not even FILE their petition until 32 years after his arrest. (Find out later about the judge who signed the order granting Ocegueda's petition).
What Hardway also failed to tell you is that Ocegueda's petition for expungement stated he was seeking the expungement of the arrest records of an "Ocegueda", O-C-E. What were ordered destroyed were the arrest records of "Osegeuda" O-S-E. Why did the booking records spell Ocegueda's name with and O-S? How did Ocegueda get the misspelled records purged when he failed to ask for O-S-E. If you seek the expungement of a particular name then that is all you should be able to get and not all the names that "are close in spelling to it." When I asked Ms. Hardway about the petition haveing one spelling and the destroyed records having another and if her inquiring, truth seeking mind had wondered and asked about that, here is what transpired:
Q. Have you seen the arrest records of Mr. Ocegueda? You saw my flyer?
A. Right. Yes.
Q. Do you remember that his name was O-S-E?
A. Yes.
Q. And so you would agree that the petition for expungement was to erase the records of a man who spells his name with an O-C and not an O-S?
A. Right.
Q. Did you ask anybody about that?
A. I noticed there were several documents that had his name spelled two different ways. I don't remember exactly which ones were spelled which way, but I remember there were several things--
Ms. Caballero: I'm sorry. Objection, non-repsonsive, Judge. I asked her if she asked anybody to clear that up.
A. I don't recall if I asked anyone.
Hardway doesn't report that expungement law does not permit such an expungement. She thinks it is not relevant. She thinks it is not relevant that the order she is accusing me of violating could never have been legally granted. She doesn't report that even if the order had been legally obtained the records that were expunged were not the ones they asked to be expunged.
Look for my next installment to see what else Hardway thought was irrelevant and not important. I think you will find it interesting and enlightening as to how certain members of the El Paso press function.
Ashlie Hardway accused me on tv of being a criminal. She said that I could be prosecuted for violating the Texas expunction law for disseminating SISD coach Alberto Ocegueda's arrest records of aggravated sexual assault of a child. I told her that I did not know anything about an expunction order, that I had never been served with an expunction order and not being a government actor am not subject to such an order. Hardway preferred to run with the story Ocegueda's attorney Joe Spencer handed to her anyway, even though she had no proof that I had ever been served with an expunction order. What makes Hardway's actions more deplorable is that Hardway testified on August 13, 2008, that she had READ the expunction statute and she even held it up on TV for her viewers to see. What Hardway failed to tell her viewers was that the expunction petition and order Ocegueda had given her to do her story COULD NOT HAVE BEEN legally granted. Here is what Art 55.01 (Expunction statute) of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure says:
"A person who has been placed under a custodial or non-custodial arrest for commission of either a felony or misdemeanor is entitled to have all records and files relating to the arrest expunged if:
(A) an indictment or information charging the person with commission of a felony has not been presented against the person for an offense arising out of the transaction for which the person was arrested or, if an idictment or information charging the person with commission of a felony was presented...and the limitations period expired before the date on which a petition for expunction was filed under Article 55.02;
Hardway knew from her own story that the "Special Prosecutor" Chris Bradley did not take the case before a grand jury and therefore there was no indictment and no information (Bradley said she had declined the case). This means then under the above law, that Ocegueda would have to wait for the limitations to pass before he could file for an expunction (32 years in this case). Ocegueda filed for and obtained an expunction in less than two years. This isn't even the limitations for a misdemeanor. Anyone else in this town woud have had to have waited 32 years. Can we say "special treatment?"
It was ASTOUNDING to me that Ashlie Hardway and Channel 7 did not report that Alberto Ocegueda could never have gotten his records legally expunged just by using the information they provided in THEIR OWN REPORT. Their story should have been about how the expunction was illegal, another example of my campaign platform: District Attorney Jaime Esparza's friends get special treatment under the law that no else gets!
Here are some verbatim excerpts from the transcript of the August 13, 2008 hearing where a judge agreed that the expunction was a "legal malady" and ordered it vacated as being a void order. Ashlie Hardway testified at that hearing. I am doing the questioning.
Q. Ms. Hardway, did you not in your report say that I could be prosecuted for publishing expunged records?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you looked at the expungement law?
A. I did at the time. I don't recall exactly what it says.
Q. Have you been shown any evidence that I have been served with an expunction order?
A. No.
Q. Okay. Have you ever been served with an expungement order?
A. No.
Q. Okay. And how do you know that these records are expunged?
A. I received a copy of--I beleive it was Mr. Spencer's, after the fact, a motion or something he has filed that he requested this case be expunged. And I received a copy after the fact saying, yes, these were indeed expunged.
Q. Okay. And did you look at the petition Mr. Spencer sent you?
A. Yes.
...
Q. Are you aware that the statute of limitations for sexual assault is 20 years after the child turns 18, or life, depending on what year the offense had been committed?"
A. No
Q. And you didn't cover any of that in your reports either, did you?
A. It wasn't relevant to my report at the time. The report was about the document that was published.
Q. You didn't cover any of that in your report?
A. No, because it was not relevant.
Hardway testifies under oath that the expunction law that she is accusing me of violating, "..was not relevant" to her report. Why wasn't her report that the expungement law would not permit Mr. Ocegueda's expungement? Under the expungement law, Ocegueda and his attorney could not even FILE their petition until 32 years after his arrest. (Find out later about the judge who signed the order granting Ocegueda's petition).
What Hardway also failed to tell you is that Ocegueda's petition for expungement stated he was seeking the expungement of the arrest records of an "Ocegueda", O-C-E. What were ordered destroyed were the arrest records of "Osegeuda" O-S-E. Why did the booking records spell Ocegueda's name with and O-S? How did Ocegueda get the misspelled records purged when he failed to ask for O-S-E. If you seek the expungement of a particular name then that is all you should be able to get and not all the names that "are close in spelling to it." When I asked Ms. Hardway about the petition haveing one spelling and the destroyed records having another and if her inquiring, truth seeking mind had wondered and asked about that, here is what transpired:
Q. Have you seen the arrest records of Mr. Ocegueda? You saw my flyer?
A. Right. Yes.
Q. Do you remember that his name was O-S-E?
A. Yes.
Q. And so you would agree that the petition for expungement was to erase the records of a man who spells his name with an O-C and not an O-S?
A. Right.
Q. Did you ask anybody about that?
A. I noticed there were several documents that had his name spelled two different ways. I don't remember exactly which ones were spelled which way, but I remember there were several things--
Ms. Caballero: I'm sorry. Objection, non-repsonsive, Judge. I asked her if she asked anybody to clear that up.
A. I don't recall if I asked anyone.
Hardway doesn't report that expungement law does not permit such an expungement. She thinks it is not relevant. She thinks it is not relevant that the order she is accusing me of violating could never have been legally granted. She doesn't report that even if the order had been legally obtained the records that were expunged were not the ones they asked to be expunged.
Look for my next installment to see what else Hardway thought was irrelevant and not important. I think you will find it interesting and enlightening as to how certain members of the El Paso press function.