I’m Back: No Need To Round Up The Usual Suspects: First Thoughts on Connolly Decision

(`) Joe BltzJ. Edgar, Freddy, Whitey, Tommy Football and others had nothing to do with the blog being down. I am told it was something that affected many blogs on the World Press site which handles this blog.

Thanks to those who notified me of this situation. I was also told that the John Connolly appeal was denied and the poor bastard won’t be seeing daylight anytime soon, if ever. I will have more to say about that tomorrow after I finish reading the decision.

As you have heard me preach that the law is what the judges say it is; what it was  before doesn’t matter. I told yesterday how Whitey’s appeal had no chance because it was Whitey who was appealing. The same applies for Connolly — over and over again the judges tell us what a bad guy he is with the lesson being we will bend over backwards to see that he never gets out. If you want to read the decision click here.

It is 144 pages long. When you have decisions on simple matters that require 144 pages you know you are going to be showered with lots of legal bull. The issue is simple, the judges try to make it complicated.

The decision could have been written in one page since the message is clear — in the same way it was to the black professor who tried to register to vote in his southern town who was told he had to show he was intellectually qualified to vote. He was asked to read and explain two sheets of paper that had writing in Ancient Chinese on it. He studied it a while and said  “the best I can make out it says no black man is going to vote in this town this year” — that Connolly is never going to get out of a Florida prison. It is not because he committed the crime; it is because the judges believe he committed lots of other crimes which they spell out in the opinion. The legal theory being if he didn’t do this he did something else so we will keep him locked up. Yikes! It gets me ill thinking these judges credit the testimony of the gangsters which on its face is incredible.

I’ll discuss it more tomorrow. Thanks for the support and patience with the site being down. Hopefully it was an internal glitch that took it down rather than Tim Cook being upset that I said mean things about his watch.

23 Comments

  1. John King McDonald

    Btw MS.FREEH 🙂 … We certainly do not want to GASLIGHT you and ” Elbows Wychulis” as you peer imploringly into the Plexiglas Sneeze Hood @ your favorite all you can try to eat WORD SALAD BUFFET 🙂 … But … ” Lettuce Pray ” ( a simple and amusing word play Ms. so don’t start chanting your beads as you pore over your PDR) that if you are … semantically/linguistically/psychologically … uhmmmmmmm … confused by , par example, my July 30 posts, that you will simply rely on my friendly feeling towards you and the …. uhmmmmm … Flying Pond-er -ers ( Pander-ers … gasp !!! ) to patiently … de- Crypt them for you . We tease only to … share … with your beloved ” uneducated and uneducable ” that which can be indicated, not struck in stone . I credit the Genius that lurks in US ALL . So …. encryption keys hang upon each according to capacity. Yours … is of course … inexhaustible. A SKELETON KEY TO FINNEGAN’S WAKE is a recommended read if you are wrestling with Joyce ( as opposed to the somewhat schizophrenic ELBOWS. I notice Khalid has returned so enough of your lazing around … Up There … Ms.Freeh 🙂

  2. John King McDonald

    ★ There were corrupt Agents … In Boston, and as Ms.Freeh and her bouncer ” Elbows ” will happily instruct … ” The uneducated and the uneducable ” ( And THAT is an exact Freeh quote 🙂 ) , Nationwide !!!! … As structured … organically … The FBI TEI PROGRAM CORRUPTS ABSOLUTELY . To tame The Beast you may well become not unlike The Beast or ” Peer not too long into the abyss, lest it peer into thee” Classically.

    Yet, you encounter an FBI Agent like Phil Torsney who was on Bulger Task Force for the duration, and as you watch him on 60 MINUTES you muse … ” I am looking at a Guy who might just as well be the most straitlaced Fighting Quaker Federal Judge I’ve ever seen, as a top Fed. SO …… A cadre of really high character Agents does exist. And John Connolly REALLLLLYYYY PISSED OFF the Phil Torsney . It is not a Perfect World. OR IS IT ?

  3. John King McDonald

    * So … MIAMI INNOCENCE PROJECT.
    ….So …. 2014 !!! … Manny Casabiello and I believe former FBI Agent ret. and very qualified Counsel, Ed McDonald were his defense team in original ( Sovereign squared ) trial. I think Manny fumbled appeal deadline that would have had, Judge Woodruff? …. freeing him . Was not at all sure how culpable both defense lawyers were in that … critical pass … failure to file ; In this case an obscure stipulation to all but John Connolly. Both Counsel were loyal and highly capable advocates for him overall. Was not aware that … ” both lawyers conceded in FSJC Appeal that their client was rightly convicted of second degree murder ” or some such panditry from MTC ( Not exact quote, but plenty close enough to provoke the incredulous smile) . John Connolly deserves better. Just what ” Bettor ” will push in with Freddy ” Green Eyeshades ” 🙂 running the Game, is a Cardinal consideration . He is THE HOUSE after all . John Connolly played agin’ it and sits Still … in The Big House .

  4. niall maclachlainn

    On reading the Opinion of the Florida Court of Appeals I note that Connolly was represented by two Public Defenders. He retired as a supervisor with over 20 years of service with the FBI and thus earned a very respectable pension/annuity which he is still receiving. I fail to see how he is entitled to a PD. Perhaps he is still paying for his first trial. I don’t recall if he was fined or lost a civil suit or maybe no member of the FL Bar would take his case. Just curious.

    • Niall:

      Connolly has had so many civil judgments against him because he was unable to defend himself in the civil cases that any spare change he has will be levied upon. I’d guess his pension goes to his wife and three kids to keep them afloat and that may not be attachable by the long line of people wanting if not some money then a piece of flesh.

      He’s been tried twice; I’m sure he was pretty much broke after the first trial; I’m not sure he had money for that appeal, or the subsequent motions for a new trial, or the later trial in Florida and the lenghty appeals that has followed that. He’s ben broke for a long time, doesn’t earn much in prison and has depended upon volunteer lawyers and public counsel.

      No lawyer would volunteer to help him because of the enormous time and effort it would require to do it effectively.

  5. John King McDonald

    🙂 … I do wear a very old iron skeleton key Ms.Freeh, on a chain with an amethyst crystal. Give Sidekick Elbows Wychulis our regards !!!

  6. Yesterday turned out to be a brutal day for
    the Matt Connolly irregulars gathered around
    the Green Mountain coffee machine at
    Flying Pond Variety in Mount Vernon Maine.

    Let me tell you it was not a pretty
    sight to watch a group of grown
    men srart to experience seperation
    anxiety when the Matt Connolly
    blog shut down under the heady
    weight of the John Connolly testimonials.

    Elbows Wychulis was forced to use the Flying
    Pond Variety crank phone and call down to Matt
    and give him a citizen alert on his FBI Smog Blog
    His wife answered the phone with a sigh one would
    expect from someone married to a curmudgeon.
    She handed the phone to Matt while a recording
    played in the bacground saying” this call is being
    monitored to improve FBI customer service.”

    Elbows was brief and to the point ending the
    conversation alerting Matt to the Judges decision
    in John Connolly’ s case.

    Within seconds of hanging up the phone
    the tornado sirens started blaring forcing
    the irregulars to refill their styrofoam cups
    with Green Mountain Hazelnut blend and
    head into the beer cooler for protection
    where they continued their discussion
    of the similarities between John King McDonald’s
    posts, James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake and
    the PDR definition of word salad

    see

    https://mobile.twitter.com/charliewgme
    Charlie Lopresti ‏@CharlieWGME
    Strong winds in this afternoons t-storms flipped over this dock on Flying Pond in Mt. Vernon. #MEwx

    In other news

    more video evidence released indicating
    J Edgar Hoover and other FBI agents
    hwlped assassinate President Kennedy

    http://aarclibrary.org/conference-speakers/

    • MS:

      My eternal gratitude to Elbows for his concern and I thought at first it was the FBI getting revenge but then the post related to Apple so it could have been it. It was too bad to shut me down they screwed up and shut down all the others. Tell Elbows he is right about what the suffering the person who answered the phone goes through on a daiy basis.

  7. John King McDonald

    * Edward Brian Halloran is alleged in a dying ” croaked ” , if you will pardon the expression , bullet ” rattled in the head ” death gurney/ambulance statement that … ” Jimmy Flynn shot me. ” ( btw) … This was to a BPD Sergeant I believe. Mr. Flynn, albeit a ” Charlestown Guy ” had an alibi as solid as The Rock as Alcatraz was known ; he was utterly exonerated at trial. Strange Day and leave it at that .

  8. John King McDonald

    Would’ve loved to have been there. They say that it was a fabulously beautiful day what is now called THE SEAPORT DISTRICT. Glad to observe K getting the specific location right as it is lost in his story’s mists 🙂 … There were @ least a couple hundred eye witnesses, most drinking and victualling across street @ THE PIER RESTAURANT. Actual events were on shared prop line of THE PORT CAFE and ANTHONY’S P-4 extended if you will ; as they had a vasty front parking area that lipped Northern Ave. John Connolly is … FBI Agent John Connolly. ” E- PHRAIMED ” himself perhaps ; to riff off of Kerry’s extremely witty shot. Dunno !!!

  9. From the decision: “The defendant prepared and submitted a series of false reports suggesting that other organized crime factions in Boston were responsible for
    Halloran’s murder. ”

    It would be mighty interesting to read that “series of false reports.” Quite a novella from Boston’s own Efrem Fabulist Junior I’m sure. Connolly couldn’t just claim it was because Halloran was an informant. It was already known to what extent that was true so that would bring more scrutiny on his own operation as investigators tried to determine the source of the leak. So Connolly would have to dream up some non-existent and deadly beef between Halloran and some other organized crime faction. Real Geroge Higgins stuff.

    • Kerry,

      You’re first mistake is quoting something from the decision and giving it credibility. These decisions are full of conventional wisdom that is based on nothing more than the myths and fabrications created by the U.S. Attorneys media arm, that being the Boston Globe with assistance from the duplicitous hypocrite Howard “show me the money” Carr.

      • Declan:

        Good points. You hit the nail on the head. (or as my wife says your head on the nail)

    • Here’s Matt’s take on “that series of false reports” from the May 28, 2014 Patriot Ledger:

      “I found it interesting that she [Judge Leslie B. Rothenberg] told how Connolly “prepared and submitted a series of false reports suggesting that other organized crime factions in Boston were responsible for Halloran’s murder.” It’s true that Connolly filed reports on the Halloran murder relative to what Whitey was telling him. That they turned out to be false after the fact doesn’t show that at the time Connolly was filing them he knew them to be false.”

      http://www.patriotledger.com/article/20140528/BLOGS/305289947

      1. My questions would be: Did Connolly attribute that information to Bulger in his reports.

      2. Did Connolly express a view as to why he thought the information was credible or not credible.

      2. How gullible do you have to be that when a guy gets gunned down in front of Anthony’s Pier 4 restaurant, a renowned Boston landmark, right in Southie, just a mile from Triple O’s to trust Whitey Bulger when he say some “guys from Charlestown” did it.

      Even if it was Whitey who made up the story, because a story was made up. I would just like the hear it.

      That is one story I would very much like to hear.

      • Kerry:

        1. As I understand it those reports were in the informant file of Bulger. It should be noted that the reports the agents file are what the informants tell them whether or not they are true or not. Looking back to the time since Halloran identified a Charlestown guy as having shot him it was probably something that Connolly was not only told by Whitey but what he believed.

        2. No – Connolly was only filing the report. He did not make any assertions as to its truthfulness or not in the report. Whether he did to other agents there is no way to know.

        3. I pointed out in answer one that the victim, Halloran, believed it was a guy from Charlestown named Flynn and told a Boston police officer, Bo McLean I think, that it was Flynn. It’s not being gullible, it seems to me it is following the evidence that you have at the time.

        You have to keep in mind several things about Halloran. He had been shot at by others at other locations over the preceding few months. He was not liked by lots of people. He had just given information that allowed for search warrants to be issued on Flynn’s house. He killed Pappas and that jammed in one of the brothers of a Mafia guy. There were lots of people out to get him aside from Whitey and it was well know on the street that he was cooperating with the FBI since he told people that he was doing it. Whether he was playing a double game trying to get a deal for himself to get off the murder charge and not wanting to upset his gangster friends is not known since he is no longer with us. The simple answer that he was killed in Southie so it had to be Whitey who he was informing on only makes sense looking back; at the time there were a multitude of other probabilities.

    • Kerry:

      The beefs between Halloran and others is well documented. See my answer to your questions.

  10. And does this event confirm, for one and all who are paying attention, that the DOJ is corrupt beyond belief? And that AG Loretta Lynch will not be changing DOJ much?

    • GOK:

      It comes close to doing that but there will always be others who will prefer the media stories. As for Lynch she is just a caretaker for a bit and will do nothing of note to change the system.

  11. Matt,
    How very sad for John Connolly. And, John Morris enjoys his life of comfort. How do these judges sleep at night? How does Wyshak? He seems to have a strangle-hold on so many. What might be done to stop him?

    • Janet:

      You can rest assured Wyshak feels good about this. He probably brought a round for the guys he hangs around with who patted him on the back.

  12. “When you have decisions on simple matters that require 144 pages you know you are going to be showered with lots of legal bull. The issue is simple, the judges try to make it complicated.

    The decision could have been written in one page since the message is clear —…”

    What percentage of US judges do you think would admit that they “try to make it complicated?”

    What percentage of US judges do you think know this in their heart of hearts?

    • GOK:

      Hard to give percentages – judges get too mired down in their own importance and have a hard time of cutting to the core of an issue and most want us to think they are brilliant so if they write to the point where we can no longer understand what they are saying we say the fault must be in us rather than in their obtuseness.