I’ve written more times than I can count of the symbiotic relationship between the Boston Globe and the Boston U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz.
Here’s what is behind it. Attorney Ortiz was appointed as Boston’s U.S. attorney. Shortly after she was in that office and before she had really gotten her feet wet the people at the Globe decided that it would be nice if they could get her to do their bidding. They came up with the idea of naming her “Bostonian of the Year.” which they did on December 30, 2011, about two years after she was appointed. That would be a feather in her hat
Ortiz had really done nothing to merit the Bostonian of the Year pick. A look at the prior nominations showed what an outlier it was. Unlike her, all the others had made significant public and well-known contributions of their own: 2004 Theo Epstein; 2005 Judge Edward Ginsberg; 2006 Deval Patrick; 2007 Bruce Marks (executive director of the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA)) , Paul Pierce, Elizabeth Warren, and Scott Brown. Ortiz’s big accomplishment was convincing Teddy Kennedy and John Kerry that it would be nice for a woman from a minority group to take over that office.
The Globe continued to keep up with her. It would tell us on December 7, 2012, that she might be the next governor in Massachusetts. We all know that dream came to an abrupt halt about a month later when the lid was lifted on the way her office operated with the death of Aaron Swartz.
But the Globe had come through with its side of the bargain to push her into public notice so it still expected her to come through with her part which was being grateful to the Globe for having done so. She could show her gratitude by following up on Globe stories with federal prosecutions.
This she did and continues to do. We all know how the Globe was incensed that John O’Brien the former Commissioner of Probation was giving out jobs to people recommended by judges and legislatures. It demanded that the federal investigate. Ortiz did and came down with a charge against O’Brien for racketeering alleging he and two of his assistants ran an illegal enterprise which gave jobs based on patronage. They faced twenty years in prison even though none had a criminal record.
The Globe then went after the owner of a taxi company where it alleged “fleet owners get rich, drivers are frequently fleeced, and the city does little about it.” It told about Edward J. Tutunjian, “a onetime cabbie who began buying taxi licenses 40 years ago, is the king of Boston’s taxi industry.” It did not allege he had committed any crimes; it just said that he wasn’t treating his taxi drivers the way the Globe thought they should be treated. Everyone yawned at the story. The city continued to do nothing.
The Globe saw its big Spotlight Investigation amounting to a storm in a kettle. Then, well here is what the Globe wrote, “Internal Revenue Service agents executed a federal search warrant Friday at the headquarters of Boston Cab, the largest taxi company in the city and the focus of a recent Globe Spotlight Team investigation that found widespread exploitation in the industry. The agents, who were accompanied by Boston and Cambridge police officers and agents from the US Secret Service and the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of Inspector General, descended on the Kilmarnock Street garage around 3 p.m. The IRS agents entered the garage with guns drawn, according to a cabbie who witnessed the raid. “Hands up,” the driver heard them say. . . . Jessica Crocker, an IRS agent and spokeswoman for the agency’s Boston office, said the IRS was “conducting a court-authorized operation” but referred all other questions to the office of US Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz.”
Ortiz was really going overboard for the paper. Nowhere in the Spotlight article was there any allegation the owner of the cab company did anything illegal. That raid happened almost three years ago and there has been no follow-up.
Now she’s at it again. The Globe has been writing about Senator Brian A. Joyce from Norfolk County. It noted the Globe has had him “under fire for alleged ethical lapses, including accepting free or discounted services and charging his campaign fund for a family party. So what happens: “more than a dozen FBI agents entered . . . [his] law office building in downtown Canton”
Kristen Setera, an FBI spokeswoman, said “The FBI and the IRS are conducting court-authorized activity in connection with an ongoing investigation.” It may have been more correct to say it was a Globe authorized activity in connection with a newspapers allegations.
I know Joyce as well as I know Kim Jong-un. For all I know he may have misspent his campaign funds in a blatant manner hosting his kid’s graduation party; Jerry Richman, may have given Joyce free dry cleaning for more than a decade starting in 1997. (That would be beyond any statute of limitations.); or he may have done other things a state politician should not have done. Joyce is under investigation by state authorities as he should be. The state should be allowed to police its own house and officials.
The big problem is that because of the Globe’s vendetta against Joyce it seems Carmen Ortiz has stepped in to do its dirty work. I’m sure that she and her staff can come up with some type of federal violation to pin on Joyce. There are so many everyday acts that are federal crimes that if the feds want to get you they can.
But how tawdry is the federal prosecutor’s office when it is operating not in the interests of justice but of a private enterprise.
★ ” The cure for pain is in the pain ” … Rumi
JKM-Thank You for the advice and guidance, it takes the sting out of the malaise and gloom knowing i can rely on you for a GEM of a quote to “keep on trying”. God Bless!!
@ Freeh :
Relax Ms. When you’re not pissing me off I generally get a kick out of your droll services to ” The People. ” 🙂
★ ” The cure to the suffering is in the pain ” to render it correctly unto God, Caesar, and the rest of us suffering human bastards 🙂 …. “We all will die someday, yes. ” as the wily Boris said. So … You do your Best !!!
Doubting Thomas – The cure is in the suffering , as was once said, and , like yourself , I say … God Bless 🙂 Thankyou for your good words, also !!!
wrong spelling
should be occurrencesforeigndomestic
★at some point even the craziest * see just who it is they are dealing with .
that was covered in the film
King of Hearts
see
occurencesforeigndomestic
dot com
Doubting T – I’ve seen people tricked out in all sorts of ” Rigs ” in my day. Carmen Ortiz is no exception. Chose/Chosen ??? … in due respect it is perhaps a distinction wirhout a difference. Different ” COMBINATIONS” … Same Old Game:-) … To say the game is ” Rigged” does not say more than it can say. At some point even the craziest really just who it is they are dealing with. The US Attorney’s Office … and it’s ” Crew” just continues to keep things organized ” Eastern Style,” you might say. Carmen is a major piece of work no doubt, but indubitably a … Major Piece . All chauvinistic glosses notwithstanding, she is definitely ” On The Board. ” … I get your antipathy to her, but if , as we both recognize, the game is rigged, we must then concede the impersonal qualities of it ; nothing personal, just business as the saw goes. For Aaron Swartz and other victims of the game it is wholly personal. Therein lies its tragic character. Your points are well taken.
JKM- Enjoy the feedback from you, your comments are always well written. I just have to ask, how do you personally deal with or handle the unfair,maybe even illegal behavior from those who have power and use it for corruption or cronyism? Carmen Ortiz aside, I think it is tough for a younger guy like me to just accept it, knowing that the future looks bleak and the corruption flourishes. God Bless JKM.
This just in from the DOJ crime family
US Dept. of Homeland Security loses 1,300 badges and credentials in 31 months
January 27, 2016 11:05 AM·
According to a spreadsheet of lost, damaged and destroyed items, various agencies inside the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reported over 1,300 badges and credentials lost or stolen, and no fewer than 165 firearms lost or stolen over the course of 31 months*.
Doubting T – Boris, my eighty years old chess mentor is a Teacher. ” We all will die someday, yes ” he intoned quietly as we played amidst like spirited chess as a philosophy of life devotees in one of Cambridge’s … coffee dens. Life is the Great Teacher. Again, Carmen did not invent the Game. She plays it as it has to be played though … Relentlessly, and …. to the best of her ” Understanding .”
JKM- The Game is rigged, my friend. Carmen chooses the Game, she was not forced in the game. Carmen is more than willing to play the game, money and chunky pensions is the objective. Carmen is a big girl, she knows the almighty dollar and power are her most favorite things. Bostonian of the year. i agree with you, it is part of the schtick.
Norman Chandler and Chandler family owned L.A. Times and had a very proprietary interest in the LAPD ; circa early twentieth century, particularly the teens and twenties. Taylor family founding family, since deposed, of the Globe represented their class and financial interests in their social editing capacity as it were. Their ” Liberal ” views still color the bloody rag. It is an old dynamic.
Ortiz plays the game. She takes her chances and opportunities. It is an old game. It is a dirty game. She did not invent it, but as my eighty year old hale and rugged Russian chess nemesis likes to impishly remind all players …. ” Sometimes pawn can be Queen !!! ”
What power really does she have over the Globe’s ” Bostonian Of The Year ” award? … She plays the game. Again, she did not invent it. Aaron Swartz haunts her. Of that I have little doubt. She had the depth of feeling to publicly express strong remorse and emotion over this gifted young man’s suicide. It will not bring him back. It does indicate to me though that at some level of being and consciousness she understands just what a rotten game it is.
Pawn or Queen? Take your pick. I for one am not certain Carmen Ortiz has as much choice as we suppose .
JKM- She could become a teacher.
She really is a nasty piece of work. She loves to terrorize anyone or thing. Incapable of not abusing the power that is at her disposal. I wonder if she ever thinks of Aaron Swartz? or his family? I wonder how she sleeps at night? probably very well.
magistrate judge, an Apple employee, and an FBI agent agree to meet
at a local bar. Only the Apple employee makes it. Why? Because the bar
didn’t have a back door
Matt,
What’s your take on the Apple situation?
http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-versus-the-fbi-why-the-lowest-priced-iphone-has-the-us-in-a-tizzy-faq/
Rather;
That was a great site you set out in your comment. It explained a lot.
I wrote about part of my take earlier where I said the FBI went to a friendly judge and got an order against Apple even at the same time they were in discussions with the. It did to to make Apple look un-American. It was typical of how the FBI operates in a sleazy manner.
As to the main issue, Apple has to fight it. First, it was in the middle of discussions with Congress that the FBI is trying to subvert. Second, if it does it once it will be required to do it again and again. Precedent will be set. No one will be able to rely on the security n their iPhones. Local cops looking to find out who their girlfriends are calling will be demanding Apple open the phone.
It also has ramifications for Apple worldwide. If it opens secured phones at the government’s request other phone companies might advertise that and push their phones saying their system is totally secure. The overall problem is there is no evidence the guy even used the iPhone for over a month prior to terror act. It was a work iPhone. He and his lovely bride destroyed their iPhones and the hard drive of their computers so it is highly unlikely there is anything on the phone worth while. Before a warrant can issue you need probable cause to believe the item you are looking for will be on the phone — no one seems to question the FBI’s lack of probable cause – if you follow the FBI’s logic then suppose your friend becomes a terrorist – the FBI could say Rather has an iPhone and has been with his friend therefore his friend may have used Rather’s iPhone therefore we want to check it out to see if that happened. Right now the FBI is on a great fishing expedition; it is as someone pointed out over two months since the attack. There is no imminent danger — the FBI should have made its case before Congress as it was doing unsuccessfully. By the way it is now saying it want to see what was on the phone for the victims. That still does not mean the probable cause standard does not apply — plain and simple there is no probable cause any evidence of a crime will be found on the phone.
MS,
You cahn’t get theaah from heahh.
Matt
as Jerry Trupiano would say about John Henry
owner of the Red Sox and Boston Globe also
known down in the whisper stream as
the Manny Ramirez of Truth….
” Way Back Way Back”
to learn more about the FBI control
of the media read
Matthew Cecil – ELLIOTT SCHOOL OF COMMUNICATION – Wichita …
webs.wichita.edu/?u=elliott&p=/2012/profile12cecil/
Cecil is a media historian and the author of Hoover’s FBI and the Fourth Estate: The Campaign to Control the Press and the Bureau’s Image, published in 2014 …
“There are so many everyday acts that are federal crimes that if the feds want to get you they can.” True. This characterizes all tyrannies. The bureaucratic controls and constraints put upon Liberty here are starting to rival those of the defunct Soviet Union. The source is the same. The people are losing. Ordinary Americans must restore the balance of power in their own favor and to Trump Washington.
“But how tawdry is the federal prosecutor’s office when it is operating not in the interests of justice but of a private enterprise.”
Not just any private enterprise, but a major metropolitan newspaper. What a dynamic duo: the BostonFedGlobe!
It crossed my mind that a letter-writing campaign on this matter to US AG Loretta Lynch might be in order. Why do I imagine that the response to same would be crickets?
Nah, the response would be a file opened on anyone participating in such, am I right?