198. Truth or Dare?

VIEWS@13,197

BLOGGER'S NOTE:

For some inexplicable reason, the following article posted in 2013 (on below URL of lawctopus.com) showed up on one of my LinkedIn entries.  It was written by a highly respected lawyer teaching at the Calcutta University. I post it here, with some of my comments interspersed.
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"Protik Da

-Most clients these days have become smart.  They do not want to litigate, defend or even enter into transactions without obtaining a written opinion from at least one lawyer if not more.  Writing these opinions represent a dialectic between two schools of thought:

One, which holds that the lawyer is supposed to give his opinion, not the sources or precedents that he relies upon.

This has the advantage, according to one school of thought, of not disclosing all the cards to the client, because nine times out of ten, a client has his own favourite lawyer, who may not be particularly bright, but comes to you for an opinion because you are supposed to be an expert on the subject.

In other words the client, even armed with your opinion, will not be able to go to some other lawyer and get the drafting/ conveyancing/pleading done, because he and presumably the other lawyer will not have the judgments, legal provisions and authorities that you have relied upon.

The other school of thought, to which I subscribe, is to make the opinion precise but exhaustive in its scope.

Rather like saying be not eternal, since being an opinion you must end, but be infinite while you last! If the client chooses someone else and he is able to do an adequate job based on your opinion and research, he would have learned something new and the profession itself will be enriched.

Remember, a profession is only as good as its least competent member and you are judged not by the best of your kind, but the worst.  More of this later, in some future instalment."
[emphasis by Blogger]
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: I suggest this would be true if the profession is fully conscionable and ethical, adhering strictly to clearly defined rules. My experience has shown the profession runs more like a business, with intrigue and manipulation applied in order to position to win.
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"An opinion, as I see it, must set out the questions on which it is sought very clearly and unambiguously.  If the Querist (which is what we call a person who seeks the opinion) is himself confused, his questions will be equally mindless. 

It is your duty as a lawyer to unravel his tangled skein of thought, identify the issues that are material and on which the relief he wants depends, and then frame them as questions.

Of course, these must resemble the original questions, because otherwise the Querist will feel that you have not answered him, however stupid his questions might have been.

After that, state the facts in a manner which brings out the materials that will become material for answering his questions, whether with an “yes” or a “no”.

This narration must not employ any fact that has not been supplied (rather like the facts in a moot) but it certainly ought to include any presumption or natural inference you have made from the facts, for the purpose of the opinion.

You must of course, state that this is your presumption or inference.

After the facts are over, you may begin your analysis, on which the opinion depends."
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: Again, we are 'presuming,' I suppose, to be functioning on at least an equal ground within that profession. With respect to Mr. Protik Da, when the Querist is an SRL he can expect to receive a double whammy when meddling in the affairs of a closed profession. Not only will he be in-competent, he is not even a subscribed and legitimate member. 
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"An easy way of analysing is to first set out the law and the provisions of the law (or laws) that are applicable.  Then you go on to summarize the binding precedents (judgments of the Supreme Court and the High Court of the State exercising jurisdiction over the subject matter) with full citations.

If your choice of extracts is precise enough, your ultimate opinion will appear from the extracts of the judgments that you have quoted.

In the analysis you may also point out the conditions which have to exist for the answer to the queries to be positive or negative which will advise the client as to what steps he ought to have taken so that he can correct himself in the future in similar matters."
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: Very likely the SRL Querist will have learned his lesson, having come to the realization that as a stranger in a strange land, his circumstances are such he well never be able to sit at the same table, treated as an equal, since he is NOT!
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"Then indicate in brief that according to the law applicable to the facts, where the Querist actually stands."  [blogger's emphasis]

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BLOGGER'S NOTE: Aye, there is the rub! "according to the law applicable to the facts" 
This is Justice adhered to and presumed applicable in the 'Just' world, not in the theatre as practiced in the real world. Is there then some rhetoric naivety of purity at play here?     
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"Numbering the paragraphs help, because in your opinion or as part of the analysis you may have to refer to what has been written before and by referring to the paragraph-number you obviate the need of repeating the whole thing.

-Now you are ready to answer the Queries, that is, the opinion proper, as it is called.  Try to answer with a monosyllabic “yes” or “no”, referring to the paragraph number of the analysis and facts sections of the opinion.

Where that is impossible, keep your answers as short as possible.  An example may help.

Where the Querist has asked “Is the transaction a valid mortgage”, you can answer “Yes” or “No”, and then add “in view of what has been said in paragraphs such and such of the Facts and paragraphs such and such of the Analysis”.

However, where the Querist asks “Why is this not a valid mortgage” you cannot answer with ‘yes’ or ‘no’ but must explain, though with reference to what has been written by you in the Facts and Analysis sections.

Remember to use the usual disclaimers, that the opinion is based on the law as it stands on the date when you are signing it, and is based on the facts and documents that were supplied to you by the Querist.

It helps if you list the documents supplied and also that which you have consulted.  Remember to add that it is according to the best of your ability.

If you are practising as an advocate on record, this will go a long way in saving you from being found guilty of professional misconduct and also negligent in any proceeding before the Bar Council or for damages for malpractice, in case your opinion was wrong."
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: AH! Rather than accepting the Courts are not about Justice, but about a Party's positioning and gaining the upper hand through rhetoric of argument, the above assumes the system is actually on its toes, on the look out for any possible deviation.  
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Mr. Protik Prokash Banerji, popularly called Protik da by law students, juniors and friends is an advocate at the Kolkata High Court. Interning at his chambers is an experience of a life time. People who learn drafting and oratory skills from him swear by the excellent teacher he is. He talks about movies and literature as authoritatively as he talks on law and wrote on such diverse subjects for the Economic Times in 1994-1995.

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FROM AN INTERVIEW (see below URL)

Remember, litigation means appearing before an adjudicator.  He is only human.  It is the Mentor, with his vast experience, who can guide you and teach you how adjudicators can be lawfully persuaded and what are the ways in which you can train yourself to do it instinctively.

These are the reasons why a Mentor is still indispensable in the world of litigation.

(<…>)

Being an advocate is a very heavy responsibility.  As you grow older you will appreciate it does not consist only of wearing a black coat and bands and doing “Judge Saab” like Sunny Deol in a Bollywood blockbuster or rushing to the police station with a bulging brief case to bail out your gangster client.  It requires a dedication to the rule of law, the ineffable yet ineradicable principles of justice and a commitment to the dignity of the most impartial wing of government, the last bastion of liberty and democracy in an age of increasing commercialism, capitalism and authoritarianism – to the judiciary which is forever a sentinel on the que vive.
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: "It requires a dedication to the rule of law,..."
This SRL has NO idea WHAT purist Nirvana world is being identified here. Show me any Jurisdiction that still functions thusly, and I may go visit it and observe with mine own eyes. 
Otherwise, we may indeed be speaking Make-Believe in Bollywood!

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http://superlawyer.in/protik-prokash-banerjee-law-career-litigator-calcutta-high-court-building-clientele/

http://www.lawctopus.com/category/career-advice-3/protik-da/

197. The GOOGLE GOD of Online Reality.

VIEWS@13021

It is both awesome and real!
Online usage, whether info through business or pleasure, is syphoned and digested to be dedicated within nano-seconds to chuck or feature. Our focus is down to split-seconds. Thumbs up, or move on.

We are morphing exponentially. Welcome to the online circus where make belief is the new reality.
"Every word you say, every step you make, I'll be watching you" (Sting) The theatre of life.

So it has come to be with little ol me now. I left Facebook several years ago, when I felt it was becoming too invasive. Now my Google profile is helping to nudge good talent away. Don't touch him, he looks like trouble. Am I shooting myself in the foot?

This is taking me to make some serious adjustments. Can I manage to avoid an implosion? Time will tell. In the meantime, I re-assess, and ask: What is this urge, this drive to stay 'involved?' Could I possibly acknowledge failure?

To face the fact that all the years of dedicated effort and money spent on that - which I am still told to be a good idea - has been a waste of time? Is there such a thing as 'wasting time?'  Can I accept defeat, and live with it, comfortably? Then re-focus, and put my energies to projects I have greater control over? Like digging a hole, plant a tree, and see it grow?

Still, all those out in the Googling world, working dauntingly on their numerous causes, give me the drive to hold on tenaciously and find a solution. Although we are ultimately all finite creatures, when nearly depleted, we can take a break, re-assess, muster new energy, and continue to seek a solution. Somewhere lies an untapped source that can make the difference. Everything is its own answer.

Seek and ye shall find. Who knows?

196. BC hydro on the WAR PATH!

VIEWS@12950

1. British Columbia Hydro and Power Authority (BC Hydro) is a Crown corporation, owned by the Provincial Government. It is established under the Hydro and Power Authority Act. BC Hydro's primary business functions are the generation and distribution of electricity.
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   JESSICA MCDONALD

President & CEO

Jessica McDonald was appointed President and CEO of BC Hydro in July 2014.

She began her career in the Public Service in 1991 and held many different roles including serving as a Deputy Minister to the Premier*, Cabinet Secretary and head of the B.C. Public Service.

Today, Jessica oversees one of the largest utilities in Canada, with 5,500 employees, over $5 billion in revenue, providing 93% clean energy and the third lowest rates in North America.

Bringing a future-focused approach to her role as CEO, Jessica's agenda is structured around five key pillars: customer service, capital project delivery, energy conservation, employee engagement and continued operational improvement.

Jessica is a member of the B.C. Arbitrators' and Mediators' Institute and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Institute of Canada and serves as a Board Director of the Insurance Corporation of B.C. and Powerex, and Board Chair of Powertech Labs. She has been recognized nationally for her leadership in innovation and employee engagement, including the IPAC/Deloitte National Gold Award for Public Sector Leadership.

Jessica has been named to Canada's Top 40 Under 40 and Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women. Born and raised in British Columbia, Jessica is proud to be a part of BC Hydro.

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*(I guess that would have been Gordon Campbell) 

- Please keep in mind from above 'BIO:' "head of the B.C. Public Service." "over $5 billion in revenue, providing 93% clean energy and the third lowest rates in North America." 

- "Bringing a future-focused approach to her role as CEO, Jessica's agenda is structured around five key pillars: customer service, capital project delivery, energy conservation, employee engagement and continued operational improvement." 

- "Jessica is a member of the B.C. Arbitrators' and Mediators' Institute and the Alternative Dispute Resolution Institute of Canada"

- "National Gold Award for Public Sector Leadership.""Jessica is proud to be a part of BC Hydro."

BLOGGER'S NOTE: 

Before you read the following BC Hydro disconnection Notice I just received, let me explain and comment:

 (On the above) 

- To me an agenda of "capital project delivery" and "continued operational improvement"  is incongruous with "customer service." 

As well "employee engagement" and "continued operational improvement," as a twosome don't, in my view, quite fit. The appearance of rhetoric and verbal gobbledygook, appears evident here.

   

===================================================================

NOW TO:

The following letter arriving in my Post Box today! 

(In order to cut/paste, I had to reformat it; all text=as is).  

BChydro :::

FOR GENERATIONS                     K2515L LETCA           4794      (P)      004794

JAN STEEN

'NUMBER @ XYZ'  RD

HORNBY ISLAND BC VOR lZO

May 25, 2015

Account Number: 'DELETED'

For service at: ('My Place') HORNBY ISLAND BC VOR 1ZO

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Disconnection Notice for Total Amount Owing of $132.60

Our records indicate that payment for the above account is past due.

To prevent disconnection of your BC Hydro service, please pay the total amount owing today. In addition, you need to report your payment by calling 604-224 9376 or 1-800-224 9376 and selecting payment options from the main menu.

You can also report your payment by logging in to your account at bchydro.com/login. At the same time, consider setting up a pre-authorized payment plan that many customers find works well with online billing to make paying easier.

If disconnection occurs, the following will need to happen before reconnection: 
- the total amount owing must be paid; 
- a reconnection charge of up to $355 will be charged and appear on your next bill;
- to prevent fires, we need to confirm that all electrical equipment is turned off or disconnected, particularly those that produce heat such as stoves, space heaters, and irons; and 
- preparation may be necessary to reduce the potential for weather-related damage including frozen or burst pipes.

In the event of a disconnection, you can request your service be reconnected. Once you've paid the amount owing, call 604-224 9376 or 1-800-2249376 and follow the prompts to report your payment and request your service be reconnected. This option is available to most customers at any time and does not require BC Hydro Customer Service assistance.

Sincereiy,

BC Hydro Customer Service                                                                                             FNDNSD
+ Direction Particulars about payment) 
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BLOGGER'S NOTE: 

 - Since Ms. McDonald is a Member of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Institute of Canada,

I shall address her with this role in mind: (I felt the need to address her in BOLD)

Dear Ms. McDonald:

Before you were willingly appointed to become the president of this BC crown-owned, public, company (i.e. NOT private), BC Hydro, in its efforts to upgrade while cutting costs, introduced the Province-wide switch from standard analogue to electronic Smart Meters; meters that constantly send out strong wi-fi waves to communicate with each other and your office. 

In the company's literature the overtures to its customers were nothing but glorious. Simplicity was lauded, costs would come down, usage would be monitored, overall safety was assured. There were no ends to their all round benefits. The future had become the present!

While areas like California were well ahead with their instalments, the public began hearing about some serious negatives concerning these "SMART Meters." A number had blown up, or caught fire; individuals were getting ill, discovering their wi-fi waves harmful. Bills, instead of going down as promised > Increased... On and on it went. 

That's when individuals, like myself, began discussing the issues, coming to the conclusion we did NOT want them installed; we liked the status quo of our 'analogue' meters (later by our Hydro experts to be called 'legacy' meters.) We did not LIKE the intrusional aspects of the extra waves and internal 'eyes' giving data of our stoves, fridges, and private equipment. This was not the behaviour of a democratic, customer caring, publicly owned company; this was an indication of an oligarchy, if not a company working inside a police state.

Now, Ms. Jessica, I would like to take you back several years and make you aware of some serious anomalies I hold 'OUR' company responsible for. I will relate what befell me with my own Hydro account.  

In 2013 I was in the middle of a Court case with a Web-Developer from Ottawa. This very Blog was created with the intentions of writing about my legal experiences. Since your (OUR) Company is now the second one I am addressing here, I shall use this platform to express my details to those who continue to read my Postings. 

Living on a minimum pension, during the colder winter months I mostly use my Reverse-Process wood-burning stove (I appear to have been the first to have created these stove adaptations with my 'Sunrise' Stove. See No.14 issue/1978 of the Harrowsmith magazine, or Google/Wikipedia: The Reverse-Process Wood Burning Stove)  

Being obsessed with Justice, while gradually learning about the facts that the Legal System is essentially a Business like any other Business, I was neglecting my stove, opting for the ease of more electric heat that winter. 

Hydro had begun their Smart Meter installations, eliminating direct readings by laying off employees. Bills became 'Guesstimate' readings. Although I was aware of my increase consumption that winter I was much surprised by my high bills the following year.  
In fact,  it turned out my company (your company) had over-charged me over the months to the tune of some $760.00. This amount almost equals my annual land tax, so I asked Hydro to refund me. My Company (your company) REFUSED to return the monies that were MINE, and, in fact, illegally retained it!

As my bi-monthly bill amounts were reducing my $760 overpaid 'DEPOSIT,' I can show proof my bills indicated PENALTIES for having refused the installation of a Smart Meter were LARGER than my Hydro usages. My July, 2014, bill shows my "Failed Installation Charge"at some $68.50 with an added $64.80 "Legacy Meter Charge." For a total penalty of : $133.05  My actual Electrical Usage from May 27  > July 23 was a mere $26.40          

I am suggesting to you Madame Jessica McDonald, BC Hydro President, that in my books this is called THEFT and USURY!  
   
The above amount of $132.60 your company (my company) now wants me to pay, OR ELSE, is not for any ELECTRICAL USAGE. Under THREAT of DISCONNECTION, and according to its OWN, self-set, un-democratic process your Company (MY Company) is demanding the illegal sum it purports to be entitled to. In my book this is called BLACKMAIL!  

In summation, I would like to suggest you seriously reconsider allowing that percentage of BC Hydro customers who decided for their own, personal reasons, to retain their 'legacy meter' (i.e. analogue). Indeed, in doing so, find a workable alternative to an accurate meter reading by the customers themselves.  I have suggested, as we did many years ago, a card with the clocks showing which could be sent your office by mail or on line. 
-  I am sure a surcharge of some $5.00 on each bi-monthly bill would be customer acceptable. 

I am aware your company (my company) is being taken to court in a class action suit. There is additional information displaying those holding out are within their Civil Rights! Additionally, there is ample proof BC Hydro is acting illegally according to the Rules of Civil Procedure. 

YOU are the most senior employee in this case, and I am appealing to your experience and talents as a Mediator in the Alternative Dispute Resolution Institute of Canada to arrange for a more democratic and acceptable solution. Let's please discontinue this adversarial route.  

"Jessica is proud to be a part of BC Hydro." Surely, as it stands, none of us can be proud with this behaviour! I look forward to your positive and innovative response.

Sincerely,
a caring BC domiciled Canadian Citizen due his constitutional rights.
Jan Steen

PS: I shall continue to promptly pay for my Hydro usage. Disconnection is at this stage out of the question and non negotiable.

195. Addressing those in power.

VIEWS@12,900

Hornby Island, BC, May 29/ 2015

Dear Madame Justice Suzanne Anton, Minister of Justice + Attorney General for BC:

Seeking to avoid any adversarial stance, this letter is intended as an amicable gesture, incorporating the principle of good faith, and a duty to act honestly.

As Minister of Justice and Attorney General of British Columbia you are in charge of the daily actions and behavior of those you employ, i.e. the Masters and Justices of this province. Additionally your National office created the Rules of Civil Procedure on which all our country’s legal decisions are based.

In your honourable and highly privileged position, I ask you to comprehend that as a Self Representing Litigant (by need, since I exist on a minimum pension), I have these past five years endured the ins and outs of our Democracy’s legal system. It continues to be both a financial, as well as an emotional nightmare.

All the while searching for Justice and due process, I experienced none of its defined prerequisites. Our Rules of Civil Procedure, the Sedona Conferences (Moving the law forward in a reasoned and just way), as well as the Supreme Court of Canada’s move to include “The principle of good faith and duty to act honestly” in Contract Law, while well-intentioned objectives, all were absent from the realities I encountered.

In my recently Blogged letter to the advisory board of the NSRLP in Ontario, I explain:

“Jan continues:

My experience has taught me that before there is “commitment to advancing access to justice in Canada” the “urgency of system change” must occur at the very core of the system. For me this means that before there is better access to procedure, we must make sense of the Rules. Any system created and governed by its employed participants is bound to raise barriers for outsiders. Over the last seven years I have experienced numerous examples of permitted anomalies and what seemed to me to be apparently illegal behavior by the legal system. In the end, I feel that the system managed to devour me and then spit me out, after a tedious and long-drawn game.”

The system your office created, Madame Anton, expresses itself as if running like any other ‘business.’ In their efforts to satisfy their clients, my experience showed integrated law firms riding shotgun over Masters and Judges. Due diligence, fairness, good faith, as well as adherence to the facts at issue, were missing from proper rule application. Like chess, directives were about positioning, the aim towards ‘winning.’

This then takes me to the responsibilities of your office.

Though you may have inherited what you are in control of, truth is, with the above said your system is the average citizen’s bane. Human foible as it is, unless serious issues are addressed, the legal system, i.e. our system of ‘Justice’ will continue to be a parody of its intentions. While actual Justice eludes the average citizen’s legal rights, it will continue to serve the flush and well connected. Nothing has changed for hundreds of years.

As parents and grandparents, surely our consciences are prepared to take on this challenge by making every effort necessary to rectify what has gone so seriously awry. To bring back some faith and honorability to both your office as well as the very manner in which the justice system is being practiced is our duty. In turning lie to truth, hundreds of thousands of fellow Canadians would sigh a welcome relief and applaud you.

A claim will be filed against your office for damages suffered at the hand of one of your officers, Madame Justice Justine Saunders. My BC claim for contractual non-compliance for the creation of a website by an Ottawa domiciled web company was erroneously dismissed for “lack of Jurisdiction.” I will indicate how the ‘OR’ rule for filing in BC indicates the necessary provisos for an applicable and acceptable filing. I will have case law to validate the above. The Ontario default Rule for filing states to file “where the claim originates.” Had I filed in Ontario, a judge could more justly have dismissed it.

Justice Saunders erred a second time for allowing me to appeal. Defence Counsel brought this to my attention in an Application to a Judge a number of months after I had filed same. A technicality allows an appeal after a Trial, not a Hearing. Ours had been a Hearing; hence no appeal was allowed. This became the argument.

The JUSTICE OF THE PEACE CODE OF ETHICS Rule 2.01 indicates: “Justices should remain up to date on changes in the law relevant to their judicial function.” This aggravating phase alone took up some 6 months of my life.

(Quoting your website)

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 Justice Reform Initiatives

The B.C. government is modernizing and transforming justice services in a way that meets the needs of British Columbians. In particular, it is aiming to create a transparent justice system capable of delivering timely, well-balanced services.

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While I will do everything in my powers to recover what has been lost both financially, emotionally as well as in time investment, as a fourty year domiciled British Columbian, I offer my due diligence in helping my government achieve the above transparency.

Understanding parliament will be taking a summer break soon, I am sending this connect today with the hope your office will both acknowledge receipt, as well as allow for an indication when my claim filing would be best timed.

In the meantime I remain,

Sincerely Yours,

Evert-Jan Steen 

194. My new Reality

VIEWS@12854

This past week is guiding me towards a new reality, a need to turn the page.
Cognitive of you the readers who read, yet do not connect, I feel ultimately alone in the presence of strangers. And although, as voyeurs, you are entitled to your anonymity, and to some extent with your ongoing 'views' fulfill a need to carry on, I am comprehending a certain sense of futility of efforts.

So together with my realization that life is finite, I am finding myself of late re-assessing my priorities. My age and the awareness that younger generations are in charge now, is leading me to re-consider.

Yes! I will take my legal issues up with those in charge of these affairs. I am sufficiently curious to await their responses. Will they, within their powers, find quick ways to dispense with me? Will they skirt the issues I present them with? Are they in their inimitable way mere agents of opportunity, placed in their positions based on their abilities to perpetuate the rhetoric of political pretence?
This I am sufficiently intrigued to encounter and experience.

I will be gentle in my attack. Should they be interested, I will offer my services to help bring about what is conscionable and correct. But if they decide to cut me down like any other pesky fodder, I will likely come to my senses with the belief that life in their fast lane is a complete farce. That the running core of mankind is evil, and that evil has become the acceptable norm of our kind.

Should that happen, I will grin and bare my losses, and with acceptance, I will fight no more. I shall withdraw into my cocoon, my envelope of self-worth, and seek fulfillment by enjoying the simpler life that still struggles around me with its evolutionary sense of equilibrium.
Hey, I do live as near to heaven as anyone could wish. Why complain?

Maybe at 76 it's time to put this bogeyman to bed.
It's your turn now!

193. Life Out of Bed!

VIEWS@12,737

Away from my woods, I Just returned from visiting a metropolis. A metropolis in which my offspring lives. Job-related, it offers a clearer format to interpret the total experience called 'life.'

To get out of bed, know what to do and where to go, is defining. It becomes the umbrella you have come to understand and accept. If not, the hyenas will self-deservedly get you.

My own lot is similarly sealed. But somehow I managed to live it, as interpreted by others, by not adhering to certain set and given rules and realities.

Based on my early roots, afar in a distant former colony, I too meandered towards discovering my identity. But unlike others who sojourn in to being motivated to perform indescribable acts, I continue to question our species in a more gentle fashion. My character is wont to question and lash out through rhetoric. Is it more accepting; in any way more effective? So far, it does not seem so.

Each to our own, it is ultimately a basic choice for seeking expression of self in an over-crowded world. Go and do where they will feed you. All is a day to day existence. In essence nothing has changed. Board the inflatable of maybe, to drown bobbing towards the ocean of hope.

Purpose is in the eye of the beholder. Face it. Nobody needs you. All action is self-driven. Survive or die. All lies in the pretence of purpose. Life is fickle; life is cheap.

And yet, those of us who managed to hang in by segueing to conquer those basics of survival, through leisure time, may have acquired an appreciation for conscience - that urge to improve upon the general lot of the lesser.

Although this ethic may have a Christian foundation, "do not do on to others"... "Love thy neighbour as you would" etc. ...
Reality proves that energies towards achieving the more noble, with age, lessen.

As I descended from my dreaming loft this morning, upon having my 2 cups of Organic while catching up on email connectives, I came to the conclusion to narrow my varying objectives.
It will become a one on one now.

Is our democracy really run by self-serving, indulgent yes men? Where are those pillars of society hiding? Are there even any? Is reality in truth a farce of being? Is real life become an accepted circus?

Before I descend in to my final sack down under, I insist on finding that answer.
For now it is Justice 101.

192. A Caring and Insightful Reader's response...

VIEWS@12,658

With my responses in Bold Italic, I am posting the following lengthy, much appreciated response:

"The lawyer you quote is correct about justice ..... But in reality should have phrased it slightly differently. He or she said to you "There is no justice in court" or words to this effect. 

(actual phrase: "The courts are not about Justice, Jan.")

That is not quite true. 

There is no justice for the defendant in the court or for the self representing plaintiff in the courtroom. 

(in my case the defendant won big-time, since with their counter-claim they managed to take control of procedures, while having jurisdiction in their favour; i.e Ontario)

Enter this realm at your own peril.

You have just left your rights behind, on land.

 

There is a kind of justice, albeit only for the other players, since they share the booty, they uphold merchant law and they abide by Admiralty Law.

There is simply no justice for the outsider who unwittingly enters and becomes subject to the essentially foreign jurisdiction once inside the courtroom. 

(As indicated above)

Think of it as a border. 

Once you cross the Mexican border you can end up in a Mexican jail with no recourse. Why? Like Quebec, Mexico operates under Napoleonic laws. 

In a sense you are guilty until proven innocent. Good luck with that.

 

The courtroom and the world of law is a world beyond the one in which you live and have rights.

The players are lawyers and judges. 

They work together. In fact they lunch together. 

You may try to represent yourself and yet be robbed, or, conversely, you could pay a lawyer to hold your hand while the court robs you. 

Bu virtue of entering their world, the laws under which they operate assure that they get to keep what was yours as their booty. They are allowed to take what is yours because you have left your country and boarded their ship and it matters not one wit whether or not you are aware that you are now subject to different laws once you do so.

In court they will invariably at some point ask you if you, JAN STEEN, "understand". What they mean is "Do you agree to stand under their edicts?"  It is pure ritual. YOU have already handed over your agreement by crossing over into this jurisdiction.

ORIGIN Middle English : from Old French jurediction, from Latin jurisdictio(n-), from jus, jur- ‘law’ + dictio ‘saying’ (from dicere ‘say’ ).

THE RIGHT WORDThe authority of our elected and appointed officials refers to their power (often conferred by rank or office) to give orders, require obedience, or make decisions.Their authority is normally limited by their jurisdiction, which is a legally predetermined division of a larger whole, within which someone has a right to rule or decide (: the matter was beyond his jurisdiction).(This excuse was used by the second, senior Master when informing me he had no jurisdiction over prior decisions/ orders made by his 'fellow' in-house Master)

You may even end up walking their plank, too. This is how justice works, once you place yourself under the Law of the Sea which rules the courtroom and all who work there.

Those in that courtroom are not under the Law of the Land, the one from which you may naively expect justice. That is a costly illusion. Your assets, your property, your family and your self have no protection in this new land.

There are a few rare judges out there who buck the system, to some extent, but most will not violate their oath to uphold the terms of the laws under which a courtroom functions, and almost none would risk doing so. Judges and lawyers, like politicians, uphold their oath to the Queen of Canada, which is written right into the oath they take. How many think the Queen is in every meaningful sense the Queen of Canada? How many understand that when she comes here she is here to collect booty during a "royal" visit? 

Those judges who do set a new precedent, often do so in favour of the court. Occasionally they may set one in favour of the litigant or the defendant and by extension the rest of us.

More likely, however, it will be the litigant who sets the precedent, by outwitting the system to their own benefit.

(again, in my case, as an out-of-jurisdiction, distant Plaintiff, it was the Defendant/Counter Claimant who managed to manipulate both the laws and the willing Masters of the Court. They saw eye-2-eye so to speak.)  

Then everyone may benefit.

Or not, depending on which precedent is set. 

Case law precedent has recently been set to the benefit of utility customers due to changes in the law regarding the rights afforded a customer by a contract made in good faith. 

This is good news.

(Really? Although it may be so in certain circumstances, I have furious issues about Case Law. The laws state every case is unique! Case Law nullifies that ) 

Meanwhile, however, the terms of a courtroom are there to sustain that jurisdiction, not the one you are from, and not the one where your complaint exists. 

Think of it as theatre with serious clout. 

The courtroom is a stage for a separate world unto itself, it uses elevated platforms, according to rank, costumes, bibles, long black gowns, rituals similar to those used in religious rituals, all very kafkaesque. 

I think I have mentioned common law and how it protects us before. However,  I had the sense that at that point perhaps you were too far inside what you refer to as the so called "justice" system to "see" what was and is right there out in the open.

When you decided to self represent, were you familiar with Admiralty Law, Merchant Law, the laws under which courts operate under, as distinct from the laws which represents you? 

(The writer now ventures in to a specific area of a more local concern)

That is why (I hope) you still have retained your very own electromechanical meter, because, whether or not you knew it, when your used the documents that retained that meter you used a process of common law, which is law of a higher order which supersedes statutory laws used by governments, courts, judges, lawyers, corporations,  all working within the ironically named "justice" system. 

Each one who operates in this realm swears an oath, not to Canada, no, only to the Queen of Canada, an oath to uphold common law. However they can do pretty much as they wish when not inside common law, as long as they play by their own rules. 

(AH! "as long as they play by their own Rules" This continues to be my most personal beef: To have experienced, the not so subtle manipulation of the ACTUAL Rules, to suit their own objectives) 

If you appear in court and refuse to answer to the name by which the judge and other members of the court address you, if you remained at the back of the gallery and did not stand up when spoken to you using your PUBLIC name, you would not be subject to court laws. Of course it is not that easy, but it is doable.

I may be wrong but, as far as I can make out, your struggle to find justice appears to have operated entirely on foreign turf and foreign terms, all dealt with just as if you went to a foreign "country", which is essentially what you did. 

In this foreign country, just as when Alice goes down the rabbit hole and enters Wonderland. a place where what is logical is turned on its head and where justice is arbitrary ("Off With Her Head") , this place you cross over into by passing through what is actually called The Divider" or "Bar" (see pictures) is designed in such a way that it purposely creates all its own rules and takes over and defines the terms and conditions by which you must abide. 

In every sense of the word you become merely a visitor to a different country and are now subject to its rules. 

While those rules may appear to you to defy all logic and are unlike any rules of any pre-existing  understanding and/or ideals you or anyone else who is not within the inner circle may have had about what comprises justice, that is only because you are not let in on the game, since  no one tells you that you have left behind the common law land laws that are there to protect you, no one informs you that metaphorically you have departed, and you are now figuratively "at sea". 

See?

Merchant law was designed for ships. Admiralty law began as pirate "law", actually outlaw.

Pirate law evolved to become privateer law. 

It remains the Law of the Sea.

In search of "justice", you left your own jurisdiction, wherein you had certain rights and powers. Now you are in/under their jurisdiction and are subject to their rules and decisions. 

Just as the City of London is a City within a city and has its own laws, just as the Vatican is a City within a city and also operates on its own laws, just as banks also exempt themselves from laws and leave you wondering how they get away with it, so, too, do those inside courtrooms and those who operate by different rules as lawyers and judges.  

So while you may enter this world uninformed of the switchover, you then compound the error and succumb to it, mostly because no one tells you, or you never thought to ask.

And it almost never occurs to the defendant to question or ask, nor to the sole self representing plaintiff to ask where they just landed. 

Certainly the self representative thinks they are there to represent themselves when they enter this new jurisdiction. In reality, it is literally a case of "when in Rome". The rules are all predetermined and those who seek to represent themselves are no longer representing themselves once they enter inside the borders of this other country.  

Worse still, those who enter give away their  power to a hierarchical  system run by self declared "authorities", a system that is not there to represent you, only itself. That system answers to no one else but the Queen. She is not your friend. In essential matters of she is no different from Queen Isabella who sent Christopher Columbus off to conquer the new world, to rape, pillage, murder and bring back booty for the enrichment of Spain.

He swore an oath to her, he plundered the continent,  he declared it a New World simply because he landed there, he ignored the population's prior rights of claim, he and his men took everything from any and all indigenous people and slaughtered them. 

He stole all the gold for his Queen. But hey, he upheld his oath to his Queen, right?  

To beat this game, the world you need to operate inside is your own world. Common law was created to implement checks and balances on privateers and their self anointed roles and self serving systems. It is there for the aware to use, but no one tells you this. You can only use the laws that favour you if you know they exist and want to know how to use them to your own advantage without getting trapped.  

Pirate law is a separate world.

Are you a pirate at sea?

Are you a privateer? 

Hardly.

Are you a corporation. 

I hope not.

And unlike an aboriginal, you cannot argue any treaty agreement.

Your only treaty to protect your lands is limited to any foothold on your own land that you learn how to protect and maintain, so for those not under treaty there is no overarching treaty to protect you OTHER THAN common law. 

That said, common law is bountiful and wonderful.

Use it or lose it.

However,when you enter the courts either metaphorically or physically you become the willing prisoner of privateers who have sworn an oath to the Queen, not to Canada as a sovereign nation,  only to the Queen and God. 

Yes, they are modern pirates, called privateers. This is considered absolutely legitimate inside that world. It has rules you are not let in on and which do not apply to you. Only the persistently curious come to understand how to use discipline to level this playing field in their own favour.

The players in this world sign oaths to a monarch you imagine does not rule the country you live in. Nor do you imagine she has claims on everything your are and everything you do or make or earn, including a claim on your children.

All of this is based on plunder and booty. If you enter the world of pirates you cannot turn around and hold them to account for the Laws of the Land. This is why they stay on the ship, and then lure you onboard.

Anyone who unwittingly boards that ship might as well push a boulder up a hill forever, since that ship is its own foreign country and is intended to work outside of your own land based inherent rights. 

To board that ship turns those on board into your intermediaries and, worse yet, essentially you consent to make them into your trustees, since to enter court is in effect to declare yourself incompetent to handle your own affairs, business affairs, property issues, etc. 

You have instead chosen to try to operate inside that law of the sea, aboard that ship, a foreign domain which uses your consent by way of entry, your agreement to be governed, and turns it all against you.

This is a realm that depends upon your unwitting forfeiture of essential rights, your belief that any justice is only to be found inside their separate system. 

This foreign realm is based on one single foundation, consent. The governed must grant their consent, you must hand over your compliance with court terms, your willingness to enter a world that operates inside their rights over you, once you are within Admiralty Law settings practicing statutory law, using their laws, not yours.

In that world you are JAN STEEN, not Jan Steen. 

Look at your birth certificate registration back to the authorities, it uses your PUBLIC name, as does "your" driver's license registration back to those authorities, and, if you "own" land, as does "your" certificate of title for your "own" land, also registered back to the authorities.

All of these are not rights, they are non unalienable. Like "your" pension, they are merely government sanctioned benefits and privileges, just as easily taken away as given since none of them are unalienable rights.

Anything which renders you beholden to others is not yours to own.

In that world, unless you challenge it, the fact of your very birth serves as collateral for a debt they invent and which you owe. In that world you yourself and all you own have been registered back to the Queen as serfs, slaves, as hers to own. You serve as collateral for yourself, since your parents have already offered you up as collateral for your own birth, ditto for your driver's license, which grants you permission to use roads you fund to build but do not own the right to use, a "permission" or "benefit" or "privilege" as distinct from a right.

At any moment those who uphold Admiralty Law can arbitrarily revoke that same or any of a long list of "privileges" and can do so for almost any arbitrary reason. This includes a kind of implicit "lease back" arrangement concerning  your property, wherein you are merely a tenant of the Queen, living on property which, like your body, your wages, your income (tax),  also all serve as collateral for a debt you actually do not owe to the queen or government.

And those who realize that they owe no debt definitely represent a threat to the status quo. 

And in that world's view, you have no property, no rights , since all forms of registration involve you handing back what is yours to those who own it and you once you do so. 

In order to properly represent your own private rights under the Law of the Land, essentially you must correctly assert that NO ONE can serve as intermediary between you and the Universe.

You must actively remind them of what they swore an oath to, that is that your own common law rights are of a higher order than the courts rules, and that your property and private life are yours. 

For example, the documents you used to refuse the contractual offer of a smart meter intentionally were designed in such a way that as a private man on private property (not a "premises")  you have used common law documents for which every single word was very carefully hand picked, then given to you for free, whether or not you grasp the import of what is there to use, done so that you could prove that you did NOT enter their realm of Admiralty Law ( Law of the Sea ) and that you (versus YOU) are not subject to plunder of your booty, (your metadata, your meter base, your property).  

Instead those precious documents you use operate under Common Law. They were created to protect you from self declared "authorities" who only use statutory law which, in turn, was created to protect self declared "authorities" from you. 

Common law includes and protects you via trespass law, electrical code law, and, most important of all, contract law, all of which operate under common law.

 

As for the surveillance grid, the Notices you have used to refuse the smart meter represent your repeat refusal of a series of new contractual offers made by a corporation.

It is that simple.

You have every right to demand that they adhere to the original terms of your contract and to refuse to allow them to sever your bond of ownership by removal of your meter, no matter which uninsurable corporate commercial radar transceiver antenna device they seek to put in place of what you own, BEFORE they also separately leave after they STEAL your very own meter.

The common law documents you use protect your private rights under the Law of the Land.

The use of those bc-freedom COR and NOD-MCP documents constitute your lawful assertion of your private rights to adhere to the terms of your original commercial contract on your own terms. 

Not to mention these documents claim your possession of the meter this corporation wants to steal away. 

What many are successfully using now is an NOL, a Notice of Liability addressed not to an abstraction called a corporation, but to those men and women behind that corporate banner, those who assumed that they could hide behind that abstraction and commit plunder. 

Meanwhile smart grid precipitated sickness, fires and deaths occurred, all because pirate utility corporations in bed with pirate governments all over the world had largely outwitted the majority of energy customers and had transferred all liability for their own actions back on to the customers. 

Now? 

Game on. 

Everywhere everyone is now issuing  Notice of Personal Liability addressed to actual individuals, who are culpable for the smart grid and Technological Trespass on private property, such as your body, your home, and your life. And this NOL  has already forced them to not act on threats of disconnection and has already prevented actual disconnections.

You know how in most any courtroom there is that physical barricade that one is expected to cross through in order to engage with those on the other side? Often it has a gate or a set of gates  between those in the courtroom and the players on the otherwise of that barricade? 

That delineation, that barricade and gateway, may appear to be merely symbolic but it is very real.

Likewise, when you are addressed in the room as JAN STEEN versus Jan Steen, if you reply and stand up, in that moment you forfeit your private rights, the minute you agree to be the former, not the latter. 

If you say you are acting as an Authorized Representative of Jan Steen, that is different. At that moment you begin to claim a higher jurisdiction than the judge in the courtroom. Many judges have fled the courtroom when this is done by those in the know. But of course one must know exactly what one is doing and how to do every minute of it or this will fail.  

Never underestimate the power which that barricade represents if you acknowledge it, or stand under it, (understand means just that)  or cross through that border, symbolizing your legal consent and your compliance to the terms of this foreign country, which gives all who live there the power to extinguish your access to justice - in the name of "justice".

  

The barricade is there on purpose. It  stands as the division line between your rights and the singularly other rights of the courts, judges, lawyers, corporations, all which override and sever your rights the minute you "under-stand" or answer to your full name JAN STEEN or cross over into the inner sanctum of any courtroom. 

That "bar" represents the railing of a pirate ship. As soon as you cross over you forfeit your own jurisdiction under the Law of the Land and you come under an entirely different jurisdiction, Admiralty Law.

Remember that while every judge and every lawyer swears an oath to the Queen of Canada and to God to uphold the laws of Admiralty and Merchant Law, but they also swear to acknowledge Common Law.

If you remain ignorant, they can do as they wish and you will have no recourse once you enter their terms."

Jan Steen thanks you so very much for your grandiose effort, and informed views!  

May we, together, turn this powder-kegged, infested ship around!