Kansas City Attorney accused of killing father makes $1 million bond

Where did the money come from?  That's what everyone wants to know.  The accused herself was supposedly broke and just declared bankruptcy, but somehow a million dollar check made its way to the courthouse so that Susan Elizabeth Van Note could get out of jail.  Her criminal defense attorney doesn't know..the bankruptcy trustee doesn't know..the prosecutor doesn't know... and everyone is left wondering.  Who made the million dollar cash only bond on Susan Van Note?

Here is the article in the Kansas City Star.

 

 KC attorney's posting of $1M bond raises questions

KANSAS CITY, Mo. —

Three years ago, Kansas City attorney Susan Elizabeth Van Note filed for bankruptcy, unable to pay nearly $400,000 in debt. Last week, she was able to come up with $1 million for a cash bond while awaiting trial in the death of her father for allegedly forging documents to deny him life-sustaining medical treatment.

The trustee in the bankruptcy case wants to know where that bond money came from, The Kansas City Star reported Wednesday.  Attorney Erlene Krigel said at the time she couldn't find any assets to help satisfy the creditor claims against Van Note, who owed more on her home and two car loans than the property was worth. Krigel said she would inform the U.S. Trustee Office, which appointed her to the case and is an arm of the Department of Justice.  "It's very important we know where that money came from," she said.

Defense attorney Tom Bath said he doesn't know where his client got the bond money. He also couldn't identity of the person who presented a cashier's check at the Boone County Jail. But he suggested a friend could have helped.  Van Note has pleaded not guilty to felony forgery and first-degree murder charges. Her father, 67-year-old William B. Van Note, and his companion, 59-year-old Sharon Dickson, were shot at their Lake of the Ozarks home in Sunrise Beach in October 2010.

Dickson died at the scene, while the elder Van Note was hospitalized for four days before his daughter allegedly gave doctors a forged durable power of attorney that persuaded them to remove his life support. Charges haven't been filed in Dickson's death.  Some are wondering whether any of the bond money came from the estate of William Van Note, a millionaire businessman.  Camden County prosecutor Brian Keedy said he too was surprised that Van Note is out of jail. On Tuesday, he went to the Columbia courthouse to view the cashier's check, which was drawn on Landmark Bank.  "I've never heard of anyone making a million-dollar cash-only bond," Keedy said. "But if she has the ability to do it ."

Van Note's attorney has acknowledged his client forged the document but said she did so only because she couldn't find one her father actually signed. Bath also said no physical evidence places Liz Van Note at the crime scene.  A high school classmate of Liz Van Note and the classmate's husband also face charges for allegedly signing the power of attorney as witnesses.  On Sept. 12, about a week after the criminal indictment, an attorney for Sharon Dickson's adult son asked a Clay County judge to remove Liz Van Note from serving as personal representative of her father's estate. According to a lawsuit, William Van Note's will named Sharon Dickson to be personal representative of his estate, but only if she outlived him.

Judge Larry Harmon, citing the charges against Liz Van Note, suspended her from the position, appointed a replacement and ordered that no distributions from the estate take place without a court order.

Zimmerman amasses small fortune for legal defense.

After many many recorded telephone calls were released it looks like George Zimmerman's criminal defense lawyer may have a little explaining to do. The media is now saying that Zimmerman's attorney knew about a small fortune that Zimmerman had compiled for his legal defense via online money transfer giant, Paypal. It doesn't appear that the tapes are conclusive but many are saying that Zimmerman's criminal defense attorney allowed the court to hear testimony he knew not to be true. This being the testimony of Zimmerman's wife referring to the couples finances and Zimmerman's ability to make bond. I don't know if he knew or didn't know but I don't think the tapes prove either way what the lawyer knew. You be the judge. Here is the article that says what the tapes contained.
  
Jail Call Suggests attorney knew about Zimmerman Money
By Frances Robles

MIAMI -- Prosecutors released nearly 150 of George Zimmerman's recorded jailhouse phone calls Monday, including one that suggests his defense attorney knew from the start that tens of thousands of dollars in donations had begun pouring in.  In a phone call recorded April 14 between Zimmerman and a friend named Scott, the two discuss the new defense lawyer and the attorney's vision for an upcoming bond hearing. Zimmerman tells his friend that he told his new attorney, Mark O'Mara, that he tried to transfer $37,000 from his online legal defense fund site, but could not complete the transaction because of PayPal rules that prevent transfers larger than $10,000.  He twice mentions telling O'Mara about the money.
"He said he's going to have me declared indigent," Zimmerman told his friend. "I told him I didn't think that would be possible, because there was one sizable transfer I tried to make. It got stopped. You know, $37. He said: 'Well that doesn't matter. Right now you're not working. You're not providing an income for your family. You're probably not going to be employable for the rest of your life.'"

At one point the friend asks whether O'Mara knew "the volume" of the donations that came into the PayPal account Zimmerman had set up to solicit donations from the public. Zimmerman said O'Mara knew about the attempted transfer of $37,000, but not any more than that.  They agreed to keep it that way.  At an April 20 bond hearing, Zimmerman's wife testified the couple was broke, and the judge granted her husband a $150,000 bond. Days later, O'Mara declared to the court that Zimmerman had actually amassed a small fortune in donations.  At the time, O'Mara said he had failed to press his client about how much money he had raised.

Prosecutors then reviewed Zimmerman's jailhouse calls and bank records, and found that he, his wife, sister and the friend had collaborated to transfer all the donations out Zimmerman's name into cash. Zimmerman and his wife were recorded talking in a simple code to refer to large amounts of money. "Eight dollars" meant $80,000.  Furious, Seminole County Circuit Judge Kenneth Lester sent Zimmerman back to jail. A new bail hearing was held in June, and Zimmerman was released on a $1 million bond.  Zimmerman's wife was charged with perjury for lying at the first bond hearing.

Critics have questioned O'Mara's role in the plot, wondering whether he was really duped by his client or if he played a role in misleading the court. Zimmerman's wife, Shellie, testified that it was her brother-in-law who managed the online donations and she did not know how much was in it. O'Mara did not call Zimmerman's brother to testify.  Reached late Monday, O'Mara insisted he did not know about the money.
"I recall now some conversation of a transfer, but I don't recall a specific amount," O'Mara told The Miami Herald. "If it was $10,000 or $100,000 or $30,000, I would have remembered. It's not the type of thing you would risk your license to practice law over."  He stressed that the recording shows that Zimmerman was keeping him "at an arm's length" regarding the funding he had raised. He does not think the recording is clear-cut about whether Zimmerman told him about the money.  "I would have remembered $37,000," he said. "I can't imagine not remembering. It puts my credibility on the line."


The bulk of the calls reveal that Zimmerman was bored out of his skull, in a cell with no mirror and no clock. He seemed to have nearly unlimited access to a phone. In jail for just 11 days, he averaged more than 10 15-minute calls a day. He's heard whispering sweet nothings to his wife, and growing exasperated as she fails to understand his code language.  Fluent in Spanish, in one call he lamented to his sister that their parents did not give him a proper Hispanic name like "Jorge." If America had understood he was Latino, the entire ugly affair over the shooting death of Trayvon Martin could have been avoided, he said.  Zimmerman is charged with second degree murder for the Feb. 26 killing of the Miami Gardens teenager. The charges came only after weeks of protests by civil rights activists, people who Zimmerman said wrongly believed him to be "white."

At least one protest was almost held to support Zimmerman, but he stepped in and had organizers call off the rally. On April 19, Zimmerman reached out to the Rev. Terry Jones of Gainesville, Fla., to stop him from holding a rally in Sanford that weekend.  Jones had made headlines around the world when his threat to hold "International Burn a Koran Day" on the anniversary of 9/11 set off deadly protests in Afghanistan. On the phone, Zimmerman prayed with Jones and asked him to give America time to heal.

"I was calling as one God-fearing sinner to another for time for healing, not just for the city of Sanford, for America," Zimmerman said. "I know your intentions are good."  He was inspired by the biblical story of Jesus calming the storms, he said. Jesus, he said, wanted everyone to calm the storms.  Zimmerman asked Jones to come visit him in the jail instead

Richard Cuchli, a Kansas City lawyer that was convicted of murdering his law partner in 2002, is a free man.  In what was an obvious and blatant disregard for the criminal justice process, the prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence and convicted Mr. Cuchli at an unfair trial.  The Court of Appeals has upheld the decision to exclude all evidence that the prosecutor has forcing the DA's office to dismiss the charges.

Irregardless of the defendant's guilt or innocence this just goes to show you that you have to play by the rules, and when you don't sometimes you get caught.

Here is the article in the Kansas City Star.

All charges dismissed in Kansas City lawyer’s murder case 

By: Tony Rizzo

A murder case that roiled the Kansas City legal community for more than a decade has been dropped.

Faced with an appeals court ruling that threw out all evidence in the case, Jackson County prosecutors said Monday that they had dismissed murder charges against a Kansas City lawyer accused in the 2000 killing of his law partner.  The case against Richard Buchli, accused in the beating death of Richard Armitage, had been plagued throughout by problems over evidence being turned over to defense attorneys in a timely manner.  After those problems came to light, Buchli’s 2002 conviction on charges of first-degree murder and armed criminal action was thrown out in 2006.  And in December, as attorneys prepared for a second trial, the Missouri Court of Appeals ruled that the state’s continued failure to provide all the evidence in its possession had prevented Buchli from receiving a fair trial.

Jackson County prosecutors called that ruling a “de-facto dismissal of the case.”

They asked the Missouri Supreme Court to review that ruling, but last week the high court declined to hear the case, allowing the appeals court ruling to stand.With no evidence left to use, prosecutors filed the dismissal Friday.  “We are happy the state has decided to dismiss the charges,” said Richard Johnson, one of the attorneys representing Buchli. “I have no doubt about Richard’s innocence, and I’m glad the case has ended in his favor.”

Because murder has no statute of limitations and the case could someday be refiled if new information turns up, Johnson said that Buchli did not want to make a comment about the dismissal.  Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker’s office also declined to comment. Members of the Armitage family could not be reached.  Armitage was 49 when he was beaten to death in May 2000 in the 13th floor office he and Buchli shared in the Kansas City Power & Light Building downtown.  After a Jackson County jury convicted Buchli in 2002, he was sentenced to life in prison.

Much of the trial testimony centered on spatters of Armitage’s blood found on Buchli’s shoes and clothing. The prosecution contended that showed he was the killer; the defense countered that the blood was transferred when Buchli attempted to revive his injured partner.  Another key piece of evidence was a piece of surveillance video that prosecutors used to establish that Buchli had time to kill Armitage and clean up afterward before he was seen leaving for lunch.  Only later was it discovered that prosecutors had an entire daylong surveillance tape that had not been disclosed to the defense before trial. As a result, a Jackson County judge threw out Buchli’s conviction in 2006 after he had served about five years in prison.

The full tape showed that Buchli would have had little time to commit the killing and clean up, potentially refuting the longer “window of opportunity” argument that prosecutors made at trial.  The judge’s ruling was upheld on appeal and in 2008, after all Jackson County judges recused themselves from presiding over the retrial, the case was assigned to Nodaway County Circuit Judge Roger Prokes.  Two years later, after Buchli’s attorneys raised additional concerns about evidence they had not received while preparing for trial, Prokes ordered the exclusion of all evidence.  “The rules have been ignored, this court has been ignored and judicial resources have been squandered,” Prokes said. “The judiciary cannot wait while the state dawdles.”
In his order, Prokes noted a long list of similar “discovery” lapses in the case.

“If this case did not have the history that it does, this court may well impose different sanctions for the state’s current violations,” he wrote.  But Prokes found that after 10 years of litigation, “the state still has inexcusably failed to produce a complete discovery set.”  “A decade is enough time. This court is left with but one conclusion: The only effective sanction is to exclude all of the state’s evidence from trial,” Prokes ordered.  Jackson County prosecutors appealed the order, but in December the Missouri Court of Appeals voted 8-2 to affirm Prokes’ decision.

“There is unquestionably a societal interest in prosecuting cases of murder, but this does not give the state free reign to prosecute this defendant for an indefinite period of time, no matter how many decades it takes the state to comply with its legal obligations,” the appeals court ruled.

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/05/07/3599125/all-charges-dismissed-in-kc-lawyers.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/05/07/3599125/all-charges-dismissed-in-kc-lawyers.html#storylink=cpy

Another KC Merto City moving to the popular e-ticket format for speeding tickets

Overland Park, Olathe, Kansas City Kansas, Kansas City Missouri and now North Kansas City, all have something in common.  They are using the new e-ticket system for issuing and prosecuting traffic violations.  What this means for the city is a streamlined system and a more up to date record.  No more waiting on the police to turn in paper tickets before the court can do anything with the tickets.

Many of the suburb towns that make up the metro are moving or have moved to this new system and most attorneys like it, including this one.  Here is hoping that more will soon follow.  Here it the article in the KC Star.

NKC moving to electronic traffic ticket system

By: ROBERT A. CRONKLETON

The City Council last week unanimously approved a measure that would move the city to an electronic ticketing system. Currently, police carry ticket books and fill out the citations by hand. Another person enters those citations into the municipal court system.

Under the new e-ticket system, police will use an electronic device to capture information from driver’s licenses, print the citations and transmit them to the municipal court.  The devices also can read some license plates and vehicle identification numbers.  The main advantages of the new system are that it makes the process more efficient while at the same time saving the city money, said Stephen Roberts, information technology manager for North Kansas City.


Here is a short video describing the differences and how to identify where you got your ticket.

 

North Kansas City police can soon say goodbye to handwriting tickets.The City Council last week unanimously approved a measure that would move the city to an electronic ticketing system.
Currently, police carry ticket books and fill out the citations by hand. Another person enters those citations into the municipal court system.
Under the new e-ticket system, police will use an electronic device to capture information from driver’s licenses, print the citations and transmit them to the municipal court.
The devices also can read some license plates and vehicle identification numbers.
The main advantages of the new system are that it makes the process more efficient while at the same time saving the city money, said Stephen Roberts, information technology manager for North Kansas City

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/04/10/3546550/nkc-moving-to-electronic-traffic.html#storylink=cpy
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/04/10/3546550/nkc-moving-to-electronic-traffic.html#storylink=cpy