Judge Kathy Viviano

Our lawyers appear in front of Macomb County Family Court Judge Kathy Viviano on a regular basis. Her father was a long-serving family court judge from Macomb; her brother sits on the Michigan Supreme Court.

Earlier this summer, a father with a custody case before Judge Viviano began emailing threats to court staffers that he was going to blow-up her car with a pressure cooker bomb. The 55-year old man, Keith Rebar, also made threats to shoot the judge if things did not go his way in the child custody proceedings.

Rebar's threats came to light a few weeks ago when they were renewed and, ultimately reported to the sheriff.  Atta boy Keith; now your children will get to read about their loose cannon father and may even be deprived of your company while you pay your debt to society for your threats.

Over the years, we have had our share of litigants, both clients and opponents alike, who have taken a dim view of the family court system. These folks talk a lot about taking matters into their own hands when they feel helpless within the system.

Often, such folks have visceral disagreements with the family court professionals assigned to their case. These people feel that no one can decide matters, or can make parental decisions, better than they can.

When they see their case taking a few turns in a direction they do not support, they tend to overreact. In the case of Judge Viviano, Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith took Rebar's threats seriously, charging him with making a false report or threat of terrorism; a 20-year felony.

Because family court judges make decisions that hit so close to home, they are faced with situations on a daily basis where one party in every case views the judge's decision as a vital threat to the very existence of their family.

A trip through family court is a rough road for the hot head. Good legal counsel is the best bet to keep things moving in the right direction.

Making threats to the family court professionals is never a good move. It amazes us here at the Law Blogger how often that occurs.

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Across the state, doctors who have been taking fees for rubber-stamping, falsifying, or pre-authorizing written certifications for folks applying for medical marijuana cards are collecting criminal convictions.  In order to receive a pot card, the patient must demonstrate they have a "debilitating medical condition".

The Michigan Medical Marijuana Act requires a prospective patient to present medical records to a physician within a bona fide physician-patient relationship.  The physician must then make an evaluation as to whether the patient has a debilitating medical condition.

In doing so, section 4 of the MMMA affords doctors immunity from prosecution simply for providing the requested certifications.  In this regard, the Act states:

A physician shall not be subject to arrest, prosecution, or penalty in any manner, or denied any right or privilege, including but not limited to civil penalty or disciplinary action by the Michigan board of medicine, the Michigan board of osteopathic medicine and surgery, or any other business or occupational or professional licensing board or bureau, solely for providing written certifications, in the course of a bona fide physician-patient relationship and after the physician has completed a full assessment of the qualifying patient's medical history, or for otherwise stating that, in the physician's professional opinion, a patient is likely to receive therapeutic or palliative benefit from the medical use of marihuana to treat or alleviate the patient's serious or debilitating medical condition or symptoms associated with the serious or debilitating medical condition, provided that nothing shall prevent a professional licensing board from sanctioning a physician for failing to properly evaluate a patient's medical condition or otherwise violating the standard of care for evaluating medical conditions.

Well, as with all things "medical marijuana"-related, schemes have popped-up within the medical community.For example, in Macomb County, Lois Butler-Jackson was jury-convicted last month of conspiracy and health care fraud.  The Macomb County Prosecutor and the Michigan Attorney General teamed-up to prove that Dr. Butler-Jackson was pre-authorizing certifications for unseen  patients; stacks of the certifications were then distributed, presumably for a fee, by other individuals to pot card-seeking members of the public.
Up in Cadillac, MI, Dr. Edward Harwell has been charged by the Michigan Attorney General with a series of felonies for allegedly issuing medical marijuana certifications to undercover law enforcement officers without obtaining proper medical verification of the requisite debilitating medical condition.

We here at the Law Blogger have long-suspected that the, er, "medical" nature of the Act is a ruse created by dedicated pot-lobbists whose real goal is to use the fashionable medical marijuana legislation as a proverbial Trojan-Horse for outright legalization.

This legalization highway, however, is getting littered with casualties such as the less-than-forthright physicians featured in this post; and the marijuana dispensaries recently outlawed by the Michigan Supreme Court.

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