Posted on 03/22/2007 7:48:22 AM PDT by SmithL
They sound, at times, like two jousting lovers.
You're mad at me, one says. You're paranoid, the other responds. Pretty soon, patience wanes, tempers flare. One winds up in a jail cell.
Will this pair kiss and make up?
Or will veteran defense attorney Herbert S. Moncier wind up back behind bars for his allegedly contemptuous encounter with Greeneville U.S. District Court Judge Ronnie Greer?
The answer should come April 24, the day Greer has, after months of delay, settled on to decide if Moncier should be found in contempt of court in connection with a January closed-door hearing.
It's not clear why Greer delayed setting the hearing. Details of the exchange that led him to charge Moncier with contempt finally have been unveiled in a transcript of what had been a hearing closed to the public.
"I know that the court has been irritated with me in this trial and other trials," Moncier said at one point in the lengthy January hearing in U.S. District Court in Greeneville. "I know that the court does not like the style by which I represent my clients before juries that has resulted in the series of fairly successful results."
Not so, Greer responded.
"There have been a number of occasions when I have complimented you in the open courtroom on the success you've had in defending criminal defendants in this court," Greer said.
Moncier, the judge opined, was just being paranoid.
"You think the government is out to get you because you have success," Greer said. "You think the court is against you because you have success. Aside and apart from the egotistical implications that statement contains, they're just simply wrong."
At stake in the January hearing were issues of justice and liberty - literally. The closed-door hearing was a run-up to a sentencing hearing for Michael Carl Vassar, who was looking at the loss of some three decades of his freedom in a drug case.
Moncier had asked for the hearing after, he said, Assistant U.S. Attorney Neil Smith sandbagged him with a last-minute notice that Vassar may have told another inmate that he had a conversation about the drug business with Harold Grooms.
Grooms, a convicted chop-shop operator, has been identified in federal court filings as a target in a public corruption probe in Cocke County.
When news of Grooms' name on the FBI target list broke, Grooms hired Moncier.
Until learning of the alleged jailhouse statement by Vassar, Moncier said he had no idea there might be a connection between client Vassar and client Grooms. The defense attorney told Greer he didn't really believe Vassar had even made such a statement, but he wanted the judge to bring in an independent attorney to find out.
Greer had warned Moncier months earlier that he was treading on dangerous ground by representing Grooms and another man tied to Grooms in a different case. News of a potential conflict with Vassar - at what was to be the sentencing, delayed five times before, of Vassar that very day - raised the judge's hackles, the transcript showed.
"Mr. Moncier, this is the, I believe, the fifth time in two weeks that you've attempted to get this sentencing hearing continued," Greer said. "What's going on here? What's going on?
" You've created a situation where you're going to get the continuance you want, and I'm going to be frank with you all of this is highly suspicious," Greer said.
Things turned ugly when Greer began questioning Vassar about whether he still wanted Moncier as an attorney even though, in the judge's opinion, Moncier's "loyalty" lay with Grooms. Moncier tried to object.
Moncier: "Once again, Your Honor - "
Greer: "Mr. Moncier - "
Moncier: "He makes - "
Greer: "Mr. Moncier, you be quiet."
Moncier: "May I approach the bench?"
Greer: "You may stand there and do what I told you to do until Mr. Vassar answers this question."
Moncier: "For the record, Your Honor, I object without him having - "
Greer: "Mr. Moncier, one more word and you're going to jail."
Moncier: "May I speak to my - "
Greer: "Officers, take him into custody."
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