Harassment By Wenatchee's Judge Harmon

I filed a defense to a ticket for expired tabs. It cites profiling, for which there is proof. It also cites unlawful actions taken against me by a now-retired Judge, Judge Warren, whom I discovered had contacts with lawyers in Oregon, where I had litigation against the Catholic church. Judge Harmon replaced Warren. There are some complications to their backgrounds, which I won't elaborate on right now. Suffice it to say I made some connections to the connections.

My case was assigned to one pro-tem Judge, and I wasn't notified that he was replaced by Judge Harmon, last minute. I had several matters going on which affected my ability to conduct discovery, and I hadn't received important discovery (such as, a videotape of the incident, where I was pulled over for something I didn't do, and then cited for another thing).

For one thing, my receipt of medications through my insurance had been disrupted, and I was harassed by them, actually put through to afterhours messages, when they were not closed, over an hour before closing, and from one state to another, all the way to headquarters. I taped all of this. I wrote about this, and submitted it to the Medical Director of Wenatchee Valley Medical Clinic, to explain some situations with insurance which affected other things. I gave the letter to a nurse, Alison Kuske, who said she gave it to Richard Bennett, who gave it to Dr. Freed. Only two days later, the morning of my hearing before Judge Harmon, I tried to call District Court to request a continuance. I began calling at 8:30 a.m., when their offices open. I was put through to afterhours recordings. I called every 5 minutes, up to 9:00 a.m., and was put to afterhours messages all this time. I thought it very strange that right after my insurance company does this to me, and I wrote about it, Wenatchee's District Court does this?

I called Superior Court to get through. I was given the runaround. When I then tried calling District Court again, I finally got the morning recording options. So I asked a clerk if they'd had problems that morning, October 23, 2007, with their answering service, or if they'd been receiving calls. I was told people were calling in without problems. Everyone was getting through except me? That didn't make sense. It was also strange that this happened right after others knew my insurance company had done this to me purposefully. Later that afternoon, when I tried calling right before the hearing again, I got the "all circuits are busy" for an entire half hour. Which may have been the case. The part that is odd is the afterhours messages stuff.

I went to the hearing, even though I had not had notice the Judge had been changed, and without notice that the time had been changed. The court never mailed me anything, and didn't speak to me on the phone. I found out from my grandparents, that the court called THEM, only two days before the hearing. I went to the hearing to request continuance because of these things, and the fact that I still needed discovery and other things were going on.

The hearing should have been 15 minutes. I had every right to a continuance. And, as I had contested the hearing, I had the right to a separate hearing, separate from group arraignments. The time the hearing was changed to disrupted my son's nap schedule, and I didn't have proper notice to contest it. Then when I arrived, at 2:30 p.m., I discovered we'd been thrown into a group, and Judge Harmon, knowing I had my son with me, made us go last. She told us to appear at 2:30 p.m. and then my son had to wait 2 hours before we could have our hearing.

Then, Judge Harmon harassed me AND my son directly, and demonstrated prejudice by her remarks before she made a single decision. ...To be finished later this day...

My son was very patient. He'd been woken from a nap and had only slept about 10 minutes or less and usually took a good 2-3 1/2 hour nap during that time of day. He had become fussy about 5 minutes before it was our turn. While we were waiting, I went to the board to look at the schedule. I saw that we had originally been scheduled for another group, all contested hearings, with representation by lawyers. They were status conference hearings. I had been moved to a different group of people who were taking plea bargains. Mine was the only contested hearing in this second group.

Judge Harmon almost immediately began to yell and insult. My son was reaching towards the mic, and barely touched it, and we were told not to let him touch it. I nodded, and brought a motion for continuance to the other lawyer and up to the bench to give to the Judge. When I was handing it to the Judge, there was a different mic at the desk, and my son reached for it. Judge Harmon was already angry that I had a motion for continuance, and then she YELLED, "DON'T allow your SON to touch our equipment!!!" I believe she said something about allowing him to destroy their property. My son, after being made to wait so long, had made a playful reach, probably thinking about our kareoke machine at home with our mics, and she yelled so loud he became upset. I went back to the desk and said, "He was only reaching for the mic; I don't know if you have children...". My son is 18 months old. His actions were normal and natural and the Judge, either then or a few minutes later, decided to say on the record that she was concerned about my parenting skills and that I couldn't control him. She kept going on. Then she tried not to accept my motion for continuance. She tried to argue about it and get my responses without my being sworn in. I repeatedly asked to be sworn in so my testimony and arguments would hold up as evidence in court. Reluctantly, she finally did.

After this Judge read a list of reasons why I needed continuance, one reason which was because of disabiltity and disruption to my medications in the previous month for chronic pain, and two other reasons were because I had not received a videotape of the incidence in question, and had also not received all discovery requested from the Prosecuting Attorney's office. The other lawyer was the District Attorney, Alan Blackmun. My motion was a page and a half long, and the reasons were written succinctly, and I had added other reasons, describing other disrutpions that were out of my control within the last month. Judge Harmon read this and said on the record: "I don't see any need for continuance. This is just information about your LIFE situations." At that, I said, "You just read this motion, which has listed my disabilities and the lack of receipt of crucial pieces of evidence and you purposefully don't mention these, and claim there is no good reason? You're prejudiced already." She looked surprised as if she didn't think I would catch this. She had admitted and expressed her prejudice and inability to preside over this case, before she made a single decision.

I also stated on the record that we needed continuance because we had not received any notice of change of time for the hearing by the court, and that I'd only found out a couple days prior, from my grandparents who said the court had called THEM. I asked why my son and I had been told the hearing was for 2:30 p.m. when we had the right to fair and full hearing and we were made to wait hours and then just tacked onto the end of a long line-up of other people. I asked why we were last. I also stated that I hardly believed even the people before me, who HAD representation, had had a "fair and full hearing". You can't have a fair and full hearing when people are getting 15 minutes per case, I said. Judge Harmon began to squirm in her seat and turned red in the face. She said I was to argue my case, not for others.

She kept yelling and using a terrible tone of voice, which SHE knows cannot be caught on a transcript. My son picked up on it and began to cry. Not only was he in need of a nap, she was harassing his mother and HIM. He threw a temper tantrum, after I wouldn't allow him to leave, and I had to hold him while he arched his bad and screamed and cried. Judge Harmon got a smirk on her face, and when he stopped, she insulted us further, saying how I wasn't fit to be a mother and, "Your son is so out-of-control I was afraid he was going to injure himself..." and she went on and on about how terrible my son was and how I had no parenting skills. Then she added, "...And I do have children." I looked at her and said, "I have worked over 6 years as a professional nanny; I could babysit YOUR kids before you could babysit MINE."

I asked for continuance and she refused. I kept stating my son needed his nap and this was unfair. I said I'd tried to call earlier but had had some "interesting" experiences that morning with their phone system. This Judge saw how badly my son needed a nap, and that he was 18 months, and knew how patient he'd been, and she went on the record to harass us, and claim that his actions were because of my "bad parenting" and not the fault of the court for giving me enough notice so I could call in and cancell or reschedule, or otherwise accomodate my son's needs. So Harmon says she will give me 2 weeks to get the rest of the discovery and demands to know which company has the surveillance tape. I didn't want to give her that information. Then, she tells the District Attorney that she will PROCEED with their side of the testimony!

Judge Harmon saw me, just about 5 minutes earlier, gather my bags and things and appear to be readying to leave. I couldn't stay there while being harassed and my son had to listen to it. But I knew she wanted me to leave, so she could give the other party a decision in their favor. So I stayed. When she saw me settle back down, she decided to prolong things. Instead of just granting continuance, she wanted to drag this on and hoped my son would act up again. My son finally settled down, but I knew he was NOT okay. His eyes were wide open and he was staring at Judge Harmon. He had his thumb in his mouth and his other hand was holding my finger and caressing it. He does this when he's very upset or afraid. To have my son sitting there, while he was worried and unhappy, and needing comfort and nap, went against my grain. I felt very sad for him that he had heard an adult, a grown-up, insult him and his mother, to his face. And she was yelling.

I stood up. I said, if the other side was just going to give their testimony, could we go? I didn't care to stay for it, and they could get their testimony in before the judge without me. She had already stated I had a continuance for 2 weeks. I knew that wasn't enough time and so did she, but I knew, based on her prejudice, she would rule against us, no matter what. I asked if we had to be present for the testimony. I knew we did not. But she stalled, clearing wanting us to suffer more. My son began to cry again the minute she spoke. THEN, on the record, this Judge accused me of "baiting your son" to cry. She began to talk fast, obviously wanting to make a statement and description of events for the transcript to distort reality. She started giving a narrative of how I had "stood up" and my son didn't cry, so then I "baited him" by "slamming your keys on the desk" to get him to cry. I had not slammed my keys on the counter, and it was clear this Judge was NUTS. What kind of twisted mind thinks a mother would "bait" her child to cry? Only one that does that sort of thing to kids herself.

I realized she didn't want the transcript to read my son was crying, when I was stating over and again that he needed a nap. The whole situation was HER fault. She claimed my son had been sitting there quietly and I'd baited him. My son had been sitting there passively, with worry, and I wasn't going to expose him to Judge Harmon any further. He needed a nap in his own bed.

Then, Judge Harmon threatened to rule against me if we walked out the door. She yelled, for good measure, a whole list of things about how she questioned my parenting skills, and that I couldn't handle him, and THEN she said, "Your son ATTACKED OUR MICROPHONE! and went on to state I had stood by as "HE WAS DESTROYING OUR PROPERTY."

She was seriously, mentally ill. This entire hearing had been about one person: Judge Nancy Harmon. She had been prejudiced from the start and didn't do the right thing in recusing herself. Then she shot herself in the foot by recording her hateful statements on the record. The only other person in the room who was smiling was the District Attorney. Some of the guards looked sick to their stomachs. I said, "I feel sorry for this county, and town of Wenatchee, that they have YOU for a Judge." I saw Judge Harmon and the DA look at eachother and break into snide smiles. They knew I was leaving and she was going to have an excuse to rule in their favor. I left.

As I left, I felt liberated. I knew I could contest the entire thing and appeal, based on prejudice. I later found out there were other personal reasons for her prejudice. I didn't know her background and other things, until after the hearing because I hadn't been told Judges were being switched and she was going to preside.

I felt sick, but I also knew I did the right thing. I had also stood her down in court, not allowing her to walk all over me. I was polite and did not raise my voice when she yelled. But I didn't allow her to harass me without throwing it back in her face and walking out on her.

I was the bigger person, and I knew that Judge would not be in her position for very long. She could enjoy it and make the most of it while it lasted. I feel sorry for the public in the meantime. If I had sat there, after her tirade, and harassment, she would have won. But I didn't allow fear of her position to influence my decisions, I followed a moral compass.