WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO AMBASSADOR LEO/LEE EMIL WANTA UP TO THIS POINT:
(NOTE: It is logical to progress from the last blog about the unlawful tax cases involving Falls Vending which were filed against Ambassador Wanta by the State of Wisconsin Department of Revenue [from 1982 - 1987] to the next major court event in his life: his arrest in Lausanne, Switzerland. At this moment, however, the Editor awaits a response from the Lausanne Courts regarding a recent letter to them (which is a response to a letter to me from them). Another letter from the International Court of Justice at The Hague is also expected. The Lausanne Court system has sent 20 pages of court text -- a Tribunal Decision from 2000. It is in French and is currently being translated. While waiting for the necessary tools to write the portion of Wanta World that deals with the Ambassador's imprisonment in Switzerland, it is time to begin coverage of the Dane County (Madison) Wisconsin trial... if one can call it a trial. Interpreting court transcripts is difficult and time consuming work and will be provided as analysis is completed. Editor) EVENTS LEADING TO THE DANE COUNTY TRIAL: 1. On July 7, 1993
2. Leo Emil Wanta was appointed Ambassador to Switzerland (and also Canada) by the nation of Somalia. His Ambassadorial Investiture was witnessed by the Foreign Minister of France, the Honorable Alain Juppe… a former Mayor of Paris. Thus, questions arise as to the legality of the imprisonment of Ambassador Wanta in Lausanne. The Swiss may question the validity of the Ambassadorial appointment, but they do not have the right to ignore it. Why would the Swiss Government imprison someone with Diplomatic Immunity in violation of the various international agreements known as the Vienna Conventions? Thus we see the first attacks on an innocent man caused by good old fashioned greed... the attraction of the moth to the flame of money.
3. The group was leaving for Geneva, a short distance from Lausanne (they were going by cab) to meet with White House Deputy Counsel Vince Foster. Foster and his group (which included Leon Panetta) would join Wanta and his group at the Hotel de la Paix in Geneva. Vince Foster's presence is affirmed by his American Express credit card statement Foster (who was murdered within two weeks of the planned meeting) was there to get $250 million from Ambassador Wanta. The funds had been requested by White House Economic Chairperson Laura d'Andrea Tyson, right-hand to First Lady (at the time) Hillary Clitone. The money was for the Children's Defense Fund (which is rumored to be Hillary's personal piggy bank).
4. The reason they were traveling by cab to Geneva (rather than by train) was because of a large, heavy blue nylon bag Leo Wanta was carrying. It contained all of his immediate investigative records and included highly classified information about an undercover operation on which he was working called "Operation Chaselet." Chaselet involved Credit Suisse and Letters of Credit issued by Chase Manhattan Bank. He had been told by his U.S, Treasury Department Representative, RAC William LeCates (Nashville), to take his records with him on this trip. The records included a federal arrest warrant for Marc Rich, issued by FBI Director William Sessions (who was terminated by Clinton two days after Wanta was arrested and the arrest warrant went unexecuted -- and yes, the same Marc Rich who was the last person pardoned by President William Jeffersonn Clinton as he departed the White House for the final time). Was Wanta being set up for the fall he took that day in Lausanne?
5. Wanta was traveling on his Somali Diplomatic Passport.
6. Wanta was held in what he terms "a dungeon" (Cell No. 130, within Prison du Bois - Mermet, CH du Bois - Gentil, 1018 Lausanne, Switzerland) from July 7, 1993 until November 17, 1993. On that date, the Swiss put him in body restraints (chains -- heavy duty stuff for someone against whom the Swiss filed no charges after unlawfully holding him in prison for over four months), and with two armed guards sent him on Swiss Air Flight #110 to New York where he was arraigned in Federal District Court in Brooklyn.
7. On November 17, 1993, Ambassador Wanta re-entered the United States using his Somali Diplomatic Passport. It was recorded by U.S. Customs upon his re-entry; to further prove the point, his U.S. Passport had expired in August 1993; it would have been impossible for him to use it to re-enter the U.S. This is irrefutable evidence that the Somali Ambassadorship and the Diplomatic Passport that came with it were valid... further evidence the Swiss government arrested and imprisoned a man entitled to Diplomatic Immunity.
8. Judge Allyne Ross dismissed all charges against Leo Emil Wanta on November 19, 1993. I have a copy of the New York Court Docket.
9. Ambassador Leo Emil Wanta was re-arrested on the steps of the Brooklyn Federal District Court and was held in New York until mid-December when he was "extradited" to Wisconsin.
THE DANE COUNTY CRIMINAL TRIAL OF AMBASSADOR LEO/LEE EMIL WANTA
Judge Michael B. Torphy, Jr., a former District Attorney thoroughly familiar with criminal law, states in Circuit Court Branch 2, Madison (Dane Coounty), Wisconsin, on May 8, 1995:
THE COURT: We are on the record in the matter entitled State of Wisconsin versus Leo E. Wanta. Mr. Wanta is charged in an information dated April 20, 1995.(See Page 5 of Court Transcript, above.)
Thus, it appears the criminal charges on which Lee Wanta is being tried were filed a mere three weeks before the trial. This raises a huge question: On what charges did Wisconsin have Wanta re-arrested on the steps of the Brooklyn Federal District Court after Judge Allyne Ross dismissed all charges against him on November 19, 1993, when Switzerland finally sent him back (in body chains) to the United States?
Based on Judge Torphy's "on the record" statement, it appears the only "charges" the State of Wisconsin had against Ambassador Wanta in 1993 until the criminal charges were filed in 1995 were civil charges for an estimated income tax deficiency. Is an unproven, estimated civil income tax penalty sufficient reason for extradition from New York to Wisconsin -- in body chains? Is an unproven, estimated civil income tax penalty sufficient reason to hold an American citizen in a filthy city jail from December 1993 until his trial in May 1995? It is obvious that something else was going on here. The State of New York and the Federal Government became complicit in this unlawful procedure when Wanta was held unlawfully in the Brooklyn Federal prison for a month -- from November 19th (after Judge Ross dismissed all charges against him on November 19, 1993) until mid-December when he was flown (again in body chains) from New York to Madison, Wisconsin, where he was immediately incarcerated in the Dane County Jail.
Bear in mind, Wanta paid the estimated civil income tax of $14,129 under protest a full year before any of this unlawful behavior by New York, Wisconsin and the federal government occurred. The State of Wisconsin billed him for income taxes during years Wanta was not a resident of the State of Wisconsin. Leo/Lee Wanta became a legal resident of Vienna, Austria, in June of 1988.
PARAGRAPH 3, PAGE 5, FROM THE TRANSCRIPT::
MR. CHAVEZ: Judge, yes, I do. I’d like to make a record. I’d prefer it be in camera. And Mr. Haag and I discussed we’d also – it’s my understanding he would have no objection to an ex parte in camera discussion.
THE COURT: Ex parte with who?
MR. CHAVEZ: With you, Your Honor.
THE COURT: You and Mr, Wanta?
MR. CHAVEZ: Yes.
THE COURT: Just the three of us?
MR. CHAVEZ: Yes.
THE COURT: I always am very leery of ex parte discussions.
Why would a defense attorney discuss his desire to make a record before a trial begins? Why does he care if prosecutor, Assistant Attorney General J. Douglas Haag, objects and why is he coordinating defense strategies with the prosecution? Why does he all but apologize for wanting to make a record? It does NOT strike me as strange that a defense attorney would ask for an ex parte in camera discussion with the judge that's about to try his case – but the judge’s reaction indicates surprise – “just the three of us?” Does a request for an ex parte in camera meeting usually involve anyone but the defendant and his counsel? Yes, Judge Torphy, the defense attorney and his client – without the prosecutor. Then Haag injects himself into the conversation as if he’s giving the Court his blessing/permission to confer with the defendant and his lawyer – he even suggests the terms re when he’d be willing to leave. Who is running courtroom procedures?(See Page 5, above, and Page 6, below.)
This first 30 pages of the State of Wisconsin versus Leo Emil Wanta provide some of the strangest courtroom verbal exchanges in courtroom history. It took me until the third reading to realize the three lawyers (Chavez, Haag, and Torphy) are sharing a kind of "code speak." There is no other reasonable explanation for what is said and how it is verbally stated.
PAGE 6, 1995 DANE COUNTY COURT TRIAL TRANSCRIPT:
Page 5 ends with non-appointed State Public Defender (illegal under Wisconsin Statutes),counsel for the Defendant, Mr. John Chavez, a retired military lawyer, a former Judge Advocate General (JAG) and an Attorney at Law from Cambridge, Wisconsin, stating that he wants to make a record. The Courtroom conversation that occurs after this request is strange, indeed. In addition to Mr. Chavez, we have J. Douglas Haag, Assistant Attorney General, prosecuting the case for the State of Wisconsin, Department of Revenue. It is Judge Michael B. Torphy, Jr.'s courtroom -- though in the following record from the Court transcript it certainly doesn't sound like Torphy's in charge. Torphy is a former district attorney who is more than a little familiar with criminal law.
MR. HAAG: The only – perhaps we ought to convene all of us – but what I’m concerned about is that I don’t want – to the extent that any matters that could be deemed privileged would be brought to the Court’s attention, I don’t want to be in a position where that privilege was inadvertently breached because I was present.So I think we have to be particularly cautious about proceeding on these matters with that – just with the privilege issue in mind, Your Honor.
THE COURT: Well, I guess if -- I’m willing to have Mr. Chavez and Mr. Wanta discuss with me whatever they – if you’re agreeable to it.
MR. HAAG: Well…
THE COURT: I don’t know what it is. I don’t know why it is, and I – but that’s – that’s sort of a carte blanche situation.
MR. HAAG: I would prefer to be present at first, but if it at all appears to Your Honor or Mr, Chavez that we may be entering into a very delicate area of privilege, then I would be happy to leave.
THE COURT: Yeah. But I don’t know what’s privileged. How would I know what’s privileged?
MR. HAAG: We have to leave that to Mr. Chavez’s determination.
THE COURT: I guess what I would like to do in that circumstances, very honestly, is rather than moving back and forth between chambers and the courtroom, unless there is some objection I’d like to, you know, just clear the courtroom. Is that sufficient for your purposes?
MR. CHAVEZ: (Moves his head in an affirmative manner.)
THE COURT: And get everybody back at such time as it’s appropriate. So to that extent I would like to have everybody but the counsel and Mr. Wanta, as I understand, excused from the room.
COURT REPORTER: Do you want this on the record?
THE COURT: It’s on the record – no question about it.
DANE COUNTY TRIAL TRANSCRIPT, MAY 8, 1995, BOTTOM OF PAGE 7:
(At this time the following record was made in a closed courtroom with the Court and counsel, at 9:25 a.m.)
THE COURT: I gather, just so the record is clear, Mr. Wanta, you have no objection to that, I assume?
THE DEFENDANT: No, I don’t. But I would like to give the Court a statement, which I have the right to do, Your Honor. And if I may approach the bench, I have a statement I would like to present the Court..
To continue to pages 8 and 9 of transcript testimony, click here.
1 comment:
Sounds very interesting! I will check this out! hyundai windshields
Post a Comment