Dealing justice?
Politics: Villalpando, Cantrells wage war -- unethical public conduct, political cronyism, electioneering at issue
NWI Times
Mar 12, 2006
nwitimes.com/news/local/dealing-justice/article_3a2b8ce0-ca35-5f9a-838a-4df48257a191.html
It's a laundry list one Lake Superior Court judge believes taints the local judiciary and a legal ethics expert says casts a shadow over the court's ability to appear beyond reproach.
The issues in question:
* Judge Julie Cantrell mandating hundreds of criminal defendants pay for drug and alcohol counseling at a Hammond-based counseling service owned by one of the judge's most active campaign workers. It also is a business in which her father, Lake County political operative Robert Cantrell, has had financial interests.
* Robert Cantrell insisting, according to Lake Superior Judge Jesse Villalpando, that Villalpando increase referrals to the same counseling service. Villalpando claims when he refused to do so, Robert Cantrell recruited two lawyers to run against Villalpando on the May primary ballot.
* Julie Cantrell's brother, attorney John Cantrell, being allowed to practice law in the courtroom controlled by his sister.
Villalpando is calling on the public to stop what he calls attacks on the integrity of his court by the Cantrell family, known as one of the most formidable in Lake County politics.
Villalpando, who faces voters May 2 for the first time in his judicial career, has released hundreds of his private memoranda and letters to Indiana judicial officials and the state police. He has also released court documents to demonstrate what he calls "the Cantrell political syndicate's insidious efforts to compromise and contaminate my court."
Those documents, contained in a 1,000-page binder, are what Villalpando believes should spark an investigation into the practices of Judge Cantrell, her father and her brother.
The pages are laced with allegations involving Cantrell, her brother, John, a politically connected Hammond lawyer, and their father, Robert Cantrell, who has been a kingpin in both Republican and Democratic politics.
Villalpando said he has asked the Indiana Judicial Qualifications Commission, an enforcement arm of the Indiana Supreme Court, as well as state and federal law enforcement authorities to investigate.
The Cantrells say some of the allegations are lies and others overblown.
"He is one of the biggest liars I've ever dealt with," Robert Cantrell said.
Judge Cantrell said this week she is considering a lawsuit against Villalpando based on his allegations.
John Cantrell said at least one of the allegations -- that he argued cases in his sister's courtroom -- no longer has any basis since he has discontinued the practice.
Taking notice
But the Rev. John Coughlin, a legal ethics professor at University of Notre Dame Law School, said while some of the described actions of Judge Cantrell may not rise to the criminal level, they raise a pattern of ethical questions that could be damaging to the image of the court.
And at least some law enforcement agencies are taking notice of Villalpando's claims.
Sources close to the U.S. Attorney's office in Hammond said federal authorities are reviewing allegations concerning Addiction and Family Care, or AFC, operated by Cantrell political supporter Nancy Fromm.
State Examiner Bruce Hartman said the State Board of Accounts may perform an audit focusing on the counseling services mandated by Judge Cantrell after learning of Villalpando's accusations.
However, Villalpando's efforts to involve Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter met with resistance. Carter, running for re-election in 2006, said in January he reviewed Villalpando's material and didn't find any wrongdoing on Judge Cantrell's part.
As retribution for his going public, Villalpando claims the Cantrells have enlisted two defense lawyers -- Eduardo Fontanez of Hammond and Stanley Jablonski of Merrillville -- to run against him in the spring Democratic primary.
Villalpando writes:
"Robert Cantrell ... has made clear his intention to attempt to gain control of the court through the electoral process because he failed to control it through fraud and extortion."
Villalpando has complained repeatedly about the Cantrells to Judicial Qualifications Commission Counsel Meg Babcock and to David Remondini, chief counsel to the Indiana Supreme Court.
Remondini and Babcock refused comment last week on the bulk of Villalpando's allegations.
But Remondini did say, "We take complaints by judges and about judges very seriously."
Counseling service
Villalpando began complaining about the Cantrells in a December 2001 letter to the director of the Division of State Court Administration.
"(Judge Julie) Cantrell through her father, Dr. Robert Cantrell, has pressured me to hire a relative, business associates and political cronies on our staff. I resisted, but they do not stop exerting pressure," that letter states.
Villalpando said Julie and Robert Cantrell began pressing him in 2003 to send substance abusers appearing in his courtroom to AFC, which provides counseling for people convicted in a number of Lake County courts, including Julie Cantrell's courtroom.
AFC and other counseling services can bill court-mandated customers for hundreds of dollars in services before their criminal charges are resolved.
And in the case of AFC, Fromm said she has paid Robert Cantrell a sort of finder's fee every time he refers business to her company. She denies, however, Villalpando's allegation that she paid Robert Cantrell any money for the cases his daughter referred to Fromm's service.
Still, it is argued the practice amounts to a judge referring defendants to a service in which her father has financial interests -- a practice that Villalpando and other ethics experts believe casts a pall over the ethics of Judge Cantrell's courtroom.
And Fromm's heavy activity as a campaign organizer for Judge Cantrell deepens the ethical quagmire, professor Coughlin said.
"Judges are held to a higher standard of ethical conduct than lawyers or ordinary people," Coughlin said. "If the appearance of impropriety exists, that's thought to make something ethically suspect.
"It sounds like you have something that's ethically suspect here."
Villalpando agrees.
"The reason for Robert Cantrell's use of political intimidation is to gain control of judicial operations for his family's own economic benefit," Villalpando alleged.
Villalpando said he fears proceeds from AFC contracts are being used to finance his political opponents' campaigns.
The Cantrells and Fromm dispute those allegations.
"That is a lie. I don't do that," Robert Cantrell said. "I don't get a penny from that. Believe me, that's been checked over and over again ... by a higher authority. If they had something like that, they would have put me away a long time ago. That's not true."
Judge Cantrell, when asked to comment, made a statement Thursday through her brother, John, saying criminal defendants have a choice to use any of a number of counseling services and that her father doesn't profit from any of it.
Fromm said Villalpando initially refused to send AFC business because "he hated Bobby Cantrell."
She said Joe De La Cruz, a former East Chicago city councilman now serving time behind bars in a federal corruption case, set up a luncheon to resolve the dispute.
"They had a heated disagreement and kind of worked it out," Fromm said. "There was no demand."
Fromm said she pays Robert Cantrell consultant fees for finding new business for her.
"He has never gotten any money from his daughter's court. He wouldn't do that. Julie wouldn't let him do that. That would be just totally crazy," Fromm said.
Fromm's AFC was the subject of an earlier controversy.
She previously received public funds under a contract with the North Township trustee's office, where Robert Cantrell works as a supervisor.
Her service used to provide township employee lectures about diversity in the workplace. Employees claimed the AFC sessions also involved pointless games, mood music and massages intended to make them sensitive, caring public servants.
That ended late last year after Gregory Cvitkovitch stepped down as township trustee following his conviction on federal tax fraud charges. Newly elected North Township Trustee Frank Mrvan cancelled the service.
Family court
Villalpando went on the offensive last year, accusing Judge Cantrell and her brother John of violating a judicial canon forbidding a judge from presiding over a case involving a "spouse, a person within the third degree of relationship (or their spouse) or a person living in the judge's household."
Villalpando said he found hundreds of court records, "docket entries showing John Cantrell representing clients in his sister's court." However, Villalpando said state officials eventually let the Cantrells off the hook and won't penalize them, to his disappointment.
John Cantrell, speaking for himself and sister, said, "When I got out of law school, one of the things we did is ask the people in Indianapolis how we handle this situation, and we were told I can practice in her court as long as it's not in front of her."
Judge Cantrell, declined a full interview with The Times.
John Cantrell said he always argued his cases on his sister's court with an assistant judicial officer -- or magistrate.
Babcock, who counsels state judges on ethical questions, agreed the Cantrells weren't in violation of state ethics rules.
"In 2001... Judge Cantrell asked me if her brother, John, could practice in her court. I said he could practice in front of her judicial officers but not in front of her. Judge Cantrell relied on that advice.
"When it was brought to my attention some months ago that this advice had been given, I retracted it. I talk to about 600 judges a year by telephone, and once in a while it backfires. And this time it did. I just didn't give her a very good answer. I exercised my option to change my mind and (John Cantrell) is no longer practicing there at all," Babcock said.
The problem is, John Cantrell never should have been practicing in his sister's courtroom to begin with, legal ethics professor Coughlin says.
"It's extremely clear she should not have been involved in those cases," Coughlin said, noting that even magistrates or judicial officers still work directly for Judge Cantrell.
"I'm not suggesting there was actually any wrongdoing, but again, even the appearance of impropriety makes it ethically suspect," Coughlin said.
John Cantrell said all pending cases of his and his former law partner, (now Hammond Mayor) Thomas McDermott Jr., have been transferred out of Julie Cantrell's court to a different judge.
Villalpando also alleges Judge Cantrell has steered business to her brother and cites two cases in which indigent defendants, who had been charged in her court, later hired John Cantrell as their defense lawyer.
Those cases also have been transferred out of Judge Cantrell's court. John Cantrell denies his sister steered the clients his way.
"I don't need my sister to steer business my way," John Cantrell said. "I can't help it if somebody walks into my office and they have a case in my sister's court."
Robert and John Cantrell said Villalpando has made other inaccurate allegations against them and Judge Cantrell.
"(Villalpando) is a judge," John Cantrell said. "Shouldn't he research what he says before he makes these kinds of comments?"
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