o'hare - News - The Coastal Star2024-03-28T18:59:02Zhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/feed/tag/o%27hareGulf Stream: Circuit judge rules for O’Boyle and O’Harehttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/gulf-stream-circuit-judge-rules-for-o-boyle-and-o-hare2015-12-02T21:08:08.000Z2015-12-02T21:08:08.000ZMary Kate Leminghttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/MaryKateLeming769<div><p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong><br /> <br />A Palm Beach County Circuit Court judge has echoed the words of a federal ruling in dismissing the town of Gulf Stream’s conspiracy complaint over hundreds of public records requests filed by residents Martin O’Boyle and Chris O’Hare.<br /> Circuit Judge Richard Oftedal ruled on Nov. 4 that O’Boyle and O’Hare have the “absolute right under current Florida law to file public record requests and then file lawsuits if the requests went unanswered.”<br /> Oftedal threw out the town’s request for an injunction halting new requests from the two men and said their lawsuits and claims for attorney’s fees should go forward.<br /> The judge’s ruling against Gulf Stream came with a dose of empathy for the town’s predicament in dealing with the onslaught of records requests, however.<br /> “The court is neither unmindful nor unsympathetic with the plight of Gulf Stream, a small municipality of only 17 permanent employees, who, if the allegations are true, are being forced to divert taxpayer monies earmarked for public services in order to address the avalanche of public records requests being filed for no purpose other than to harass and shake down the town by fear and the threat of having to pay attorneys’ fees under the statute,” Oftedal wrote. “While Gulf Stream may well be the poster boy for those victimized by individuals seeking to ‘game the system’ by suing public agencies, it is hardly alone.”<br /> The judge said relief for the town and other municipalities would have to come from the Florida Legislature, which could change the law. Oftedal’s ruling aligned with that of U.S. District Court Judge Kenneth Marra, who in June threw out the town’s civil RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) suit against the two men. The town’s attorneys are appealing that dismissal.<br /> “Thankfully, for citizens, journalists and data collectors, Judge Oftedal is not alone and is part of a growing trend of courts refusing to use their judicial powers to prevent people from exercising civil rights,” said Jonathan O’Boyle, Martin’s son and an attorney named as a defendant in the town’s cases, who criticized Mayor Scott Morgan for not pursuing a settlement. <br />Morgan has said the town is willing to negotiate when O’Boyle and O’Hare agree to drop their lawsuits and make a serious proposal to the town’s attorneys. <br />The O’Boyles have urged town commissioners to form a panel of residents and officials to help broker a settlement.<br /> “Morgan is crazy if he thinks that he can resolve this issue without a sit-down,” Jonathan O’Boyle said. “In my opinion, attributable to me and no one else, a sit-down is mandatory.”<br /> <strong>In other business:</strong><br /> • The Florida Commission on Ethics has dismissed O’Hare’s complaint against Town Attorney John Randolph. O’Hare had accused the town of an improper contractual arrangement with Randolph that allowed him to directly pass work on to his law firm. The commission found “no probable cause to believe that he (Randolph) misused his public position to benefit himself, his law firm, or others.”<br /> • Residents will notice a $30 fee added to their water bills next year. The surcharge is to build the town’s utility fund to prepare for problems with the aging infrastructure. Many of the town’s water pipes are more than 50 years old and living on borrowed time, officials say, and a failure can cost more than $1 million to repair. Ú<br /><br /></p></div>Judge tosses out Gulf Stream’s RICO suithttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/judge-tosses-out-gulf-stream-s-rico-suit2015-07-02T12:00:00.000Z2015-07-02T12:00:00.000ZMary Kate Leminghttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/MaryKateLeming769<div><p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong><br /> <br /> Gulf Stream’s legal offensive against Martin O’Boyle and Chris O’Hare suffered a huge setback late last month when a West Palm Beach judge threw out the town’s federal racketeering suit against the two men. <br /> U.S. District Court Judge Kenneth Marra said that, while he was sympathetic with the town’s “very difficult situation” because of the hundreds of public records requests O’Boyle and O’Hare had filed, their actions did not meet the legal standards for suing under the RICO statute. <br /> Marra, in effect, told the town to fight it out with the two litigious residents in the state court and forget the federal class-action case.<br /> O’Boyle and O’Hare, the judge said, “had the absolute right under current Florida law to file public records requests and then file lawsuits if requests went unanswered.” <br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960582868,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960582868,original{{/staticFileLink}}" width="135" alt="7960582868?profile=original" /></a> O’Hare said he was elated with the decision. He said the town’s suit against him had strained his family and hurt his business. <br /> “I can’t begin to tell you how debilitating this RICO accusation has been for me and my family,” O’Hare said. “I have had to do a lot of explaining, sometimes to perfect strangers but also to state officials and others involved in my artificial reef efforts.”<br /> Mayor Scott Morgan, a lawyer, said the defeat shouldn’t be construed as validation for the behavior of the town’s two most zealous critics.<br /> “While we are disappointed in the court’s decision, it is important to note that the judge was not excusing the defendants’ actions,” Morgan said. “Rather, he simply held that the filing of public records requests and lawsuits, whether malicious or not, does not constitute ‘racketeering’ as defined in the federal racketeering law, and that the abuse of the public records act is for the Florida state courts to determine.”<br /> In his nine-page decision issued June 30, Marra also said that the mere threat of filing suit for legal fees over the records requests was not grounds for proving extortion or conspiracy, as the town’s attorneys had claimed. The judge dismissed the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act suit with prejudice, meaning the court believes it unlikely it can be amended to pass legal muster. <br /> The town hired West Palm Beach attorney Gerald Richman to pursue the RICO strategy in October and filed the federal suit in February.<br /> Beyond Gulf Stream, the class-action suit alleged that O’Boyle used a group he founded called the Citizens Awareness Foundation to extort settlements from frivolous public records requests made to municipalities and businesses across the state — communities including Miami, Bradenton, Cutler Bay and Fernandina Beach. The suit claimed hundreds of thousands of dollars in settlements were funneled to The O’Boyle Law Firm.<br /> O’Hare says he had nothing to do with the Citizens Awareness Foundation or any conspiracy, and the town was using the RICO case to distract from its mistakes. He says the dozens of suits he’s filed against the town are not frivolous but over legitimate issues. <br /> “The town is doing a great many things unfairly,” O’Hare said. “That’s one reason they are being sued.”<br /> <a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960582886,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960582886,original{{/staticFileLink}}" width="135" alt="7960582886?profile=original" /></a> Mitchell Berger, a Fort Lauderdale attorney who represents Martin O’Boyle, said the town was wrong to “sue one of its citizens.”<br /> “It’s unfortunate when it comes to this,” Berger said. “When someone asks for records, give them the records.”<br /> Jonathan O’Boyle, O’Boyle’s son and a Pennsylvania attorney who is a director with The O’Boyle Law Firm in Deerfield Beach, said he expected the RICO suit would be dismissed and blames the town for creating its own problems.<br /> Gulf Stream has dozens of cases pending with O’Boyle and O’Hare in the state courts. Officials say the town has spent at least $1 million in legal fees over the last two years fighting with the two men. Morgan said the town will move forward with its other complaints and hope for better results.<br /> “The town of Gulf Stream has simultaneously been advancing its claims against these defendants in the state courts,” the mayor said, “where we have already had some success, and we will continue those actions.”</p></div>Gulf Stream: Town attorneys win three rulings against O’Boyle, O’Harehttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/gulf-stream-town-attorneys-win-three-rulings-against-o-boyle-o-ha2015-04-29T20:07:29.000Z2015-04-29T20:07:29.000ZMary Kate Leminghttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/MaryKateLeming769<div><p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong></p>
<p>Lawyers for the town of Gulf Stream are having a good spring, winning three court rulings in cases raised by Martin O’Boyle and Chris O’Hare, the town’s litigious duo.<br />Meanwhile, Town Manager William Thrasher says his early budget estimates call for setting aside $800,000 to cover the town’s rising legal costs during the next year, and commissioners are planning a special budget workshop to update taxpayers on all that’s going on.<br />The rulings that broke Gulf Stream’s way in recent weeks were:<br />• Palm Beach County Circuit Court Judge Jessica Ticktin denied O’Boyle’s complaint that the town was violating state law by charging too much for filling public records requests.<br />O’Boyle had accused the town of inflating the price of copying documents and passing on unreasonable fees to citizens, deterring the public from accessing information. The judge was unconvinced and ruled that O’Boyle was not overcharged for his records requests, and the town had lived up to its statutory obligations.<br />According to Ticktin, O’Boyle “has shown neither the demonstrated pattern of noncompliance nor the likelihood of future violations.”<br />• Palm Beach County Circuit Court Judge Peter Blanc denied O’Hare’s attempt to have attorney Robert Sweetapple disqualified from representing the town against him.<br />O’Hare had argued that, when he lived in Ocean Ridge in 1998, he hired Sweetapple to represent him in a code dispute with the town. O’Hare claimed that Sweetapple had “private, confidential” information about him that could be damaging now in his suits against Gulf Stream.<br />Blanc ruled against O’Hare, saying he did not prove that Sweetapple’s work in Ocean Ridge was “substantially related” to the current cases against Gulf Stream. The judge said the lawyer hasn’t done anything in his recent work to compromise the outcome in Ocean Ridge.<br />“No actions by Attorney Sweetapple on behalf of the Town (of Gulf Stream) in this case would involve attacking any work previously done for Plaintiff,” Blanc wrote in his decision. He also said that O’Hare had failed to prove his claim that Sweetapple had sensitive information that could hurt him.<br />• In a summary judgment in federal court, U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks dismissed O’Boyle’s claim that the town violated his constitutional rights by removing his campaign signs from public areas when he ran for Town Commission in 2014. O’Boyle claimed that the town’s sign code infringed on free speech and violated the First Amendment.<br />After the election, the town rewrote its sign code in an attempt to make it more content neutral and clarify restrictions. Middlebrooks found that nothing in the town’s previous sign code “reflected an aversion to political speech.” The judge ruled that the town’s restrictions on signs were reasonable. <br />“The town’s general size and location limitations on political signs advanced its interests in lessening street congestion, providing adequate light and air, and preventing the overcrowding of land,” he wrote. The judge said the courts have ruled that towns have a duty to keep streets open and orderly.<br />“By allowing O’Boyle to place his political signs on private property,” Middlebrooks wrote, “the Old Sign Code left open adequate alternative channels of communication.”<br />Commissioners unanimously approved Town Attorney John Randolph’s request that the town cover a $50,000 insurance deductible for its attorneys. O’Boyle is suing Randolph, Mayor Scott Morgan, Sweetapple and Joanne O’Connor, an associate of Randolph at the Jones, Foster, Johnston and Stubbs law firm. The town’s insurance carrier has refused to cover the attorneys, so they will use coverage under Randolph’s firm.<br />“In my opinion, it’s our obligation to protect our lawyers,” Morgan said.<br />Earlier this year, commissioners approved covering a $25,000 insurance deductible for Sweetapple.<br />The commission has scheduled a budget workshop, beginning at 5:30 p.m. on May 13, to discuss the long-range implications of the rising legal costs.<br /><strong>In other business</strong>, commissioners decided to defer action on developer Thomas Laudani’s plans to build two houses at 3424 N. Ocean Blvd., until he presents new design plans.<br />Morgan criticized Laudani’s proposal to begin construction because the architecture of the two houses was too similar. Laudani developed the old Spence estate, and commissioners have said they don’t want a repeat of that project.</p></div>Gulf Stream: RICO suit alleges conspiracy, extortionhttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/gulf-stream-rico-suit-alleges-conspiracy-extortion2015-03-05T16:36:09.000Z2015-03-05T16:36:09.000ZMary Kate Leminghttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/MaryKateLeming769<div><p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong><br /><br />In their federal racketeering lawsuit against Martin O’Boyle and Christopher O’Hare, attorneys for the town of Gulf Stream allege the two men have conspired to use the state’s public records laws as weapons to extort legal fees from hundreds of municipalities and contractors across the state.</p>
<p><a href="{{#staticFileLink}}7960565289,original{{/staticFileLink}}"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}7960565289,original{{/staticFileLink}}" width="276" alt="7960565289?profile=original" /></a>Beyond Gulf Stream, the RICO complaint cites similar records assaults by O’Boyle in places far removed from South Florida, one of them in another small, affluent seaside community more than a thousand miles way. <br />In 2007, during a dispute with the borough of Longport in his native New Jersey, O’Boyle filed so many demands for public records that “the clerk went to the emergency room because of the stress she attributed to the flood of (Open Public Records Act) requests,” the suit says.<br />Gulf Stream officials know all about that kind of stress. Town Clerk Rita Taylor says she has been working seven days a week for the last two years to keep up with workload generated by O’Boyle and O’Hare. <br />Town Manager William Thrasher says these days he devotes virtually all his time to lawsuits and records requests. “There’s no end in sight. My job description has been altered forever,” Thrasher said. “When you look back, you get discouraged.”<br />The 49-page class-action civil suit claims that “the Town of Gulf Stream has become the epicenter of the RICO Enterprises’ scheme” and has fielded about 2,000 public records requests since 2013 from the two residents.<br />RICO is an acronym for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.<br />O’Boyle and O’Hare, separately and together, have sued the town dozens of times in the state and federal courts over grievances involving building codes, campaign signage and assorted constitutional rights, to name a few. <br />Thrasher says the town has spent more than $1 million to satisfy records requests and pay lawyers since hostilities with the two men began.<br />West Palm Beach attorney Gerald Richman, who filed the suit on Gulf Stream’s behalf, accuses the two men of engaging in predatory “scorched-earth” tactics intended to intimidate and collect settlements. “It’s extortion, plain and simple,” he said.<br />Jonathan O’Boyle, O’Boyle’s son and a key co-defendant in the RICO complaint, believes the town’s lawsuit will have a lasting detrimental effect on open government.<br />“It is absolutely ludicrous,” he said. “This filing is the boogeyman that will be used to chill citizens from seeking public records for years to come.”<br />The town’s attorneys allege that Jonathan O’Boyle, who is licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania but not Florida, violated the Florida Bar’s requirements when he ran The O’Boyle Law Firm in Deerfield Beach and supervised hundreds of public records suits for the firm’s nonprofit client, Citizens Awareness Foundation Inc. <br />Another central figure in the town’s case is Joel Chandler, who worked for Martin O’Boyle last year as executive director of Citizens Awareness. Chandler had a falling out with O’Boyle after a few months and has been publicly critical of the O’Boyles and CAFI as a money-making scheme that had nothing to do with legitimate use of public records. Chandler was not named as a defendant in the suit and is expected to testify on behalf of the town.<br />In an interview with The Coastal Star, Chandler said his relationship with the O’Boyles broke down after he was ordered to fulfill a weekly quota of 25 public records suits.<br />Chandler said he joined the O’Boyles to promote open government, not to take part in a “money-making scheme” that may have damaged the cause of transparency instead.<br />“The money was in the sheer volume of the cases,” Chandler said. “It all adds up to millions in legal fees.”<br />The RICO action claims that lawyers from the O’Boyle firm filed boilerplate public records suits against municipalities or contractors doing business with municipalities, then pressed for settlements. Fernandina Beach paid $5,000 to settle one of the CAFI suits, according to court documents, Miami Lakes paid $2,000 and Cutler Bay $2,250.<br />Besides CAFI, Gulf Stream’s attorneys say Martin O’Boyle used his Commerce Group corporation in Deerfield Beach to launch other sham public records organizations, such as Stopdirtygovernment LLC, Our Public Records, Public Awareness Institute, Inc.<br />Contractors doing business with local governments also were hit with records requests. In April 2014, the Wantman Group, a West Palm Beach engineering company, received an email from “An Onomy” seeking insurance documents for work with the South Florida Management District. Three weeks later, according to the complaint, the O’Boyle Law Firm sued Wantman on behalf CAFI, demanding attorneys’ fees and costs totaling $3,923.<br />Wantman has joined Gulf Stream in the RICO suit and the town’s attorneys hope to find other plaintiffs around the state.<br /><br /><strong>Suit cites false names used</strong><br />Though O’Hare says he has joined with O’Boyle in only one lawsuit, the town’s attorneys maintain the relationship between the two men runs deep when it comes to assailing the town: “O’Hare has been a client of the O’Boyle Law Firm generally, and Jonathan O’Boyle in particular, since the firm’s inception in January 2014,” the suit says. “The O’Boyle Law Firm represents him (O’Hare) in approximately 10 of the public records suits he has brought against the Town, with the first such suit filed by the O’Boyle Law Firm on his behalf on Jan. 22, 2014.”<br />The RICO case, which has been assigned to U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra, claims that O’Hare often filed dozens of records requests in a single day, and he filed hundreds of them under fictitious or fraudulent names to avoid special services charges from the town. Some of them were bastardizations of town officials — “Billy Trasher” for Town Manager Thrasher, “Bobby Gangrene” for Commissioner Bob Ganger, “Groan Orthwein” for Commissioner Joan Orthwein — and others outright fabrications: Irnawaty Tirtarahardja, Janto Djajaputra, Hokuikekai Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele, Prigs Hypocrites and Wyatt Burp.<br />O’Boyle and O’Hare blame the town for violating its own rules and blocking lawful attempts to ensure governmental transparency.<br />“All this stuff would go away and go back to normal,” O’Hare has told town commissioners, “if you’d just tell staff to follow the law.”<br />O’Boyle’s attorney, Mitchell Berger of Berger Singerman in Fort Lauderdale, calls it “unfortunate” that the town has decided to file a RICO suit, “instead of just giving the records that were requested.”<br /><br /><strong>Legislation being considered</strong><br />Worries about public records abuses have reached the Florida Legislature, where Sen. Wilton Simpson, R-Trilby, and Rep. Halsey Beshears, R-Monticello, are sponsoring a bill that would try to prevent frivolous requests and unwarranted lawsuits aimed at forcing cash settlements. <br />“I am an unwavering supporter of comprehensive public access laws, so citizens can hold their government accountable,” Simpson said. “In these cases, though, it is clear that the rights of private citizens and hardworking business owners are being trampled by some unscrupulous people bent on getting rich off a new scam.”<br />Beshears said he was particularly concerned about cases where small municipal governments with limited resources were overwhelmed by heavy-handed demands for records.<br />“In each case that I’ve reviewed, government agencies have the records that are being requested,” said Beshears. “Instead of simply asking the records custodian at the state agency, spam-like emails are sent or even worse, intimidating individuals wearing cameras go onto private property and make demands of office staff that have had no training in our public records laws. This isn’t right and we’ve got to put an end to it.”<br />Advocates for transparency now have worries, too. They are concerned that an overreacting Legislature may damage Florida’s Sunshine Law, widely regarded as one of the nation’s best open government laws.<br />In Tallahassee, Barbara Petersen, president of the First Amendment Foundation, says the watchdog group is hoping to find “middle ground” with Simpson and Beshears, so that legislative fixes don’t go too far.<br />It’s not a small irony that the story of the Gulf Stream RICO case actually took root in Tallahassee in the summer of 2013, when Chandler went to visit the FAF’s president and met Martin O’Boyle for the first time.<br />“My dear friend and colleague, Barbara Petersen of the Florida First Amendment Foundation told me she was meeting Marty for breakfast and I invited myself,” Chandler wrote in a blog post from that July. “Since then we’ve spent many hours together discussing open government and how citizens might better exercise that important right.”<br />Chandler says he now regrets the encounter. <br /><br /></p></div>Gulf Stream files RICO suit against O'Boyle, O'Harehttps://thecoastalstar.com/profiles/blogs/gulf-stream-files-rico-suit-against-o-boyle-o-hare2015-02-13T18:30:00.000Z2015-02-13T18:30:00.000ZMary Kate Leminghttps://thecoastalstar.com/members/MaryKateLeming769<div><p style="text-align:center;"><strong>Read the <a href="http://www2.gulf-stream.org/WebLink8/DocView.aspx?id=37657" target="_blank">RICO case</a></strong></p>
<p><strong>By Dan Moffett</strong></p>
<p><br /> The Town of Gulf Stream has rolled out the heavy artillery in its legal war against residents Martin O’Boyle and Christopher O’Hare, filing a class-action RICO lawsuit Feb. 12 in U.S. District Court.<br /> The 48-page federal complaint alleges that the two men engaged in a conspiracy to exploit the state’s public record laws and extort settlements from the town and other municipalities and organizations around the state.<br /> O’Boyle and O’Hare, the suit says, “filed frivolous public records requests and lawsuits” against hundreds of governments, businesses and organizations, and then demanded attorneys’ fees and costs, “resulting in a profit windfall” that funneled through The O’Boyle Law Firm in Deerfield Beach.<br /> O’Boyle’s son, Jonathan, a Pennsylvania lawyer, is among a half-dozen attorneys and employees of the law firm named as co-defendants in the suit.<br /> A central figure in the town’s case is Joel Chandler, who worked for Martin O’Boyle last year as executive director of Citizens Awareness Foundation Inc. (CAFI), a group that collaborated with The O’Boyle Law Firm to file the records requests. Chandler had a falling out with O’Boyle after a few months and has been publicly critical of CAFI and the O’Boyles. Chandler was not named as a defendant in the suit.<br /> Gulf Stream officials say they have fielded more than 1,700 public records requests from O’Boyle and O’Hare during the last two years, and the two men have filed dozens of suits against the town in the state and federal courts.<br /> Joining Gulf Stream in the class action is Wantman Group Inc., a West Palm Beach engineering company, that also claims to have been victimized by frivolous records requests and settlement demands.<br /> The extraordinary step of filing a RICO (Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations) suit allows the town and the other plaintiffs to seek triple damages and legal fees from the defendants. Gulf Stream officials say the town has spent more than $1 million to handle the records requests and pay legal bills during the last two years.<br /> Mayor Scott Morgan said the town also will pursue its case against O’Boyle and O’Hare at the state level, calling on the State Attorney’s Office and Florida attorney general to act against the two men.<br /> Morgan said that O’Boyle and O’Hare had abused the state’s public records laws and engaged in “a conspiracy of sorts to advance actions that essentially do nothing other than shake down municipal agencies.”</p>
<p> O'Boyle and O'Hare deny any wrongdoing and accuse the town of violating records laws.</p>
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