COMMENT: The following letter dated 5/29/97 to my court appointed counsel, Brian Boyle, was written by me in jail and mailed to the Clerk of Court for filing in my case no. 94-803CF. I requested the clerk to send a copy to the State, Judge Nelson, to Brian Boyle, and return a copy to me for my file. The copy sent to me contains stamps and writing by the Clerk stating that it was received by the Clerk on 6/3/97 and sent to all the above parties on 6/4/97. I also hand delivered a copy to Brian Boyle when he visited the jail on 6/4/97. The next day or two on the telephone he said he would do what the letter requested. (The letter was hand written, 10 pages or 5 double sided pages in length. The copy sent to me from the Clerk was missing pages 2, 4 and 6 for some reason. However they of course had the original and if any of the other recipients were missing pages it would have been obvious since each of the 10 pages was clearly numbered.)
Brian Boyle, Esq.
Dear Mr. Boyle:
By way of excuses, I have limited access to the phone, you are of course not always available and I am running out of time in which I can function to communicate my intentions. I am on a hunger strike in which I have been off and on with food since May 18, but I have had no synthroid. I have no thyroid gland and the substitute for it, synthroid, takes a number of days to have effect after taking it and the jail nurse tells me they haven't ordered any since I have refused it on the hunger strike. (without it one eventually dies.) Thus there is not much I can do in the short run even if I wanted to since ordering has taken up to a week in the past.
I also don't have your address with me so I am filing this with the Clerk, depending on the Clerk to send you a copy as they did for Mr. Hendry in the past. Lastly I am sitting on the floor of my cell to write this doing my best to make it readable. Since this letter covers the reason for my hunger strike it is as well that the State and Court be appraised of it anyway.
Despite the public perception that defense attorneys go overboard for their clients, there is a clear line they haven't crossed in Lee County; at least in my case. That is attacking the crooked dealings of other attorneys, whether in my defense of otherwise. Due to its nature, this case abounds with it.
Since my attorneys have known they have an obligation to do so they have tried to discredit me in various ways to get around having to deal with it. Thus the problem is destructive of the attorney-client relationship. I don't know how you stand on this of course but the purpose of this letter is to try to off load some of this problem to members of the legislature where it has the potential to be constructive for the legal profession and this case.
Many of these problems are discussed on my web page on the internet http//:www.afn.org/~afn54735/. Some examples would be the obviously intentional falsified affidavits and criminal charges in the Information and Amended Information.
They are the methods used to throw me in jail, destroy my reputation and render me pennyless and homeless. They are far more serious crimes than I am even accused of and the perpetrators go scott free hiding behind state power, judicial immunity and the profession's unwritten conspiracy of silence about such things.
Despite the fact that the majority of law faculty, many other faculty, and many others in general in Florida know about my web page, I have taken many other measures over the past 3 years, and there is the legal issue that when the prosecution has proceeded in bad faith they must withdraw the case, the prosecution is still hanging on.
As I understand from you they now want to reduce the 4 charges to 1 charge, withholding adjudication on it, and give me time served for my 10 months in jail. I understand withholding adjudication means I am innocent of this charge as well.
Why then should I concede I should spend 10 months in jail? When is anyone going to address the vast array of crooked dealings passed off as due process in this case? Is the prosecutor's case now reduced to blocking a civil suit for damages? Can you as my lawyer tread into this territory forbidden to all of your predecessors? I am not privileged to such information but I look very much forward to discussing it with you.
As I am sure you know there is a movement in the legislature to take lawyer oversight away from the Bar and give it to the legislature.
I would appreciate it if you would contact each member that takes this position and let them know that I have what I believe to be the best available analysis of the problems of the Florida legal profession on the Internet which they may find useful or wish to advise their constituents or others having an interest in the area about.
Please ask each of them if they would care to compare my legal affairs as set forth on my web page with what they believe should be the minimum standards of legal practice if the standards and enforcement were controlled by the legislature.
Please offer them any reasonable assistance in the way of copies of the record or other materials they might need from any of my affairs in the web page including my Baker Acts and civil disobedience arrests, etc. I realize this is beyond your contract to represent me when going outside of this case and possibly my own case as well but I hope you will knowing that for my part I am placing my life and health in danger, and going through a lot of pain in the hunger strike to get these things addressed.
Please advise them I am in jail on a hunger and medications strike to demonstrate my concern and belief that this area needs vast improvement and I am awaiting their positive reply that they will agree to do this comparison.
I would assume they are on the Internet or of course they could be contacted through other means.
I would of course appreciate it if you would be very familiar with this case as set forth on the Internet so you can discuss it knowledgeably and of course I would appreciate your counsel and comments to me about it as well.
Historically (i.e. Gandhi and others) hunger strikes are employed to address personal or social problems that are consistent with moral or cultural values but opposed by a self serving unpopular power structure. This is such an instance: According to a recent judicial study only 12% of Floridians like lawyers, only 5 percent think the courts do a good job and access to the courts is limited largely to the rich (web page, Temple U. study) which may be cited in addition to the facts and circumstances of this specific case.
It is well established as well that hunger strikes are not indications of mental disorders although as in my case such power structures will characteristically attempt to so characterize them in an attempt to avoid addressing the issues raised.
By focusing legislative attention on the problems of Lee County, it will open Lee County up to outside scrutiny and hopefully make it more acceptable within the legal community for you or any lawyer to address the crooked dealings of other lawyers. In my case this could mean my trial could be much more honest and I assume the prospects for a long overdue motion to dismiss on the grounds of bad faith by the prosecution improved. A hunger strike is a very proper instrument for achieving such gains.
In the event of my death, disability or attempts to characterize it as mental illness please follow through with contacting the above mentioned legislators advising them of the circumstances and of my purpose in contacting them set forth above, and follow through.
Apparently the prosecution is conceding I'm not guilty of anything now after turning me into a pennyless jail bird fugitive over the past 3 years. From the standpoint of the taxpayers are they now to keep on spending $40/day to keep me locked up after paying for 10 months in jail for no purpose already? Further I was undergoing testing at UF for prostate cancer which may by canceled if I'm not there. I don't know. This was mentioned in my last motion and the delay could have serious consequences.
I will try to reach you by phone this week. There aren't always opportunities to get the phone in the medical section when the chances are you are around. Whether I am in good enough shape to phone (requiring standing up at the bars) or visitation next week is problematical.
Sincerely,
Robert F. Allston