Arrest warrant for judge rejected…if it existed in the first place

Updating the humdinger of a story from last Friday, wherein a State Trooper was allegedly seeking an arrest warrant for a judge who failed to sign an arrest warrant, there are two conflicting sets of stories out today. First, we have the Waterbury Republican-American, which reports that the trooper did indeed submit an arrest warrant application, but it was rejected (by whom, we don’t know), and that now the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office is “reviewing the allegations” that were made in that application:

A state trooper’s arrest warrant application that charges a Bantam Superior Court judge with coercion and hindering an investigation has been rejected, but the allegations it raises have been forwarded to the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office for review. … On Friday, state police spokesman Lt. J. Paul Vance declined to say why the application was denied or by whom. Vance said the document, stamped in bold with the words “arrest warrant application” at the top, is not considered an application for arrest unless and until it is signed by the investigating trooper and a supervisor.

BUT then we turn to the Register-Citizen, which has a different story. According to the R-C, no warrant was ever submitted by any police agency to any prosecuting authority:

“No arrest warrant was ever submitted from any police agency to any prosecutorial agency,” said State’s Attorney David Shepack. Mark Dupuis, a spokesman for the Division of Criminal Justice, which includes the State’s Attorney’s Office and Chief State’s Attorney’s Office, also indicated that there is no warrant or warrant application for the arrest of any superior court judge. “What’s been reported up there is inaccurate,” Dupuis said regarding the news coverage in Litchfield County. “No valid warrant application was submitted. There may have been other documents, but it is not an arrest warrant application and we can’t act on it,” Dupuis said.

Note that the two may not be inconsistent. It’s entirely possible that Lauretano filled out an application and submitted it to his supervisor, who sat him down and had a nice long talk. Lauretano may then have forwarded the application to the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office anyway. Notice that Dupuis uses the word valid and references “other documents”, and finally this quote:

“The document people are referring to had no signatures,” Dupuis said. “Nothing was ever submitted to us to act on.”

Curiously, it seems that Judge Klatt did end up signing an arrest warrant for the individual who was the subject of the original warrant:

Later on Tuesday, attorney Ira Scott Mayo of Torrington said Klatt had signed a warrant for the arrest of Dylan Hickey following its submission from the Western District Major Crime Squad. … Klatt wanted more information regarding the altercation or to see an arrest warrant filed for everyone involved in the fight, according to Mayo, Hickey’s attorney.

Curiouser and curiouser. Whether the CSAO are actually looking into possible misconduct by one or more parties remains to be seen, as does any action they may pursue. In the end, I’d be extremely surprised if the Judge were accused of any wrongdoing, but I’ve been wrong so many times that it’s embarrassing for me to even think about. The original issue raised by the decision of the judge not to sign the warrant, from a legal geekery perspective, was the protection of the “victim” in cases of domestic violence and violations of protective order. Anyone who’s either been subject to a protective order or represented someone subject to it, knows how easy it is for the “victim” to get the defendant in trouble. All it takes is one phone call and some plaintive bleating about how the defendant “tried to contact me” or sent me a letter and bam! you’re in jail. Even in cases where the communication between the two is perfectly consensual – as it often is – there are no consequences for the purported “victim” for enticing the defendant to violate this protective order. So she [look, I know. It just gets really tiring to keep typing "the victim" and it reads awkwardly.] can call and say “I love you and fuck the protective order and I want you to come over” all she wants and then laugh mercilessly when he shows up with a six-pack and every available police officer in the State is waiting for him. And now the legislature wants to codify this nonsense. I present HB 6629 (you have to scroll way, way down to Section 12), which states in relevant part:

(a) A person is guilty of criminal violation of a protective order when an order issued pursuant to subsection (e) of section 46b-38c, as amended by this act, or section 54-1k or 54-82r has been issued against such person, and such person violates such order. (b) No person who is listed as a protected person in such protective order may be criminally liable for (1) soliciting, requesting, commanding, importuning or intentionally aiding in the violation of the protective order pursuant to subsection (a) of section 53a-8, or (2) conspiracy to violate such protective order pursuant to section 53a-48.

The amendment is to CGS 53a-223, 223a and 223b. Subsection (b) above is a new entry here. “Aiding” or “conspiring to induce a person to violate a protective order” is not a crime anyway, so I’m not entirely sure why this subsection was added, but there you have it.