Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Richard Isaac Fine

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Too many issues with this article. BLP is the key policy here. Tone 20:43, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Richard Isaac Fine

Richard Isaac Fine (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log • AfD statistics)

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This is a non-notable person. Also, only a couple of the citations in this article are from reliable sources. The rest of the citations are from either 1) non-reliable sources or 2) reliable sources that discuss the political opinions in this article but do not relate to facts about the man or news coverage about him and indeed in many cases do not even mention him. OCNative (talk) 21:28, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment: The creator of the page is attempting meatpuppetry to prevent the deletion of Richard Isaac Fine at http://inproperinla.blogspot.com/2009/12/09-12-24-wikipedia-skirmishes-in-re.html (which explains the single-purpose accounts' "votes" below). OCNative (talk) 06:52, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

• Weak delete. This is a toughish one, because there is some decent coverage of this man, for instance in the California Bar Journal here and the LA Times, reprinted via the local news, here. (Most of the coverage, though, is in spurious and non-reliable sources.) I think, though, that this is basically a WP:BLP1E case: to the extent he is notable, it is for just one "newsy" event—getting disbarred and chucked in the slammer. Whatever the merits of his crusade against the local judiciary, he hasn't received any reliable-source coverage for it except in the context of explaining why he was thrown in prison. I find especially instructive here the concern expressed in BLP1E that "[b]iographies in [such] cases can give undue weight to the event and conflict with neutral point of view." My understanding of the history of this article is that it has largely been used by a few editors as a vehicle to express solidarity with Fine, to argue for his liberation, and to promote his theories about the L.A. judiciary. That issue leads me to vote for deletion, especially when I consider that having garnered a handful of news stories would still only make Fine a quite minor figure of local notability anyway.  Glenfarclas  (talk) 23:30, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
• Delete This is a local story. I have found no newsbank articles outside of Los Angeles. Nothing even in other parts of the state.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:04, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
• Delete NOT SOAPBOX, and multiple BLP violations. Possibly, Speedy delete as G10, atttack page. DGG ( talk ) 04:14, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

  OPPOSE DELETE - keep wikipedia in touch with reality...

I was the one who initiated the article, albeit it was edited, modified, added to etc by others. I challenge the move to delete on the following grounds:

1) The man reversed or prevented single handed over a billion dollars in false taxation on Californians. Not a feat that could be claimed by many.

2) Starting 2001, the man single handed exposed, advertised and denounced the secret payments to all ~450 judges and ~120 commissioners in Los Angeles that required pardons for civil and criminal liabilities for all judges and commissioners. This is the most populous county in the US,with more than 10 million residents, and the largest superior court in the US. In such county, and such court - all judges were in fact declared pardoned criminals. The story this far already was worthy of inclusion in wikipedia - it was unprecedented in US history.

3) Less than two weeks after the signing of the pardons on February 20, 2009, the man was arrested with no warrant, while appearing in court, and he has been held with no conviction and no sentencing ever since, under the guise of false hospitalization, with no medical justification. That too, I hope, was not common, albeit, I have not data regarding the prevalence of human rights abuses of this sort in the US. It is exactly the kind of data that were often deleted from wikipedia and other published sources. (see below)

It would be regrettable if wikipedia decided to delete this article, but would also be a repeat of my experience in an attempt to mention extreme Human Rights abuses that took place under Katrina in the article on Human Rights in the US. A one sentence mention, in a multi page article, which referenced articles in the Nation and a UN official report, was repeatedly attacked and deleted, to the point that I found it worthless to insist on its inclusion. The human rights abuses that were referenced there were most likely the worst in the US in the past decade. Prisoners were left to drown in their cells, the guards left them locked when the water was rising, and abandoned the prison. You could not find the story ever mentioned in the English version wikipedia, with pages and pages on human rights virtues of the US. If the trend goes on, you were likely to find the English Wikipedia supporting education of young Americans in a bubble that is out of touch with reality as perceived by the rest of mankind. Deletion of the Richard Fine story, would confirm a picture of wikipedia trying to portray the US as clean and good as mom and apple pie. It just ain't the reality, folks.

I hope you share a vision of wikipedia as a place where people, especially young people can go and find true data on significant subjects. Not only celebrity stories and trivia pursuit. We have sufficient other sources for that.

The story was referenced in brief under biography of Carlos R. Moreno,in wikipedia, as the reason that undermined his credibility as US Supreme Court candidate. Surely it was no "local story."

Finally - I invite anybody to google the web for Richard Fine and see the level of interest around the country in the story. However, many of the sites can be confusing in providing partial information, and not allowing to grasp the full story. There was need for one place where people could get a short, reliable information on the story as a whole -that was exactly the function of a good encyclopedia.

Suggested action - I hope that the article would not be deleted, it would be a sign of politization, in the worst sense of the word, of wikipedia. I would be grateful for any constructive suggestions. I could make efforts to beef the article up with more references, albeit, it already had many more references, but some were deleted by others.

I request that the issue be forwarded for moderation using whatever procedures were available in Wikipedia.

InproperinLA (talk) 09:16, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

"The story was referenced in brief under biography of Carlos R. Moreno,in wikipedia, as the reason that undermined his credibility as US Supreme Court candidate." This "fact" does not appear in the current version of Moreno's article. It is referenced in the article about Fine, but there is no source supporting this allegation. --Weazie (talk) 04:38, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Strong opposition to deletion I would remind all that, at the time of the celebrated incident which ignited the civil rights movement of the '60s, Rosa Parks would most certainly have been a "non-notable" person. I have been following the story from the aeries of Colorado, and view this as a flash-point in the most important civil rights battle since the '60s. If errors are to be made in Wikipedia, they should be on the side of inclusion, as opposed to exclusion. That having been said, the article itself does need to be upgraded, but this should be the burden of those who know the story. I'd like to see links to the actual briefs, analyzed by an expert in that area of the law. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bouldergeist (talk • contribs) 13:31, 24 December 2009 (UTC) — Bouldergeist (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Unfortunately, we don't have legal experts write analyses of briefs because of WP:NOT#OR and in particular WP:SYNTH: "Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources." That's already a big issue with this article.
• Fair enough. It might make more sense for Inproper to write up an entry on the scandal that has resulted in Mr. Fine's allegedly unlawful imprisonment. This is of general interest (not unlike Operation Greylord and the Cash for Kids scandal), and would address the objections raised herein. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bouldergeist (talk • contribs) 21:11, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Oppose deletion The nature of this entry speaks to the possibility of judicial corruption (which specifically needs verification by the U.S. DOJ in a lawful manner). Because the information on Richard Fine is open to the public as court records it is verifiable in a legal sense. Because judicial corruption is an issue at the heart of any society whether healthy or toxic, and because the topic of judicial corruption may be outside the awareness of many Wiki readers and other members of society, to delete an issue as vital as this would be a hardship. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jtsa (talk • contribs) 19:52, 24 December 2009 (UTC) — Jtsa (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Oppose Deletion

• Anyone who claims that there were any legal conclusions in the article from legal analysis,etc, that were unsupported - please be specific, instead of making general statements.
• In general, I would say that the nature of the discussion above, demonstrated that this article was anything but an unworthy "local story", which was the original stated reason for move to delete.
• I was the first to admit I was new to wikipedia. If the article needed to be wikified, I would be glad to learn and do my best to comply with requirements. Therefore, any constructive critisim would be most welcome. —Preceding unsigned comment added by InproperinLA (talk • contribs) 22:02, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Strongly oppose deletion:

Although I live in Texas, I have become aware that the unlawful incarceration of Richard Fine is a major human rights issue. I have personally verified, some months ago, through a complicated series of phone calls that Richard Fine is, in fact, incarcerated in the Los Angeles County prison system. This information was not easily obtained, but required persistence on my part and a determination not to be dissuaded. When I finally was able to confirm Dr. Zernik's allegations regarding Fine's imprisonment, I was told that no other information was available to me because he was a "high profile prisoner". Dr. Zernik has tirelessly tried to go through normal government channels to get Los Angeles County and other responsible persons to do their duties and provide Richard Fine justice; he has also unsuccessfully tried to elicit the cooperation of the media. He has faced active suppression. God only knows what Richard Fine himself has faced.

What I don't know, but would like to find out, is whether a Writ of Habeas Corpus has ever been filed, and if so, what is the court's response.

In addition to the case of Richard Fine, I have personal knowledge of the confinement, also presumably illegal, of my friend and medical colleague, Jacques Jaikaran MD, in the Houston Federal Detention Center under the order of Judge Lynn Hughes. One might be able to say that Dr. Jaikaran is not a person of note. However, Judge Lynn Hughes is, and it is evident to me that Judge Hughes is guilty of judicial misconduct.

Has any judge made any ruling in the case of Richard Fine? If not, he is most certainly illegally incarcerated, and that is news. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shirleypigott (talk • contribs) 23:36, 24 December 2009 (UTC) — Shirleypigott (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Delete. As noted, the notability is confined to one event (or perhaps, more charitably, one nexus of related events). On top of the non-notability, the article itself is NPOV, relies mostly on non-reliable sources (or reliabile sources for mundane information), and is being used as a soapbox (as the opposition in deletion also seem to be doing). In sum, not up to wikipedia's criteria. --Weazie (talk) 04:20, 25 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose Delete:
  

I find it difficult to accept the comment above at face value. "the single event" has lasted more than a decade. It involved the urgent need to issue pardons to ALL judges of the largest superior court in the US, in fact - declaring them pardoned criminals. It is unprecedented in US history. Calling is lacking in notability is just not credible criticism.
It goes more along the lines of deleting from the English wikipedia uncomfortable facts about the U.S. - example - the Katrina Human Rights atrocities mentioned above. I guess it was also, local, single event, was never reported in US media in any significant way, therefore - was lacking in notability... Only difference - in the Katrina story, the victims were dead, the living persons criticism could not be used.
It would be really unfortunate if one could find these stories in the non-English wikipedia, but not in the English version.
InproperinLA (talk) 00:54, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

I oppose deletion, however imperfect the post by improperinLA. My post about JAIL 4 Judges was not perfect either. I was, and still am, new to posting; but people improved upon what I'd written. What I added on July 27, 2009 regarding SBX2 11 was not deleted or moved into history. There's alot of information in improperinLA's post. He could get rid of some of it and instead provide links to websites where the information can be accessed. I suggested removing many links. From Maine to California people want judicial accountability... and Attorney Fine's story has shone light on the fact that ALL THREE of the branches are corrupt, at least in California. If Attorney Fine is not soon freed, God help us all. His imprisonment is absolute proof of a failed system. www.dirtydecisions.com MarthaMitchell 05:34, 26 December 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by MarthaMitchell (talk • contribs) — MarthaMitchell (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Weak keep but prune and let's have a frank discussion with article creator. The offsite canvassing evidenced above is utterly unacceptable, and taints the AfD in a shameful way. That said, there is some weak evidence of notability, but this requires first the article to be completely pruned of everything coming from questionable sources and BLP1E concerns are to be addressed. Since this can be addressed with editing, the article should be kept for now (Userfying could be a nice option if BLP concerns are too strong), but for sure the situation has to be dealt with seriously if the meatpuppetry continues. In particular, the article creator must learn that canvassing offsite is the best way to get his article deleted and his account banned. We're not morons. --Cyclopia^talk 16:24, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• Weak keep but drastically prune. I concur with User:Cyclopia, there may be enough here for notability (just barely), but this is part of a concerted internet campaign by the creator of this article and he/she is using Wikipedia as yet another soapbox to further the campaign (as are the variety of meat puppets he has recruited). This editor has a blatant conflict of interest and the canvassing is completely unacceptable. The vast majority of the current "references" are spurious and link to other sites and blogs that are part of the campaign. They should all go, leaving only reliable sources, which from what I can see look to be about three. The article is also full of original research which needs to go. Voceditenore (talk) 18:48, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• Note: This discussion has been notified to WikiProject Law - Voceditenore (talk) 18:59, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• weak keep and rewrite [1] could be argued to be a 1 event type thing, but I'd say it has enough material for a BLP. The other sources are questionable, but enough to meet WP:N in my opinion. That said, there are BLP issues and NPOV issues that need fixing. A stubification and reliance only on traditional news media should be able to do that. Hobit (talk) 20:50, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose delete
  

I guess by wiki standards I was the creator or progenitor, however, many others changed, edited, added and deleted, to the point that I could not call it my own child. Also, in view of the comments above, and with generous and gracious help from PMJ, the article was now transformed into a new trim and slim figure, regardless of holidays overeating!
A major mop up job on the references, in view of comments above, and again - PMJ's helpful hints - is still planned for this long holiday weekend.
Therefore - I suggest that anybody interested in the discussion above take a look at the article again
In case deletion is still on the agenda - I request moderation following whatever procedures are available in wikipedia.
InproperinLA (talk) 21:04, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose Delete
  

After reading and writing, i browsed a bit the list of proposed deletions in this site, and found here at #82 Montclair plaza - a shopping mall that I happen to know and love. However, I never considered it notable enough to be an entry in an encyclopedia. I was not sure what the final editors' consensus was regarding my favorite shopping experience, but finding it here surely gave me an entirely new perspective on the nature of wikipedia. In view of possible, or likely notability of Montclair Plaza, I would repeat my request: In case deletion is still on the agenda - I request moderation following whatever procedures are available in wikipedia.
InproperinLA (talk) 21:17, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

• • Comment: FYI, I've struck out your two !votes above, because you should only !vote once, although you're free to keep adding new comments, of course. Also, that's gotta be the wildest example of WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS I've ever seen. 98.233.249.17 (talk) 22:18, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Rewritten Per the suggestions, I've removed all the non-RS and attempted to introduce NPOV. --Weazie (talk) 22:52, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Having rewritten the article, I still vote for deletion. Fine was an attorney (not notable) who was disbarred (not notable) for his improper widespread campaign to recuse the judges of L.A. County from cases where the county was also a litigant (not notable). Fine's argument for recusal was based on a legal theory that ultimately proved to be correct, but Fine did not work on that other case, nor was that legal theory a legitimate basis for recusal. Fine's only real act of notability was being jail for contempt. But many people are jailed for contempt, and his particular reasons for doing so are not notable (he refused to answer questions about his own finances in an attempt to avoid paying sanctions). At best, this is a single event. --Weazie (talk) 01:01, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

• Delete, agree with Weazie above. While this fellow is of local and some blogger interest, the incident has not made an impact nationally in reliable sources, and as a BLP we err on the side of deletion in these cases. Auntie E. 04:16, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
  • There is nothing wrong with local sources, nor is national impact required. WP:N doesn't discount local sources nor require national attention. Hobit (talk) 04:41, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
• Delete. Fails WP:GNG (barely). The only substantial coverage that Fine has received in reliable, third-party sources was one article in the local section of the LA Times [2] and three articles in the Metropolitan News Enterprise [3] [4] [5], a Los Angeles daily newspaper with a circulation of 2,000 covering local legal news [6]. Like Auntie E., I prefer to err on the side of deletion with BLPs, and the minimal local news coverage is just not enough for me to support keeping it. 98.233.249.17 (talk) 15:04, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
• Keep in the version linked below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Richard_Isaac_Fine&oldid=334124004

Quick link for review of the difference between the current and above versions: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Richard_Isaac_Fine&action=historysubmit&diff=334218213&oldid=334124059 Regarding striking and such - I thought this was not going by popularity vote, so what the striking for? The Keep title is to indicate the content of the opionion, not meant as a vote. As to opinion: I suggest that Richard Fine be declared a shopping mall, which would be as close to to the true fact in this matter as the current exposition in wikipedia. As a shopping mall he would also be automatically notable. 19:50, 27 December 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by InproperinLA (talk • contribs)

InproperinLA, your behaviour is not helping. And, no, you don't have a right to ask which version of the article is kept. --Cyclopia^talk 21:07, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

In case there's any doubt that this is a soapbox effort: http://inproperinla.blogspot.com/2009/12/09-12-24-soliciting-proclamation-by.html --Weazie (talk) 04:48, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

There is no doubt whatsoever, but that's not what we're talking about. --Cyclopia^talk 11:40, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Just noting for the log. Orginal author also attempting to add material about Fine (based on same non-RS) to political dissent and punitive psychiatry in the Soviet Union. --Weazie (talk) 16:53, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Note also Rampart-FIPs (Falsely Imprisoned Persons) created by User:InproperinLA (the creator of Richard Isaac Fine). There are multiple links to his website used as references + a spurious reference (http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/restore-justice-in-l-a) which links to a petition largely filled with comments (not surprisingly) about "freeing" Richard Fine. Voceditenore (talk) 17:12, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

And note also the emerging edit war in Notice of Electronic Filing in which same author does orginal research in attempt to show that Fine is being wrongly held. --Weazie (talk) 17:55, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

And the most recent canvassing for this deletion discussion: http://inproperinla.blogspot.com/2009/12/09-12-27-wikipediaarticles-for.html Voceditenore (talk) 11:42, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose deletion. I am a new contributer. I am a Professor Emeritus in Mathematics. In addition, Richard I. Fine represented me and my condo association in fighting the Developers and County across the alley in Marina del Rey. A State Bar proceeding against Fine was initiated two weeks after we hired Fine when an agent of the developers was the State Bar president, and the State Bar Court found Fine guilty of moral turpitude at a most inopportune time in our suit against the County of Los Angeles and the Developers. After Fine was removed from our case, the developer's lawyers got an ex partite decision from the judge ordering Fine to pay a large sum to the to the developer's attorneys. Fine's efforts to revoke this harsh and severe order, which was asked for and granted to the lawyers without his knowledge and arguments, resulted in the developers prosecuting him for 16 counts of contempt. I have read five of the seven volumes of testimony to the State Bar Court and also the decision of the State Bar Review Court, and I am certain Fine was the victim of a gross miscarriage of justice, and my condo association was illegitimately deprived of a talented and honest advocate by the State Bar and malicious prosecution by the developer's law firm. After Fine was incarcerated for contempt, he availed himself of every opportunity to appeal the decision. He needed and had a group of paralegals and lawyers volunteering and aiding him in filing numerous appeals. These knowledgeable volunteers report several cases of documents disappearing from court dockets and unsigned judicial orders. Finally, I note the circular argument advanced by many pro deleters: The Fine article is not important because there is little coverage of him in the main stream press. One reason is that there is evidence of the press ignoring important stories involved with the development in Marina del Rey, and this applies to the Fine case as well. A particular shocking example is captured on video on FullDisclosure.net when their reporter is told by a County Sheriff's aide that she would never be allowed to interview Fine in the County Jail. Those advocating deletion are recommending the same result from which they derive their argument, Reduce public knowledge of the Fine case. SophistryAlert (talk) 07:33, 29 December 2009 (UTC)SophistryAlert — SophistryAlert (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• You need to read this Wikipedia policy and this one to understand what this discussion is about and why the article has been edited to its present state. This discussion is about whether the subject is sufficiently notable for a Wikipedia article. The notability must be verified by references to reliable sources. The putative reasons as to why there are so few reliable sources, i.e. a press conspiracy to ignore the grievances of the Marina del Rey residents and Mr. Fine, is not a valid argument. I personally think there is an argument that he may pass the notability criteria (just barely) given what coverage there is. But even if the article is kept, it will not be allowed to be used as advocacy for him, or his views, or the views of his supporters. This has been pointed out numerous times, as well as why that is entirely inappropriate and contrary to Wikipedia's core policies. Voceditenore (talk) 08:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

• Delete. All the smokescreen about where his name gets mentioned etc just diverts from the simple truth that this is a non-notable person who has fans trying to push him to notability on wikipedia. Nothing more than soapboxing in disguise. Niteshift36 (talk) 04:32, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

• OK vocedutenore, I will try to stay within the parameters. Is R. I. Fine notable? Yes, he is one of a very rare group of men who has been convicted by a Judge who was a party to the case. Such men are rare because of the ancient English Common Law rule that a man cannot judge his own case. The trial occurred on December 22, 2008 and its transcripts can be found on pages 96/169 to 107/169 at the link http://inproperinla.com/00-00-00-us-dist-ct-la-fine-v-la-county-sheriff-doc-01-4_fine-habeas-corpus-petition_p1-169.pdf . This should be a quick, interesting and even amusing read, and does not require extensive knowledge of the underlying cases. It is easy to verify the judge is a witness in the trial he is presiding over, and of course it is reliable since it is a court document. I don't understand which argument you are saying is not valid. Are you agreeing with my circular argument statement? Or is that the argument which is not valid? At any rate, given what is happening to the Main stream media vis a vis the internet, I think the internet will become the standard for notability, in the future. Fine is very visible on the internet. There is allot of quality coverage of Fine in the internet. Googling on Richard Isaac Fine to find how many new groups have taken up his case, I found the Wikipedia article. It seemed to be edited towards an evenhanded position just before Christmas, but now it only produces legal orders and does not seek to answer the natural question: Why is Fine, who practiced before the US supreme Court, now disbarred and in jail? Why are so many people supporting him? A fair description of his supporters would be make a more useful article.

The news organization http://www.fulldisclosure.net/ follows the Fine story, as well as several others. The blog http://righttrumpsmight.blogspot.com/ is accurate and contains links to several other reliable sites. SophistryAlert (talk) 11:33, 30 December 2009 (UTC)SophistryAlert

That "news organization" (?) and a blog are 'not reliable sources. If that is the best you can bring about, you're practically pushing for deletion. Really, guys, you're not helping your case at all. --Cyclopia^talk 11:51, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Reply to SophistryAlert: 1. If you read this discussion, you'll see that my opinion was and remains "weak keep" on the grounds that he (barely) passes the the notability criteria via the existing reliable sources. However, the editors who have opined "delete" in this discussion also make valid arguments. You have now been pointed many times to Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:Reliable sources. The arguments you have just made above show that you certainly haven't understood them and may not even have read them. Deletion discussions are not forums for changing existing Wikipedia policy and guidelines, your views on the reliability of blogs, the personal opinions of Mr. Fine's supporters and "internet visibility" notwithstanding.

2. Yes, I read the transcripts of the court cases you are referring to. I also read the documents in which the United States Supreme Court declined to review his disbarment [7] and the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld the federal district court's denial of his habeas corpus petition, [8].

3. Finally, and most crucially for understanding why this article needed drastic pruning, please read another link that's been pointed out here numerous times - Wikipedia:No original research. Voceditenore (talk) 14:21, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.