Arthur Wolk Files Contempt Motion Against Lower Merion School Board, Adminstrators, Lawyers
On Wednesday (November 18), Attorney Arthur Wolk filed a motion in Common Pleas Court (Montgomery County) that calls for Lower Merion School District to show cause why it “should not be held in Contempt of the Decision and Order of Judge Joseph Smyth, dated August 29, 2016.”
Wolk’s filing also calls for the school district, its administrators and lawyers; to be fined $100,000 for every day that they do not comply with Judge Smyth’s decision and order.
In addition, Wolk is asking the court to empanel a grand jury “to investigate the fraud committed by the Lower Merion School District, its Adminstrators and Lawyers, from 2005 to the present, and to issue indictments for those found to have perpetrated, advised or sanctioned such theft.”
The motion also asks that Judge [Thomas] Rogers recuse himself.
Judge Smyth’s decision to which Wolk refers in his latest filing, was for a Motion of Injunctive Relief, that Wolk filed in May of 2016. At that time Wolk and the District were engaged in a litigation that dated back to February of 2016. Wolk’s original complaint had to do with the District’s practice of annually adding millions of dollars to a surplus fund, while also annually raising taxes above the ACT 1 Index limit.
Wolk filed a separate motion for an injunction, because The District, while the case was being litigated, again raised taxes.
After Smyth ruled in favor of Wolk’s motion for an injunction, The District immediately filed an appeal. The appeal process dragged on until October of 2020, when the Pennsylvania Supreme Court refused to hear The District’s appeal of a Commonwealth Court ruling that affirmed Judge Smyth’s injuction.
Keep in mind, all the litigation of the last four years only had to do with the injuction. With The District’s appeals having come to a final unsuccessful conclusion, the original case can now be heard in Common Pleas Court – when they get they get around to it.
Last month, LMSD’s motion for a Stay of Judge Smyth’s Injunction was rejected.
On October 16, the School District filed a motion for a temporary stay of Judge Smyth’s 2016 injunction. On October 20, Judge Garrett Page denied that motion.
District’s lawyer writes a letter to Judge Rogers
The letter, dated October 26, 2020 is from Alicia Hickock, an attorney with Faerge Drinker Biddle and Reath, the law firm that has been representing LMSD throughout most of this litigation. It is addressed to Judge Thomas P. Rogers. In the letter, Hickock asks for his “guidance as to how to address the preliminary injunction directed to monies appropriated for and spent for special education and PSERS for the 2016-2017 year, pending the remainder of litigation.”
Judge Rogers responds – Wolk is Outraged
Wolk, also on October 26, wrote to Judge Rogers and told him that “Judge Page made the correct decision. There is no procedure in Montgomery County Courts for this end run around Judge Page, or Judge Smyth, or the Commonwealth Court twice.”
However, to Wolk’s chagrine, Judge Rogers responded to Hickock in a letter dated October 30. In the letter, Hickock explained that because of delays caused by Covid-19, the court is justs entering “Phase III” in which bench trials are being held. However, The District’s case falls under “Phase IV,” for jury trials. The judge gave no indication as to when Phase IV would begin.
In his recent filing Wolk wrote, “Judge Rogers, citing no reason under law, wrote back saying that somehow Covid-19 was the culprit, and the Court would get to the case under Phase IV some time in the future even though there was nothing before the court, nothing to be decided, nothing but an unethical letter to Judge Rogers by the defense which should have been rejected out of hand by Judge Rogers.”
Wolk also wrote that “At the next regularly scheduled meeting of the Lower Merion School District, in blatant disregard of the orders of Judge Smyth, The Commonwealth Court and Judge Garrett Page, the District used Judge Rogers’ letter as an excuse to refuse to roll back the tax increase as ordered by a mandatory injunction.”