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Cool
Justice
Satanic Verses & FBI Fairy Tales
By ANDY THIBAULT, Columnist
Law Tribune Newspapers
November 21, 2005
Fake news item: Murder trial of Bridgeport drug dealer reveals that an
effective and respected defense attorney - with no believable role in the
murder trial at hand - was close to a former long-term client. What a
revelation.
The former client, perhaps Bridgeport's most successful drug dealer, has
pleaded guilty to 14 federal charges including the same murder and turned
rat.
Who is the big rat blaming besides alleged shooters, former colleagues,
his mother, all his relatives and anyone who might be convenient? His old
lawyer.
Who's putting out the story? FBI agents and federal prosecutors, in
motions that are wholly ancillary to the case.
Why are they doing this? It might be because they are crybabies and losers
who fought hard battles with the defense attorney. He's the kind of
defense attorney who would not roll over and play dead.
Three and a half years after raiding the defense attorney's office, the
government is dropping cheap and counterfeit dimes in legal documents
claiming he played a role in the 1996 murder. Is this a fair fight? No,
it's cowardly, gutless and wrong.
The victim of this character assassination is attorney James J. Ruane, a
Fairfield University and University of Connecticut Law School graduate who
began his career as a public defender in Bridgeport 28 years ago.
Colleagues call Ruane among the most ethical and moral lawyers in
Connecticut.
Here's a look at the dirt bags outside the government who are trying to do
him in:
· Frankie "The Terminator" Estrada, a gang leader who dealt
heroin, crack and cocaine out from a Bridgeport housing project. Among his
pastimes were real estate and Satanic worship. Estrada owned the nightspot
Club Innovations, purchased with $1.6 million cash and renovated for
$300,000. He allegedly had an altar at which he placed photos of cops and
court officials. Estrada is facing a life sentence, but he is hoping to
get that reduced in part for fingering Ruane. Estrada began telling
bedtime stories to the feds two years ago.
· Billie "The Kid" Gomez, aka Rat Number Two, a witness who has
been coached with modest results at best. "I shoot people, that's
what I do," Gomez told the jury in the murder trial of his former
partner, Eddie Mercado. Gomez and Mercado were lieutenants in the Estrada
gang. Gomez testified Estrada asked him and Mercado to kill Aida Escalara,
a woman who was a witness to another murder. Supposedly this was all done
to help Ruane, according to the latest chapter of Federal Fairy Tales.
Mercado's lawyer, Frederick Pratt, maintains his client had nothing to do
with the Escalara shooting.
Here's the power of the government's cheap shot at Ruane, delivered to the
public in court documents: "According to Frank Estrada, Ruane raised
the issue of certain witnesses who were to testify against a client of his
who was about to stand trial for murder and assault. One of those
witnesses was Aida Escalara. Ruane told Estrada it would not be a bad
thing if one of the witnesses disappeared …"
Ruane has not been charged with any crime. If there was evidence he
committed a crime, he should have been charged years ago.
Is this the kind of government we are willing to tolerate?
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