A cesspool of Judicial Corruption

TWENTY-NINE why feds dumped raff, their first star witness

Jodi Walker of the Lewiston Tribune Online wrote an article entitled, "Wanted Pair Stopped at Mexican Border." Tuesday January 25, 2005, GRANGEVILLE:

Two Orofino residents wanted for several months on felony charges in Idaho County were arrested trying to cross into Mexico Friday. Mariana Raff (age 31) and Brett Melwing (age 23) are being extradited from San Diego to Grangeville to face charges according to Idaho County sheriff's Chief Deputy, John Nida. They along with their infant and Melwing's mother were caught by the Department of Homeland Security's immigration officers at the Mexican border. Raff used her real name to pass through the border, and the warrant for her surfaced. Melwing, who was using an alias, according to Nida was not immediately recognized, but the warrant against him was later found.

Warrants were issued for each of them after they failed to appear on earlier charges. Both were arrested in early 2004 after police said a search of Raff's Kooskia home found the two were involved in an identity and bank fraud scam.

They were allegedly stealing paychecks from mail boxes and using computer equipment to replicate the checks. They also were arrested after allegedly making fake identification cards. Melwing was also arrested at that time for failure to appear on another charge in Clearwater County. Melwing was charged in Idaho County with possession of forged documents and possession of counterfeiting equipment.

While in jail on those charges Melwing allegedly tried to escape a charge that was later dismissed. Raff who paid her bond using a bad check failed to appear on those original charges. She was later arrested in Lewiston on the "Failure to Appear Warrant" and charged with possession of cocaine. She was released in time to give birth to the couple's child, according to the Idaho County Sheriff's Office. They were both charged with grand-theft after police said they stole a car from Lee Dinges Auto Center in Lewiston.

When Melwing is returned to Idaho County, he will face sentencing on the felony charges of possession of forged checks and possession of counterfeiting equipment. The grand theft charge also still stands as do three misdemeanor charges of driving without privileges, resisting and obstructing an officer and malicious injury. Raff will face felony charges of possession of cocaine grand theft and a misdemeanor resisting and obstructing an officer charge.

Raff was set to testify in the federal case against Grangeville businessman David Hinkson. Hinkson is currently standing trial in Boise for allegedly trying to hire a hit man to kill a U.S. attorney, an agent of the Internal Revenue Service and harm others. According to earlier court documents it was Raff's two brothers Hinkson tried to hire. Raff did not testify in the Hinkson case according to court documents because of her "credibility."

Proof of the obstruction of justice came when David’s defense attorney, Hoyt, conducted his own investigation. He contacted Raff’s two brothers in Mexico and learned that they were not hit men, but were responsible business men. After repeated demands that the FBI to look into the matter, it took 17 months for Agent Long to contact these men and verify that Raff’s allegations were false.

David had, in truth, trusted Mariana. She could translate for him, and David didn't know of Lonnie Birmingham's close involvement with Mariana. She had been a housekeeper for David. But when they went to Puebla, Mexico, Mariana substituted David's bank account number with her Uncle's. Eighty-thousand dollars of David's money was, thus, misappropriated. After returning home Mariana burglarized David's house (in March 2003). In that burglary she stole $6,000 cash and a credit card from David and drove to Lewiston (a town of 40,000, an hour and half from Grangeville), and withdrew another $600 (using David’s credit card) from an ATM machine–she had his pin number.

When David discovered her theft, he fired her and announced over the company loudspeakers what she had done. However, as mentioned earlier, David reported the theft, went to the Sheriff's office but was himself arrested instead of Mariana. They locked him up and threw away the key. Of course, the authorities never returned the money to him. We later learned that Marianna needed $6,600 for a down payment on a house she wanted. Yet, the authorities did nothing to her for her crimes against David. This was the third time she went to jail over a crime spree that started in January and ended in July 2004.

As to how cold-blooded Marianna Raff is, when her former husband, Quinn Raff (now deceased), was deathly sick with a brain tumor, she said she was glad he had life insurance and hoped he would die. She stayed with Quinn until she met the ten year moratorium for immigrant-brides then immediately split.

She wound up in jailed in Clearwater County and again in Nez Perce County for various charges (forgery, burglary of a postal facility and a drug store, for counterfeiting money and green cards etc.). The FEDS dropped all charges against her while she was yet on her crime spree.

Wes Hoyt called Lonnie Birmingham, another disloyal employee-opportunist, and questioned him on July 16, 2004.

Lonnie told Mr. Hoyt, "She [Mariana] was glad to say bad things against Hinkson–like he hired her brothers as hit men because it kept the FBI happy and also because she enjoys getting even with Hinkson. She feels he really screwed her."

Birminham also said that it had been a big mistake for Hinkson to get mad at Mariana, and it was a bigger mistake to fire her "because she really knows how to get even with Hinkson; and she is doing so by telling lies about him to the FBI." Lonnie felt it was all Hinkson’s fault for firing her anyway. Yet Lonnie admitted that Mariana was a clever liar.

Both Idaho County Detective Skott Mealer and FBI Agent Will Long wanted her cooperation, since they caught her with cocaine in her jail cell, and they had traded leniency on her criminal drug charges for her testimony against Hinkson. Mariana told Lonnie that she and Mealer "are real close" and that she had traded sexual favors to him to have criminal charges dismissed (from an Affidavit of Wesley W. Hoyt Regarding Telephone Call with Lonnie Birmingham of July 16, 2004.)."

We have no testimony by Marianna regarding David; although we know that AUSA Wendy Olson used a Writ of Habeas Corpus to get her out of the Idaho County Jail on March 4, 2004, to testify before a grand jury in Boise regarding David. Lonnie quoted Mariana saying: "David is so stupid–he trusted me. I’ve got enough on him, and I’ll bring him down."

Lonnie and Mariana shacked up for several years. Lonnie left his wife and children to live with Mariana, and together they were reportedly heavy users of drugs. We believe that Lonnie may have been charged with "Possession of a Controlled Substance" and that federal officials may have had those charges dropped or exercised their influence to prevent charges from even being filed [against him]–as they did with Mariana–as leverage to get Lonnie also to make up false stories about David.

Another employee, Debbie Morley, said, "Mariana is an excellent liar."

Mariana Claimed in her FBI 302 Report on April 1, 2003, that when she, Lonnie and Dave were in Mexico on a business trip looking for property for a WaterOz facility, Dave solicited her Mexican brothers to kill AUSA Nancy Cook and IRS Agent Steve Hines but that she would not give out the name of her brothers. Quinn Raff called her brothers (in January 2004) and confirmed that David never discussed homicide or hit men with them when Dave was there in Mexico. Her brothers were active church members and stressed by her lying.

Mariana, supposedly, told Dennis Albers (the former Grangeville District Attorney) that Dave tried to hire her Mexican brothers to kill him. This was useful ammunition for Albers.

After the Hasalone v. Hinkson case was over, Dave and Albers had a conversation.

David said, "Albers, you’re nothing but a piece of shit."

Albers said to Dave, "You belong in prison."

"Why, I’ve haven’t done anything wrong."

"You’re going to jail and I’m gonna put you there."

"How can you do that?"

"We have our ways.'" Albers said.

That conversation took place in mid-September 2000, at the time when Albers still had a 30% favorable margin in Idaho County Prosecutor Campaign. Dave’s letter writing campaign followed and Albers lost his election bid in November by a minus 30%. The last we heard, Marianna Raff was living free in Northern Idaho–again released by the Feds.

David's attorney, Former Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Hoyt, did something that none of David's other paid attorneys, and certainly not any in the judiciary did, and that is to seek the full story. The government seeks money and convictions–not truth. Our adversarial system of law rewards the attorneys who can muster acquittals; so the most successful ones make the most money. Seldom do we encounter champions of justice for the sake of justice. Like an iceberg, most is unobserved and hidden beneath the surface. Wes dug, questioned and dug relentlessly. Here is what he observed:

Had the jurors known all the withheld facts there is little doubt that they would have been convicted David of anything. He was simply minding his own lawful business, but he stepped on the toes of some government agents. To bring David down those agents conspired, with paid informants, to entrap him with their fabricated stories of murder-for-hire.

Much of the case on trial in January 2005 involved the issue of freedom of speech. Questions arose about his intense statements, such as “God should smite," them [referring to government agents who abuse their authority and the law]. In taking advantage of his unrestrained, vocal statements, certain government agents relentlessly sought to destroy him.

David has always used the legal system as the means of addressing perceived corruption in the system. Routinely, Davi made sharp and cutting statements about the corruption in the U.S. Government. This behavior did not win him any friends within the System. His career as a radio host involved bringing many guests to the talk show who also criticized corruption by government officials. Publicly and openly, he stated his views on issues such as the legality or illegality of the federal income tax, of unlawful Bureau of Land Management schemes to seize property from western private property owners and on generalized corruption in our federal, state and local governments.

David learned the art of affecting the political process with expository pamphlets and he takes credit, in part, for un-electing various corrupt politicians. He became a lightning-rod of controversy and used his position as a gadfly; or whistleblower to challenge the government to clean up its act. By exercising his right to free speech, David certainly gave the government cause to put him out of circulation. However, since they supposedly couldn't arrest him for the exercise of free speech, the government chose to arrest him for made-up and falsified stories of murder-for-hire of federal officials– based purely on hearsay.

To support their fabrication, the government conspirators substituted accuser Swisher for the former accuser Marianna Raff. Raff was their first choice informant, but they finally dumped her due to the many felonies she persisted in committing while they were using her.

Now that we had the evidence on the government's fraud, it was time to go to the honorable courts. But we need a choice spokesman with clout.