Seattle Washington, March 13, 2021: Attorney Shannon Ragonesi, an attorney at Keating, Bucklin & McCormack, Inc., P.S, was constructively disbarred from the State of New York (NY). In New York, unlike Washington State Bar Association, is operated by NY State’s Board of Examiners, a state licensing agency. With no surprise, Ms. Ragonesi is a dear friend of Attorney General Bob Ferguson. They both attended NY Law School together and both participated in the helping the Catholic Church cover up hundreds of sexual abuse cases here in the Pacific Northwest.
When a complainant files a bar complaint in NY State, the lawyer is giving a copy of the complaint and a copy is filed with the State of NY’s Judiciary Here in Washington State, when a person files a Washington State Bar Association complaint, such complaints are filed with an alleged private association.
Using the word “alleged” means “not proven.” In the case of the Washington State Bar Association, we discovered three important features through various public records requests to the Washington State Attorney General’s Office, (1) the Washington Attorney General is illegally running the private Washington State Bar Association’s Continuing Legal Education classes,, (3) the Washington Attorney General is illegally hosting the Washington State Bar Association’s email server in Olympia right from the Washington State Attorney General’s office, (3) The Washington Attorney General is illegally providing free rent to the Washington State Bar Association at two publicly owned buildings, one in Olympia and one in Seattle on 4th Ave, and the Washington Attorney General is illegally funneling millions of public money to several law firms that defend the Washington State Bar Association such as Pacifica Law Group, Keating Buckling and McCormack ( and NY disbarred attorney Shannon Ragonesi), Kenyon Disend PLLC, and Gordon Rees and illegally using the AG’s risk management division also known as Department of Enterprise Services to provide legal services to the Washington State Bar Association, and (6) the Washington State Bar Association is stealing public money from the Washington State Public Retirement System (PERS).
If the Washington State Bar Association is not a public agency, then why are the taxpayers of Washington State allowing Washington State Bar Association employees Doug Ende, Kara Ralph, Felice Congalton, Scott Busby, and Allison Sato to collect a state funded paid retirement from the taxpayers? PERs is for public employees, but yet the Washington State Supreme Court held it was not a public agency subject to Washington State’s Public Disclosure laws but has no issue misappropriating taxpayer monies for their own pecuniary and financial gain. Are citizens of Washington providing a welfare program given to alleged private associations? Why not call the National Riffle Association and ask them if they would also like a taxpayer funded retirement pension like the alleged private Washington State Bar Association is getting?
Shannon Ragonesi, located at 33429 SE 114TH ST in ISSAQUAH, WA 98027, after being constructively disbarred from NY State, called a good friend of hers here in Washington State, Bob Ferguson who personally authorized Shannon Ragonesi to commit the same crimes against taxpayers as she did in NY State. Ms. Ragonesi’s crimes include false filings, perjury, harassment of public records requesters, forgery, fraud, theft of public money, and defamation. But she had a lot of help from other Special Assistant Attorney Generals like King County Superior Court and SAAG Judges such as Michael Scott ( Hillis Clarke, Martin and Peterson), Jim Rogers (Fox Rothchilds), Julie Spector (Lane & Powell), and Joseph Genster ( Hillis Clarke, Martin & Peterson).
Here’s the Washington State Attorney General’s Office case fixing scam works. SAAGs like disbarred NY State Attorney Shannon Ragonesi is paid millions via a fraudulent scam titled the Special Attorney General contracts. The Washington State Attorney General makes judicial appointments and the Governor simply rubber stamps the request. Since Governor Inslee has been in office, we could find only one judicial appointment in the whole state that was not a SAAG on contract with the Washington State Attorney General’s Office to provide a legal defense to public agencies. This means when a person is charged with a crime, or perhaps brings a lawsuit for access to public records, the agency, as was the case in Gold Bar Washington, is defended 100 % by the Washington State Attorney General’s contractors aslo known as SAAGs, and the Judge, like Michael Scott ( King County), Marybeth Dingledy (former employee of King County and City of Everett), Bruce Weiss (labeled a SAAG by AG’s list), Cindy Larsen (labeled a SAAG by AG’s list),, Julie Spector (SAAG law firm at Lane & Powell), and Jim Rogers ( King County SAAG while employed at Fox Rothchild) hear and decide your case. This in spite of the fact that the Washington Court of Appeals Div. I held in Ann Gonzales v WA State that a SAAG attorney cannot be have a SAAG Judge hear and decide any part of their case, or in the words of the Gonzales Court, the right to a fair and impartial judge is constitutional right . . . if a judge was a SAAG, and the Defense counsel was SAAG, disclosure isn’t enough, a judge must recuse themselves from the cases.”
If having a SAAG Judge hearing and deciding cases involving other attorneys such as SAAG law firms like Keating, Buckling and McCormack, or worse, US Federal District Court Judge Richard Jones, Ronald Leighton, Benjamin Settles, and Ricardo Martinez ( all SAAGs while employed with WA State), is this not case fixing at the highest level in the state? In Block v WSBA et al ,S Federal District Court Judge Ricardo Martinez, and local Snohomish County District Court Judge Douglas Fair, we obtained telephone records from SAAG attorney, Special Snohomish County Deputy Prosecutor at Hillis Clarke, Martin & Peterson confirming beyond any doubt that Snohomish County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney (SAP/SAAG) Joseph Genster openly engaged in exparte communication via public telephone records with judges.
In Block v Gold Bar, SAAG/SAP Shannon Ragonesi openly brags of her case fixing scam using King County Superior Court Judge ( also a SAAG at Hillis Clarke Martin & Peterson) Michael Scott to SLAPP public requesters down from trying to file lawsuits for access to public records. A case the US Court of Appeals 9th Circuit just agreed hear in Block v WSBA et al, can a judge who was a SAAG, as Ricardo Martinez was with WA State Attorney General’s Office, hear and decide cases when SAAGs Gordon Rees, Leslie Seffren and Shannon Ragonesi are representing the defendants? Under Ann Gonzales v Washington State, our state courts have already held ” NO” and that recusal was mandatory to preserve a litigant’s constitutional right to a fair and impartial judge.
Sorry SAAG/SAP/AWC contractors, the cat is out of the bag. If every defendant filed a disqualification against every judge that had SAAG/SAP contracts with Judges like Jim Rogers, Julie Spector, Bruce Wiess, Cindy Larsen, or Michael Scott, how many cases would be overturned for not recusing themselves ensuring that a litigant should have a fair and impartial judge? Washingtonians have a Constitutional right to access to courts, and a right to unlimited public records. and should never be faced with a judicial plant sent by the AG’s office to fix cases as “risk management.”
Claims of “Nigerian Fraud” Questioned as Cause of Record Losses
Part Two of Five – By The Gold Bar Reporter
Former Washington State Employment Security Commissioner LeVine (R) is Responsible For the Largest Loss from Fraud in her State’s History. She is Alleged to Have Actively Engaged in a Coverup of Massive Internal Fraud and Negligence.
Seattle, Washington State Feb. 12, 2021. When Sage Wilson of Working Washington heard former State Employment Security (ESD) Department Commissioner LeVine – and current National Employment Security appointee – quote a $650 million dollar loss from ‘Nigerian’ fraud while claiming not to know how many claims the losses related to, the red flags went up.
“How can anyone give a loss figure without knowing the number of claims involved? Something’s really wrong here,” he said. Other state’s employment security departments that have released dollar figures from fraud, in fact, have also released the number of associated false claims. “How can you know one without the other?” asked a prominent employment lawyer. “Isn’t it just simple math?”
The highly regarded Ninth Circuit public interest attorney John Scannell has his own equation: “If former Commissioner LeVine had no idea what numbers were associated with the losses, how on earth did she immediately conclude that it was ‘Nigerian Fraud’?” he said. “Add that fact to LeVine’s obstruction of the Washington State Auditor’s staff. Doesn’t that equal probable cause of internal fraud?” he added.
Like the number of unresolved unemployment claims, the chorus of voices that had called for Ms. LeVine’s resignation had been escalating at the same rate as the current questions of her qualifications being asked regarding her pending federal appointment. “We’re talking about a person who is a patronage appointment with absolutely zero qualifications, and who has demonstrated total incompetence. The people who are some of our most vulnerable in Washington state have paid a high price for obvious political patronage – should the entire nation?” said Mr. Scannell.
“It’s just inconceivable that a demonstrably incompetent employment security director in history, who lied to state auditors, who is the sole person responsible for killing the new software that could have prevented the fraud just months before COVID-19,” said an ESD staffer.
Ms. LeVine’s background includes a position in a luxury travel subsidiary of a software business and fundraising for the Democratic party. With no experience she was given a foreign position in the State Department by the Obama Administration. After her $17,500 donation to Washington Governor Inslee, she was then appointed by him as Commissioner of Employment Security. After Ms. LeVine and her husband donated $400,000 to the Biden campaign, she received her current pending appointment.
“This is the worst conceivable caricature of a patronage appointment. We’re talking about someone whose resume is absent any relevant government experience whatsoever, and a person who is completely disconnected from the reality of the unemployed,” said Mr. Scannell. “If someone really deems it necessary to give someone a patronage appointment, why hand a job caring for the unemployed to an unqualified multi-multi-millionaire who has demonstrated contempt for the unemployed?”
Ms. LeVine may in fact be less than directly impacted by the suffering caused by her mismanagement. With her husband Eric, Ms. LeVine lives in a $3.5 million-dollar 7,200 sq. ft. Seattle mansion. They own a multimillion-dollar software company that tracks wine collections for the world’s wealthiest people. The State of Washington paid her substantially over $200,000 including benefits and allowances.
Meanwhile, Ms. LeVine’s disconnection from the pain and suffering caused by her historic mismanagement appears to have coincided with what is being calling “an utterly sadistic negligence of her responsibility to have cared for the unemployed,” according to a prominent employment law attorney. “Ms. LeVine cynically used several of the same fraudulent tactics to deny claims that she used to obstruct audits,” she said.
According to the employment law attorney, the tactics deployed against claimants and auditors alike include feigning confusion, shuffling people between ESD employees, refusing to release information, destroying documents, and simply not responding to inquiries. “Federal crimes have been committed here. Why are there no federal charges? These are criminal acts.” said the attorney who has shared notes with colleagues. “Where is the federal investigation?”
“The conclusion that we’ve all come to is, if it was really ‘Nigerian fraud’ as Ms. LeVine has claimed in Washington state, why did she obstruct the audits?” said the employment law attorney. “Why aren’t all the records being posted online after an outside GAAP equivalent audit? Isn’t this a lot of the public’s hard-earned money? What business could possibly run without accounting for where the money is going?” she said.
Meanwhile, for her part, with her only accomplishments in government being the greatest loss to fraud in the history of Washington State, insiders express incredulity of her current pending appointment, “this is utterly the worst conceivable candidate for the person responsible for some of our nation’s most vulnerable, the unemployed. It is inconceivable to even consider this person for the appointment,” stated attorney Mr. Scannell.
Ms. LeVine, who contrary to federal law accepted $9000 worth of gifted luxury wine tasting functions in Luxembourg while working in her political patronage appointed State Department job in Switzerland and living in a government provided $25 million dollar mansion, asked the unemployed and the taxpayers of Washington State to trust her. Now she asks the nation.
When asked exactly how much money had been taken from the unemployed of the State of Washington, and exactly how it happened, her response was, “trust me, I want to know. I asked every single day,” although she had direct and unlimited access to all accounting and transaction information.
Ms. LeVine’s business philosophy may be of little consolation to Washington’s unemployed and taxpayers: “fail fast, and fail cheaply,” said Ms. LeVine. The “North star” for her personal moral compass, she says, is the Jewish expression “tikkun olam” which means “repair the world.”
“Perhaps Ms. LeVine could repair an important part of the world by assuming responsibility for the results of a comprehensive outside audit of the mess she left in Washington State,” said attorney Mr. Scannell. “The best thing she could do for all of us is to decline the patronage appointment and not doing any more damage.”
GOLD BAR REPORTER 
see what inslee has really been doing at https://www.magicofkent.com
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