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By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon

SDNY COURTHOUSE, Sept 10 – It was at a make up counter in Saks Fifth Avenue at 611 First Avenue that Niurka Corona says she was told by her Clarins supervisor Felipe Vaca, "you are a very good looking woman" who should use those attributes.

That was in 2016. Only on September 10, 2019 were the oral arguments on summary judge heard before U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge John G. Koeltl, with Inner City Press the only media in the courtroom.

  Defendant Clarins' lawyer hammered away that Ms. Corona was not selling the product; he denied that the Clarins' supervisors were against her, mentioning joint travel to a wedding in Colombia. And prior to the argument he put into the docket deposition testimony of Vaca praising other workers as "pullers," whom he recruited from Macy's on 34th Street. It's the Saks way - watch this site.

Previously before Judge Koeltl: a defendant named Winston Ramirez appeared for sentencing on July 24 for stealing / cashing tax refund checks that were not him, to the tune of $213,627.30, before Judge Koeltl.

 The guidelines were for 18 to 24 months. Judge Koeltl went with 14 months and two years of supervised release including the search condition that fellow SDNY Judge Jed Rakoff eschews as possibly unconstitutional.

  At the end there was some different of opinion whether Judge Koeltl had said the same amount each time for restitution and forfeiture - one time, at least, Inner City Press heard $213,629.30 - but that was resolved into the record, with surrender set for September 27 at 2 pm. On July 25 Judge Koeltl oversees closing arguments in a criminal ERISA case. Inner City Press will continue to follow these cases.

The worse half of a couple which defrauded the IRS for over $1 million cashing tax refund checks appeared for sentencing on July 12 before U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge John G. Koeltl.

William Polanco and what Judge Koeltl repeatedly called his common-law wife Albanelly Ramirez (Polanco's lawyer used the word "paramour") cashed the checks through Guara Multiservices and Albanelly Multiservices.

Polanco on July 12 said he bought clothes, paid for entertainment and some for their two children. Now they asked for, and the government supported, staggered sentences. Polanco will go first, his arm in a sling from an accident with FedEx. He will turn himself in on September 27. Then 22 months later, presumably, Albanelly Ramirez who Judge Koeltl has scheduled to sentence based on information including from the Consulting Project on September 15. Watch this site.

On July 8 hours after the presentment of Jeffrey Epstein in prison blues in the SDNY another invocation of #MeToo was made before SDNY Judge Koeltl with Inner City Press the only media present.

  Ralph M. Watson is or was an advertising executive at Crispin, Porter & Bogusky LLC (CP+B) in Boulder, Colorado - until he was anonymously accused of being a series sexual predator. The allegations came on in Instagram Stories that disappear in 24 hours, on an account called @DietMadisonAve.

 Now Watson is suing NY DOE 1, DOE 2-3, ILLINOIS DOE 1 and DOES 1-50, saying he knows who some of them are. Three of them had lawyers before Judge Koeltl on July 8, arguing that Watson is mostly seeking discovery that he got in a California case but wasn't to his liking.

 Watson's lawyer, meanwhile, says that he got a trove of Google discovery was was ordered to destroy it since it covered more than the January 19 and 25 dates of the contested statements.

  Diet Madison Avenue at a minimum has good sources - it reported on a CP+B Town Hall meeting on the same day it occurred, June 25, 2018, stating that "Apparently during the @CPBgroup townhall today, they claimed to support the Me Too campaign... Are they letting go of Ralph AKA the unrepentant series predator?"

  Then he was fired. And the rest, as they sometimes say, is history: gone in 24 hours. The case is Watson v. NY DOE 1, et al, 19-cv-533 (Koeltl).

  That Jeffrey Epstein, now in the Metropolitan Correctional Center by Foley Square, will be denied bail later this week is widely reported. But as Inner City Press has reported from the Magistrates Court of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York this year, at least two accused pedofiles have been released on bond, with conditions.

One, Donnie Fetters, was bailed by Magistrate Judge Ona T. Wang on May 10 and allowed to fly back to Iowa from whence he came to Laguardia to meet an underage girl, or what he thought was an underage girl. See the Inner City Press, the only media that day in the Magistrate Court, story here. Fetters remains free; most recently his appearance before SDNY Judge Victor Marrero was waived. This case is now US v. Fetters, 19-cr-387 (VM).

On May 30 SDNY Magistrate Judge James L. Cott granted bond to Bryan Pivnick, accused of grooming an 11 year old boy, see Inner City Press story here: now Pivnick is asking for greater access to the Internet in New Jersey, ostensibly to pay his student loans. This case is now US v. Pivnick, 19-cr-00464 (PKC). More on Patreon, here.

Certainly, conspiracy to commit sex trafficking charges are different. But these two recent bailings, and the SDNY's continuing usually ignored proceedings, merit reporting, which Inner City Press will continue to do, perched as for months over the PACER terminal in the 500 Pearl Street press room, if it is available, as it continues its "Murky Mag Court" series. 

Back on March 6 when the question of releasing or at least reviewing sealed Jeffrey Epstein documents was taken up by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Inner City Press story here, Alan Dershowitz was there. Afterward by the elevators in 40 Foley Square Inner City Press asked Dershowitz, what he'd thought of Judge Sweet's decision. He began to say, Judge Sweet made a mistake - when first his lawyer gestured that they should go, and then the clerk of court asked everyone to leave the floor.

 Now it's reported not only that on July 8 Epstein will be presented and indicted on sex trafficking charges but also that a search warrant was executed on Epstein's Manhattan mansion at 8 East 71st Street on July 6. Epstein is in the Metropolitan Correctional Center, photo here, along with among others convicted UN briber, Antonio Guterres linked, Patrick Ho of CEFC.

  Cursory research revealed not only Epstein as a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, but bragging about his financial support to CFR, through the Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation. Photo here. What will CFR say? Will they belatedly be returning the money?

While some call it a pink hued building on a dead end street, his mansion is at 9 East 71st Street - one block, it turns out, from the Qatar royal family mansion which has hosted human trafficking covered up in the SDNY, see Inner City Press here, and below.

The July 8 presentment will presumably be in Courtroom 5A of 500 Pearl Street, or perhaps a larger room to accommodate the interest. In Courtroom 5A as the July 1-3 work week ended Inner City Press alone in the gallery observed Magistrate Judge Barbara Moses signed sealed indictments and warrants, even with what some called sleight of hand of saying there would be no action until 8 pm then, when Inner City Press ran to the PACER terminal in the press room, ending the day's business at 7:45 pm with no press present. Expect on July 7 another Geoffrey Berman press conference as well -- Inner City Press will be there.

  The rights or lack of rights of victims have been highlighted for some in this case - but the violation of rights of less prominent people has been happening every day, from before March until now in the SDNY including its murky Magistrates Court. Inner City Press was in the 2d Circuit in March and will be in the SDNY July 8, based from a PACER terminal, documenting the disparities. Watch this site.

Back in March all of the parties - the Miami Herald's Julie Brown, Mike Cernovich, Alan Dershowitz and even Virginia Giuffre -- were pushing for the unsealing of the documents, except Ghislaine Maxwell.  Her lawyer Ty Gee argued that people had relied on the commitment to seal the information. He ended by saying the U.S. judicial system is not about democracy.

But by then the panel of Judges of Cabranes, Pooler and Droney had made it pretty clear they will be remanding the case and the 167 documents back to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The only question seems to be whether Judge Sweet, who initially agreed to seal them, will get the case on remand or if another judge will.

. He challenged Giuffre to sue him, and of Judge Cassel was highly critical, a term of art.

Another term of art: slut-shamer, a term applied during the argument to Mike Cernovich but one that the judges mocked, with Judge Pooler asking if there was a "slut-shaming cabal." The wider point was that there is in the United States no system for certifying journalists, that as the Ninth Circuit case Opsidium v Cox has it, journalist is something you do, not something you are.

All citizens - and non citizens, as in the case of Argentines seeking information about their country's debt revealed in a U.S. case - have a right to information, a right that predated the Constitution.  The judges reserved judgement. Inner City Press will continue to cover this and other SDNY and 2nd Circuit cases - watch this site.