By Samuel López | USA Herald

Attorney Michael Jacob Libman’s Petition for Review now pending before the California Supreme Court does not merely address California’s attorney discipline system of procedural unfairness. It also invokes one of the darkest constitutional symbols in Anglo-American legal history — the infamous Star Chamber — to argue that the very conditions the United States Constitution was designed to abolish are reappearing inside modern disciplinary proceedings.

And from a legal and forensic analysis standpoint, Libman’s argument is far more sophisticated and historically grounded than casual observers may initially realize.

The petition weaves together a remarkable line of United States Supreme Court precedent stretching back nearly 140 years to argue that structural judicial bias, compelled testimony, pre-decided proceedings, retaliatory punishment against attorneys, and tribunal-driven prosecutions all share a common constitutional ancestry: the abuses of the English Star Chamber.

Case Background:

Attorney Michael Libman’s case stems from the massive Jones v. City of Los Angeles class action litigation, where Libman served as liaison counsel and later began openly questioning what he believed were undisclosed relationships and irregularities involving Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Elihu Berle and attorney Brian Kabateck.

According to Libman’s California Supreme Court petition, Berle appointed Kabateck as replacement class counsel in April 2019, despite their prior shared service on the Board of Governors of the Association of Business Trial Lawyers (ABTL).

The petition further documents that Judge Berle later purchased an “opulent Tarzana residence for cash, no recorded mortgage” in close temporal proximity to approving a $67.5 million attorney-fee disbursement order in the same litigation. Those facts, according to Libman, triggered his investigation into possible judicial impropriety and undisclosed conflicts.

Importantly, Libman’s petition argues that he disclosed those concerns openly and formally through verified disqualification motions, writ petitions, depositions, and judicial complaints long before sanctions were imposed against him.

Libman now stands before the California Supreme Court seeking review of a State Bar Court disbarment recommendation that he argues was produced through structurally biased proceedings infected by judicial partiality, retaliatory motives, exclusion of defense evidence, and due process violations. It is within that constitutional framework that Libman invokes the infamous Star Chamber — the historical English tribunal notorious for secretive proceedings, coercion, pre-decided outcomes, and punishment imposed through intertwined prosecutorial and judicial power.

Libman’s petition argues that the constitutional protections recognized in cases such as In re Murchison, Brown v. Mississippi, In re Oliver, and Faretta v. California were specifically designed to prevent modern tribunals from replicating those same structural abuses.

In essence, Libman argues that when a judge allegedly abandons neutrality and functions as both decision-maker and prosecutor — while excluding defense evidence wholesale, removing Libman’s counsel mid-trial, and appearing to predetermine guilt before the defense fully presents its case — the proceeding begins to resemble the very Star Chamber abuses the Due Process Clause was designed to prevent.

For readers unfamiliar with the history, the Court of Star Chamber became infamous in England as a mechanism of unchecked royal power. Proceedings were often conducted in secrecy. Judges and prosecutors became intertwined. Confessions could be coerced. Political enemies could be targeted. Procedural safeguards were stripped away. And perhaps most importantly, the outcome was frequently perceived as predetermined before the accused was ever truly heard.

The Star Chamber became so notorious that its abolition in 1641 ultimately became one of the foundational historical events influencing the development of modern due process protections embedded in both English and American constitutional law.

Libman’s petition argues that the structural defects he identifies in California’s attorney discipline system are not isolated procedural mistakes, but modern manifestations of the very abuses constitutional due process was intended to prevent.

The petition specifically relies upon In re Murchison, Caperton v. A.T. Massey Coal Co., and Williams v. Pennsylvania to argue that structural judicial bias alone can invalidate proceedings, even without direct evidence of subjective corruption.
But Libman then goes much further.

The filing ties those modern due process authorities to an older constitutional lineage rooted in the destruction of the Star Chamber itself.

One of the most powerful portions of the petition invokes Brown v. Mississippi (1936), where the United States Supreme Court condemned coerced confessions as “the chief iniquity, the crowning infamy of the Star Chamber, and the Inquisition.” Libman uses that case to argue that constitutional protections were created specifically to prevent proceedings driven by coercion and institutional abuse rather than neutral adjudication. The petition references Brown in its constitutional analysis beginning around pages 56 and 57.

The petition next invokes Counselman v. Hitchcock (1892), a landmark Self-Incrimination Clause case recognizing that constitutional protections must extend beyond criminal trials themselves to any proceeding where compelled testimony could later be used against an individual.

That point becomes critically important within Libman’s broader theory because the petition repeatedly argues that attorney disciplinary proceedings cannot evade constitutional safeguards merely because they are labeled “administrative” or “professional discipline” matters rather than criminal prosecutions.

The petition further relies upon In re Oliver (1948), where the United States Supreme Court explicitly traced modern due process protections back to “the abolition of the Court of Star Chamber in 1641.” According to Libman, that history matters because the Constitution was designed specifically to prohibit proceedings where adjudicators effectively decide guilt before the accused receives a meaningful opportunity to defend themselves.

That argument directly intersects with Libman’s explosive allegations against State Bar Court Hearing Judge Yvette Roland.

As detailed throughout the petition, Libman alleges Roland announced a “preliminary finding of culpability” before the defense had even completed presenting its case, excluded more than 800 defense exhibits, removed defense counsel mid-trial, and repeatedly assisted prosecutors by constructing evidentiary foundations from the bench. Those allegations appear on page 11 of the petition.

The constitutional implications of those allegations become even more serious when viewed through the Star Chamber framework Libman invokes.

The petition effectively argues that once a tribunal abandons neutrality and begins operating as both adjudicator and prosecutorial force, the proceeding itself becomes constitutionally suspect regardless of the formal labels attached to it.

Libman also invokes Quinn v. United States (1955), where the Supreme Court refused to permit “Star Chamber-style compulsion” within congressional committee proceedings.

That authority becomes particularly important given Libman’s allegations involving compelled testimony, Fifth Amendment concerns, federal investigative pressure, and disciplinary proceedings allegedly intertwined with broader governmental activity.

The petition repeatedly references the July 2020 FBI raid on Libman’s home and the later involvement of federal cooperator Konstantin Paradis, whom Libman identifies as an FBI-directed cooperating witness involved in approximately “184 undercover operations.”
According to the petition, Paradis later testified that federal handlers instructed him regarding what to say during recorded conversations and directed him to lie. Those allegations appear on page 31.

Within the constitutional framework Libman presents, these facts are not isolated events.

They are part of a larger structural pattern that, according to the petition, resembles precisely the kind of tribunal-driven, coercive system the Due Process Clause was designed to eliminate centuries ago.

The petition also invokes Faretta v. California (1975), where the Supreme Court recognized that the Star Chamber “has, for centuries, symbolized disregard of basic individual rights” and condemned the punishment of advocates “for the substance of their representation” as part of “the arbitrary arm of royal power.”

That language may prove especially significant because Libman repeatedly argues he was targeted not for ordinary misconduct, but because he investigated judicial conduct and openly challenged powerful institutional actors.

Throughout the petition, Libman frames his activities as protected petitioning and investigative conduct and not part of any deceit or retaliation.

The filing repeatedly argues that California disciplinary authorities inverted chronology itself by portraying his investigation as revenge, even though the petition documents that Libman’s disclosures and investigative activity predated the major sanctions later imposed against him.

Perhaps the most important constitutional authority cited in the petition is In re Murchison itself.

There, the United States Supreme Court declared that “no man can be a judge in his own case” and warned that proceedings conducted “without the safeguards which the law has provided” cannot satisfy due process.

Libman’s petition argues that the structural-bias problems he identifies are the modern manifestation of the same constitutional dangers condemned throughout the Supreme Court’s Star Chamber jurisprudence.

From a broader legal perspective, the filing presents an extraordinary challenge to California’s attorney discipline system itself.

The petition argues that California’s unique structure — where prosecutorial, adjudicatory, and review functions operate within a tightly interconnected institutional framework — creates an especially dangerous environment when allegations of judicial corruption become intertwined with disciplinary proceedings.

And unlike many disciplinary appeals that focus narrowly on evidentiary disputes, Libman’s petition instead frames the case as a constitutional crisis involving structural neutrality itself.

In essence, the filing asks the California Supreme Court a deeply uncomfortable question:

At what point does a disciplinary proceeding stop functioning as a neutral tribunal and begin resembling the very Star Chamber conditions American constitutional law was designed to abolish?

That question is now squarely before California’s highest court.

And depending on how the Court answers it, the consequences could reshape the future of attorney discipline proceedings throughout the state.

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