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For Immediate Release

Re: Pompano Beach Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) v. Gil Eriksen
Properties LLC; Case No. 06-004169 (21)

Broward County Court Cover Up Fails to Hide Florida Land Grab

Corruption of Pompano Beach CRA and Broward County Commission
Pompano Beach, FL, August 23, 2010 – The Broward County Court recently
made a public relations attempt to quiet the outcry against the county’s land grab
racketeering schemes by criminally staging a fake jury trial as a coverup to the corruption
in the county’s most highly contested and well-publicized eminent domain case. The
respondent was not allowed to appear or participate in the trial, and the jury was
instructed under penalty of jailtime to return a “preordained” verdict to try to end the case
that has been haunting Broward County and Pompano Beach officials for years.
However, what was supposed to quiet matters has now only become more fuel for the fire
of outrage against the city, county and court as a clear example of egregious abuses of
power and blockades of justice in what is reputed as the most corrupt county in the
United States.
The Broward County Court has previously been implicated in the land grab
conspiracy to profit developers and politicians by initially facilitating the illegal grabs
through the court system, and next by blockading respondents’ access to justice, but now
in this Pompano Beach Community Redevelopment Agency v. Gil Eriksen Properties
LLC landmark case, has gone so far as to stage a kangaroo court trial without the
property owner whose very property was taken and destroyed by the Pompano Beach
Community Redevelopment Agency. Irony is not lost on a case involving fraud and
constitutional abuses being ended by an unconstitutional and fraudulent jury trial.
The abuses initially came to the fore in the eminent domain action brought by the
petitioner, Pompano Beach Community Redevelopment Agency who filed to take the
multi-million dollar prime non-blighted historical property from Gil Eriksen Properties
LLC to resell for private development, when another Broward Circuit Court ruling found
that at the time of the filing, the Community Redevelopment Agency wasn’t authorized to
be formed, let alone seize properties. This combined with the Florida State Constitutional
Amendment banning the use of eminent domain of private citizen’s property for private
development, and the fact the CRA had been taking properties illegally for a decade prior,

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made it clear that this case would be a hotbed of political and legal upset with potentially
many liability ramifications, including criminal ones.
The case history shows that the historical property was indeed taken by the
Pompano Beach CRA, destroyed, and sits abandoned while Gil Eriksen Properties LLC
has not yet been heard in the case, five years later, to include this final blockade against
appearing at the case trial. This is particularly brazen in that the right to own land is a
Constitutional right, the right to due process is a Constitutional right, and the Florida
Constitution has strict requirements regarding eminent domain procedures and requires
that respondents be allowed to defend against a government land taking with provisions
to financially provide for a property owner’s response in a twelve person jury trial of
one’s peers, which never occurred in this case.
At the recent one and one half day “trial”, the presiding judge on the case, David
Krathen only allowed the petitioner, the Pompano Beach CRA, to appear and present
evidence, while ordering the property owner to sit in the gallery of the court, and not
speak, leaving the respondent table empty. All potential jurors were threatened by Judge
Krathen repeatedly and those who spoke out against eminent domain abuse or questioned
the lack of two sides being represented were immediately dismissed by the Pompano
Beach Community Redevelopment’s attorney Mitchell J. Burnstein of Weiss, Serota,
Helfman, Pastoriza, Cole, and Berniske. Jury selection was made by Judge Krathen and
Attorney Burnstein without the respondent. During proceedings, the property owner’s
rights, evidence and testimony were not allowed to be represented at all, and a one-sided
and unchecked propaganda fest ensued. The property owner was continuously vilified
and referred to by Judge Krathen and Attorney Burnstein as the “defendent,” and the
CRA was continuously referred to as the “plaintiff,” deeming the proceedings a criminal
proceedings instead of the civil proceeding that it is, with the necessary civil legal terms
of “respondent” and “petitioner,” respectively.
The jury was threatened by Judge Krathen that if they did not obey the law, that
they would be sent to jail on judge’s order as facilitated by his bailiff who, according to
Krathen, “must do whatever I order.” The jury were told repeatedly by Attorney
Burnstein that the verdict in the case was “preordained” and was “already determined”
and to obey the law they must return that preordained verdict. The jury was told by Judge
Krathen that this trial was only a matter of “dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s” and by
Attorney Burnstein to disregard the fact that there was no other party represented and not
be concerned with the legality of that, as he knows it is legal. The jury took three minutes
to dutifully return the only verdict allowed. The verdict is one of the property owner
owing money to the Pompano Beach Community Redevelopment Agency that took the
owners’ multi-million dollar prime property. So in a five year long eminent domain case,
the Pompano Beach CRA, an agency without proper authorization to be formed or to take
properties, seized the owner’s property, is further awarded money from the owner, and
the owner has not yet got to have a trial or be heard in the court system in any fashion.
So was the trial a coup for the Pompano Beach CRA? An end of inquiry into the
land grab schemes? Not likely. Civil rights advocates and constitutionalists are up in

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arms. The property owner, although seemingly shocked at the brazenness of the
corruption, thinks the recent “faux trial” is a smoking gun of the criminality, and doesn’t
plan to stop seeking justice. Passersby of the courthouse, when asked for comment
said, “How can the government take someone’s land and then they don’t even get to
show up at the trial? How can that be legal? They should sue,” along with “That’s
Broward County for you, killing the constitution one case at a time. The courthouse needs
a real renovation, and I’m not talking cosmetic,” and lastly an attorney who wished to
remain nameless said, “Judge Krathen? He’s the most crooked of them all, and he needs
to go down.” Perhaps even the Pompano Beach Community Redevelopment Agency
knows this is not to be the end of the scandal, as during proceedings its representative,
Chris Brown, executive director of the CRA, had to take a break as he appeared to be
having breathing difficulties and was slumped over clutching his heart and gasping for
air. The following day Brown did not even make it court and was replaced by the CRA’s
deputy director Steve Spalding. Even Attorney Mitchell J. Burnstein appeared a bit
defensive telling the jury, “This is not a sham proceeding!”
For a county that has so little public confidence, with its own county
commissioners recently being sent to jail for fraud schemes, a one-sided jury trial
featuring the respondent bound and gagged in a corner, in the most highly contested case
of illegal eminent domain, brought by an agency without authority of eminent domain,
seems no less insane, and certainly no resolve to the county’s corruption scandals.

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For the latest information on the Pompano Beach CRA illegal land grabs visit
http://www.wojspubs.com

For more information on the 19th Statewide Grand Jury on Public Corruption visit
http://myfloridalegal.com/19thstatewidegrandjury

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