Recognizing Rosenblum, Oregon’s Attorney General

Recognizing Rosenblum, Oregon’s Attorney General

August 26, 2017 – HARBR is a nonpartisan organization. As an organization, HARBR endorses no official categorical opinion regarding Oregon’s Attorney General, Ellen Rosenblum. HARBR does, however, have some specific concerns about her behavior as it affects the lives and professions of licensed healthcare professionals in Oregon. Ms. Rosenblum is the head of Oregon’s Department of Justice (DOJ). In this position, she is the supervisor of the DOJ Assistant Attorney Generals who prosecute Oregon licensed healthcare professionals when there are allegations of misconduct by regulatory boards. She also oversees the DOJ Assistant Attorney Generals who defend healthcare regulatory boards when licensees appeal board final orders to the Oregon Court of Appeals.

In a August 24, 2017 article published by Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Chris Lehman Ms. Rosenbaum shows herself in a manner HARBR believes will be recognizable to those who have been abused by their Oregon healthcare regulatory boards and the DOJ attorneys who represent them. The article relates to the firing and re-hiring of James R. Williams, an investigator for the Oregon DOJ.

Williams sued the Oregon DOJ and the matter was settled in arbitration. Sherwood attorney David Blair presided over the arbitration.

See article: http://www.opb.org/news/article/oregon-fired-doj-investigator-gets-job-back/

Take away quotes include:

Blair: “[The Oregon DOJ] “exacted the harshest penalty possible against a seven-year veteran of the department with a spotless record [.]”

Blair: “[T]his discipline appears to have been both inappropriate, unnecessary and clearly excessive.”

According to the OBP article: Blair writes that the agency could instead have offered additional training to Williams and other employees to help them better understand the agency’s expectations. Blair also ordered the agency to scrub any reference to the matter from Williams’ personnel file.

Rosenblum: “I am disappointed in the arbitrator’s decision and continue to feel strongly that I made the right decision to terminate Mr. Williams’ employment as a criminal investigator at the Oregon Department of Justice.”

According to OPB’s Chris Lehman’s article: Johnson’s attorney, Beth Creighton, said the arbitrator’s ruling “establishes what we knew all along.”

Creighton: “This was not an isolated investigator going rogue, but a concerted effort by DOJ management to target Erious Johnson and cover it up.”

In addition to rehiring Williams, Blair ordered he be given nearly a year’s worth of back pay.

HARBR recommends the reader web-search the matter for more on the backstory. Suggested searches include:

Erious Johnson Oregon DOJ

James R. Williams Oregon DOJ

Williams claims that he had been following orders related to the allegations that he had profiled Erious Johnson. Williams also claims he was a victim of retaliation for whistle-blowing. Erious Johnson is the Director of Civil Rights with the DOJ, one of the few African-American members of Oregon’s DOJ, and the alleged victim of William’s profiling.

According to the OBP article, Rosenblum reports that both Johnson and Williams have further suits pending against the DOJ.

HARBR does not know whether contentions remain between Johnson and Williams. If contentions between these two persons remain, HARBR, at this point, does not have enough information to evaluate merits or to issue opinions.

Creighton: “For the record, Mr. Johnson was never asked if he wanted Williams terminated and in fact did not want to see him terminated.”


Photo Credit: Photo of Ellen Rosenblum provided by Wikimedia Commons

Page URL: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AOregon_Attorney_General_Ellen_Rosenblum_addresses_attendees_at_the_conference_(15478927731).jpg, File URL: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Oregon_Attorney_General_Ellen_Rosenblum_addresses_attendees_at_the_conference_%2815478927731%29.jpg, Attribution: By Oregon Department of Transportation (Ellen Rosenblum) [CC BY 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

The Seminal Bice Case and the Start of HARBR

The Seminal Bice Case and the Start of HARBR

August 15, 2017 – On October 19, 2016, a member of a group soon to become HARBR, discovered the Opinion of the Oregon Court of Appeals (OCA) in relation to David T. Bice v. the [Oregon] Board of Psychologist Examiners. The Opinion (verdict) had just been released that day. A group of physicians, psychologists, counselors and legally practicing unlicensed healthcare professionals, already associated with one another, assembled to take action.

Some of the relevant documents related to Dr. Bice can be found on the Oregon Board of Psychologist Examiner’s (OBPE). We caution the reader to understand that they may encounter OBPE bias and selective publishing. http://obpe.alcsoftware.com/files/bice.david%20t._57.pdf

What stood out about the OCA Opinion in this matter is that, in our opinion, it so clearly attested to numerous instances of malfeasance on the part of the various parties who had taken disciplinary action against Dr. Bice. The affirmations against healthcare wrong-doings had rarely been this clear or from such an authoritative source. The allegations made against Dr. Bice by the Oregon Board of Psychologist Examiners (OBPE) were reversed and remanded by the OCA. The reversal means Dr. Bice won. The remand, unfortunately a standard procedure in these matters , means the case was sent back to OBPE to redecide the matter, but to do it right this time.

On November 29, 2016, twelve members of the group now known as HARBR wrote and signed a “letter of concern and request for investigation” which was sent out far and wide to government officials and other authorities. The letter was sent to the Oregon U.S. Attorney, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), All Oregon Representatives, All Oregon Senators, the Oregon Governor, the Oregon Secretary of State, the Oregon Attorney General, the Oregon State Bar, and a general press release. Og these, the only one to respond was the Oregon State Bar (OSB).

OSB regarded our letter of concern and request for investigation as a “complaint” and notified the persons named of the complaint along with codified violations they may have violated in the Bice matter. the notice was delivered to the persons of concern on  December 7, 2016, and they were asked to answer to the “allegations.” The named persons included Karen Berry (OBPE investigator), Warren Foote (OBPE legal counsel), Carolyn Alexander (Department of Justice legal representative for OBPE in the appellate hearing), and Department of Justice (DOJ) supervisors, Anna Joyce (Oregon Solicitor General) and Ellen Rosenblum (Oregon Attorney General). On December 15, 2016, the named persons lawyered up and chose a single DOJ Senior Assistant Attorney General to represent them together as a group. They chose SAAG Stephanie Thompson.

During this time, various healthcare professionals in Oregon and in other states, already associated for several years officially formed HARBR. HARBR is the Healthcare Alliance for Regulatory Board Reform.

In forthcoming articles, we will write more about the Bice matter, where it stands today, and what it means for patients, clients, healthcare professionals and healthcare regulatory board reform, and we will write about the status of our complaint with the OSB against the above named persons.