23-1-00050-23 | STATE OF WASHINGTON vs CHANTEL DAWN PETERSON
Case Number 23-1-00050-23
Court Mason
File Date 02/14/2023
Case Type ADL Criminal Adult
Case Status Active
Party
Plaintiff (Criminal) STATE OF WASHINGTON
Active Attorneys
Lead Attorney
Dorcy, Michael K
Defendant (WIP) PETERSON, CHANTEL DAWN
DOB XX/XX/1993
Active Attorneys
Lead Attorney
Sergi, Ronald E.
Court Appointed
Elijah Gossett
Charge
Charges PETERSON, CHANTEL DAWN
Description
Statute
Level
Date
1
Assault 1st Degree Great Bodily Harm
9A.36.011(1)(d)
Felony A
02/12/2023
Events and Hearings
1 02/13/2023 Preliminary Appearance Original Type Preliminary Appearance Document Mason Minutes Judicial Officer Ferguson-Brown, Cadine Hearing Time 9:00 AM Result HeldParties PresentDefendant (WIP): PETERSON, CHANTEL DAWN
2 02/13/2023 Affidavit of Probable Cause View Document Affidavit of Probable Cause
02/27/2023 Initial Arraignment Original Type Initial Arraignment Judicial Officer Ferguson-Brown, Cadine Hearing Time 9:00 AM Result HeldParties Present Defendant (WIP): PETERSON, CHANTEL DAWN Attorney: Sergi, Ronald E.
[Prologue: Judge Amber Finlay worked as a Mason County deputy prosecutor prior to being elected Mason County Superior Court judge. During her tenure as deputy prosecutor, she was a foreign national (Canadian) in violation of Washington’s Constitution prohibiting all but U.S. citizens from holding State office as public officials. Her husband, attorney Bruce Finlay, argues appointed positions azren’t public officials. By that reasoning, appointed judges are also mere employees. Most people recognize cops, detectives, prosecutors are all public officials. Indeed, many prosecutors in small jurisdictions are HIRED by contract to fill the role. Should foreign nationals be prosecuting and putting American citizens in jail/prison? Wasn’t there a pig war in the Sjuan Islands over this issue?)
February 23, 2023
by Matt Baide
Mason County Superior Court Judge L. Cadine Ferguson-Brown.
Cadine L. Ferguson-Brown began her tenure as Mason County Superior Court judge in May, filling the shoes of Amber Finlay [Finlay immigrated from Canada].
Ferguson-Brown’s road to Shelton was long, but she said she enjoyed it.
“I don’t have any intentions of leaving Mason County,” Ferguson-Brown told the Journal. “I do appreciate the people that I work with. I love being in a small community, smaller than King County. In Jamaica, I grew up in the rural parts of Jamaica, I grew up in a small, close-knit community and that’s what I’ve always wanted in my life.”
Ferguson-Brown’s journey to the court in Shelton began in Jamaica. When she was little, she watched law shows like “Ally McBeal” and “L.A. Law,” and she knew what she wanted to do for a career.
“There was never any question of what I wanted to become. I wanted to become a lawyer,” Ferguson-Brown said. “From when I was very small, I would go around telling people that I was going to be an attorney.”
She attended the University of Wolverhampton in the United Kingdom, where she earned a bachelor’s in law. She earned a master’s in education from American Intercontinental University online while raising two kids, and while her husband pursued his career in the Navy. [A stark distinction exists between English and American jurisprudence.]
Ferguson-Brown became an attorney in the Bronx with her own practice in 2007, focusing on family law and immigration. She had many friends and people she knew who needed an immigration attorney, and they would ask her for advice.
“From the Caribbean background, people who know you and know that you’re an attorney or that you studied law, they have the idea that you know all the laws,” Ferguson-Brown said. “So they will come to you with every legal question, but immigration was one that was repeating itself and so I just found myself learning more and more about immigration to the point where I became somewhat of an expert in immigration law and friends who owned law practices would contract their immigration cases out to me and that’s what started my practice.”
Ferguson-Brown took on a lot of family law and Violence Against Women Act cases. VAWA allowed for spouses who were abused to file petitions on their own to gain status.
Ferguson-Brown and her family moved to Whidbey Island in 2010, and she stayed home and raised her kids for three years while passing the Washington bar exam. In 2014, she started taking on some cases while being a mom and homeschooling her children.
“When (my husband) was finished with his advanced training, he was informed that if he wanted to raise a wonderful, strong family, he should choose Washington state,” Ferguson-Brown said. “And so we did, we came out here and we don’t have any regrets. We have loved being here. I think it’s a wonderful place to raise children.”
In 2016, Ferguson-Brown’s family moved to Kitsap County and she started a law office with staff. She worked on some guardian ad litem cases in Mason County – cases appointed by the court to represent the best interests of a minor child in legal proceedings.
“I completed a number of cases over here as guardian ad litem and would write my reports that have been raised by many who have read them to be some of the most comprehensive reports,” Ferguson-Brown said. “I do like writing. That’s one of my other loves and that just got me into the community here and a number of the attorneys here who would then refer me as their guardian ad litem and I got to know the judicial officers as well.”
She said the shows she watched growing up that made her want to be an attorney, were more about “being the boss.”
“I think as a young child, I wanted to be the boss,” she said. “But all throughout my desires or my passion was driven by my love for the law, and the fact that I always felt that people who were disadvantaged were not seen. Throughout my life, I’ve always been somewhat of an advocate for people who were disadvantaged because I feel like they go unheard and unseen and from a very early age, I picked up on that and so that was what inspired my love for becoming an attorney and now a judge.”
She has done a lot of volunteer work and remains involved with Dream Jamaica, a nonprofit organization that helps young Jamaicans pursue education. She is an active member of the NAACP. [What does this have to do w/Mason county or her grasp if Washington State law? Immigration is federal law.]
“Volunteering is my heart … I love volunteering but I have to cut back on a number of things I used to do before because along with becoming a judge, you also have judicial committees you have to participate in that are volunteering in different areas,” Ferguson-Brown said. “For example, I am currently one of the commission members on the Minority Injustice Commission. I also am a member of the Superior Court Judicial Association’s civil and criminal law committees and these are extra hours you’re spending working on different things that they are working on.”
In 2021, Mason County court commissioner Robert Sauerlender was retiring and Ferguson-Brown applied for and received the job. She said she enjoyed her time as court commissioner, even if it wasn’t for long, because it was in the area of family law and guardianship, which she practiced most of the time.
In 2022, she applied to be the Superior Court judge to replace Finlay. Ferguson-Brown said the process to apply to replace her was interesting and intense, and it took a long time to be vetted. She was recommended to Gov. Jay Inslee and was appointed in May before Finlay retired in June.
“I’ve always heard that I should be a judge,” Ferguson-Brown said. “All throughout my career, I have heard that from my clients. I have heard that from my mom, who’s my number one supporter. She’s told me that from when I was very small. It has never been something out of my sight. But being an attorney was what I knew, I knew that was what I needed to be doing, somewhat of a calling and so the next step for me would definitely be to become a judge because I believe my temperament is made for that. I believe my work ethic is made for that because it’s not an easy thing being a judge. My love for the law is made for that.”
When she got the phone call to offer her the position of judge, she asked, “Are you sure?”
“I was excited but I couldn’t tell anyone for quite a very long time because I had to wait until I got the OK from the Governor’s Office to say it to someone,” Ferguson-Brown said. “That was difficult going around knowing that I got the position but I could not say anything. It was a relief once I got the OK to tell everyone here and the other judges, who I just know were waiting to hear back to figure out what needed to be done.”
Ferguson-Brown has been on the bench for seven months, and the transition from being an attorney to being on the bench as a judge has been an adjustment, but her time on the bench as a court commissioner helped her adapt.
She said the biggest difference as a judge, the cases she heard are different. She finished out judge Finlay’s term on the bench in juvenile court cases. She has now taken on criminal court cases, and she’s embraced the challenge of learning more about new cases she hears. [Still learning the basics? Has this judge written any appellate briefs? Where are they?]
In her short time as a judge, she said it’s always a tough call when deciding the outcome of cases.
“We’re dealing with people’s lives, that’s one, and so while it may seem simple to some people, those two individuals or the group, that’s important to them,” Ferguson-Brown said. “It’s never taken lightly by me. The decisions that I make, I never just pull it from the top of my head. It’s always reasoned, in light of what the law requires. It’s never an easy decision to make with the facts of the case and not because, sometimes, you have to go home and take time to take a break and come back to some of the decisions you have to make, but they’re never easy.”
When she’s not working, she enjoys reading or watching law movies.
“On the bench, I am a judge. But off the bench, I am a quiet, introverted person who will be fine with some good music and a nice little book to read,” Ferguson-Brown said. “A lot of times, people are fearful of judges because they can’t see them as human beings, but I’m just like the ordinary person and I love to be in a little quiet place.”
She said she has a passion to educate, and she’s hoping as judicial officers, to have more engagement with the community to help teach people about “how we’re going to get out into the community and starting to educate the community as to what we do here.”
Looking back on the journey Ferguson-Brown’s life has taken to get to Mason County, she said it’s been an amazing trip.
“When we moved to Washington, we moved to Washington because of my husband, or so we thought,” Ferguson-Brown said. “We thought we were moving here to support my husband’s military career, which he was very successful with. But here I am at the end of that and I feel it was more of a setup for me to fulfill my purpose. It’s just been amazing, I’m not complaining, even though I could do with a little less rain and a little more sunshine, no complaints.”
“This is home. I don’t have any intentions of going anywhere else.”
by Matt Baide, Reporter [edits by Amicus Curia]
Shelton-Mason County Journal & Belfair Herald Email: matt@masoncounty.com
02-2-21234-1 | STATE DEPT OF REVENUE VS SELENA SMITH DBA
Case Number 02-2-21234-1
Court Thurston
File Date 08/21/2002
Case Type Tax Warrants
Case Status Completed/Re-Completed
Party
Plaintiff (Participant) STATE DEPT OF REVENUE
Defendant SMITH, SELENA U
Disposition Events
08/21/2002 Judgment
Judgment Type Tax Warrant
Monetary/Property Award
Creditors: STATE DEPT OF REVENUE
Debtors: SMITH, SELENA U
Signed Date: 01/01/1800
Filed Date: 08/21/2002
Effective Date: 08/21/2002
Current Judgment Status:
Status: Active
Status Date: 01/01/1800
Comment: Judgments this case: 1 2002-08-21 WUTR WARRANT FOR UNPAID TAXES-REVENUE JDB0001 SMITH, SELENA U 2,600.70. DBA ALL THAT JAZZ INT PER WARRANT 5.00
What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one.
Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism.
Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance.
Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy.
As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure.
In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us. ~Neil Postman
businessman crowd military salute dictatorship 3D illustration
TACOMA, Wash. — The parents of missing West Valley City woman Susan Powell won a $98.5 million judgement in a courtroom here today, bringing a close to the latest chapter in a decade-long drama rising from Powell’s disappearance in 2009.
“All states will remember this,” Susan Powell’s father, Chuck Cox said. “Not that I expect [Washington state] will pay it. But the fact that the award was made tells them ‘you have to do something different’ … ‘you have to protect the safety of the children.’”
Cox and his wife, Judy Cox, sued Washington’s Department of Social and Health Services in 2013. The lawsuit centered on the circumstances leading up to the Feb. 5, 2012 killings of their grandsons, Charlie and Braden Powell, at the hands of their father, Josh Powell. He was at the time the sole suspect in his wife’s disappearance. However, Josh Powell was never arrested or charged with a crime related to what police believed was Susan Powell’s murder.
Josh Powell lost custody of his sons in September of 2011, on the same day deputies from the Pierce County (Washington) Sheriff’s Office arrested his father, Steve Powell on suspicion of voyeurism and possession of child pornography. Investigators discovered the elder Powell’s trove of home video recordings the month prior, while serving a search warrant at his home on the outskirts of Puyallup, Wash.
Josh Powell and his sons had been living with Steve Powell since January of 2010. That raised concerns for social workers, who believed Steve Powell’s home was an unsafe environment for the children. After a brief stay in a foster home, DSHS placed Charlie and Braden, then six and four years old respectively, with the parents of Susan Powell, their grandparents.
The placement rankled Josh Powell, who held highly antagonistic views toward his in-laws. He undertook legal efforts to regain custody of his sons almost immediately. In the months that followed, a DSHS investigator closed an investigation into Powell after finding no evidence that he had neglected or mistreated his sons. Pierce County Judge Kathryn Nelson subsequently approved moving supervised visits between Powell and the boys from a secure facility into a home Powell rented in the neighboring community of Graham.
In their lawsuit, the Coxes accused the social workers of ignoring their own policies and guidelines regarding domestic violence screening. Attorney Anne Bremner, one member of the Cox’s legal team, contended Josh Powell’s status as a suspect in the presumed murder of his wife made him an obvious risk.
“It should have been clear to these case workers that they needed to look at domestic violence because Josh was a suspect in the disappearance and potential homicide of his wife,” Bremner said.
Justice delayed by appeals and coronavirus
Just reaching the point of presenting that argument to a jury proved difficult.
The Coxes initially filed the suit in Pierce County Superior Court. It was subsequently moved into U.S. District Court, where a judge ruled the state agency and its staff were shielded from the claims by governmental immunity. The Coxes appealed that ruling to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. In January of 2019, the appellate court returned a split decision, finding the individual social workers were immune but the agency itself was not.
From there, the case returned to the District Court, which passed it back to Pierce County Superior Court.
In February of 2020, Judge Stanley Rumbaugh opened trial proceedings before a jury of 11 men and one woman. He initially blocked out five weeks for the trial. However, in mid-March, Washington shut down its courts in response to the burgeoning crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Anne Bremner worried the pandemic might derail the case permanently.
“I was very, very worried about that,” Bremner said. “But also that if we reconvened that we might have a second spike and then it might end in a mistrial.”
Courts reopen
By June, Covid-19 case counts were declining and courts across Washington were slowly reopening. Judge Rumbaugh notified the parties he intended to resume the trial. However, attorneys representing DSHS filed an emergency appeal to the Washington Supreme Court, seeking a further delay. The high court ultimately declined to hear that request, clearing the way for the trial to resume in mid July.
The jurors, who spent four months away from the courtroom, came back to serve. Chuck Cox said their willingness to return inspired him.
“To a person on the jury, they all said ‘no, we’ll wait, we want to come back and finish this,’” Cox said.
The decision
Closing arguments in the trial came on July 29, 2020. Then, on the morning of July 30, the jury began its deliberations. By the afternoon of July 31, word circulated they had reached a decision. Judge Rumbaugh called the parties together to announce the decision.
“Was the state of Washington negligent? Answer: yes,” Rumbaugh said, reading from the jury’s form. “Was such negligence a proximate cause of injury to the plaintiffs? Answer: yes.”
Next, Rumbaugh detailed the jury’s findings regarding damages.
Damages set
In opening arguments months earlier, attorney Ted Buck had asked the jury for a substantial financial penalty against the state. He had said that was the only way to force Washington to change course and prioritize the safety of children in protective custody.
The jurors appeared to take that to heart. They set damages for each child at $57.5 million, for a combined total of $115 million. They then deducted from that total the amount of roughly $16.5 million, attributing that share of financial responsibility to Josh Powell. As a result, the parents of Susan Powell stand to receive $98.5 million.
Chuck Cox said the staggering figure isn’t likely to come any time soon. He anticipates the state of Washington will appeal or challenge the jury’s result. But he says he plans to use any money he does receive advocating on behalf of domestic violence prevention.
“There’s not much else you can do with it because you can’t bring them back,” Cox said.
The Washington Attorney General’s Office referred questions about the outcome of the trial to the Washington Department of Children, Youth and Families. A spokesperson for that agency did not respond to a request for comment.
