Tim Ryan, tryan@shawanoleader.com
A Minnesota attorney for the Samanta Roy Institute of Science and Technology (SIST) has lost the right to practice law in Wisconsin for a year over what the state Supreme Court called a pattern of bad faith litigation.
The court’s Aug. 20 ruling against Rebekah Nett mirrors a similar ruling in Minnesota in November that suspended her license to practice law in that state.
A complaint filed by the Wisconsin Office of Lawyer Regulation in February requested reciprocal discipline against Nett in keeping with the Minnesota ruling. The complaint alleged Nett had made false and harassing statements toward judges and others involved in litigation against her clients.
The complaints against Nett stem from a November 2011 bankruptcy court filing involving SIST subsidiary Yehud-Monosson USA Inc.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Nancy Dreher fined Nett and her client, Naomi Isaacson, $5,000 each for bigoted and anti-Catholic slurs included in the filing.
Isaacson is SIST chief executive officer and president of Yehud-Monosson USA. SIST and its subsidiaries own a number of properties in Shawano.
A federal appeals judge upheld the fines in a May 2012 ruling.
In her unsuccessful attempt to appeal the fines, Nett said the comments in the filing — including phrases such as “black-robed bigot,” “ignoramus, bigoted Catholic beasts,” and “Catholic Knight Witch Hunter” — were written by Isaacson.
However, Nett also submitted a written response claiming that all of the statements in the Nov. 25, 2011 court filing were “supported by fact.”
Nett’s 26-page memorandum detailed what she called the “infiltration of our justice system” by “the Roman cult and their military arm — the Jesuit Order.”
It alleged the Jesuits’ involvement with, among other things, the African slave trade, the French Revolution, the American Civil War, Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, the Vietnam War, JFK assassination, terrorism in the U.S. and the sinking of the Titanic.
Nett can petition for reinstatement in nine months.