Judge says false claims lawsuit against former COPP Dave Gallik can proceed

In an order filed today, Missoula District Judge John Larson said a lawsuit against former Commissioner of Political Practices Dave Gallik can proceed.

Gallik resigned as commissioner in January 2012, shortly after the Great Falls Tribune reported allegations made by Gallik's former staff members who claimed Gallik, an attorney, was conducting private law practice work out of his state office.

The  Bozeman-based conservative watchdog group the Montana Policy Institute brought the lawsuit in March 2012 after the articles first ran in the Tribune.

The lawsuit was filed under the “False Claims Act,” a law Gallik carried when he was in the state House of Representatives in 2005.

The False Claims Act law authorizes a private person to prosecute a recovery and civil sanction action on behalf of the state government against any person who obtains payment from a government entity by means of a knowingly false or fraudulent representation or claim. The Montana Attorney General can then decide whether to join in on the lawsuit, stay out of the lawsuit, or move to dismiss the lawsuit altogether.

Great Falls attorney Ward "Mick" Taleff, the attorney representing the state in the case, last November argued in court that the case should be dismissed because the Montana Policy Institute lacked standing to bring the lawsuit.

The state asserted that Gallik’s alleged conduct was performed within the scope of his duties to the state. The state also argued the allegations in the complain mirrored those publically disclosed in the Tribune articles, and thus MPI cannot identify direct and independent knowledge of the allegations.

MPI argued in court that the group filed a freedom of information request several moths prior to the Tribune’s FOI request and subsequent news reports.

Larson ruled  in favor of MPI, saying state law does not  preclude MPI from bringing the case. The judge denied the state’s motion to dismiss the case.

The state now has 10 days to elect to intervene in the proceedings against Gallik or it must notify the court that it declines to take over the action. If the state elects to intervene, the state has to serve the complain on all defendants within 20 days of the intervening action. If the state declines to intervene, then then MPI can serve the defendants and move on with the lawsuit.

I’ll update this post throughout the day as I learn more.

UPDATE: Here’s the judge’s full order.

Right-wing blogger sues newly appointed Commissioner of Political Practices

A self-described advocate for “small and transparent government” filed a lawsuit against the newly appointed Commissioner of Political Practices seeking records related to the former commissioner's activities while in that office.

Edwin Berry, an atmospheric physicist and right-wing blogger from Bigfork, is asking the court to force political practices commissioner Jim Murry to turn over records related to former commissioner Dave Gallik’s alleged misconduct.

Gallik resigned in January after the staff in the office accused him of falsifying his state time sheet and doing private practice attorney work from his state office. Gallik denied the charges and said the commissioner’s fabricated the allegations to force him out because they didn't like his management style.

Matthew Monforton, Berry's Bozeman-based attorney, said his client filed the lawsuit because he has an interest in getting to the bottom of the allegations made against Gallik.

"If commissioner Gallik was performing or working on behalf of private clients and using state time and state resources to perform that work, that than would create very serious and perhaps criminal problems," Monforton said. "If the allegations are true that Mr. Gallik falsified time records, then that could potentially be theft of public funds."

The lawsuit asks the court to force Murry to turn over documents. Murry declined a public records request Berry made on Feb. 21 seeking records because of an ongoing ethics complaint Berry filed against Gallik last fall. Berry filed the complaint because Gallik was still listed as the treasurer for the Democratic Legislators Alumni Association political action committee while serving as commissioner.

Murry wrote in a Feb. 23 letter to Berry that because Berry's complaint was pending before a hearing examiner, Murry was unable to provide the document.

Rift splits groups fighting to keep wolves on endangered species list

The law firm that represented 13 environmental groups in a successful push to return wolves to the endangered species list has withdrawn from the case because of a rift among the plaintiffs.

Attorneys for Bozeman-based Earthjustice, which represented the 13 environmental groups, filed a motion in federal court in Missoula Wednesday to step aside.

According to Earthjustice attorney Douglas Honnold, some of the plaintiff groups that brought the lawsuit have "established different positions" about how to proceed with the case.

"There will be different lawyers that are going to step in in short order," Honnold said.

Honnold declined to comment on what the "different positions" were among the plaintiffs.

U.S. District Judge Don Molloy ruled in August 2010 that the government made a political decision when it removed gray wolf protections from just two of the states where Northern Rocky Mountain wolves roam.

The decision returned wolves to the list of endangered species under the Endangered Species Act in most states and stopped planned wolf hunts in Montana and Idaho. The ruling was heralded by wildlife advocates and reviled by anti-wolf interests across the nation.

The Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks joined the federal Department of Justice, the state of Idaho, the Idaho and Montana Farm Bureau federations, and the Mountain States Legal Foundation in appealing the ruling last fall.

Since then both sides have tried to negotiate a settlement, but Wednesday’s motion and Honnold’s statement indicate that those negotiations failed to produce an agreement all parties were willing to go along with.

Mike Garrity, executive director for the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, said some plaintiffs wanted to settle the case and others did not.

The Alliance, Western Watersheds Project and Friends of the Clearwater refused to settle, Garrity told the Tribune Thursday.

"I believe these other groups will ask Judge Molloy for stay of his ruling which put wolves back on the Endangered Species List. This would mean that wolves could then be shot on sight and the states could have a hunting season on wolves before the wolf population is fully recovered," Garrity said. "We are sticking to our original request that wolf management should be based on science and the law, not politics."

Michael Leahy, Rocky Mountain region director for Defenders of Wildlife, the lead plaintiff in the case, declined to comment. Other plaintiffs in the case also declined to comment Thursday.

According to court documents filed in federal court Thursday, Bozeman attorney Brian Gallik will represent Defenders of Wildlife, Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, Oregon Wild, Cascadia Wildlands, Wildlands Network and Hells Canyon Preservation Council.

James Jay Tutchton, of Englewood, Colo., will represent the Alliance and Friends of the Clearwater.

Summer Nelson, an attorney for the Western Watersheds Project, will take over representation of that group.