'Spotlight Team' Report:

Office of 'Save Our Horses' Was a Mailbox at Mail Boxes Etc.; Two Lawyers from Palmer and Dodge Led Scam

Lawyers from Palmer & Dodge Slander Marriage Amendment

Artists and Staff at Concord's Center for Arts Also Implicated
By MassNews Staff
May 2002

The horse "office" is one of the mailboxes shown on this wall.		The only offices for 'Save Our Horses' in Mass. were inside one small mailbox in this franchise of Mailboxes Etc., located on Route 9, only a short distance from the Mass. Turnpike exit at Framingham.

Two lawyers from Palmer & Dodge, plus artists and staff from the Emerson Umbrella Center for the Arts in Concord, are the people behind the slander and libel of the sponsors of the "Protection of Marriage Amendment."

"We have been very quiet while this slander has been going on," says Sarah McVay Pawlick, President of Massachusetts Citizens for Marriage. "But this news is especially disappointing. Why can't these people play according to the rules? Their calumny is disheartening, to say the least."

Both of the Palmer & Dodge lawyers are original signers of the "Save Our Horses" petition which was unsuccessful in its attempt to gain enough signatures last fall to be placed on the ballot.

They have been conducting a very vocal, contentious attempt to say they failed because the voters were tricked into signing the Marriage Amendment instead of the Horse petition.

Pawlick wondered, "How would they like it if a large headline in the New York Times went across the country falsely accusing them of fraud?"

She said she would like to ask them, "Why are you doing this to us? Have you no sense of decency or honesty?"

		Why Was It Done? Many are speculating about the reason for this slander. The supporters of the Marriage Amendment used to believe this would all go away eventually. The horse people would either prove that some of the signature gatherers had deceived people or they wouldn't. But it's become obvious that their only purpose has been to get large amounts of publicity in order to damage the Marriage petition. After the marriage people understood the motive, they thought that Susan Wagner, the woman from Queens on Long Island who is
All slander against the supporters of the Marriage Amendment originates from the horse people at the "Emerson Umbrella Center for the Arts" in Concord. The attack is led by the lawyer-husbands of two residents artists. They, plus two of the staff, four resident artists and other family members comprise the original 13-signers of the horse petition.

behind the Horse petition, was cooperating with their opponents. But the latest information shows that it was two Boston lawyers who have been masterminding this slander.

Lawyers Are Arkuss and Ticknor

The two lawyers are Neil P. Arkuss and George Ticknor, both of Concord. Atty. Arkuss is the lead plaintiff in the suit filed by the horse people against Sec. of State William Galvin in order to force him to approve the horse measure, even though it did not receive the necessary number of signatures in last fall's petition drive.

Although the lawyers have been careful not to directly make any slanderous remarks against MCM, the innuendos have been huge.

These innuendos showed their ugly side this month when the New York Times printed the following headline over a prominent story in its national edition on Sunday, April 7, Drive to Ban Gay Marriage Is Accused of Duping Signers. This headline explicitly placed the blame on MCM.

The headline writer at the Times in New York was not tricked about the real message from Atty. Arkuss. He could see that the message was aimed directly at those behind the Marriage Amendment. Even though the writer of the story was careful not to go beyond suggestions and innuendos, the headline person gave away their true intent.

		New York Times Was Not the First The New York Times article was not the first to mislead the voters. Many newspaper articles have insinuated how Atty. Arkuss and his associates were cheated by those at MCM. He knows all about the smears that have occurred in the media. The material given to the court in his lawsuit last week included the text of a Channel 7 story which appeared on January 21.
This is "Unit 284, 1257 Worcester Rd.," the home of "Save Our Horses" in Massachusetts.

The story made it clear that the "bad guys" were the people at MCM. It included a 7-second soundbite from a spokesman for MCM. But this was used only to portray him as the culprit. (See sidebar for Channel 7 segment.)

Timing Was for Media

The timing of Atty. Arkuss was solely for a media smear against MCM. It has become obvious to anyone that Arkuss does not have a valid complaint, or else he is trying to keep us in suspense. After almost five months have passed, he still has told us about only 13 people - out of over 100,000 who signed the Marriage petition - who say they were duped into signing.

Arkuss is not a stupid person. He is not a hick. He is a lawyer from an august Boston law firm. He knew he didn't have any case - unless he could possibly find a judge like Allan van Gestel who was laughed at across the country for violating the U.S. Constitution when he ruled against the whistle blowing parents at Fistgate. Arkuss also knew that if he tried to "rig" the judge in this case, he would begin a real scandal, although the power of those big law firms in Boston is not to be underestimated.

He kept the matter simmering for many months with little teasers to the press that he had found some new information. And he kept dribbling out letters to signers of the Marriage Amendment advising them of the "fraud" which had taken place against them. He sent the letters across the state in an attempt to demoralize the signers. But he didn't understand that he was just stirring them up, not demoralizing them.

When it became clear that a legislative hearing would be held on the Marriage Amendment on April 10, he let loose on March 23 a barrage of 19,613 letters to signers of the petition. (Keep in mind that the hearing date was not announced, at least not to the public, until about March 23. The opponents had been trying to stop any hearing at all from taking place.) This meant the letters arrived in over 19,000 mailboxes just a week before the Marriage hearing. Arkuss had previously sent letters to 6,000 signers on February 21 and 2,438 on March 15.

In addition, he placed the story in the New York Times for April 7, three days before the hearing.

Slanders Were Heard

And his machinations did have results, but not as much as he expected. About 15 state legislators, out of 200, attacked the Amendment in a media "circus" at the State House. Committee members Rep. David Torrissi (D-Lawrence, N. Andover) and Rep. Paul Demakis (D-Boston) kept raising the Horse petition.

The co-chair of the Mass. Gay and Lesbian Political Caucus, Arlene Isaacson, went on at length about alleged fraud and deception in the signature gathering effort. She said there were hundreds of victims of bait and switch tactics. She said she even had affidavits from signature gatherers who were trained in these tactics.

When MassNews asked Isaacson if we could see the affidavits to which she was referring, she nervously said, "I'll be right back," and never returned.

Reps. Torrissi and Demakis also raised the resignation of Executive Director Bryan Rudnick from MCM in February after the signature campaign was successfully concluded. Reports at the time said Rudnick resigned in order to prepare to go to law school.

The two committee members wondered aloud why Rudnick "suddenly" left and implied it may have been related to the allegations of fraudulently obtained Marriage petition signatures although they did not reveal how the two could possibly be connected.

Sarah McVay Pawlick pointed out to the legislators that almost two years in the first job after college was a long time and to expect two additional years after that from Rudnick was too much.

Many have also wondered how Arkuss managed to get a computer database of the signers which had obviously been manipulated at great expense by someone who planned to use it a lot. Who would have given it to him except the opposition?

Horse Petition Was Foolish

The horse petition was foolish, in any event. If those who signed to "save" the horses had known the facts about the initiative, many of them would not have approved it.

The originator of the proposal is Susan Wagner of Equine Advocates on Long Island, which is within walking distance of Aqueduct Racetrack. She says she worked in the racing industry for 14 years until she formed this organization in 1996. Many wonder whether she still works there and is receiving money from the racing industry in order to keep them from getting the bad publicity which has gone to the greyhound racetracks.

Where else would she be getting all this money?

Wagner says on her website that "over 100,000 American horses are being slaughtered here and in Canada annually." She has "rescued" only a few dozen of those half-million horses in the past six years and takes enormous credit for it.

The law she would have us pass would have done little to correct the problem. It would have prohibited the slaughter of horses only if they were destined for human consumption. It would not have stopped the slaughter for dog food or other purposes. All 100,000 horses could still be slaughtered every year.

In addition, it would have put innocent people in the grasp of a poorly written law. It included people who "give away," "offer to give away," or "transport" horses where the person knows "or should know" that the animal was going to be slaughtered for human consumption.

If a horse is going to a slaughter house in Canada, how would anyone know the purpose of the meat?

The penalty is one year in jail for each horse.

Susan Wagner's website is at www.equineadvocates.com.

Sidebar:

Dirty Tricks Originate in Concord

All of the 13 original signers of the horse petition are residents of Concord. They include the following:

Atty. Arkuss, his wife, Nancy, who is a Resident Artist at the Emerson Umbrella Center for the Arts, and apparently their son, Brett, all of the same address.
Atty. Ticknor, his apparent wife, Susan C. Getsinger-Ticknor, who is a Resident Artist at the Center, his apparent son, H. Malcolm and her apparent son, Alex, all of the same address.
Marijane Raymond, Resident Educator at the Center.
Maxine Payne, Resident Artist and Staff at the Center.
Corrine Kinsman, an active artist at the Center's "Concord Players" and "Concord Youth Theatre."
Priscilla Parrott, Resident Artist at the Center, member of First Parish Unitarian Church.
Suzanne Winsby, Resident Artist and Staff member at the Center, member of Unitarian Church.
Allison Aley, member of Social Action Council at Unitarian Church.