Mandamus Petition against Judges Janow and Gamble

M. Ismail Sloan, being duly sworn, deposes and says:

1. I make this affidavit in opposition to the motion of respondents to dismiss my petition for a writ of mandamus and prohibition. I hope the court will forebear the fact that I am presenting this in affidavit form, even though it contains points which more properly might be found in a legal brief. The fact is that this petition seems to represent my last hope of ever seeing my kidnapped daughter again. All other appeals and avenues for relief have been cut off. My notices of appeal have all been dismissed, either because they were too early or because they were too late. My petition for a writ of habeas corpus had been denied a hearing on the grounds of "lack of an adequate record." I have not even had a meaningful hearing in the year and a half that I have fought to get my kidnapped daughter back, because Judge Janow's decision was known in advance. That leaves only this petition for a writ of mandamus and prohibition. In short, if this petition fails, my daughter may never again see her father, her mother, her brothers, her sisters and her grandmother, all of whom love her very much, all because of the nefarious deeds of the respondents to this petition.

2. Counsel for the respondents makes a number of specious and indeed ridiculous statements in her brief which cannot go unanswered. Among these are that I have not alleged that the judges acted without jurisdiction and that there are no pending proceedings involving these two judges. The fact is that Judge Gamble has specifically retained jurisdiction over this case. Indeed, in his decision and order denying my motion to disqualify himself from these cases, he specifically states that he will not disqualify himself while these cases are still pending before him. Thus, he has stated exactly the opposite from what his counsel states in her motion filed with this court.

3. It has consistently been my contention that these judges have had no jurisdiction whatever over this matter. I have made that point going back to 1987. I raised that point in my prior appeal entitled Sloan v. Amherst Department of Social Services (unpublished May, 1991 decision by the Court of Appeals dismissing my appeal). That was where I appealed a prior order of Judge Janow to the Virginia Court of Appeals. That appeal was dismissed with the statement that it was a non-final order. This was reported in "Virginia Law Weekly", June 3, 1991, page 12. I have always characterized the activities of Judge Janow as being not merely without jurisdiction, but as illegal and in violation of the criminal statutes. I have suggested that Judge Janow more properly belongs in jail rather than on the bench. I will now go into that point in somewhat greater detail.

4. I have repeatedly since 1987 at every opportunity demanded that Judge Janow disqualify himself or else be removed by a higher court. The refusal of the two respondent judges to recuse themselves is clearly reviewable by way of mandamus. In re United States, 666 F.2d 690 (1st Cir. 1981). As to the claim that there is nothing pending before these judges, that is ridiculous. In the first place, Judge Gamble has specifically retained jurisdiction over the child custody proceeding, although he states that he may remand the matter back to Judge Janow soon. Secondly, there are about six other cases (forgive me but I have lost count) which have been filed against me, and all of these are being referred to Judge Gamble. The latest of these is Creighton Sloan v. Helen Marjorie Sloan and Samuel Sloan, Lynchburg Circuit Court, 1992. In this proceeding, Creighton Sloan seeks to sell my mother's house and to get the money for himself. That comes on top of a multitude of other suits filed by my brother against my mother, by which he seeks my mother's life savings and her pension and social security checks.

5. In addition, there is a criminal case in which Judge Gamble is charging me with the felony of interstate kidnaping under 18.2-47. That case is a good example of what is going on here. It can be demonstrably proven that I am not guilty of this charge. The statute states that I can be charged with a felony only if "the person abducted is removed from the Commonwealth by the abducting parent." In the instance in question, my daughter never left the back yard of my house. I certainly never removed her from the Commonwealth.

6. On the other hand, in May, 1991, Charles Roberts removed my daughter from the Commonwealth by taking her to South Carolina for the purpose of depriving me of the visitation which had just been ordered by the court. This makes Charles Roberts clearly guilty of a Class 6 felony under 18.2-49.1. In addition, this makes Mr. Roberts in contempt of Judge Janow's order that "no person" shall remove my daughter from Virginia. However, all of this has been ignored. Mr. Roberts has been allowed to keep my daughter.

7. This is just a typical example of what has been going on since the beginning of this case. Mr. Roberts, who is neither a parent nor a relative of any kind, has been allowed to do what he wants with my daughter but I, the father, have been chased around the world by professional kidnappers and hired killers hired by Mr. Roberts, and there is nothing I can do about it.

8. From the beginning, Judge Janow has never had jurisdiction. For this reason, a writ of prohibition should issue prohibiting him and Judge Gamble from proceeding with this case. County School Board of Tazewell v. Snead, 92 S.E.2d 497, 198 Va. 100 (1956). Mr. Roberts filed his first custody petition on August 27, 1986, at which time neither I nor my daughter were in the State of Virginia. There has never been any personal service of a summons, a fundamental hallmark to establish jurisdiction. Instead, Judge Janow ordered substituted service in the form of a Notice by Publication in the "Amherst New Era Progress", a local county weekly. I never saw that publication, nor did the mother of Shamema, who was at all times in Pakistan. The notice was published in the "Amherst New Era Progress" in October, 1986.

9. In order to get around my point that he has never had jurisdiction, Judge Janow claims that he had jurisdiction under my own unopposed custody petitions filed in 1983, 1984 and January, 1986. However, I was never able to get a hearing on those petitions. At that time, Judge Janow stated that he had no jurisdiction because the mother of Shamema had been awarded custody by the Supreme Court of New York and she had gone to Pakistan and could not be personally served with a summons. However, as soon as the friend of Judge Janow, Mr. Roberts, a complete non-relative to my daughter, filed a custody petition, Judge Janow suddenly reversed himself, even though the subject child was no longer in the State of Virginia.

10. It has since become obvious from subsequent events that there was a method to the madness of Judge Janow. He clearly planned from the beginning to give custody of my daughter to Charles Roberts, whom he knew had an interest in the child from extra-judicial sources. Judge Janow's initial refusal to take jurisdiction over this case was just a way to prolong the proceedings until I was finally forced to do what I did, which was to take my daughter from Virginia and go elsewhere.

11. As noted previously, Charles Roberts filed his first custody petition on exactly August 27, 1986. Neither the child nor I were in the State of Virginia on that date. On September 3, 1986, I appeared before Judge Preston Boothe Glen of the New York Supreme Court in a matter related to the custody of my two other children, Peter and Mary Sloan, neither of whom had ever been to Virginia. Charles Roberts had found out about this hearing, because he was in touch with Anda, the mother of Peter and Mary. (In fact, I believe it was Anda, along with my brother, who put Charles Roberts up to the idea of trying to seize my daughter, as Roberts is too stupid to think of such a thing himself.) While the hearing on September 3, 1986 before Judge Glen was going on, Judge Janow called her on the telephone. Judge Janow told Judge Glen that he was just in the process of issuing an order for my arrest and he wanted me arrested. This caused Judge Glen to stop the hearing and call the police. The police came and took me and my mother to the First Precinct police station in Chinatown. Judge Janow then had several telephone conversations with the police. However, in spite of the efforts of Judge Janow to have me arrested, after about two hours, the police released me from jail, because no warrant for my arrest had ever been issued.

12. Meanwhile, Judge Glen disqualified herself from the case of Peter and Mary Sloan, stating that in view of the inflammatory statements made by Judge Janow, she could no longer judge the case impartially. Even though I was released from jail only two hours later, the damage was done. To this day, the scheduled hearing with regard to Peter and Mary has never taken place. In the meantime, Peter has developed into a seriously troubled youth, who has been suspended from school twelve times. Peter, now 13 years old, puts his considerable literary talents to use by writing violence-oriented pornography, which he sells to the other junior high school students. He uses his great artistic talents to write graffiti all over the school and in the school library books.

13. On September 5, 1986, Judge Janow issued an order stating that "Shamema Honzagool Sloan shall be seized wherever she may be found" and brought to Virginia. It is this order which Charles Roberts now claims gave him the right to have Shamema kidnapped more than four years later. Again, this September 5, 1986 order was issued without personal service of a summons and complaint and before the notice had been published in the "Amherst New Era Progress".

14. At the same time, on September 5, 1986, Judge Janow awarded custody to the Amherst County Department of Social Services. It is important to note that the Amherst County Department of Social Services had never requested custody. Indeed, they were not even aware of the existence of this child. What Judge Janow did was he appointed Amherst County Department of Social Services as a stakeholder. They were directed to check with the authorities in other states, locate Shamema Honzagool Sloan, have her detained, and have her brought back to Virginia.

15. Again, it must be emphasized that all of this was done without jurisdiction. The jurisdiction of Judge Janow is defined by statute as extending just one mile beyond the county line of Amherst County. However, by this order, Judge Janow was extending his jurisdiction across the entire United States of America and indeed around the world, even though, in reality, he had no jurisdiction at all over this child.

16. Shortly thereafter, my mother, my daughter, and I went to Argentina for a chess tournament. In truth, we had no inking about the nationwide detention ordered issued by Judge Janow. In my wildest dreams, I could not have imagined such a thing possible. The chess tournament in Argentina had been on my calendar for many months.

17. We had flight reservations to return from Argentina on October 3, 1986. However, when we were getting ready to leave Argentina, we discovered that my brother, Creighton W. Sloan, had withdrawn all of the money from my mother's bank accounts and had stopped her credit cards, thereby preventing her from checking out of her hotel, because she could not pay the bill. My mother then sent a telegram to the bank revoking the power of attorney she had given to Creighton, so finally she was able to check out of the hotel. (Otherwise, she was going to be arrested and put in jail.) We got on the flight. However, when we got to Rio, my mother said she wasn't feeling well and we had to get off the flight.

18. This turned out to be a fantastic stroke of luck. When a hearing was held about this in February, 1991, Officer Lariviere of the Lynchburg Police Department testified that they knew about our flight reservation and had staked out Miami International Airport, planning to arrest us as soon as we stepped off the airplane. They were surprised that we did not get off of that airplane, because they knew that we had checked onto that flight. When Officer Lariviere testified, I had to jog my memory to recall why we had embarked on the flight in Argentina but did not arrive in Miami. The reason was that my mother said that she wasn't feeling well. Even though our seats were checked through to Miami, we had gotten off at Rio.

19. On this point, I must confess that my mother's judgment has always been better than mine. She never liked the idea of having Shelby Roberts as her granddaughter's baby sitter. She especially disliked Mr. Roberts, because he once told my mother to read the Bible and "get saved". If I had listened to my mother and fired Mrs. Roberts years ago, I would never be in the trouble that I am in now.

20. After getting off of the airplane in Rio, my mother refused to proceed onward to the United States, because she said that Creighton was going to have her arrested. We therefore took a circuitous route through Paraguay, Spain, France, and Hungary, finally arriving at Dubai, United Arab Emirates, where I quickly established myself as the leading journalist covering the World Chess Olympiad, which was taking place there. Within just a few days after our arrival in that country, my picture was appearing every day in the local newspapers and was published more frequently than that of Garry Kasparov, the world chess champion.

21. Because of this high visibility, the Roberts found out that I was in Dubai within a few days of our arrival there. A consular officer of the U.S. Embassy approached members of the U.S. Chess Team and told them that there was a warrant for my arrest, but not to tell me. The news of this arrest warrant was eventually leaked to me through Florencio Campomanes, President of the World Chess Federation. I was advised to leave the country with my family immediately.

22. I did not leave the country immediately. Instead, I remained there for the next four years. There is no extradition treaty between the United Arab Emirates and United States. Therefore, my mother and I both felt that this was the safest place to be.

23. In January, 1987, we found out that Judge Miller had frozen all of my mother's bank accounts. Again, this had been done with no jurisdiction. This made it apparent that there was a clear pattern of illegal behavior on the part of the Virginia judges. Neither I nor my mother had ever been served with process, and yet there were warrants out for my arrest and all of my mother's bank accounts were frozen. The freeze on my mother's bank accounts continues to this very day.

24. The warrants for my arrest and the illegal freeze on my mother's bank accounts were all done for the obvious purpose of trying to force us to return to the United States and hand over my daughter, Shamema. However, my mother would much rather live without her money than to live without her granddaughter. This made her that much more determined to stay put in the United Arab Emirates.

25. In June, 1988, I went to Guam and surrendered to the F.B.I. However the charges against me were dropped because Virginia refused to pay the costs of extradition.

26. Finally, Creighton Sloan and Charles Roberts got their big chance when my mother became seriously ill in Bangkok in 1990. Creighton and Roberts hired a gangster named Boonchoo to kidnap my mother and my three children (two of whom had been born in the meantime). Boonchoo got my mother, but I escaped to Malaysia with the three children. Finally, however, the three children were kidnapped in the United Arab Emirates, one month later.

27. Starting in about February, 1987, I wrote numerous letters to Judge Janow demanding that he disqualify himself from the case and suggesting that he resign from the bench altogether. It was clear by that time that Judge Janow was engaging in grossly illegal activities. Actually, I had been suspicious of Judge Janow as early as April, 1986. I had filed an unopposed custody petition in January, 1986. He could easily have scheduled a hearing and concluded the matter in four to six weeks. Why did he delay? Why did he refuse to set the matter for a hearing? In September, 1986, I had a long distance telephone call from Argentina with Ed Meeks, the Amherst County Commonwealth Attorney, in which I complained that Judge Janow was refusing to hear the case and kept postponing it for no reason at all. Ed Meeks assured me that nobody was trying to steal my child. (His assurances were later to be proven wrong.)

28. When my children were finally kidnapped in 1990, four years later, as soon as I knew that they were really gone, it was obvious that Mr. Roberts had taken them. In the intervening four years, Mr. Roberts had regularly written letters to my daughter, asking her to run away from home and then call him collect. My daughter, however, stated that she could not even rememberer what Mr. Roberts looked like since she had not seen him since she was four years old.

29. This is the reason that I filed a federal lawsuit against Judge Janow on December 17, 1990 and then filed with the Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission a complaint against him dated February 3, 1991. Both Judge Janow and I knew that no other judge in Virginia would award custody of my daughter to a third party stranger like Roberts. It was therefore essential for his ego satisfaction not to be recused from this case. This explains his tenacious hanging on to this case and my extreme efforts to remove him from this case. Directly stated, it is clear that my chances are zero of my ever getting my daughter back, as long as Judge Janow is the judge on this case.

30. As soon as Roberts succeeded in having my daughter kidnapped and brought to Virginia, the Amherst County Department of Social Services was named as the nominal custodian, with the Roberts rewarded for their kidnapping by being appointed as foster care parents, paid by the state.

31. The fact is that the only reason that Shamema Honzagool Sloan reached America is that she was kidnapped. She was only one of three of my children who were kidnapped at the same time. The details of how this happened are rather long and complicated and are available in other documents I have filed in other courts. However, the main point is that there is now an international warrant outstanding for the arrest of Mr. Roberts and one other person in connection with this kidnapping. This can be verified by having any suitable law enforcement authority make a call to the Office of Interpol, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C.

32. Because of this, the conduct of this child custody proceeding is a violation of the International Child Abduction Remedies Act, 42 U.S.C. 11601. That act specifically states that international kidnappings are on the rise and, in order to discourage this practice, countries who receive kidnapped children must return them to the country from which they were kidnapped.

33. I wish to point out that after the subject child was kidnapped on October 7, 1990, there was a change of airplanes at London Heathrow Airport. There, Shanti, also known as "Renuka", and the two remaining kidnapped children (the third one, Michael, having been jettisoned along the way) were detained briefly by the British authorities for questioning, because they suspected that a kidnapping might be taking place, especially since the oldest child, Shamema, was traveling without either parent. This means that the child was kidnapped not only in the United Arab Emirates, but also in England. (This fact might be significant with regard to reciprocity related issues.)

34. After the arrival of Shamema in America on October 9, 1990, Charles Roberts filed a custody petition for her on October 23, 1990 in Amherst County, Virginia. I subsequently arrived in Virginia and strenuously objected on the grounds of lack of jurisdiction. This was a clear violation of the Uniform Child Custody Act, which states that a child must be in a state for six months before a judge can take jurisdiction. The judge overruled me and had already prior to my arrival in America entered an order taking jurisdiction over the matter and ordering that the child not be removed from the State of Virginia.

35. I contend that under these facts, Virginia has no jurisdiction over me. It is therefore required by law that the child must be returned to me. Therefore, this action must be dismissed.

36. The child custody proceedings are also illegal under applicable federal law. In particular, Shamema has been detained pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 601 et seq. In particular, 42 U.S.C. 606(a) states: "The term 'dependant child' means a needy child (1) who has been deprived of parental support or care by reason of the death, continued absence from the home ..... or physical or mental incapacity of a parent. ...".

37. In this case, I am not absent from the home. Rather, the child is absent from my home as a result of having been kidnapped. It must be understood that the federal and state taxpayer's money was used to maintain my child in foster care. This is clearly illegal under federal law, because I am perfectly willing and able to take care of my child, provided that she is restored to my home.

38. It must be emphasized that it is unfair to maintain this proceeding against me. I never brought the child to Virginia. Yet, I was told that if I want to get my kidnapped daughter back, I must establish a residence in Virginia and go thorough a long procedure there. This is a clear violation of 42 U.S.C. 11601 and of the Uniform Child Custody Act.

39. There have been a number of recent United States Supreme Court decisions pertaining to this area of law. In particular, there is Wilder v. Virginia Hospital Association, 496 U.S. 498, 110 S. Ct. 2510 (1990) and Suter v. Artist M., 112 S.Ct. 1360 (March 25, 1992). What these cases establish is that the states must follow the federal law in matters pertaining to the departments of social services, because the federal government is where the states get their money from to run these services. The federal law requires the states "to make reasonable efforts to prevent the removal of children from their homes and to facilitate the reunification of families where removal has occurred." In my case, the child has been kidnapped from my home with the use of federal funds. Shamema was kidnapped from my home in the United Arab Emirates. No showing has ever been made that Shamema was not well taken care of as long as she was in my home. It is therefore illegal to require me to come to Virginia to contest this case, when my child should be returned to my home there.

40. The way the current situation came about, to be very brief, is that in June, 1990, Shanti, also known as "Renuka", by complete surprise called me and said that she was in the airport in Dubai, had already received her boarding pass, was about to board a flight to Sri Lanka, and that I should take good care of her daughter Jessica, because she would never see her again. At that time, I was living in the United Arab Emirates. One month later, Shanti called me collect from Sri Lanka and said that she had changed her mind and wanted to come back. She wanted me to send her one thousand dollars for her airplane ticket. I was reluctant to do this.

41. Eventually, Shanti raised the money on her own. She was able to buy her own ticket from Sri Lanka to Dubai. She showed up at my house, but it was deserted, as I had gone with Shamema, Michael, Jessica and my mother to Thailand. Shanti got inside my house in the United Arab Emirates and started making long distance telephone calls all over the world. She finally reached a Mr. Charles Roberts, who was interested in having Shamema kidnapped. Mr. Roberts sent twelve thousand dollars to a professional kidnapper in Thailand named Boonchoo. Boonchoo then allocated two thousand dollars of this money to Shanti. With this money, Shanti was able to fly to Bangkok on September 13, 1990, amidst great fanfare and newspaper publicity in the "Bangkok Post" arranged by Boonchoo, who is one of the most notorious personalities in Thailand.

42. However, as soon as Shanti arrived in Bangkok, she ran away from Boonchoo and rejoined me. Shanti and I ran with the three children. We finally crossed the border by foot into Malaysia, and got back to the United Arab Emirates. When Boonchoo found out that Shanti and I had escaped from his clutches, he called Shanti on the telephone and threatened to kill her if she did not hand over Shamema. Faced with this threat from a man perfectly capable of carrying it out, Shanti finally agreed. Roberts sent the airplane tickets and Shanti and the two children arrived in America on October 9, 1990, after a brief stopover in England. This explains the Interpol warrant for the arrest of both Shanti and Roberts.

43. Complete documentation of the above can be found in the exhibits filed in the case of Sloan v. Roberts, 928 F.2d 399 (4th Cir. 1991) certiorari denied October, 1991, 112 S.Ct. 235 (no opinion). This includes copies of the airplane tickets by which Shanti and Shamema were brought to America, and copies of newspaper articles and other documentary evidence. I have recently filed another federal case regarding this entitled Sloan v. Pattison, E.D.N.Y., CV 92-2388.

44. The main point is that I have now chased all the way around the world in an effort to recover my kidnapped children. No showing has ever been made that I am not a good father. Therefore, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 11601, the child must be returned to me forthwith without the need for further proceedings.

45. The first thing Charles Roberts did after he succeeded in having my children kidnapped and brought to America, is that he applied to the Amherst County Department of Social Services for foster care money. They proceeded to pay him $254 per month to care for my child, plus they paid all the medical, dental and other expenses. Roberts apparently applied for them to pay her tuition to the Temple Baptist School, but I am not aware of whether they agreed to that outrage or not. In order to receive this money, Charles and Shelby Roberts signed a written agreement with the Amherst County Department of Social Services by which they agreed to cooperate with their mandated plan of family reunification, even though it was clear that it was the intention of the Roberts that the family would never be reunified. Obviously, having paid $12,000 to have my daughter kidnapped, the Roberts were not willingly going to agree to give her back to her family.

46. The point is that under applicable law, the Roberts had no standing to sue for the custody of my child, nor was there any legal basis for Judge Janow to award custody to foster care parents. It has been established since Smith v. Organization of Foster Families, 431 U.S. 816 (1977) that foster care parents have no standing to sue for the custody of the child they are paid to take care of. This principle was also enunciated in the 1991 circuit court case of Rakowski v. Hopewell Department of Social Services, in which the custody petition filed by the foster care parents was dismissed with prejudice. 47. However, it was the plan of Judge Janow going back to 1986 that the Roberts be appointed as foster care parents to provide them with a stepping-stone eventually to adopt this child. The fact that Judge Janow was acting as the legal advisor to the Roberts shows his clear bias against the actual parents and requires his disqualification.

48. The clear bias of Judge Gamble is illustrated by his numerous illegal acts since he became a judge and by his deliberate lies in the decision he wrote. In general, every judicial decision contains statements with which one of the parties does not agree. However, the falsehood by Judge Gamble rises well above that, as will be shown.

49. According even to the testimony of Shelby Roberts before both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble, Mrs. Roberts was paid $110 per week to care for Shamema over a period of four years. She contended that some of the money was paid not by me but rather by my mother. However, she never claimed that she did not get paid for her services. She admitted that she got paid "almost all" the money she was due. She never said how much more she felt entitled to, but it was clear that this was a small amount compared with the more than $22,000 which she admitted having received from us over a period of four years.

50. What do Judge Janow and Judge Gamble say about this? The answer is: Nothing. From their decisions, it would appear that Mrs. Roberts took care of my daughter free of charge out of the goodness of her heart. The truth is that Mrs. Roberts did not even take care of her own 90-year-old mother during the last years before she died. (I, myself, was not aware of this until Shamema told me that.)

51. The fact is that during that time, Mrs. Roberts made her living by baby-sitting. She was not working for me for free, nor does she now because she receives donations from her church for keeping my daughter and for converting her to Christianity. Mrs. Roberts kept at least one other child for an even longer period of time than my daughter, under similar conditions, except that she was paid less. That was a child belonging to a Mrs. Campbell, who testified before Judge Janow as a character witness for Mrs. Roberts. (Nobody testified as a character witness for Mr. Roberts). However, Mrs. Roberts never sued for the custody of the child of Mrs. Campbell. The difference was that the child of Mrs. Campbell was not brilliant and gifted like my daughter. A second and more important reason was that Mrs. Campbell was a Christian like Mrs. Roberts, not a Muslim like both myself and the mother of Shamema.

52. A further example of outright falsification by Judge Gamble concerns an airline ticket found in my pocket at the time I was arrested on about September 5, 1991, just 18 hours before I was scheduled to argue my appeal in my petition for a writ of habeas corpus before the Supreme Court of Virginia. Judge Gamble makes it appear like this was a ticket for me to fly to Japan. In reality, this was a round trip ticket for my employer and publisher, Mr. Richard Bozulich, to fly from South Carolina to Hong Kong, with a one hour stopover to change airplanes on the way back in Japan. Anybody who has ever travelled internationally knows that prior to boarding an aircraft on an international flight, passports, visas and tickets are checked carefully. There is no way that a person named Ismail Sloan could board an international flight with a ticket made out to Richard Bozulich. It was also an expired ticket. Judge Gamble claimed in open court that "obviously" I could have cashed in that ticket and had another one issued in my name. This was not true at all. I could not have cashed in that ticket. Any refund would have gone on the credit card which Mr. Bozulich used to purchase the ticket.

53. None of these obvious facts are mentioned by Judge Gamble in his decision. He further does not mention that this was an expired ticket. This was a special "bulk rate" ticket of a type normally issued to a tour group in connection with hotel and rental car reservations. The problem with such bulk rate tickets is that once the date has passed, the tickets are no longer valid for travel. This is what happened to Mr. Bozulich. He missed the flight. I had the ticket with me because he wanted me to see if I could get him a refund, even though refunds are normally not available in such cases.

54. None of this is mentioned in the decision of Judge Gamble. He just says that I had in my pocket a ticket to fly to Japan. His omission of the facts that this was a ticket in the name of another person which had already expired constitutes not merely judicial error. It is deliberate falsification of the facts.

55. Going further, both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble state that the New York Supreme Court had in 1982 divested me of all parental rights with respect to Shamema. This is clearly false. The order of Judge Mercorella of the Bronx Supreme Court was the standard order which awarded custody to the mother and weekly visitation to me, the father. I had my full parental rights. Otherwise, I would not have been given weekly visitation in the local mosque. The respects in which the order was not standard all favored me. Honzagool was given custody only "so long as she remains together with the child in the State of New York". This clause was inserted because of my contention that Honzagool was about to depart imminently with Shamema for Pakistan and that, once departed, she would never return. (In case anyone does not believe that I predicted the exact future course of events of this case, it might be possible to retrieve old television news clippings from New York City in 1982 in which I said exactly that about this highly publicized case.)

56. In response to this, Judge Mercorella apparently felt that he could stop Shamema from being taken to Pakistan by merely ordering that it not be done. This is how I came to have the child. In August, 1982, Honzagool returned to Pakistan without the child and never returned. Since then, I have had custody, not by any court order, but by operation of natural law.

57. Regarding this, Judge Gamble states that I was in contempt and in violation of the order of the New York Court by bringing the child to Virginia. It is true that, on an ex-parte basis, the New York Supreme Court in 1983 issued a contempt order, but that was withdrawn and the entire matter stayed when Judge Fusco found out that Honzagool had long before gone back to Pakistan. If New York was not willing to find me in contempt, how can Judge Gamble in Virginia do so nearly ten years after the fact?

58. Finally, Judge Gamble states that the Roberts are "church oriented" people. That is a considerable understatement. The Roberts are religious fanatics, by their own admission. Not only do they go to church three times a week, but their entire lives consist of church choir, playing church music, performing in church plays and attending church socials. They do nothing with their lives but that and watch religious programs on television. They can barely read and write. They have not one book in their house other than the Bible and other religiously oriented materials. By what legal right are they allowed to impose their life style on my daughter, especially when both of the parents of my daughter are Muslims?

59. Of course, I made a very serious error in employing Mrs. Roberts as a baby sitter. However, at the time of the events in question, this did not appear to be an error. I was employed in Japan by Mr. Richard Bozulich, the same person I am working for now. I could not take my daughter to Japan because of the court order which I myself had obtained which prohibited Shamema from being taken out of the United States. Of course, looking back, I could have found other employment. In retrospect, other courses of action were available to me. However, Mrs. Roberts had worked for me since 1975, typing the legal briefs in the various court cases I was involved in and she was very anxious to work for me as a baby sitter to take care of Shamema. She even testified before Judge Janow in 1991 that she would still like to return to the old arrangement whereby I paid her for baby sitting services. I simply failed to recognize the danger posed by her husband, Charles Roberts, who had his own ideas about the future of my daughter. I also failed to consider the possibility that there might be a judge like Judge Janow, who would have a child kidnapped from the natural parents and given to a crazy man like Charles Roberts. I had survived the war in Afghanistan, which indeed is the way that I got Honzagool, the mother of Shamema, in the first place. How could I have imagined that some day my brilliant daughter would be captured by a bunch of gun-toting, back-country, Bible thumping, rednecks, fully prepared to kill me just to keep me from getting my daughter back?

60. Finally, a very serious falsehood arises when Judge Gamble states in his decision that my daughter does not want to go back with her father. The truth is that my daughter did not speak a single word to Judge Gamble. In fact, my daughter has not uttered a word at all to an adult in the one and a half years since she was kidnapped. She just nods her head up and down or right and left. My daughter has never testified. My daughter has obviously been terrorized by this entire incident. Even the psychologist hired by the Roberts stated in his report that my daughter was in need of psychotherapy, but that he was unable to commence the psychotherapy because my daughter refuses to talk. In short, Judge Gamble is personally participating in the traumatization of this child and yet makes no mention of this in his decision.

61. The truth is that I am blessed with the most devoted daughter that any man could possibly want to have. Everybody who saw my daughter with me in the four years we lived together in the United Arab Emirates remarked at how happy, healthy and intelligent my daughter was and how attached she was to me. However, nobody connected with this case has seen my daughter with me. The Roberts have banned telephone conversations between me and my daughter since she was kidnapped. Even the psychologist hired by the Roberts to present a report for this case was prohibited from seeing me together with my daughter by the Roberts and by Judge Janow. Normally, this sort of psychological testing and evaluation is done with the child and the parent present together. However, Judge Janow ordered that this not be done to prevent me and my daughter from seeing each other. When both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble sought to interview my daughter for this case, she was brought into the courthouse through a back corridor so that she would not be able to see me. At the conclusion of the evidence at the hearing before Judge Janow, both Ed Meeks, the Commonwealth Attorney representing the Amherst County Department of Social Services, and the guardian ad litem for Shamema recommended that the child be returned to me, the father. Ed Meeks further agrued that there was "no way" that the Roberts could come out of this with custody, because they had only served as foster care parents for seven months. Yet, Judge Janow ignored the recommendation by the Amherst County Department of Social Services and awarded custody to his friends, the Roberts.

62. The claim made by the Roberts is that the reason that Shamema refuses to talk is that she promised me that if she was ever kidnapped she would stop talking. However, the truth is that this is not the reason that she doesn't talk. In the last three weeks in 1986, just before I fired Mrs. Roberts as a baby sitter, Shamema also stopped talking when the Roberts or anyone connected with them was around. This was noted in the report made by the social worker at that time. The fact is that my daughter stops talking when she is placed in a traumatic situation, and she has been in that situation in the year and a half since she was kidnapped by Mr. Roberts.

63. In this proceeding, I am asking for a writ of mandamus and prohibition. Both are appropriate. It is well established that a writ of mandamus is the appropriate remedy to remove a judge who is plainly biased. In re United States, 666 F.2d 690 (1st Cir. 1981). Both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble fall into this category. Judge Janow started this case by calling the New York City police and trying to have me arrested and then, two days later, issuing an order on an ex-parte basis giving custody of my daughter to the Amherst Department of Social Services, when that agency had made no request for this relief.

64. In addition, the very motion papers filed by Ms. Gaden here provide an additional ground for demanding the disqualification of Judge Janow. I was not previously aware of the order of Judge Peatross, which is included in the motion by Ms. Gaden, because it had not previously been served upon me. That order enjoins me from saying bad things about Judge Janow and, according to Ms. Gaden, also enjoins me from filing this very petition for a writ of mandamus and prohibition. It is noteworthy that the motion for sanctions filed by Ms. Gaden was argued before Judge Peatross on July 10, 1991, before Judge Janow had made his written decision on this case. The motion for sanctions basically amounts to a lawsuit by Judge Janow against me. Now, under the order of Judge Peatross, I can be put in jail if I say one more word about the fact that Judge Janow happens to be a crook and a criminal.

65. The fact is that the motion for sanctions was argued on July 10, 1991 and Judge Janow came out with his written decision denying me custody of Shamema on about July 18, 1991. This means that already he was suing me for slandering his good name at the time when he entered his order giving Charles and Shelby Roberts, the convicted kidnappers, custody of my daughter. No reasonable person could believe that he could act impartially under such circumstances.

66. There seems to be no specific recusal statute in Virginia. However, there is a federal statute and there is the Code of Judicial Conduct of the American Bar Association. The legal standard clearly set forth is not whether Judge Janow is actually biased but whether reasonable minds would agree that he might be biased. United States v. Ritter, 540 F.2d 459 (10th Cir. 1976). In re City of Houston, 745 F.2d 925 (6th Cir. 1984). A writ of mandamus will issue when a lower court has clearly exceeded its jurisdiction. Kerr v. United States District Court, 426 U.S. 394, 402 (1977); Will v. United States, 389 U.S. 90, 95 (1967); County School Board of Tazewell v. Snead, 92 S.E.2d 497, 198 Va. 100 (1956). In addition, a writ of mandamus will issue when there is a clear abuse of discretion or usurpation of judicial power. Warren v. Bergeron, 831 F. 2d 101 (6th Cir. 1987). Even a waiver of disqualification of a judge cannot be accepted when specific grounds for disqualification are present. U.S. v. Conforte, 624 F.2d 869 (9th Cir. 1980), SCA Services v. Morgan, 557 F.2d 110 (6th Cir. 1977), Pope v. State, 354 S.E.2d 429 (Ga. 1987).

67. Regarding Judge Gamble, he was the lawyer for Alma Coates Dawson, who is a close friend of Charles and Shelby Roberts and who has been suing me since 1986 for what she claims to be the widow's share of my father's estate. On this grounds, Judge Janow disqualified Steve Martin from representing me in this Shamema case, because Steve Martin had become Judge Gamble's law partner while this case was going on, Judge Gamble being the lawyer who was suing me. It is strange that Steve Martin was disqualified without notice to me, and yet Judge Gamble, the opposing lawyer, who is now a judge, is refusing to disqualify himself from the same case. Is it just possible that the reason Judge Gamble refuses to disqualify himself is that he actually is prejudiced against me?

68. In addition to the grounds I gave in my initial petition for a writ of mandamus and prohibition, there are many additional grounds. For example, since this case started, Judge Gamble has placed a standing order with the Clerk of the Circuit Court not to accept for filing any papers submitted by me. Many papers which I filed with the clerk were subsequently removed from the file and mailed back to me, even though file stamps were on them. It is because of this standing order that I was not allowed to file my notice of appeal from the custody order, which I otherwise would have done. Then, without notice to me, Judge Gamble disqualified my second lawyer, James Massie. Judge Gamble also never informed me of his decisions. Even today, I still have not been able to obtain a copy of at least one of his decisions. This is the reason that my appeals were dismissed. I could not appeal because I did not know about his orders and because I was not allowed to file papers with the clerk. Also, my lawyer had been removed from the case without me knowing about it. It is difficult to imagine a more egregious case of misconduct on the part of a judge.

69. Finally, I want to say something about Miss Gaden, the Assistant Attorney General assigned to these cases. I have found her conduct in this entire matter from the beginning to be repulsive and objectionable. Ms. Gaden treats this as routine litigation and her judicial clients as normal clients. Every dirty trick imaginable is okay by her. It must be understood that this is not a routine case for me. I am not fighting for a mere dollar amount. I am fighting for my life. My children have been kidnapped. My daughter is in the custody of a wanton criminal. It has been proven by the California authorities that my youngest daughter, Jessica, who lived in the house of Roberts for three and a half months, has been sexually abused. I must use every means possible to rescue my daughters from the terrible situation they are in. Miss Gaden thinks that this entire matter is a joke. This is her 9 to 5 job, to help these criminals steal my daughters and get away with it. (I know that Judge Janow does not regard this case as a joke. Judge Janow carries a gun for the purpose of shooting me should I try to approach him, and for other reasons as well, because Judge Janow is known to be one of the most hated men in Amherst County. He does not even attend bar association meetings for fear that someone might shoot him.)

70. Typical of the type of things which Ms. Gaden has done, she once filed a motion in the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for sanctions on the ground that I had not served on her papers I had filed in that court. Later, she discovered that somebody in her office had mislaid the papers for about one week, and for that reason she did not get them. However, she never corrected the record in the court or apologized to me. As far as that court is concerned, it still believes that I had filed papers which I had never served upon her.

71. Similarly, in her motion before Judge Peatross, she attributed to me statements which she herself had made. If Ms. Gaden says something in oral argument which is not accurate, it is not my job to correct her. Now, she wants to have me put in jail for saying something which I did not say but actually she said. Now, the most recent dirty trick of Ms. Gaden is that she failed to serve me with a copy of the order of Judge Peatross, and yet now claims that I have violated it, in spite of knowing full well that I never received it.

72. I am attaching to this affidavit a copy of my recent motion to vacate that order of Judge Peatross which I have just filed in his court. My motion speaks for itself.

73. In summary, the situation is this. If this court grants all or any part of my petition for a writ of mandamus and/or prohibition, I will get my kidnapped daughter back. I am confident that even if this court merely removes these two crooked judges from this case, that no other judge in Virginia will agree with the kidnapping and unlawful retention of my daughter. However, this court should go further. It is clear that the courts of Virginia have never had jurisdiction over this matter. In that case, all proceedings should be dismissed and I should be allowed to take my daughter back.

74. On the other hand, if my current petition fails, there is almost no chance that I will ever see my daughter again. Judge Janow and Judge Gamble have got this case so locked up that there is no chance that they will ever let me have my daughter back, and they will consistently deny any appellate review.

75. Finally, I want to mention that I have just learned that there is another case in Amherst County nearly identical to mine. In that case, three little girls were abducted from California and brought to Amherst County by non-parents. This happened just about three weeks after my two daughters were kidnapped and brought to Amherst County in 1990. The case worker in that case is Rick Groff, the same as the case worker in my case. The judge in that case is Judge Janow, the same as the judge in my case. The people who kidnapped those children are evangelical Baptists and are close friends of the Roberts. They live about five miles from the Roberts. The method of abduction was the same. The natural parent was arrested on the false claim of the kidnappers. With the mother in jail, the kidnappers brought the children to Amherst County and got themselves appointed as foster care parents. When the mother was released shortly thereafter, she was not and to this very day has not been allowed to find out where her children are. The father of those three little girls is filing a federal suit in California trying to get his kidnapped daughters back and is making even less progress than I am. Indeed, he is doing worse than me. He now faces a motion to terminate his parental rights by Judge Janow, even though he has been awarded joint custody by the courts of California where the children were born and has never been to Virginia. The existence of that case shows that Judge Janow habitually violates the Uniform Child Custody Act, not only just in my case.

76. Clearly, what has happened here is that the good church-going residents of Amherst County have discovered a wonderful thing. They alone have the right to kidnap children and take them from their parents, because they have the benefit of a judge in Amherst County who favors kidnapping. I have found out that Amherst County has the highest rate of having children taken away from their parents of any county in Virginia, all because of the illegal activities of Judge Janow.

77. Ms. Gaden claims that my petition for a writ of mandamus is not sufficiently specific. Therefore, I will spell out the various things which I believe that this court can and ought to do. First, both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble are clearly biased against me. Even the authorities in Amherst County have privately admitted this. They therefore must be disqualified from this case. (By "this case", I mean the entire group of six to eight cases which have been brought against me, depending on how one counts them).

78. Next, Judge Gamble has two conflicting proceedings against me. He is charging me under 18.2-47 with the felony of interstate kidnapping and also he is charging me with criminal contempt for the same act. Both prosecutions cannot be maintained. The specific provision of 18.2-47 is that the matter cannot be charged as a felony if it is publishable as contempt. Yet, Judge Gamble is trying to do exactly what the statute prohibits. He is charging me with both felony kidnaping and contempt for the same act. A writ of mandamus should issue compelling the dismissal of these proceedings.

79. Although it is not appropriate to go into the specific factual details of that case, the fact is that my daughter and I never left the back yard of my house. Also, my daughter has never testified and indeed has not spoken at all since October, 1990 when she was kidnapped. How can they accused me of taking my daughter against her wishes, an essential element of the crime, when my daughter has never testified at all?

80. Another thing Judge Gamble did was he tried me in absentia in 1991 on the contempt charges brought by Judge Janow in 1986. Again, his method of proceeding was entirely illegal. Since the date of my arrest on November 13, 1990, I have repeatedly demanded an immediate trial on this matter. Both Judge Janow and Judge Gamble refused to try this case. Judge Janow eventually tried the case in a five minute hearing only after I had filed a petition for a writ of mandamus against him. Then, it went to Judge Gamble who repeated the same tactics of Judge Janow. The matter dragged on until December, 1991. I was then summoned to California because my daughter, Jessica, had been taken into foster care as a sexually abused child and was going to be put up for adoption if I did not contest the matter. (Meanwhile, the appeal in the Jessica case was also pending and then dismissed in this court). As soon as I went to California to try to get my daughter there back, Judge Gamble seized that opportunity to try me in absentia.

81. This trial in absentia apparently took place in December, 1991. I was never informed that there would be a trial on that date. I was not the only one who was not informed. The Roberts, the complaining party, also did not know about this and were not present for the trial. Rick Groff of the Amherst County Department of Social Services also did not know about this and was not present. Since no witnesses were present, Judge Gamble took the testimony of Miss Groome, the attorney for the Roberts, even though Miss Groome was not even in the Lynchburg area nor was she yet the attorney for the Roberts in 1986 when the events in question took place. In short, nobody personally familiar with the facts of the case was present at the so-called trial. Moreover, Judge Gamble invented a new charge and a new theory of the case. He convicted me of "violating the status quo" by firing Shelby Roberts as my baby-sitter. This sort of kangaroo court was so blatantly illegal that it requires the disqualification of Judge Gamble. In addition, as soon as the trial was over, Judge Gamble disqualified my attorney from representing me, so he was not even able to inform me of what had happened, nor could he file a notice of appeal. (Again, I did not file a notice of appeal on time because I did not receive a copy of Judge Gamble's decision and have not received a copy of it even until this day.)

82. Numerous cases of the United States Supreme Court have established that a natural parent has a constitutional right to the custody of his children. The state can interfere with this right only after notice, opportunity for a hearing and a finding of unfitness of the natural parent, and then only under the gravest of circumstances. Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166 (1944) and Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645, 651 (1972). None of these constitutional requirements have been complied with here. Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965); Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 231 (1972).

83. This last point is of great importance. The Roberts claim that they acquired "joint custody" as early as April 2, 1986, even though the order of that date does not mention the Roberts nor does it use the term "joint custody". However, the Roberts had never filed a custody petition. Clearly, if the Roberts were seeking custody, I was entitled to notice. There is no legal way that an under-the-table deal could be made between Judge Janow and Charles Roberts giving Charles Roberts, a complete non-relative of my daughter, joint custody, without me even receiving notice before or after the event of his intention to seek custody. The same point applies to the Amherst County Department of Social Services, who never sought custody and who strenuously objected when Judge Janow forced custody upon them. I had a constitutional right to the custody of my daughter under the above cases of Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166 (1944) and Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645, 651 (1972), and clearly I could not be deprived of that right without notice and a hearing.

WHEREFORE, for all of the reasons set forth above, the two respondent judges should be disqualified, these proceedings should be dismissed and the child should be returned to the natural father forthwith.

____________________________
M. Ismail Sloan

Sworn to before me this day of June, 1992

_________________________ NOTARY PUBLIC