IN THE SUPERIOR COURT
OF FULTON COUNTY
GEORGIA
DEZSO BENEDEK, p
)
Plaintiff, ) CIVIL ACTION NO.
) 2014-CV-246185
vs. ) JURY TRIAL DEMANDED
)
SAM OLENS the ATTORNEY GENERAL OF |)
GEORGIA, JANE GATEWOOD; JUDITH )
SHAW; KASEE LASTER, and NOEL )
FALLOWS )
Defendants.
SECOND AFFIDAVIT OF STEPHEN F. HUMPHREYS
I, Stephen F. Humphreys, duly sworn before the below-named
officer authorized to administer oaths, do hereby attest as follows:
1
Iam over the age of 18 and am not suffering from any mental or
physical disability that would impair or prevent me from testifying
under oath. | attest to the truth of the facts stated herein from my own
personal knowledge.
2.
Iam an attorney licensed to practice in the state of Georgia, where
I graduated summa cum laude, First Honor Graduate, from theUniversity of Georgia School of Law. In addition to the private practice
of law, | performed public service as a legislative aide in the United
States Senate, as Special Assistant to the President of the American Bar
Association, as U.S. representative to the Barreaux de Paris, Bruxelles,
Lausanne, et Montréal, as law clerk to U.S. District Judge Sam Pointer, as
Special Counsel to the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, and as U.S State
Department special envoy to both Cuba and Iraq,
3.
lalso performed a public service in defending the Plaintiff, UGA
Professor Dezso Benedek, an outspoken critic of then-UGA President
Michael Adams, in an attempted tenure revocation action prosecuted by
the Attorney General of Georgia at the behest of President Adams, for
which well over half a million dollars in legal services ended up being
performed without payment up to the point that the effort to revoke his
tenure failed because the charges were unfounded.
4,
As part of that lengthy representation, | defended Professor
Benedek at a three-day evidentiary hearing on his tenure revocation at
UGA in July of 2010, at which Benedek’s accusers—the Defendants in
the instant action filed in Fulton Superior Court--gave sworn testimonythat support Benedek’s claims in this lawsuit that Defendants
manufactured false evidence to support knowingly false charges against
Benedek in an intentional and malicious effort to ruin his career. In
addition, documents disproving the charges against Benedek from
Defendants’ own records were produced and authenticated—including
highly relevant documents, the existence of which the Attorney General
attempted to deny and conceal, as | witnessed first-hand.
5.
The attempted tenure revocation proceedings were governed by a
broad discovery agreement in which all documents relevant to the
charges brought by the Attorney General were supposed to be produced
to each opposing counsel. Yet a large volume of exculpatory documents
were not produced by the Attorney General, including correspondence
between UGA and Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest (ELTE) that
proved the tenure revocation charges related to ELTE were false, and
additional UGA documents disproving the ELTE charges that were also
concealed by Benedek’s accusers, as well as a UGA document generated
by Defendant Judith Shaw proving that the tenure revocation charges
against Professor Benedek with respect to the UGA program at Jilin
University in China were also false. Since these documents were in thepossession of the Attorney General prior to the hearing, and the
Attorney General tried to conceal their existence, they also prove that
the Defendants in the instant action, including the Attorney General,
knew beforehand that the charges were false and acted with malice
against Professor Benedek.
6.
Accordingly, the attempt to revoke Professor Benedek's tenure
failed when it was proven at the evidentiary hearing, upon sworn
testimony and authenticated records of Benedek’s accusers, that the
charges against Benedek were false, that Benedek’s accusers knew the
charges were false before they were brought, that false evidence was
manufactured to support the knowingly false charges, with the
knowledge of President Adams and the Attorney General, and that the
Attorney General withheld exculpatory documents in discovery and
otherwise concealed documents damaging to the Attorney General's
case, and denied their existence through a series of perjuries and
subornation of perjury.
The exhibits detailed in this affidavit represent some, but not all of
the evidence instrumental in proving that the charges against Benedekwere both knowingly false and fraudulently concocted, in violation of
the Georgia RICO Act and enumerated provisions of the Georgia
Criminal Code.
8.
The exhibits verified in this affidavit include a true and correct
copy of a UGA document authenticated at the tenure revocation hearing
related to the charges against Benedek for the Jilin program—namely a
memo from Dean Kavita Pandit and OIE Director Judith Shaw ordering
termination of the Jilin program. The Attorney General did not produce
this Jilin memo in discovery, but attempted to conceal it, as it
contradicted the tenure revocation charge brought by the Attorney
General that Benedek destroyed the Jilin program.
9.
The exhibits verified in this affidavit include true and correct
copies of sworn testimony related to the Jilin program, duly recorded by
a court reporter, from the official transcript of the tenure revocation
hearing, as follows:
-Jane Gatewood (whose evasion of service and absence from this
litigation was abetted by the actions of the Attorney General) admittingthe Attorney General had possession, prior to the evidentiary hearing, of
the Jilin memo the Attorney General attempted to conceal
-Judith Shaw (who ordered the termination of the Jilin program
Benedek was accused of destroying) admitting that she would not have
accused Benedek of destroying the Jilin program if she had known he
was in possession of the Jilin memo in which she ordered termination of
the Jilin program
-Kasee Laster denying the existence of the UGA-ELTE Cooperative
Agreement (asserted by Benedek in defense of the charges related to
ELTE), and claiming she and her Office of International Education
colleagues, including Jane Gatewood, had searched everywhere for such
an agreement and been unable to locate it (it was later discovered with
a transmittal letter signed by Gatewood, who evaded service and is
absent from this litigation).
10.
The exhibits verified by this affidavit also include UGA documents
authenticated at the tenure revocation hearing related to the charges
against Benedek for the Eovos Lorand University in Budapest (ELTE)
study abroad program.
aaThe exhibits include correspondence between UGA and ELTE in
which ELTE verified that that ELTE transfer credit transcripts the
Attorney General accused Benedek of falsifying were, in fact, authentic
ELTE transcripts, refuting the charges the Attorney General brought
anyway (while attempting to conceal this exculpatory correspondence).
12.
The exhibits also include a true and correct copy of an Open
Records request to UGA by a UGA student I represent, seeking all
correspondence by UGA using the student’s name and Social Security
number, and sending out his ELTE transcript without his knowledge or
consent, in an attempt to create evidence the ELTE transfer credit
transcripts had been falsified (after ELTE had verified that they were
authentic transcripts issued by ELTE).
13.
This portion of the exhibits also includes a true and correct copy
of the response the student received from UGA denying that any
responsive documents existed—though the correspondence related to
the unauthorized and illegal use of this student's transcript was later
found to exist and produced at the hearing, as well as transmitteddirectly to then-UGA President Michael Adams in complaints about
these illegal actions.
14,
The exhibits verified by this affidavit include a true and correct
copy of the follow-up letter from the UGA student--after UGA denied the
existence of the documents, and then the same documents were
procured from recipients of the correspondence UGA denied. This
follow-up letter, including copies of the correspondence previously
denied by UGA, advised President Adams of the scheme, denied by UGA,
to send out protected student information on false pretexts without
their knowledge or consent (committing identity fraud, mail fraud, wire
fraud and computer fraud by which this UGA student's identity was
illegally misappropriated in order to manufacture false evidence of
charges that were known to be false).
15,
The exhibits verified by this affidavit include true and correct
copies of attachments to the follow-up letter notice to Adams,
correspondence sent by UGA in the student's name, as well as UGA’s
response to the student's Open Records request falsely denying theexistence of those same attachments (procured from recipients after
UGA falsely denied their existence).
16.
The exhibits verified by this affidavit include true and correct
copies of UGA documents authenticated at the tenure revocation
hearing, in the form of further examples of the correspondence
requested in the Open Records request, by which Defendants
impersonated UGA students in an attempt to create a false paper trail,
the existence of which was denied in response to the Open Records
request. These include a letter from UGA Dean Noel Fallows illegally
sending out student transcripts to be reviewed under false pretenses,
specifically warning the recipient that this activity be kept secret from
the students whose identities were being thus misappropriated, They
also include correspondence falsely claiming a UGA student was
requesting evaluation of her ELTE transcript because she was applying
to graduate school—when the student in question was not applying to
grad school and had no knowledge of this correspondence initiated in
her name, using her name and Social Security number, the existence of
which was denied in response to the Open Records request.
17.Defendants denied under oath the existence of the UGA-ELTE
Cooperative Agreement. Yet the exhibits include a true and correct copy
of the agreement I located in files of the UGA Department of
Comparative Literature. The agreement itself is signed by President
Adams, responsible under Regent's policy for every facet of the tenure
revocation proceedings. The Agreement, the existence of which
Defendants denied under oath, was accompanied by a transmittal letter
signed by UGA official Jane Gatewood, who was called by the Attorney
General to testify against Benedek at the hearing.
18.
Gatewood is also a named defendant in the instant Fulton
Superior Court action. Gatewood would provide critical evidence in this
action with respect to the Attorney General's deliberate concealment of
the Jilin memo, as well as Defendants’ perjured testimony on the
knowingly false Jilin charges and the false denials under oath
concerning the existence of the exculpatory UGA-ELTE Cooperative
Agreement. However, Gatewood evaded service and left Georgia. Her
current whereabouts is unknown and Plaintiff has not been able to
make her an official party to this action. A true and correct copy of theaffidavit of due diligence restating the unsuccessful efforts to serve her,
including repeated attempts at her job at UGA, before she left the state,
is included as an exhibit
19.
‘The Attorney General of Georgia, representing Gatewood at the time and
with notice of her intended departure from the state, refused all
cooperation in ascertaining the timing of her known departure and
effecting service on her. A true and correct copy of the email
correspondence I sent to and received from the Attorney General in this
regard is included as an exhibit.
20.
Notwithstanding the exhibits supporting the Motion for Sanctions
Against the Attorney General documenting the commission of criminal
RICO predicate acts ranging from violations of OCGA 16-10-20 and
evidence tampering to perjury and subornation of perjury, the affiant
has been subjected to a barrage of disparaging comments from Attorney
General Sam Olens, both within the court proceedings and in public
statements to the media, dismissing the extensively-documented
allegations of the Complaint as “wild charges,” “attention-seeking
gimmicks,” frivolous,” “nonsensical,” and “outlandish conspiracy
qttheories” that “do not merit investigation” and on which the Attorney
General “will not waste any more time.” I consider these statements
defamatory as they are knowingly and demonstrably false, given the
exhibits and other extensive documentation of the allegations, and
injurious to my professional reputation in falsely claiming I brought a
frivolous action. A true and correct copy of one Atlanta Journal-
Constitution article, documenting the Attorney General's dismissal of
the documentation and refusal to investigate, is included as an exhibit
downloaded from the publication's website.
Sworn and subscribed before fne this _U+- day of February, 2015.
Notary Public OF
My commission expires: G- 3 0/7
12