Victory! Hosking defeats Lemkau!

It started with a tragedy and a community rose up and decided to fight back! We knew it would be an uphill battle. Who defeats a sitting judge in the largest county in the continental United States?

Someone like James Hosking, who at great personal cost, stepped up to do what was right. With intregity and courage, James waged a campaign for the dignity the office deserved and was sorely lacking.

For those who criticize and say "it was only one case" "one bad decision" I ask: What value would you place on your 9 month old son or grandchild?

Lemkau took every opportunity to make excuses for himself, even blaming Katie and other law enforcement, never accepting his responsiblity for not protecting baby Wyatt.

The children of San Bernardino County are safer tonight. Thank you voters of San Bernardino County. Thank you to all the members of our community and FB community for all you did to remove this judge.

Thank you soon-to-be Judge James J. Hosking. Last, but certainly not least, thank you Katie for your courage and strength and love for Wyatt.

An Inconvenient Murder

That's how Judge Robert Lemkau describes the timing of baby Wyatt Garcia's murder by his father, Stephen Garcia, in his first interview with the AP, when he said, "It occurred at the worst possible time for my candidacy."

Lemkau defended his ruling, allowing Garcia to continue with unsupervised visitation, which led to Wyatt's murder 10 days after the hearing:

The evidence Tagle showed him consisted of two long e-mails titled "Necessary Evil" written by a "John Hancock" that was a fictionalized account of a father killing himself and his 9-month-old son after his ex-girlfriend refuses to come back.

The ex-boyfriend in a sworn statement and again in front of the judge, denied writing the e-mails even though Tagle insisted that Garcia had posted a similar story to his personal Web site.

Lemkau said that, since he had no way of determining on Jan. 21 who was lying and that Garcia produced photographs showing Tagle drinking while holding the baby, he was not going to cut off custody to the father. He noted that two other judges previously found Garcia wasn't a threat when they denied similar requests last year.

That's not quite the whole story. According to Katie's mother, a San Bernardino County Sheriff's deputy (officer Cook) that saw the evidence immediately stopped the visitation and got Joshua Tree Judge Mazurek to sign a temporary restraining order the day after he had originally denied one. Lemkau's ruling dismissed it.

Lemkau claims he was "crushed" when he heard about Wyatt's murder. He didn't sleep for "a week". Did he reach out to Katie Tagle and offer even his condolences? No. Katie had to go before him and then he read a statement in court surrounded by extra security ... for him.

Judge Lemkau's term is up. He is up for election on June 8, 2010. He was appointed in 2007 by Governor Schwarzenegger. Somehow this race has been used by some to further the discussion by Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, and others, as a reason to stop elections by the people of our judges. My opinion is that this is exactly why the people must have an opportunity to rid our justice system of the Lemkau's in the court.

James Hosking is running against Robert Lemkau. Your vote is needed on June 8th, for all the Baby Wyatt's in this county.

When Judges Kill

Family court judges literally hold lives in their hands. The case of 9 month old Wyatt Garcia is a prime example of what can go wrong when a judge automatically assumes a parent is lying just to get back at the other parent.

Judge Robert Lemkau could have ordered supervised visitation to ensure Wyatt Garcia's safety.

He could have given temporary custody of Wyatt to Katie Tagle's sister while he investigated her evidence of death threats against her son.

He did neither.

Not only did he not protect Wyatt, he didn't seem to be bothered by her frantic pleas to keep her son safe after his father, Stephen Garcia told her he was going to kill the baby and himself.

How many more children will die before something is done to protect innocent lives?

How many more baby Wyatts have to die before our judicial system wakes up and realizes they have to take these threats seriously?

Join our community tomorrow at the Victorville Courthouse at 7:45am to
support Katie Tagle and tell Judge Lemkau he must resign!

Judge Robert Lemkau needs to go!

In early January, Heather went to night court for a traffic violation. Her court date was earlier, but she was in Cedars-Sinai and couldn't attend. After calling the court clerk's office to see if Dave could attend in her place, she was told to bring her hospital records and ask the judge to reopen the case. They do it all the time.

Long story short, she went to court and not only did the judge not allow her to have her case re-opened, (she was there for hours and not allowed to use the restroom or put her legs up as her doctor ordered) and when she tried to explain her side of things, the judge had her bodily thrown out of court. She was 30 weeks pregnant.

So, who was this judge? Robert Lemkau. The same judge that called Katie Tagle a liar and allowed Stephen Garcia to take their 9 month old baby, Wyatt on visitation. Stephen Garcia shot and killed Wyatt and himself 10 days later as he had threatened. The judge did not believe Katie.


“My supposition, ma’am, is that you’re lying.” Those were Judge Robert Lemkau’s words to Katie Tagle of Yucca Valley as she appeared in his Victorville courtroom Jan. 21, seeking a restraining order that would prevent her ex-boyfriend, Stephen Garcia, from having unsupervised, Thursday-to-Sunday visits with their son, 9-month-old Wyatt Garcia. The judge turned down Tagle’s petition for an ex parte restraining order — a kind of emergency order made without a full hearing.

Ten days later, in the early-morning hours of Jan. 31, Stephen Garcia allegedly shot his son before turning his pistol on himself on a road in the snowy mountains of Twin Peaks.

Transcripts are here. Please read them, then support James Hosking and remove Judge Lemkau from the bench!