Colorado judge blocks whistleblower rabbi from firing ‘public pretender’ lawyers in a scheme to sabotage his defense and silence his federal lawsuit.
LUTHMANN NOTE: This is not a mistake. It is not incompetence. It is not bureaucracy gone wrong. It is power protecting itself. When a judge blocks a man from firing lawyers who refuse to defend him, that is not “procedure.” That is coercion. When courts bury evidence, ignore ADA rights, and silence a whistleblower who already embarrassed them in federal court, that is retaliation. Full stop. Colorado didn’t just fail Rabbi Bellinsky. It closed ranks against him. This is how court cartels operate: grind the dissenter down, gaslight the public, and dare anyone to stop them. I see it. I’ve lived it. And it never ends well for the corrupt.
By Rick LaRivière with Richard Luthmann and Michael Volpe
Judge Lets ‘Public Pretenders’ Gag Whistleblower’s Defense
When Rabbi Jacob Bellinsky moved to fire his court-appointed lawyers, a Colorado judge effectively gagged him instead. In a stunning December 17, 2025, order, Judge Dinsmore Tuttle flatly refused to hear any of Bellinsky’s motions unless his public defenders approved them.
In other words, the very attorneys Bellinsky accuses of sabotaging him were given veto power over his pleas.
Legal insiders say they’ve never seen such a blatant catch-22. Bellinsky had just filed four emergency motions – including one to formally fire the Public Defender’s Office for cause – but Judge Tuttle shut them all down sight unseen.
The judge “declined to take any further action” on Bellinsky’s filings unless his defense counsel asked her to, an almost unheard-of stance that tips the scales against the whistleblower defendant.
Bellinsky derisively calls the state-appointed lawyers “public pretenders,” and he says he has every reason to fire them. According to Bellinsky, these lawyers from the Colorado Public Defender’s Office have refused to defend him at all.
HERE is the motion that Judge Tuttle won’t read, containing the facts that the public pretenders won’t admit.
He’s documented their failures in writing: they ignored critical emails, failed to submit key evidence, and violated his disability rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Yet Judge Tuttle’s order means Bellinsky is stuck with the saboteurs – or forced to represent himself, with the court refusing even to read his pro se pleas. Bellinsky argues that the courts have effectively rigged the process to silence him.
With Tuttle siding against him at every step, the rabbi’s fight for a fair hearing has only grown more desperate.
Colorado Court Cartel Railroads Rabbi: Public Defender Sabotage – Evidence Buried, ADA Rights Ignored
Records show Bellinsky’s public defenders sabotaged his defense. In one email, Public Defender Ara Ohanian told Bellinsky, “We make all the other strategic decisions in your representation,” making clear the lawyers, not the client, call the shots.
Bellinsky had implored his lawyers to file exculpatory evidence and to accommodate his disabilities, but Ohanian dismissed his request and told him to “ask the Court” for a hearing instead.
According to sworn filings, Bellinsky’s appointed lawyers refused to file key documents – including an ADA disability notice he submitted on September 8. They sat on that notice for three months, depriving the court of vital information for his defense.
They also withheld evidence of official misconduct, preventing the judge from seeing Bellinsky’s federal court filings that exposed the retaliatory nature of the case.
When Bellinsky tried to file those materials himself, the court clerk refused to accept them on the grounds that, because he was “represented,” no pro se filings would be accepted.
“The result is deliberate record obstruction,” Bellinsky wrote, saying the court was being “kept blind to dispositive information by the very office appointed to defend him.”
Bellinsky’s “public pretender” lawyers even declined to subpoena any exculpatory witnesses or obtain critical records to challenge the case against him, and they refused to acknowledge his communications.
Ohanian stated, “We are not going to confirm receipt of every email you send.”
Ara Ohanian can act with impunity. Why? Because he’s banging the boss. He’s married to Colorado Chief Deputy Public Defender Lucienne Ohanian.
Bellinsky has documented disabilities, and he says his attorneys violated the ADA. They ignored his need for “trauma-informed” communication and insisted on verbal-only discussions that aggravated his condition.
By stonewalling him and flouting the ADA, they denied Bellinsky meaningful participation in his defense, in violation of Title II of the ADA.
Colorado Court Cartel Railroads Rabbi: From Family Court Hell to Retaliatory Probation Trap
Bellinsky’s nightmare began in family court and spiraled into a criminal vendetta. The rabbi says a corrupt cabal of judges and lawyers stole his children through “coordinated abuse of judicial power.”
“For four years, I have been unlawfully separated from all contact with my minor children,” Bellinsky lamented.
His ex-wife, Rachel Zinna Galán, obtained multiple fraudulent restraining orders with the help of her attorney, Andrew Hart – moves that Bellinsky calls an “enormous ‘color of law’ crime spree” designed to set him up.
In 2022, they even jailed Bellinsky for allegedly violating an order because he sent his daughter a text – “Have [daughter] call me” – during a holiday.
“They threw me in jail for reaching out to my child,” Bellinsky recalled.
Bellinsky took his battle to federal court and scored a significant victory. In July 2025, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the dismissal of Bellinsky’s civil rights lawsuit against Colorado’s judicial actors.
That win exposed evidence of judicial misconduct and child-custody fraud, and it emboldened Bellinsky’s crusade to hold the “Colorado court cartel” accountable.
But it also put a target on his back. Insiders say Colorado’s legal elite were incensed by Bellinsky’s win and desperate to shut him up.
In September 2025, Bellinsky had a Florida sheriff serve Galán with legal papers – a lawful act that Colorado twisted into a probation violation. At a routine probation check-in, probation officers tipped off by Galán’s camp ambushed him and slapped on the handcuffs.
“They set me up because I fought back,” Bellinsky said, calling the arrest retaliation.
Journalist Michael Volpe summed it up: “If you can’t beat him in court, trap him outside it.”
Colorado Court Cartel Railroads Rabbi: Federal Lawsuit Exposes Scheme – and Colorado Strikes Back
The same misconduct unfolding in Judge Tuttle’s courtroom is front and center in Bellinsky’s federal lawsuit. In Bellinsky v. Galán, he is suing his ex-wife, her lawyer, and a host of Colorado officials – including top judges and prosecutors – for brazen civil-rights violations.
His filings lay out an outrageous conspiracy: he says state actors and private parties colluded across state lines to fabricate a case against him in retaliation for his whistleblowing.
A key element of that plot is the very probation “revocation” now being used to threaten him with incarceration. On December 9, Bellinsky put the authorities on notice that the revocation push – premised on protected acts – is “retaliatory, factually unsupported, and constitutionally infirm.”
Instead of heeding the warning, the state only doubled down. Judge Tuttle’s gag order shows a determination to preserve this fraudulent revocation.
“The persistence of this case is not the result of [my] noncompliance,” Bellinsky wrote, “but of record distortion, retaliatory escalation, legal reprisal, and the refusal of appointed counsel to defend against a fraudulent narrative.”
If they succeed in branding Bellinsky a violator, it could wreck his credibility and derail his federal case.
The implications go far beyond one man’s case. Richard Luthmann calls it “a brazen frame-up by a bunch of judicial gangsters” and says, “This isn’t justice. It’s a hit job.”
For Bellinsky and his supporters, the conclusion is clear: Colorado is railroading a rabbi to cover up systemic misconduct in its judiciary.
The so-called guardians of justice have become a cartel willing to break every rule to silence the man who dared to expose them.
