JUSTICE BUILDING BLOG

WELCOME TO THE OFFICIAL RICHARD E GERSTEIN JUSTICE BUILDING BLOG. THIS BLOG IS DEDICATED TO JUSTICE BUILDING RUMOR, HUMOR, AND A DISCUSSION ABOUT AND BETWEEN THE JUDGES, LAWYERS AND THE DEDICATED SUPPORT STAFF, CLERKS, COURT REPORTERS, AND CORRECTIONAL OFFICERS WHO LABOR IN THE WORLD OF MIAMI'S CRIMINAL JUSTICE. POST YOUR COMMENTS, OR SEND RUMPOLE A PRIVATE EMAIL AT HOWARDROARK21@GMAIL.COM. Winner of the prestigious Cushing Left Anterior Descending Artery Award.

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

BROWIERD .....AGAIN

BREAKING: 3rd DCA affirms Judge Lederman on Gay Adoption case, here.
Hat tip to South Florida Lawyers, who had it up first.


We take this story
in toto from the JAA Broward Blog.

We are often asked why we despise Broward so much. In all seriousness, much of it comes down to the cowardly- and we say- unethical stance of the Broward SAO to "let the jury decide" when confronted with cases in which the client is clearly innocent.

If the defendant in the following story hadn't spent 25 months of his life in the Broward county jail, this story would be funny. But it's not. Congrats to the Broward PDs for kicking some ass and defending a client.

The Brian Greenwald Report - "Some pretty amazing things have been going on in Courtroom 4900 the past couple of days. No, the ASA's were not handing out nolle prosses in celebration of my transfer to Levenson. Rather, Judge Destry was presiding over a pretty amazing trial. That is to say, "amazing" in the sense that this overcharged, overzealous, and exaggerated prosecution ever made it out of SAO's case filing in the first place! This is yet another story in the continuing saga of "Let the Jury Decide".

Celveccius Delaney had been incarcerated for 25 months, charged with 3 counts of Sexual Battery against his wife. In August of 2008, Mrs. Delaney accused her husband of forcing her into various sexual acts. Today, in less than 5 minutes, a jury of his peers returned with a resounding NOT GUILTY.

To the credit of the ASA assigned to try the case, he kept it fair and fought honorably with what little he had to work with. This prosecution should in no way cast any negativity upon him. But even with his skilled lawyering, the jury simply couldn't look past the GLARING inconsistencies and credibility issues.

For instance, Mrs. Delaney admitted to having consensual sex with Celveccius about a week after accusing him of raping her. He had moved out at this point, and Mrs. Delaney drove down to Miami to have sex with him. Mrs. Delaney also admitted to lying to police on previous occasions involving similar accusations she made against her husband. All this was known prior to charges ever being filed. As if all that wasn't enough, APD
Matt Glassman got her to admit on cross that she never told her husband to stop, or that she didn't even want to have sex with him in the first place!

In the end, Matt Glassman and I walked a very grateful client out of the courtroom a free man! Thankfully, fellow trial guru
Bruce Prober is joining us, as our trio of APD leads take on the good fight before Judge Levenson!!! (I'm sure we'll be hearing more about those adventures in the very near future) ... "

JAABLOG SAYS: DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATH WAITING FOR SATZ TO APOLOGIZE TO THIS GUY EITHER

Rumpole wonders: when will it end up there North Of the Border? When will prosecutors begin following the Code of Ethics and stop prosecuting people they know are innocent or in cases in which they know the evidence does not and never will support a conviction?

We admire the PDs for being gracious winners, but enough is enough. Someone needs to file a bar complaint, and some ASA needs to lose their license so these folks will start taking the "do justice" part of their mandate more seriously.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

The argument of the DCF was that chidlren need both a mother and father, but the court noted that since 1974 the FL adoption law has allowed single people to adopt and in fact over 30% of all FL adoptions are to single people, so that argument fell flat on the ground.

here comes the Q said...

NY JETS Braylon Edward DUI!!! Somebody call the Q!!!

Somebody did....

"we will employ our historical analysis to this dui. Usually we can uncover a reason other than intoxication by closely examining the prior 48-72 hours of the client's life. In some cases we've gone back weeks before arriving at the pivotal event. In this case, with the brutal hits our client took on Sunday, it shouldn't be too hard to discount his actions and a specious and unreliable breath test...."


go get em Q

Anonymous said...

I heard the county court judge- former one- lost all of his money to madoff- got back like 66k lost like 35 million, any truth he's now working arbitration cases in DC?

oy vey fake mendy said...

What is a Golembe?

In Jewish folklore, a golem (גולם; English pronunciation: /ˈɡoʊləm/ GOH-ləm) is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing.[1] The most famous golem narrative involves Judah Loew ben Bezalel, the late 16th century chief rabbi of Prague.

Anonymous said...

The burning question is: Why didn't the judge grant a JOA? Oh, its Broward, sorry.

South Florida Lawyers said...

Thanks Rump, as always.

Charlie is still in charge of the gov in Tallahassee, or maybe not?

Let's see what he does here after an unfortunate waste of time, money, and judicial resources.

BLAKE JUNKET SUCKS said...

Can someone explain while the unemployment rate in Florida approaches 10%, while Florida leads the nation in foreclosures, the powers that be decided that the world just couldn't continue unless the 11th Circuit and the State of Florida tax payers HAD TO SEND JUDGE BLAKE TO ORLANDO TO SPEAK AT A LEGAL CONFERENCE???

Is it just so important to the fate of State and the nation that we spend tax payer money on some crowd pleaser wanna be TV judge's junket? Couldn't Joel Brown have found a needy family in Miami that could have used the 500 or thousand bucks that the tax payers are spending to get Blake to Orlando so he can crack some jokes and make sure everybody loves him?

Just wondering.

Anonymous said...

Can someone please file a bar complaint against the ASA who filed that piece of shit case? Can you at least name him or her so the public ridicule can commence?

Anonymous said...

8:56..........the government also pays for the toilet paper in the courthouse. Think of how many people it could feed if it left a Sears catalog in each stall instead.

Seriously, it's outrageous. I'm sure Blake's never been to Orlando and desperately needed to escape the freezing South Florida climate......oh, wait.......

BTDT

Anonymous said...

The Brian Greenwald Report? What a dipshit. Granted what goes on in Broward and the SAO is f'd up, but posting things of this nature is classless and juvenile. From now on when Brian Greenwald represents someone who is later found guilty, I want his report to discuss his bogus theory of defense that members of the community didn't buy.

Act like you've been there buddy, then I'll respect you.

Anonymous said...

Malicious Prosecution can be tough to prove, but this might be the right set of facts. Clearly, Broward SAO (and the ASAs) don't take the oath seriously. Maybe they'll reconsider when faced with having to explain their actions in a civil courtroom. $$ talks.

Anonymous said...

Rump I wish this were completely limited to Broward. I have a Sex. Batt. case right here in Dade where the victim admits to having accused the defendant of rape in the past and then telling the prosectuor that she lied about the whole thing. She also admits that she accused him of battery once and then told a judge under oath that she had lied about that incident as well. In addition, phone records indicate that she called my client just a few minutes before he came to her house despite the fact that she claims she did not know he was coming and that he made entry with an old key he had. She had recently learned that he had a new girlfriend (motive) and my guy just passed a poly. I am trying to get them to do the right thing but have had no success as of yet....

Anonymous said...

I practice civil stuff in Dade and Broward. I hear crazy things about the criminal courts in Broward. Are circuits in the western and northern parts of the state just as bad or is the SAO and judiciary in Broward an anomaly? I have spoken to experienced defense attorneys who tell me they would much prefer trying a case up north (like counties that are more akin to Georgia and Alabama than Miami) than in Broward. Why is that the case? I don't get it.

Anonymous said...

great to see that third DCA did right thing here and gave a beatdown to the bigoted morons like marco rubio and bill mccollum who are in favor of the ban.

Kudos also to Crist for breaking with his EX-parties bigoted stance on this issue

Anonymous said...

I was an asa for over 10 years and I think Broward is an embarrassment to all prosecutors. they truly do not care if they convict innocent people. i have heard over and over that that office's philosophy is "we will let a jury acquit a defendant" instead of doing the right thing and dropping a case.

I wish someone had the balls and cash to take on Satz

Anonymous said...

The solution is to strip Prosecutors of immunity from civil liability, or create a provision which strips a prosecutor who pushes a case "without justiciable basis" of his/her bar ticket. There is currently a very narrow widow for liability whena prosecutors involves his/herself in the investigative phase of a case, and essentially violates clearly established law, ie suppressess favorable evidence with the meaning of Brady, but its a tough standard to meet, as is overcoming the limit liability afforded law enforcement. If you proof the police acted with malice, you are screwed because then the employing agency is immunized and you are left with a hallow victory. There is some case law that a Federal judge in a suit under 42 USC 1983 can use its equitable power to essentially enjoin the law enforcement officer from continuing to work as a cop.

If defendants who are pushed on frivolous case start suing the alleged victims, cops, and filing bar compliants against the prosecutors and their supperiors for violating their supervisory responsibilities, perhaps things will change.

Anonymous said...

7:10 AM - yes, things will be GREAT when every jerkwad defendant who gets prosecuted (even when the prosection is valid) can clog the civil court docket with bullshit claims of malicious prosecution. Terrific idea.

Anonymous said...

7:10.......you must be new. Offenders already are clogging the system with frivolous rule 3's and file stupid bar complaints against defense lawyers and prosecutors alike. Subject prosecutors to civil liability and no rationale person would ever become one (you get paid half of what top young lawyers make to start with if you finished at or near the top of your law school class as it is).

BTDT

Anonymous said...

3:35 and 9:22 - First, I am not new. I hav been around long enough to remember when prosecutors were not intimidated by John Rivera and his gang; when nolle pros was not considered a four letter word, but a mark of integrity, and when prosecutors adhered to thier stanadard of "seeking justice", not conviction at any prices.

I suggest that neither bar compliants or civil liability will clog the system. It is a travesty when you expose "creative" penmenaship or out right perjury, and prosecutors tell you their division chief will not let them drop the case. When you stumble over suppressed favorable evidence, and not even judges seem to care. As for rule 3's, these have alway been part of the process, the reason they have increased is because of over zealous, less than ethical prosecutions, judges that rubber stamp pleas which are questionable on the factual predicate, and defense lawyers who are on a volume basis. All you have to do is look around to see who the attorneys who are getting the rule 3's.

Yes, there was a time when there were prosecutors who would not cowtow to the PBA or feel reluctant to buck the police, How we miss the days of Janet Reno, and the likes of Ben Daniels, under whose tutelage many fine lawyers were ushered into the practice of law, all taught that ethics and doing the right thing were an integral part of the profession.

There are some fine lawyers in the SAO, but many are stymied by the leadership or lack of leadership. Leadership requires more than political savoir faire.