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Tuesday, December 01, 2015

CAMPAIGN 2016 ..... NEW FILING IN CIRCUIT COURT


THE CAPTAIN REPORTS:

UPDATED:

Your next County Court Judge .....

The JNC has met and narrowed the list of applicants for our next County Court Judge.  We posted on November 25th the names of the 23 applicants which you can find here.

The JNC will be interviewing 16 of those applicants on December 14th:

2:00 p.m. Elijah A. Levitt
2:15 p.m. Griska Mena Rodriguez
2:30 p.m. Karl S.H. Brown
2:45 p.m. Luis Perez-Medina
3:15 p.m. Alexander Spicola Bokor
3:30 p.m. Paul Aiello
3:45 p.m. Gina Beovides
4:00 p.m. Joseph J. Mansfield
4:30 p.m. Ramiro C. Areces
4:45 p.m. Norman Powell
5:00 p.m. Julie H. Nelson
5:10 p.m. Peter S. Heller
5:35 p.m. Gordon C. Murray, Sr.
5:45 p.m. John W. Wylie
5:55 p.m. Jonathan Meltz
6:05 p.m. David Alschuler
 


ELECTION CENTRAL 2016 ....... UPDATE

The number of candidates running for Judge will be growing by one sometime this afternoon when attorney Antonio G. Jimenez's papers are filed with the Division of Elections in Tallahassee.  Jimenez will be running, at least for now, in Group 34, an open seat due to the retirement of Judge Gill Freeman.

Mr. Jimenez has been a member of The Florida Bar for nine years.  He served in the U.S. Navy for five years, went to law school at Stetson and then joined the Miami-Dade SAO.  He spent two years there gaining trial experience before going private.  He has been in private practice for the past seven years.  He has two web sites: duimiami.com and jimenezlegal.com.  He is a member of the Florida Traffic Court Rules Committee.

The races are beginning to get very crowded and we still have five months until the filing deadline of May 6, 2016.

There are currently four contested races in Circuit Court:

Group 9: 

Incumbent Jason Bloch v. Marcia Del Rey

Group 34:  (open seat)

Renee Gordon v. Denise Martinez-Scanziani v. Luis Perez-Medina v. Antonio G. Jimenez

Group 52: (open seat; Judge Michael Genden retiring)

Jodie Breece v. Elena Ortega-Tauler v. Raul A. Perez-Ceballos v. Oscar Rodriguez-Fonts

Group 66:

Incumbent Robert Luck v. Yolly Roberson

Also, Group 39 is an open seat due to the retirement of Judge Jorge Rodriguez-Chomat.  Currently David Young is the only candidate that has filed for that open seat.

There is currently one contested race in County Court:

Group 5:

Incumbent Judge Fred Seraphin has not filed yet, but presumably he will do so.  He already has opposition in Milena Abreu.

Group 7:

Incumbent Judge Ed Newman v. Lizzet Martinez

NORTH OF THE BORDER .......

Yet another Broward Judge is in hot water.  This time it is Judge John Patrick Contini, Circuit Court Judge in the Criminal Division.  What did the Honorable Judge do?  Well, it appears he sent a private email, on his personal email account, to an Assistant Public Defender that regularly appeared before him.  Judge Contini had obtained a well written Downward Departure Sentencing Order from a Judge in Palm Beach County.  Contini thought that it would be a great idea for the APD to read it and adopt it to his cases, where appropriate.  The email was circulated around the PD's office and one APD sent the email to an ASA, and well, you can write the rest of the story for yourself.

Suffice it to say that State Attorney Mike Satz moved for Judge Contini to remove himself from a whole bunch of criminal cases; the judge denied the motion; the issue went up to the 4th DCA, and Contini, to add fuel to the fire, decided to spit in the face of the pit ASAs on several occasions subsequent to the issue going to the 4th.  The JQC report called this conduct by Judge Contini, "discourteous, impatient, and undignified conduct."

Here is "one" of the worst parts of the JQC Report:

"During the course of the State's appeal, a stay was placed on hundreds of cases in your Division.  As a result, many of the cases before your division were effectively frozen, and defendants who were incarcerated had to remain behind bars because you were unable to make any rulings or determinations in their case."

Contini is charged with violating no less than 16 different Canons of the Code of Judicial Conduct.

You can read the entire 71 page JQC's Notice of Formal Charges Report here:
 

CAPTAIN OUT .......
Captain4Justice@gamil.com


17 comments:

Anonymous said...

Don't quit your day jobs.

Anonymous said...

I understand from several good sources that a prominent Hispanic attorney will be filing and running against Young. He doesn't deserve to sit on the bench because he is totally unqualified, was grand standing when he was on the bench to the cameras, has no judicial temperament and left the bench he now seeks again to go on TV as an entertainer. He failed at that as well. He will be soundly defeated. Take that to the bank.

Anonymous said...

Read the comments Contini made about the appeal. He insulted everyone (on the record over and over) at the SAO and AG and made it sound like it was all HIM vs. State. If he had kept his fucking mouth shut, he may have just goten a private slap on the wrist.

To make all of this worse, the fucking 4th DCA waited months to decide if a stay was warranted on hundreds of cases. They are the real bad guys here.

I hope our own idiot prosecutor with a robe (Brennan) gets hit with a complaint too. What she did was far worse. She secretly and actively helped the State and AG win an appeal. Far worse if you ask me.

Anonymous said...

Why does no one have the b*lls to file against Young? If he walks into this unopposed, well.......wow

Anonymous said...

12:01 a.m. - what about you then? Where are your b*lls?

Anonymous said...

Sounds like Jiminez broke his three year commitment to the SAO. Is that accurate? (I assume he had one since everyone else did). If he broke it, was he given permission? Did he have any extenuating circumstances that forced him to do so?

Anonymous said...

Even as a prosecutor, Meltz impressed me with his knowledge, integrity, sense of fairness, and demeanor. I think he'd make an excellent judge.

BTDT

Anonymous said...

One of the hispanic candidates will jump in against young. They would be crazy to go in a three way race with other hispanics instead of just jumping in against young. Its a presidential election in miami. Names matter and you got a better shot against a gringo in november than against other hispanics in august.

Anonymous said...

To 12:01: Because he has raised $173,630.60 and has name recognition. It takes money to run an effective judicial campaign. Who knows maybe someone in one of the other groups will raise enough cash between now and May to make a run against him in May. The groups are not set in stone. Right now its all about raising capital. Then you file qualifying papers in May 2016. Or withdraw if you don't raise the cash. Its all fluid. Hopefully someone raises the cash and goes up against him.

Anonymous said...

Poor Peacock

Anonymous said...

David was a good judge and deserves to be back on the bench. Anyone would be crazy to run against him. He never coward to to State or anyone else. He did what he felt was the right thing to do. There are others who deserve to be challenged. Too many feel comfortable bowing and catering to the big firms when they go to civil, and desrve to have to run a campaign so they learn that the big firms cannot save them from a defeat at the polls. So many suck up during the electoral cycle or while seeking a Federal judgship only to return to their old arrogant ways when the game is over. All of those (you know who you are) need to learn the lesson that arrogance and stoking the elite catches up to you sooner or later. All said, I predict several of those will have challengers before the starting bell sounds.

Anonymous said...

The point is David should have to go through an election.....get out there and campaign for it and earn it!!! No one should ever just slide into an unopposed judgeship (though it does happen). Someone needs to jump in that race......

Seraphin deserves opposition---he deserves 4 people to run against him.....or maybe more.....

Anonymous said...

BTDT - Meltz is great but he was never an ASA. No, he was a Public Defender and a damn good one at that.

Anonymous said...

I don't know Jiminez but going by the questions he asks on the list service, I would say that he isn't ready to be a judge.

Anonymous said...

448---Sorry, I was unclear. I was talking about my experience dealing with him back in the day when I was a prosecutor and he was an APD. He was one of the few I opposed who I felt I could actually trust. A man of great skill and integrity.

Ted Mastos said...

On a quiet afternoon waiting for clients who never show up to pay their fee, as it is the holiday season, I happened to scroll the blog and read the comments about judicial candidates. It pains me to read some of the comments, because some of the most vicious ones are always splashed on the screen by someone only known as anonymous. Freedom of speech is one of our most cherished rights in this country, but I would like to think that a person has enough balls to put their name on whatever opinion they wish to express. It seems so gutless to attack someone in this forum and not be willing to say who you are.

As for me, Theodore G. Mastos, I have known David Young for many years. He prosecuted in front of me when I was a circuit judge, and I had the pleasure of appearing in front of him during his tenure on the bench. I am supporting him now and will continue to support him.

Anonymous said...

If you think these folks have no business on the bench you all better get ready. Rumor from the DCBA is that Jane Muir thinks she can replace Judge Muir when she retires. Yep. Jane Muir the attorney that has yet to practice law, but applies for every award. God help us.