People are looking closely at the appointment of Judge Francis, and they are not liking what they see. The first item we post is with FULL permission from the author who originally posted this on FACDL (so do not call Interpol to complain); the second item is a shorter but equally troubling comment on this blog. A successful candidate for the Florida Supreme Court who misspelled the name of the court on her application? Very troubling. Yes you read that right. In her application to be a Justice of the Suprme Court of Florida, Judge Francis misspelled Supreeeme Court. And yet the Governor, giving careful consideration to the legal scholarship of all candidates decided this less than ten year member of the Bar, with no trial experience, was the best and the brightest of those who applied. Hmmmmm……. maybe it was the hydroxychloroquine the governor was taking.*
Dear Colleagues, I urge the members to read Judge Francis's application (found by googling "Renata Francis Application") for the Supreme Court. It is sadly lacking in indicia of the kind of intellectual maturity, deep legal experience, or any of the other qualities which could make her due anything other than a kind letter of rejection, if it had been received by a JNC which was not so poisoned by partisanship and knee-jerk adherence to mere membership in an association (the Federalist Society) that it is wholly unable to recommend truly able lawyers to the high court.
Her writing samples are paeans to "textualism," and both turgid and prolix. (All are appellate opinions she wrote as a circuit judge and are undated.)
Her employment record shows a mere 9 months (at most) at Shutts & Bown, where she worked in PIP defense, at a low level. No other law firm experience.
She has absolutely no trial experience as an attorney, and her entire criminal experience was limited to serving as a bail judge.
The most impressive part of her 1st DCA clerkship was working for Judge Peter Webster, but she does not list him as a reference. (He was an adjunct at her law school --- the for-profit and low-rated Florida Coastal -- while she was a student there.)
And what kind of background investigation did they do on her: she has only lived in Florida for 12 years; prior to that, she had lived in a foreign country. Her application is dated December 24, 2019, her name went up to the governor shortly thereafter.
Her rocketing from a no-experience attorney through county court in Miami-Dade and then circuit in Palm Beach County is both unprecedented and puzzling.
It must be noted, too, that her present husband is reported as being a "consultant," no further information. (She reports a divorce in Jacksonville in 2009.)
Think back on former appointees: Gerald Kogan (decades as a trial lawyer), Fred Lewis (long time appellate lawyer), Peggy Quince (decades in AG's Office), Rosemary Barkett (long time trial lawyer), Raul Cantero (heavy appellate experience). And so on.
The lack of time as a lawyer is the most appalling part: less than 10 years in all! Can't even take the bench until September!
A sad day.
And this comment on the blog:
OMG, 2 misspellings in question 22 alone. Misspelled supreme court in question 51. She's also a carpetbagger. Moved to Florida to go to law school. 7 years as a law clerk, 8 months as a lawyer. ZERO trials! No publications. In one of her writing samples she misidentifies which parties the lawyers represent, writing that Abigail Price-Williams, THE County Attorney represents the petitioner against Miami-Dade County. This is a joke. She is supposed to replace Lagoa or Luck?! Come on, man!
*Yes we know we misspelled Supreme Court twice. We were trying to prove a point.
While you're at it, please note that John Couriel's application also contained typos/misspellings.
ReplyDeleteActually, there are 3 misspellings on #22 of Francis' application, not to mention numerous grammatical errors throughout the rest of the form. Personally, I like Renatha and found her pleasant and fair when she presided over bond court. But her dearth of experience and basic legal writing skills should have disqualified her from contention. I hate to say it, but this appointment reeks of tokenism and will simply allow Desantis to crow about appointing a black Caribbean female to the FSC.
ReplyDeleteLibs you forget she is a person of color... all is well!
ReplyDeleteHer nomination is inexplicable on almost any level. However, and this is a big HOWEVER, you have to consider the political backdrop. De Santis owes his electoral victory to the support of black women, more specifically, black women who send their children to charter schools. The election data bear this out. He got enough of their votes to eke out a victory. Now ask yourself: what does the average black female mom take away from this? That Francis went to a bozo law school or that De Santis appointed a black women to the court? The optics tell it all. I think it is a horrible pick but this is the political reality.
ReplyDeleteDeSantis must be following the advice of Dr. Fake Bone Spurs, and injecting clorox into his brain and a UV light up his anis with his appointment of vastly unqualified Francis. Can anyone with a straight face look you in the eye and tell you she is the best qualified of those who applied? She is probably the worst. Could not even with spell check correctly spell the name of the Court to which she applied.
ReplyDeleteChina's crackdown on Hong Kong begins in earnest. All three Ren A Hong Kong Venue noodle shops closed for political subversion. How can the largest purveyor of dumplings in Asia be politically subversive?
ReplyDeletealso 11:26 if you are going to attack our newest supreme court justice for spelling errors, then it's anus, not "anis".
Just saying….
Do yourself a favor -
ReplyDeleteCompare any of Judge Mike Hanzman’s scholarly written academic 50 page orders to one of Justice Francis’s opinions.
Oh? She has none?
Never mind. Hey Governor or President Trump - call Hanzman’s cell and get him on the Florida Supreme Court or the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals
Am I right folks? (* this comment was written with no spelimg errors!).
its spellcheck. the anus is next to the "tain't".
ReplyDeleteThis President is DANGEROUS.
ReplyDeleteAn executive order regulating social media sites allowing liability and disallowing comments that are negative about the President? Omg. Horrendous.
Tomorrow - the President has just announced a press conference to announce his private war against China.
Watch the Dow drop in the next week to 18,000.
When Judge Hanzman moved to complex business I had an associate gather his civil orders off FLW Supp. There were over a hundred law review quality opinions. We then argued a complicated merger appraisal summary judgment and a week later received a 40 page order of a quality I have never seen at the trial level. Yet I promise you he would never be considered for an appointment to our Supreme Co urt by this Adm. Elections do have consequences. This last appointment is just the start of what will be a terrible shift in our appellate courts. Moderate great judges like Emas, Scales,Gerber need not apply to Supreme court or Federal, and non Federalist trial judges need not apply either . Sad. What did Bruce Hornsby say? That's just the way it is.
ReplyDeleteDear Republican Friends:
ReplyDeleteHow the fuck do you defend Ron for appointing this unqualified person?
How the fuck do you defend the Donald for doing an executive order to punish social media for fact checking his daily bullshit lies.
Love,
Your friend who did not vote for either of them.
4:00 I assume that you think it is O.K. to append Tweeter messages with your own slant on things. You know, if you Progressives wrote the constitution today, it would look at lot like the Communist Manifesto.
ReplyDeleteAs to China, under the great leadership of President Obama, tens of thousands of businesses closed and things vital to our lives are controlled by the Chinese. I hope he picks a fight with them. What do you think they are going to do, and your call on the DOW was really super, coming as it did after the 200 point drop which followed release of info by 10 minutes. If the results wouldn't be so horrific, it would be amusing at least for a bit to watch old Joe drool in the oval office with either Tracy Abrams or Senator Harris waiting for him to drop dead. The Chinese would really be sacred of any of those three.
2:)) P.M. Judge Hanzman would be great in either place, but he has no chance during a Republican era like Judge Luck would have none with the Dems.
ReplyDelete@639
ReplyDeleteThe rest of the world though that the US Constitution was the modern day equivalent of the Communist Manifesto. At the time of its writing there was no more "liberal" document or government in the world. The US and France were the USSR and Red China of their day.
Why do you not understand why his name is pronounced DUH-Santis.
ReplyDeleteDear Thursday, May 28, 2020 4:40:00 PM;
ReplyDeleteAnd so it goes.
Billy