THESE ARE THE TIMES THAT TRY WOMEN'S SOULS

Imagine you are a judge (we know it is hard, but try. You can always take a hot shower afterwards). And in Miami, most of our State Court Chief or Administrative Judges are Female. (We won't get to the fact that 92% of all Miami judges have titles like Chief Judge, Chief Administrative Judge, Associate Chief Administrative Judge, Assistant Associate Chief Administrative Judge, Assistant Associate Administrative Judge, Associate Assistant Administrative Judge... because ego wise, once a judge, the title matters.)

The President and Governor of Florida, despite knowing that we are on the front side of the infection curve (more people getting sick, more people dying) are pushing to open society because they want to look strong while caving into the lowest, dumbest, least educated parts of society who are...wait for it....virus deniers.  (Coming soon- their video of Barrack Obama's mother meeting with Hillary Clinton, Fidel Castro and Mao Zedong in Nigeria in 1966 to plot the future destruction of America). 

At some point, the opening of bowling alleys, and tattoo and mahjong parlors, and Jai Alai and hair salons, not to mention Starbucks and Sergios (where you can catch us some mornings sipping a coffee and eating a pastellito), will put pressure on our Chief Judges to open courts. 

We do not envy these judges. These are the times that try Women's souls. The summer solider and sunshine patriot and virus deniers will, in this time of crisis, shrink from the service of their courts and country. Tyranny, like hell (or Hialeah) is not easily conquered. But the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.  (H/T Thomas Paine- who is a fascinating character in his own right and we may discuss at length some day soon). 

Chief Judges Soto (head honcho) Sayfie (Criminal) Bailey (Civil) Colodny (Probate), Prescott (Unified Children's Division) Bernstein (Family) Walsh and De la O (Appeals??) have a very tough decision to make. Open courts too soon, and people will get sick and some will die.  Keep courts closed too long, and the institution that is the backbone of our democracy withers and starts to die. People need to know there is a functioning court system. The police need to continue to make arrests, and defendants need  to have their cases reviewed and bonds set. People need the ability to go to court to redress problems. Courts matter. (ugh, but we will recover from saying that). 

At some point jury trials need to start again. Will there be testing of venires before admittance to the jury room?  What happens when a potential juror who is also a republican virus denier refuses to be tested or to even have their temperature taken? Does that create  challenges to the venire?

Here is what Rumpole says: 
1) We do not envy our judges who have to make decisions about opening courts. But that is why they get the big moderate bucks. 

2) Once courts are open, the simple solution is you put one foot in front of another. You open courts. You set trials. You bring in jurors and learned judges will rule on motions made by (obdurate) attorneys on whatever issues they see fit to challenge. The motions will be decided. Some decisions  will be reviewed by appellate courts and some decisions will be affirmed and some reversed. The point here is that the PROCESS is more important than the particulars. We need courts opened in a safe manner. We need trials to begin again in a safe manner. Everything else will fall into place. 

Being serious for a moment we want to let our judges know we are with them. We know they are working hard and have very hard decisions to make. Decisions over the health of the public that they never envisioned having to make. But the wand chooses the wizard and the times pick our leaders.  We know our judges will do their level best and that is all we can ask. *

Godspeed Judge Soto. 

HR. 


*We are also fairly certain this post will forever be the high water mark in our praise of those who wear black robes to work. The words did not come easy and our finger shook when pressing the "publish" button.