JUDGE JOHNNY KALLS IT A KAREER

 Last we ventured way north of the border, to the Palm Beaches where lawyers clad in blue double breasted blazers with their club insignia and tan slacks and white buck shoes sip Gin and Tonics at 5pm and bemoan the lack of civility and the downturn in the market, one Judge Johnny Kastrenakes, he formerly of the Dade County State Attorney's Office (Janet Reno era) and US Attorneys Office (Dexter Lehtinen era?) had engendered not one but two challengers in what was going to be his last election. 

Reading the writing on the genteel Palm Beaches walls and political scene, the Judge gracefully withdrew, citing family time and teaching commitments. Discretion in blue-blood Palm Beach always being the better part of valor, as well as continued entry into the clubs whose names you are not even allowed to speak in public, it being declassee. 

This information was widely reported on other blogs before ours, pressing legal issues having prevented us from hoping on this story as it broke earlier this week. 

Two challengers entering a judicial race in WPB is a very unlikely scenario. It is hard to remember a time when that occurred before. The reasons behind the challenge are a bit unclear, but it may relate to a story where the judge held a recalcitrant juror in contempt and sentenced him to jail, later modifying the sentence when the juror apologized. Apparently the issued galvanized the West Palm Beach elite, where such things "are just not done here."

  A little of the 305 goes a long way in the 561, and sometimes a little too far. You can take the boy out of Miami, but not the Miami out of the boy. Or words to that effect. 

Judge Kastrenakes has had a long and distinguished public service career, trying and wining some of the biggest cases in South Florida before donning black robes. He was a worthy adversary when he prowled the halls of the REGJB, and we wish him well.