Tuesday, November 28, 2023

ONE BAD JUDGE

 It is a story to warm even the coldest heart of a Broward Judge. But this takes place in Liberty County, one of Florida's smallest. 

It all started when Judge Kenneth Hosford (and we'd bet all we have in guessing that his friends at the Piggly Wiggly call the Judge "Hos" ) signed a warrant for the arrest of Reese Forehand (we couldn't make these names up if we tried) for the theft of laundry detergent and dryer sheets -value less than $40.00. They take their cleaning products seriously in Liberty County (Motto "Home of the cleanest clothes in all of Florida y'all"). 


Ol Hos 

The State did not file charges.  (They called it a wash...hahahahahaha). That should have been the end of the spin cycle, but technology got Ol Hos right where it hurts. At the end of a Zoom calendar Hos dismissed the PD and said he and the prosecutor need to chat about some non-court things- presumably issues like can you add bleach to colors in the wash, and the fall run of crawdads down at the creek that runs through town. 

On Zoom, and recorded, Ol Hos proceeded to take the prosecutor out to the woodshed about not filing charges on the dirty laundry case.  Hos told the prosecutor "to back up your Sheriff and back up your judge" and suggested a search warrant that he would sign that would presumably catch ol Reese Forehand red handed with the missing laundry detergent. Then,  Ol Hos proceeded to lament the war he was having with the PDs office who were seeking to have him recused on criminal cases - for what reasons we cannot imagine. Ol Hos seems like a right fine good-old boy judge. 

The JQC got the case, and then in what can only be called a sweetheart deal, reached an agreement where ol Hos would apologize and promise not to do it anymore, pay a fine, take thirty days off to go catch them crawdads, and otherwise resume the duties of the only Judge in a small southern town. 

Into the breach stepped FACDL  and Daniel Tibbitt, superstar appellate lawyer of whom we have written about before. FACDL is seeking to file an Amicus Brief (Friend of the Court -yes, Friend of Hos- no) opposing the resolution of the case. 

This is some of what Mr. Tibbitt wrote about ol Hos: 

The judge said the state attorney has to support the sheriff and judge, and if he can’t, needs to say so in open court rather than simply decline to proceed on a case. The judge said that he realized that the search warrant had “thinness” but had suggested to the sheriff how to add to the search warrant to make it stronger and show that the “convicted felon” suspect was “lying”. The judge told the prosecutor they should “rework” the search warrant and “I need y’all to be stronger. You know, it puts me out on a limb when y’all are not stronger, and it puts me in a position to have to make inquiries to hold the law.” The judge criticized the performance of assistant state attorneys in his courtroom the previous session who had not offered harsh enough pleas and who had missed priors of defendants.

So we have a Judge in a one traffic light town asking the prosecutors to be tough and back up Ol Hos in court. A judge who admittedly did his own research on the laundry theft case and then sketched out a plan including signing a "thin" search warrant (so much for affidavits meaning anything) and nobody has a problem with that guy remaining on the bench. Talk about Southern Justice, or as Viki Lawrence sang in one of the greatest songs of the 1970s- That's The Night That The Lights Went Out In Georgia "Well don't trust your soul to no backwoods southern lawyer, cause the judge in the town's got blood stains  laundry detergent on his hands..."  (You know we could do a whole riff on laundry detergent ads that promise to remove blood stains, but by now you've had enough of Ol Hos and so have we). 

Here is the JQC Findings and Recommendation and below that is the FACDL motion. 

Bad Judge Petition - Report & Recommendation by Anonymous PbHV4H on Scribd


Motion - Amicus Curiae by Anonymous PbHV4H on Scribd



21 comments:

  1. I just read online in The Liberty Press that no other than Judge Rosie Aponte is running against this Liberty County Court Judge. It will be a heck of a race, but Ol Rosie will bring dignity, experience and integrity back to the bench.

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  2. It's not just that this judge has ex parte communications with prosecutors, but also that he has announced a de facto policy that hispanics are drug dealers for the purposes of his court.

    "The judge talked about an immigrant or non-English speaker stopped for speeding and how '[t]he strong suspicion is he is a drug dealer from over in Texas', even though '[w]e don’t know that; we couldn’t verify that.'"

    In other words, according to this judge, if you speak spanish you are automatically a criminal suspect whether or not law enforcement has any actual evidence to support that conclusion.

    Worse still, the JQC didn't even address this madness in its report.

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  3. Also, keep in mind that Liberty county is in Florida's 2nd Circuit where the prosecutor's office had a written policy posted on the wall that treated hispanics the same as those with an "extensive criminal history." See https://ourtallahassee.com/florida-prosecutors-racism-policy-leaked/ ("IF EXTENSIVE CRIMINAL HISTORY and/or HISPANIC -> Adjudicated Guilty + Costs").

    My friends, racism is alive and strong in Florida - and especially in Florida's 2nd Circuit which includes Tallahassee. Why do you think those in power in Tallahassee want to "stop woke"? Wake up.

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  4. Appalling - removal is warranted

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  5. The FIX IS IN. The JQC is made up of Southern Crackers who hate minorities and love “Pro law enforcement “ judges. He is one of them.

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  6. Looks like there is a town in Liberty County called Hosford. Wikipedia says:
    Hosford, Florida was originally known as Coe's Mill. It was founded in 1859 and was named for the Coe family. One member of the Coe family, Katherine, married Robert Flournoy Hosford. While Robert Flournoy Hosford worked in the Florida state senate, he helped to convince the railroad to come to Liberty County. In honor of his work in bringing the railroad to Liberty County, the town of Coe's Mill was changed to the town of Hosford.

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  7. We have at least one Judge in Miami Dade that is outwardly racist per the Miami Herald through creditable observers. Nothing whatsoever happened.

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  8. @1:17 - please share the link to the Miami Herald story that you're referring to.

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  9. Sounds like Altfield to me. Counsels prosecutors how to get a conviction in open court all the time. No bid deal.

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  10. There is no herald article we are aware of. We write The news as it applies to bad judges.

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  11. How on earth are judges like this allowed to stay on the bench? This is insane. So no one can trust that judges won't be having ex parte communications with prosecutors and who knows who else.

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  12. Florida Supreme Court granted the FACDL motion to file an amicus brief.

    https://acis-api.flcourts.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/908b8aa9-8701-48d0-bba8-f0f4a99d3bf5/docketentrydocuments/0567327a-f223-47ef-85a7-4b7a9bfb437f

    So the court will at least pretend to listen to defense attorney grievances.

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  13. The amicus motion, besides lacking basic paragraphing, is plainly an argument on one side, it does not even pretend to assist the court. It also lacks record citations (were the items quoted taken from the transcript? Gossip in the halls? No clue).
    The fact that the Court has granted the motion to file a brief should, if FACDL and FACDL-Miami are serious, be well written, well supported, and omit the ad hominem insults which lard the motion.
    Look up Liberty County: the smallest total pop of any county in Fla, with only about 7,800 folks; how many voters do you think there are? As well, J Hosford's CV on line seems to be both admirably varied and scholastically and experientially respectable.
    In reading the JQC's papers, I noted, too, that the JQC commented with approval on the fact that the ASA being addressed did not do anything to halt the impropriety. Not even, "Your Honor, please let us put this discussion off until the public defender is present."
    Or just by saying, "YH, I cannot participate in an ex parte hearing." Where were the lawyer guts we're supposed to show, even in tight spots?

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  14. On August 16, 2016 the Herald gave recommendations for the upcoming election. The piece discussed a family court judge where it said "creditable courtroom observers told the Editorial Board he [the judge] can be rude at times particularly to African American defendants."

    Go read it in black and white.

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  15. What the Herald Editorial Board says about a judge based on secret hearsay from a “credible courtroom observer” is simply not reliable. I would love to hear once that an editorial board member actually observed Court. It’s disgusting that an opinion section of the newspaper presents itself as if it were reporting facts and following a journalistic standard. That’s what FOX News does.

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  16. Being "rude at times particularly to African American defendants" isn't in any way even near the same ballpark as having a de facto rule that someone is a criminal because of the race or nation of origin.

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  17. And now the JQC wants to stay the disciplinary proceedings because "additional matters have come to the attention of the Investigative Panel which require further proceedings before that body."

    https://acis-api.flcourts.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/908b8aa9-8701-48d0-bba8-f0f4a99d3bf5/docketentrydocuments/19b9637a-238e-4dbe-a528-718d2dc6adf9

    Hmmm...

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  18. Judge Hosford has resigned.

    https://acis-api.flcourts.gov/courts/68f021c4-6a44-4735-9a76-5360b2e8af13/cms/case/908b8aa9-8701-48d0-bba8-f0f4a99d3bf5/docketentrydocuments/bde0fe6f-9760-46ab-ad9b-efd35c7812fa

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