Ok. lets summarize- because to keep track of those wild and crazy judges north of the border you need a scorecard and a blogger named Rumpole.
Judge Dale Cohen has a massive JQC complaint filed against him after he set out to intimidate a lawyer who had filed a lawsuit to remove Cohen's wife from the judicial ballot in the last election.
During one hearing, Judge Cohen called his wife to testify as a witness. The lawyer objected to being put in an impossible situation to which Judge Dale Cohen responded with this brilliant judicial quip: "You mean if I rule in your favor I don't get dinner tonight?"
Say what you want about Judge Cohen, but he knows where his chickens are roasted.
The Judge is also...how do we say this politely? "Challenged" when it comes to the use of commonly known sayings or aphorisms; to wit he said this twice during the prelude to the hearing, in response to the attorney positing the various problems of cross examining the judge's spouse:
"We'll approach that bridge when we get to it."
Now lets think about this carefully for a moment. There is a bridge in the distance. You walk towards it. The act of walking towards the bridge is in fact the approach to the bridge. When you get to the bridge, you've already approached it. You're now at the bridge. Your choices are to cross the bridge, (and ruin your judicial career) or perhaps a coconut falls from a nearby tree, luckily striking you in the head and knocking some sense into you- at which point you don't cross that bridge (and don't broach the rubicon sending you into professional ruin.) (That last link to "rubicon" was provided for those judges who read this blog, and there are more of you than you all care to admit.)
Thus the saying : "We'll cross that bridge when we get to it."
(The Florida Bar is sponsoring "Common sense sayings for the Judge in Broward."
3 CLE credits. They're trying to get Milt Hirsch to teach the course.)
The fallout from Marti Levy Cohen running for Judge was that Judge Dijols lost his bid for election (he was appointed and drew two opponents. Levy-Cohen didn't win
either. )
Broward Beat reports that Judge Cohen is shunned at the Broward Courthouse by his colleagues worse than Rumpole walking through the administrative suites at silent Charlie's PD emporium.
(Fun Broweird fact: Marti Levy Cohen announced to run against Judge Pedro Dijols a few weeks after the Cohens invited Dijolis and his wife out for dinner. With friends like these....who needs prosecutors?)
Marti Levy Cohen is again running for Judge.
Her opponent is a young lawyer with the last name of Backman. (uhho...this is about to get really good).
Judge Paul Backman sits on the JQC, which is the organization that filed the complaint and may seek to remove Judge Dale Cohen from office.
The Backman running against Marti Levy Cohen....is Judge Backman's son!
Only in Broweird.
What's so great about this mess is to see the judicial house of Broweird imploding upon itself in a frenzy of bad karma, back stabbing, greed, and general nastiness.
Broward judges are now treating each other the way they've treated lawyers from Dade for years. And that says it all about payback.
We're getting a bag of popcorn and sitting back and reading the Broward Blogs this weekend. You can't get this stuff from the movies.