THE CAPTAIN REPORTS:
CIRCUIT COURT GROUP 20 .......
Another Circuit Court race pitting an incumbent judge against a challenger. In this race Incumbent Judge Robert Watson faces a challenge from attorney Brenda Guerrero.
First a little background on the two candidates:
Robert T. Watson (I)
Judge Watson has been a member of The Florida Bar for 18 years. Prior to taking the bench, Judge Watson worked at Steel Hector, Holland & Knight, as an AUSA (for 5 years), and Kobre & Kim. He was appointed to the County Court bench in January of 2019 by Gov Rick Scott as one of Scott's last appointments. He was then elevated to the Circuit Court in December of 2019 by Gov. DeSantis. This will be his first election campaign.
Judge Watson has a Net Worth of $1,009,000. Judge Watson reports income of $161,797 from the State of Florida; (and an extra $22,000 from other sources). He has raised $181,868 from a total of 419 contributors. He has loaned his campaign a total of $50,000. To date, he has spent a total of $152,744 on his campaign.
Brenda Guerrero
Attorney Brenda Guerrero has been a member of The Florida Bar for 16 years. She currently runs a private practice specializing in Family law where she has been for the past almost five years. She spent two years working as a Staff Attorney for the Atlanta Legal Aid Society; she then spent nine years working as a Miami-Dade Assistant State Attorney where she was assigned to the Child Support Division. She previously applied to the JNC for an open County Court seat. The JNC vetted her application, interviewed her, and did send her name up as a nominee for an open County Court seat to Governor Scott. This will be Brenda Guerrero’s first election campaign.
Attorney Guerrero has a Net Worth of $186,361. Brenda Guerrero’s reported income for 2021 was $94,000, entirely from her law practice. She has raised a total of $51,206 from 146 contributors and she added $22,500 of her own money. To date, she has spent $56,869 on her campaign.
On July 19, 2018, in a sworn submission to the Judicial Nominating Commission (JNC), in her Application for Nomination to the Miami-Dade County Court, attorney Brenda Gitchev Guerrero (she used her married name in 2018, but she has since divorced from Mr. Gitchev) stated, in response to the Question: “In your lifetime, how many (number) of the cases you have tried to verdict or judgment were ...:
Non-Jury Trials - 200
Jury Trials - 0
In 2022, candidate Brenda Guerrero completed a Questionnaire from the League of Prosecutors (LOP) in advance of their Judicial Endorsement Forum. In that filing, she claimed that she has a total of:
Bench Trials, Civil, - Approximately 1500*
Ms. Guerrero has been a licensed attorney in Florida for 16 years. According to her answers with the LOP, she has concentrated her practice in “family law for over 14 years and Civil Law for nearly 2 years”.
*Let’s do the math. That means attorney Brenda Guerrero has handled at least 1,300 non-jury trials in just the past four years. That breaks down to an average of 325 Non-Jury Trials a year. There are only 248 work days in a calendar year (Monday through Friday minus court holidays). That works out to an average of 1.3 trials, every single day that the courthouse was opened, for the past four years.
In the spirit of making sure that these figures were accurate, we contacted candidate Brenda Guerrero and asked her to explain whether it was even remotely possible for her to have tried 1,300 Bench Trials in just the past four years. Here is what she had to say:
"Captain Justice, thank you for providing me the opportunity to correct a typo on my JNC application for your readers. Actually, it should have been a "1" in front of the "200". During my tenure as an Assistant State Attorney in the Child Support Division, the case load was very large. As you know, I served for almost 10 years. So at the time of my JNC application, I had litigated at least 1200 bench trials to judgment. Back then, ASA's averaged a minimum of 10 trials to judgment per month (or 120 per year minimum), this is common knowledge in the division. My JNC application woefully underrepresented my trial experience, but with that being said, fortunately the JNC nominated me and determined that I was qualified to be a Judge."
One other matter related to candidate Brenda Guerrero. On June 14, 2022, local attorney Benedict Kuehne sent candidate Guerrero a certified letter concerning “Judicial Campaign Practices”. In that four page letter, Kuehne indicated that he represented the Judge Robert T. Watson Campaign for Circuit Court Judge, Group 20. In the letter Kuehne accused Guerrero's campaign of violating the rules and laws governing judicial campaigns.
Specifically, the Guerrero campaign web site as well as campaign literature listed a number of Endorsements including Endorsements from certain elected officials who were, in 2022, also running for office. Those elected officials included Florida State Senator Jason Pizzo, North Miami Mayor Phillipe Bien-Aime, and Doral Vice-Mayor Digna Cabral.
According to Kuehne, the Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee (JEAC) has interpreted the rules and laws of the State of Florida to mean that a candidate for judicial office cannot be endorsed by another candidate currently running for public office in the same election cycle.
A check with Brenda Guerrero’s web site today shows that Senator Pizzo is still listed as an endorsement; (Pizzo is running unopposed in Senate District 37); Vice-Mayor Cabral from Doral is also still listed; (I could not determine whether she is running unopposed or has opposition); and Mayor Bien-Aime’s name has been removed as an endorsement.
We would like to hear from our readers who may have appeared before Judge Watson to give some insight into how he is as a judge. He has been described as smart, fair, and good, but stern to a fault.
We have already posted stories on three other judicial races including Judge Fred Seraphin vs. Renier Diaz de la Portilla; Judge Lody Jean vs. Teressa Tylman; and Judge Oscar Rodriguez Fonts vs. Jason Bloch. That leaves one Circuit Court race: Judge Mark Blumstein vs. Ariel Rodriguez; and two County Court races: Judge Jeffrey Kolokoff vs. Lissette De La Rosa; and Judge Scott Janowitz vs. Alicia Priovolos.
Also to come, some BREAKING news on a Bar Complaint just filed against a certain judicial candidate whom I think our readers should be able to very easily figure out. I think Rumpole refers to him as “de la Liar”.
EARLY VOTING OPENS TODAY
MIAMI-DADE COUNTY EARLY VOTING OPENS TODAY. For some unknown reason, North of the Border in Broweird County, their early voting does not begin until August 15.
Captain4Justice@gmail.com