THE SAGA OF JUDGE ALLEN

ANOTHER UPDATE:

Rumpole, would you please post the following for me? Dear Fromer Students of Swan,
As a fromer student and long time friend of Alan Swan, I will be speaking at his memorial service on Saturday (Plymouth Congregational Church in the Grove, 11:30am). If you have a good Professor Swan story, I would love to hear from you today or tomorrow.
Please feel free to respond to mbarzee(AT)jud11.flcourts.org
Thank you.
Mary Barzee Flores

Rumpole notes that (at) needs to be @ but we have to type it that way for complicated blogger reasons.

UPDATE: Broward Attorney Sean Conway and the Florida Bar (motto:"Speak your mind-lose your job") have agreed to resolve the bar complaint against Conway in which Conway wrote on the Broward Blog that Judge Aleman was "an evil unfair witch" (hereinafter "EUW"). Conway will accept a public reprimand.
The Sun Sentinel article is HERE

The
Wicken Society which is also upset with Conway for sullying their members by alleging that Aleman was an "EUW", has not yet commented on the resolution.

Sean Conway is one of the attorneys who founded the Broward Blog. It was a courageous act to pry open those dusty locked doors behind which the Broward County courthouse was run. Judges have lost their jobs because of the light shined on them by the Broward Blog. We support Mr. Conway and if he feels this settlement is in his best interest, then we wish him well.

Below is the link to the coverage of the JQC trial of 1st DCA Judge Michael Allen who finds himself the defendant because he wrote an appellate opinion criticising fellow 1st DCA Judge Charles Kahn. Khan did not disqualify himself from a case involving the appeal of the felony convictions of former Florida Senate President W.D Childers, and Allen wrote an opinion critical of Kahn's actions.

It seems clear that Khan, who had close political and personal ties to Childers should never have sat on the case. And somehow, although it was Khan who should have recused himself, and although it was Khan who had extra martial affairs with court personnel and lashed out at judges and court employees, it is Judge Allen who finds himself before the JQC.

Very odd. The coverage is HERE

And to add insult to injury, it is none other than North of the Border Judge Paul Backman who is the chief judge of the JQC panel. This is admittedly a personal opinion, but we have never had a judge in Broward be more rude, condescending, and downright nasty to us and our clients than Judge Backman. And he's on the JQC!!!!

Truth is indeed stranger than fiction.

This NY TIMES
article has been on our minds:
American corn, soybean, and rice farmers are struggling against a weather pattern that has the crops on the verge of failure. Australian wheat farmers are in the middle of their third year of a drought.

After three years of difficult harvests and a world food crisis that is beginning to take shape, things look bad as there is no more room for error: “If we have bad crops, it’s going to be a wild ride,” said the Agriculture Department’s chief economist, Joseph Glauber. “There’s just no cushion."

So now we have a food crisis and failing farms, piled on top of an economy in the tank with fuel prices approaching $4.50 a gallon. Things seem grim. The real possibility of a depression looms on the horizon. The real estate bubble has popped; tax revenues are down; government and private sectors are cutting jobs and the average American is finding it harder to afford fuel to commute to work. Now add a food shortage and a spike in food prices because of poor crops and the cost of fuel to get the food to the store and things start to look ugly. This is a downward spiral and we need real leadership to get us out of it.

As Sy Gaer used to say, "now you know why I drink."

See you in court, frowning with worry.