Judge of the Day: Ana Gardiner
You gotta love South Florida. It’s such a fun, crazy place. It has South Beach, the nightlife, the fashion, the wild news-making Broward judges… Joining the ranks of Judges of the Day from Broward County (Jay “Soul Glo” Spechler, Cheryl “Beelzebub” Aleman, and Jeffrey “Wide Receiver” Levenson) is Circuit Judge Ana Gardiner.
The Broward-Palm Beach New Times has a story accusing Gardiner of flirting, partying, and getting it on with defense attorneys and prosecutors.
Defense attorney John Cotrone stood before Broward Circuit Judge Ana Gardiner in her marble-laden courtroom and dropped in what seemed like a jab at her honor.It came after Gardiner, the chief criminal judge for the 17th Judicial Circuit, asked for an amended file on Cotrone’s case. The lawyer pointed out that she had asked for the file “every time I’m in court on this.”
Gardiner, a petite woman whose dark hair is tinted an artificial red, might have been displeased at being shown up by Cotrone. But instead she looked away and smiled.
“Is there a point to reminding me of that?” she asked Cotrone in her slight Cuban accent.
Gardiner shuffled through some papers on the bench before smiling again and goading Cotrone: “I may not have as good a memory as you — even though you are older than me.”
It sounded almost like… flirting.
Like awkward high school flirting.
Neither Gardiner nor Cotrone was willing to comment for the piece, but one of Coltrone’s friends stepped in to “help out:”
[W]ell-known defense attorney Fred Haddad, a longtime friend of Cotrone’s, contacted New Times in an attempt to dissuade the newspaper from publishing the story. He claimed he was calling of his own volition. “She’s one of the good ones,” he said of Gardiner. “This is going to cause [Judicial Qualifying Commission] investigations, and nobody needs that.”He didn’t deny that his friend was involved in a romance with the judge. Instead, he argued that judges and prosecutors and defense attorneys have been drinking together and having sex with one another for years in Broward County.
“What’s the big deal so long as it doesn’t affect their decisions?” he asked.
This guy is a “well-known defense attorney,” and that’s the best defense he could come up with. Really?
Judging Ana [New Times via JAABLOG]
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Comments
Kash = Sex Goddess
Plus, Figgiti FIRST!
Captain FIRST!
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Are you serious with this shit?
Long time reader, first time poster. I don't understand the colloquy being anything but a prototypical conversation between jurists and attorneys (although the good "friend" should have kept his mouth shut).
Long time reader, first time poster. I don't understand the colloquy being anything but a prototypical conversation between jurists and attorneys (although the good "friend" should have kept his mouth shut).
What? What is this? What happened to this site????
i'll have a leche with my cubano for lunch
Kash, are you just fishing for more comments about your sexual posts - in an attempt for more *internet* fawning over you??
That judge is hot.
HOT. I'd love to get underneath that robe.
Keep up the Judge of the Day posts, btw. Not all of us are here for pointless maternity leave updates.
Did anyone else notice that the lawyer involved, Cotrone, was the same lawyer who "goaded" Levenson into the "wide reciever" comment?
"I don't understand the colloquy being anything but a prototypical conversation between jurists and attorneys (although the good "friend" should have kept his mouth shut)."
12:29: do you talk like this in real life? Seriously, that sounds like maybe 1/2 the law students I go to school with. It is still shocking when it's THIS bad.
Where is the story? The newspaper admits "It sounded almost like... flirting. "
All this about something that "sounded almost like" flirting? Ridiculous... Now if he said something like you seem to forget my file all the time yet always remember to suck it before we do it- that would be news.
The inevitable "hot" comments about some fugly chick . . .
Judges need to party and "get it on" too.
In addition, she apparently divides her sexual attentions between both sides of the counsel table, so there is no pro defense or proscutorial bias.
Last (to 1:37 pm) in the world of criminal justice, she is NOT "fugly". In fact, is hot by prevailing standards.
Can we have another round of cosmos now please?
Um, yeah, I don't get the story here re: Judge Gardiner. It is completely equivocal as to whether this was flirting or not. While I agree that judges should avoid even the appearance of impropriety, just being amiable with counsel is a non-event; the characterization of the conduct here is purely subjective. I am also interested in how the friend did not deny that there was a romance, because this could have taken one of two tones: a) "I am not going to deny that they're having a romance, but gee, everybody is doing it;" or, and what I find more likely, that he simply did not dignify their question with a denial, but was busy pointing out she was one of the goods ones, in contrast to all the rest of these folks, who are busy horsing around and getting away with it. Altogether, I think this paper (and ATL by association) is tarnishing this judge's reputation based on no evidence, and that people are apparently trying to create a news story based on such tangential inferences as to be downright defamatory to this poor woman.
Does she "let it rain" on her face?
Kash - Really, you are getting desparate here. I know you love the sexual topics because you are a nympho, but this is weak. If you are dying for comments just post a picture of you in a short shirt with no panties on, topless. Comment clusterfuck guaranteed.
weak.
Read the story before you comment. The article isn't about her possible 'flirtatious' behavior in court. It is about her extensive and often inappropriate relationships with prosecutors and defense attorneys outside of court. The most troubling thing is her ex-parte conversations while out drinking with prosecutors for a murder case she was presiding. A law student at the bar overheard their conversation which mocked the fact that gruesome photographs admitted into evidence led one juror to faint, and another to be excused from the jury. Five days later the defendant in that case was convicted of 1st degree murder. The defense attorney pleaded and begged the judge to NOT allow the gruesome photos (think FRE 403, FL version) but she denied the motion and allowed it. Awful behavior really, as a fellow Latino I wanted to believe this was just a smear story, but really her behavior out of court is inexcusable.
This judge is a PIG.
1:27 wins.
i think it's "beelzebub", not "beezlebub"
either way i'll let it slide, kash, if you show me a boobie
Does she have braces? If not, she sure did at some point.
2:58--
Per your suggestion, I have read the article, and I take back my comment at 2:13. Judge Gardiner's activities are waaaay not OK. Kash, you kinda let me down, kiddo. I put too much faith in you that if there was some real heft behind the story, you would have put it on the front page. Instead, from your little digest, this seemed like just a filler gossip story. I am totally let down here. (But otherwise I am impressed with your work, and am very glad you posted this.)
Kudos to the New Times for some good, down-n-dirty journalism!
"What's the big deal so long as it doesn't affect their decisions?"
So Fred Haddad is the real frat stud!
I hate to break it to you guys, but there is no one named "Kash" on this message board.
Hey 2:58, maybe if he didn't want the photos shown in court, your dumb mother fucking client SHOULDN'T HAVE KILLED THE VICTIM in such a bad way. Maybe they should have used carbon monoxide or something.
I sure wish she hadn't said "older than ME."
Call me crazy, but her grammar makes her sound less-than-bright.
If she is bedding down with John Cotrone, it shows that she lacks good judgment. He is a whore for the court appointed cases. I wonder which of the other judges,present or former, he was boinking to make a buck.
BROWARD COUNTY LAWYERS make terrible judges................... THE BAR has a culture of corruption that produces many jay spechlers , gerald garson , wes teel miki humavay , mara ciavarella types /