Ana Gardiner is disbarred and Howard Scheinberg is suspended from practicing law for two years for carrying on a relationship during a death penalty trial she presided over that he prosecuted
When people think with their genitals they leave their brains behind, even when judges and lawyers do it. While the Sun Sentinel reported there was no romantic relationship between them, that is unbelievable considering they exchanged 949 phone calls and 471 texts in a five or six month period.
FLORIDA JUDGE DISBARRED OVER ‘PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP’ WITH PROSECUTOR AFTER THEY EXCHANGED 949 PHONE CALLS AND 471 TEXTS DURING DEATH PENALTY TRIAL
Omar Loureiro, who was sentenced to death by Judge Ana Gardiner, was granted a retrial as a result and his sentence was reduce to life in prison
By Reuters Reporter and Joel Christie
Mail Online
June 6, 2014
The Florida Supreme Court disbarred a former circuit judge on Thursday for having a 'personal and emotional relationship' with a prosecutor that started during a death penalty case he was trying before her.
The seven high court justices voted unanimously to toughen the penalty recommended by a hearing officer, who had called for a one-year suspension of Judge Ana Gardiner.
The high court said such an ethical lapse in a capital case that later resulted in a death sentence being reduced to life in prison, and her initial efforts to downplay her involvement with assistant state attorney Howard Scheinberg, required her disbarment.
The court said Gardiner had a chance meeting with Scheinberg at a restaurant during the murder trial of Omar Loureiro in 2007, and they joined some others at a bar after dinner.
Between March 23, several days before a jury returned a guilty verdict against Loureiro, and August 24, when she sentenced him to death, the court said Gardiner and Scheinberg exchanged 949 cell phone calls and 471 text messages.
Loureiro was charged with the fatal stabbing of James Lentry, 57, in Lighthouse Point on New Years Day in 2001.
He had claimed Lentry made unwanted and aggressive sexual advances toward him.
When the Judicial Qualifications Commission began an investigation in late 2008, the court said Gardiner 'failed to disclose the honest and true nature of her relationship with Scheinberg' during Louriero's trial.
It was not until the following April, when the Broward state attorney was investigating, that Gardiner 'acknowledged for the first time her ongoing emotional relationship with Scheinberg'.
According to The Sun Sentinel, the relationship between Gardiner and Scheinberg was not romantic.
She resigned from the bench in 2010, after 11 years as a judge.
In 2013 Gardiner married David Bogenschutz, who acted as her attorney during the Scheinberg investigation.
The Supreme Court suspended Scheinberg from practice for two years.
He will be allowed to return to the practice of law in 2015.
After the relationship between judge and prosecutor became known, Loureiro got a new trial and his sentence was reduced from death to life in prison.
'Considering Gardiner's dishonest conduct and the harm that her actions have caused to the administration of justice in a capital first-degree murder case, we conclude that disbarment is the appropriate action,' said the Supreme Court order.
The court also ordered her to pay $8,117.18 in costs.
1 comment:
No less an expert than Bill Clinton thought it was OK. Of course he was disbarred and impeached, so, maybe it isn't.
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