Thursday, November 07, 2019

Judge Moore is really serious about the Bluebook (updated)

Footnote 2:
The Court adopts in part Magistrate Judge Reid’s R&R with the following alterations: the pin cite in the citation on page six, line seven should be “1279” and omit citation to “n.2”; the pin cite in the citation on page seven, line seven should be “1223, n.2”; the case name on page seven, line nine should read: “Goebert v. Lee Cty.”; the quotation on page nine, line six should read: “[The] right must be . . .”; the pin cite in the citation on page nine, line thirteen should be “1121”; the quotation on page thirteen, line eleven should read: “We do not require a case directly on point, but existing precedent . . .”; the pin cite in the citations on page fourteen, lines one and six should be “589–90”; the quotation on page seventeen, line five should read: “Miami-Dade County and/or Public Health Trust”; the quotation on page eighteen, line nineteen should read: “[it] can rise to the level . . .”; the pin cite in the citation on page twenty, line seventeen should be “589–90”; the parenthetical on page twenty-one, line nine should read: “offering extraction over a root canal is not a constitutional violation if an extraction is medically appropriate to remove tooth decay”; the citation on page twenty-seven, lines five to six should read: “219 F.3d 132, 137 (2d Cir. 2000)”; and the citation on page twenty-seven, line nine should read “219 F.3d at 132.” Finally, the Court notes that it does not adopt citations in the R&R that do not conform to The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation (Columbia Law Review Ass’n et al. eds., 20th ed. 2015).
Yikes.

Here’s the R&R and the District Order.

Update— both in the comments and in emails/texts, people are criticizing me for posting this public order. I didn’t write the order, of course. This blog is meant to publish news about the District. Lawyers and judges around town are talking about the order. Numerous folks sent it to me. It certainly seems newsworthy. I have personal feelings about the order and who it makes look bad, but I’m not putting those out there. I’ll let you comment on that issue. I just put it out there because it happened.

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you're going to do that you should know your BB. For the judge's information when you cite a footnote there's no comma in between the page number at the footnote.

So, it should be "the pin cite in the citation on page seven, line seven should be “1223 n.2” with no comma.

Anonymous said...

This has nothing to do with the Blue Book and everything to with an old white male judge wanting to publicly embarrass a young, female African-American judge. He could have simply sent her an email with his edits, she would have issued a corrected R&R and he would have adopted the R&R without any need for public shaming.

Anonymous said...

I think 2:51 drastically overstates the Judge's involvement with his civil docket.
This has everything to do with an arrogant young white male law clerk wanting to prove how much smarter he is than a magistrate judge who is doing his work for him.

Anonymous said...

Why did you all make this about race and gender? Maybe it's just about someone who's tired of going to a pin cite only to find the quote/reference not there.

Anonymous said...

In either case: DOM you should be ashamed of yourself for magnifying the obvious slight.

Rumpole said...

The comment above answered my question. The judge did this to a Mag Judge? Completely unacceptable. You do not embarrass a colleague like that. He should have emailed her.
Second pincite? Not a term often used. From bluebook:

A pinpoint citation, often called a pincite, is necessary to point the reader to specific the page(s) within the
case. Pincites are placed after the page on which the case begins, separated by a comma and a space. A pincite
may consist of a page range or multiple pages that are not consecutive. To cite a footnote, give the page on
which the footnote appears, “n.,” and the footnote number, with no space between “n.” and the number

Anonymous said...

This is not racist or gender driven. Sheesh. The outrage machine is really turned up to 11 on this one.

Was this especially friendly? No. But so what. Grow a pair.

Was this done to a "colleague", not exactly. The Mags work for the Article 3 Judges. Who hasn't back handed a clerk or an associate like this at some point? I don't treat my subordinates like this. But I have (and have been treated like this). I learned better. And I moved on.

DOM should not be ashamed of himself. What kind of twerp says that.

You guys are ridiculous.

Anonymous said...

I had the same reaction as 2:13. If the Judge wants to be snarky, he should at least make sure he gets the details right. When you pincite to a footnote, there should not be a comma between the page and the note number (Rule 3.2(b)).

Anonymous said...

DOM should be praised - not criticized - for calling out how Moore treats his colleague.

Anonymous said...

By the way there are real issues how judges of color are treated by their peers.

https://www.npr.org/2016/07/12/485661659/research-black-judges-are-more-likely-to-be-reversed-on-appeal-than-white-judges

Anonymous said...

"Grow a pair?" I can see why you may be slow to detect sexism.

Anonymous said...

259

Total speculation ... and ur comment is totally racist!

DOM again...asking for the second time on this blog...why do you post racist comments? PLEASE explain!? This idiot 259 openly, unapologetically disparages a class of people, white men, for no reason whatsoever! Is it okay to be racist as long as its about white people?? Not that i havent heard demonization of white men like all day long, but dont you have any standards whatsoever????????

Anonymous said...

Speaking of orders making somebody look bad...

https://reason.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/BergervImagina.pdf

Anonymous said...

One would think that it could've been more easily resolved by walking down to the magistrate's chambers or picking up the telephone. Would seem to me that this is indicative of a deeper feud between either the judge and the magistrate or their respective clerks. At any rate, it's an eye-opener.

Anonymous said...

This order was very poor form. I've clerked on the district court and court of appeals, and I have never encountered such ridiculousness from a law clerk. It's called black robe syndrome.

Figg said...

11:45 PM yikes! Reminds me of the principal in Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Anonymous said...

Whatever Moore's motivation here, I refuse to believe he would have dropped a similar footnote if it were O'Sullivan, Seltzer, Torres, Goodman, Brannon, Matthewman, Hunt, or Reinhart...

Anonymous said...

"Why did you all make this about race and gender? Maybe it's just about someone who's tired of going to a pin cite only to find the quote/reference not there."

Thank you.

There's something to be said about a clear judicial record, and a public order helps remind everyone (Magistrate Judge's included) of that importance. The only way the common law can exist is through proper citation. Happy to see someone upholding that even if its a little aggressive. Otherwise we are publishing wikipedia articles.

Anonymous said...

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Anonymous said...

Not the only Judge who openly disregarded a R&R and called the magistrate's work/findings "unnecessary".

Anonymous said...

Criticizing DOM for posting this is ridiculous. It's public and has been reported all over the internet. Also, who really looks bad here?

Is Judge Moore such a stickler for the Bluebook that he cites Florida district court cases as (Fla. Dist. Ct. App.) or whatever the hell the stupid Bluebook format is, or does he cite them as the state appellate rule suggests (and which competent Florida lawyers do as well) so that the DCA is identified by the cite (Fla. 3d DCA 2015)?