Akerman lawyer Ryan Roman opens Mignonette

It's a fantastic restaurant. If oysters are your thing, there's no better place.  And it's the best lobster roll in town.  I highly recommend it. 

Plus, for better or worse, you'll likely see a bunch of judges and lawyers.  After all, owner Ryan Roman is a lawyer himself at Akerman:

Ryan Roman is an associate in the Litigation Practice Group. His commercial litigation practice includes a focus on securities litigation matters, including SEC enforcement proceedings and securities class-action defense. He has also represented portfolio companies in private equity litigation matters. In addition, Ryan is also experienced servicing clients in the hospitality industry, having defended restaurant shareholders in various business disputes. He has defended various businesses in consumer class actions, and represented companies in the enforcement of money judgments.

But he has a passion for food, running the popular food blog, MiamiRankings.

Ryan opened the joint with Blue Collar's Danny Serfer.  From the Miami.com review:

"We're both into oysters and classic raw bar ... and of course prime rib," Roman says. "So we're excited to share all that at Mignonette. Oysters are an aphrodisiac, the more you eat them, the more you love to eat them. We just want to have a place to eat cold seafood that's fun, casual and has curse words on the radio."

PS: Evoking sort of an ethical husband/wife privilege, Roman says that Blue Collar will no longer be eligible for his restaurant rankings.

 The Miami New Times review is great:

The idea for Mignonette came to the pals a year and a half ago over a bowl of ramen at Momi Ramen in Brickell. Roman was at first hesitant. What swayed him to risk pouring his life savings into the business? "I'd rather live in a restaurant than a house," he explains.
So a little more than a month ago, they decided to open Mignonette with a fairly expansive menu of simple, classic preparations. To execute their vision, they plucked Mignonette's chef de cuisine, Bobby Frank, from Blue Collar, where he was Serfer's protégé. Then they decorated the place in an "Old Florida meets New Orleans" style that includes tan leather banquettes, a marble raw bar, and hanging constellations festooned from copper pipes. There's also an intimate back room with original wall art consisting of life-size fish rendered in gold leaf by artist Reed van Brunschot.

I like the story of the two owners on the Mignonette website:

Following the adage that the pen is mightier than the sword, Ryan Roman cuts all of his steaks with a pen.  A Miami native, Roman began writing about food and restaurants in 2009, with the launch of his blog, Miami’s Restaurant Power Rankings.  Roman also contributes as a columnist for Edible South Florida.  When he is not writing about food, he is a practicing attorney with the law firm Akerman LLP.

Roman first met chef Daniel Serfer after becoming a regular at Blue Collar, but perhaps the more compelling story is when the two didn’t meet.  Unbeknownst to Roman, Serfer would read Roman’s blog while laboring away in a kitchen in New York City, during a short absence from the Miami culinary scene.  Operating under the misimpression that the namesake “power rankings” on the blog were the result of some scientific algorithm, as opposed to one person’s arbitrary opinion, Serfer dreamed of opening his own restaurant back in Miami and achieving a spot on the rankings.  When Blue Collar opened, Serfer invited Roman to a media preview, having pushed his public relations company to free up one extra seat.  The stars were aligned for the two to meet and for their friendship to begin.

Roman declined the invitation.  Unaware of the backstory that Serfer had created in his head, and generally preferring to avoid what he perceived as freebie meals, Roman saw the invitation as just another piece of PR material for the circular filing cabinet.

But unlike Sharknado, this story has a happy ending.  Roman discovered Blue Collar in due time, falling for its emphasis on comfort food, its homey vibe, and its friendly staff.
After developing a friendship during which time Roman served as best man at Serfer’s wedding and godfather to Serfer’s firstborn child (who is affectionately referred to as Steak), and during which time Roman’s fear of commitment made it impossible for him to return such favors to Serfer, the two conspired to open Mignonette.

Beth Bloom's formal investiture today (UPDATED WITH PHOTOS)

Congratulations!

Anthony Bosch pleads guilty

Here's the AP:

The former owner of a South Florida anti-aging clinic pleaded guilty Thursday to charges of illegally providing performance-enhancing drugs to athletes including high-profile Major League Baseball players, most notably New York Yankees star Alex Rodriguez.
Anthony Bosch, former owner of the Biogenesis of America clinic in Coral Gables, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to distribute testosterone before U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles. Bosch, who called himself "Dr. T," faces a maximum 10-year prison sentence but is likely to get far less because of cooperation with prosecutors and with MLB's investigation into player drug use.
Defense attorney Guy Lewis said Bosch, 51, provided key information to MLB investigators that led to suspensions of 14 players, including the record season-long suspension handed to Rodriguez for this past year. Bosch also met numerous times with federal prosecutors and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents, Lewis said.
"He was faithful in terms of appearing each and every time he was requested to," Lewis said. "Each and every time he appeared, answered questions and was available."
...In a plea agreement, Bosch admitted to providing testosterone to baseball players, from professionals to high school athletes. Six other people are charged in the case, and Bosch has agreed to testify against them if they go to trial.

He was also reinstated on bond:

Earlier this month, Gayles revoked Bosch's $100,000 bail because he twice tested positive after his August arrest for cocaine use and had missed appointments at drug treatment programs. On Thursday, Gayles agreed to release Bosch on bail with several new conditions, including a requirement that Bosch attended a 24-hour inpatient drug treatment program.Prosecutors did not object, and Lewis said Bosch needs the treatment badly.
"You have before you an individual who does need counseling. We recognize that. He's begging for it," Lewis said.
When Bosch is not in the treatment program, he will remain on house arrest with electronic monitoring, Gayles said. Sentencing for Bosch is set for Dec. 18.

Deputy U.S. Marshal from Miami arrested on drug ripoff charge in California

From News10 ABC in Yuba City, California:

One of three men arrested following a suspected marijuana theft is a deputy US Marshal.
Clorenzo Mack Griffin, 37, works out of the US Marshal's Service office in Miami and has been a deputy marshal since April 2010, said Drew Wade, a spokesman for the US Marshal's Service in Washington.
According to the California Highway Patrol, Griffin and two other men were in a Jeep that ran a red light around the corner from the CHP's Yuba City office on Saturday afternoon.
Following a short chase, the three occupants abandoned the vehicle near the Sutter County Jail and fled on foot.
A Sutter County sheriff's deputy saw one of the men, identified as Griffin, run into a secure area of the jail property and draw a handgun from his waistband.
The CHP says the deputy fired at Griffin, who wasn't hit, and was taken into custody along with the other two suspects without further incident.
Investigators found a large amount of marijuana in the Jeep and said their subsequent investigation determined the pot had been stolen at gunpoint from an individual in Yuba City.

 

Federal Bar invites pro bono participation

The Federal Bar Association had a nice luncheon at the Hyatt today asking lawyers to become more involved in pro bono cases at both the state and federal level.  Judge Salter from the 3rd DCA and Judge Jordan from the 11th Circuit spoke.  Good peeps.  Here's a picture from the event:

Scalia says no to sentencing on acquitted conduct

Unfortunately, he only got Justices Thomas and Ginsburg to agree with him, so the Court denied cert in Jones v. U.S.  From Scalia's dissent on the cert denial:

This has gone on long enough. The present petition
presents the nonhypothetical case the Court claimed to
have been waiting for. And it is a particularly appealing
case, because not only did no jury convict these defendants
of the offense the sentencing judge thought them guilty of,
but a jury acquitted them of that offense. Petitioners were
convicted of distributing drugs, but acquitted of conspiring
to distribute drugs. The sentencing judge found that
petitioners had engaged in the conspiracy of which the
jury acquitted them. The Guidelines, petitioners claim,
recommend sentences of between 27 and 71 months for
their distribution convictions. But in light of the conspiracy
finding, the court calculated much higher Guidelines
ranges, and sentenced Jones, Thurston, and Ball to 180,
194, and 225 months’ imprisonment.
On petitioners’ appeal, the D. C. Circuit held that even if
their sentences would have been substantively unreasonable
but for judge-found facts, their Sixth Amendment
rights were not violated. 744 F. 3d 1362, 1369 (2014). We
should grant certiorari to put an end to the unbroken
string of cases disregarding the Sixth Amendment—or to
eliminate the Sixth Amendment difficulty by acknowledging
that all sentences below the statutory maximum are
substantively reasonable.

It's terrible to me that in a free society an individual can be sentenced to conduct for which he was found not guilty.  How is this acceptable?

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Well, the federal courthouse is closed today.  It's one of those weird days, though, when schools are still open.  I wonder what most law firms are doing today?  Please post in the comments whether your firm is open or closed.

If you are working, and are looking for some interesting reading, check out this article in the Washington Post about Supreme Court reasoning:

Twice this past week readers wondered why I had forgotten a key element of one of the most basic aspects of journalism: the old who-what-where-when-and-how.
It was clear what the Supreme Court had done, they said, but where’s the why? There’s a pretty good defense for that, though it is frustrating for all: The justices never gave their reasons.
In an in­cred­ibly consequential first week of the term, the court allowed same-sex marriages to proliferate around the nation, temporarily put on hold and then gave the green light to rulings ending the bans in Idaho and Nevada, and refereed state laws governing voting in next month’s midterm elections.
All without explanation.

 Judge Kopf believes Judge Arnold would have been excellent on the Supreme Court.  President Clinton was close to nominating him instead of Breyer.  As I've said before Justice Breyer is one of the most conservative Justices on the Supreme Court as it relates to criminal justice issues, so things would have been quite different had Arnold made it instead.

With all this Supreme Court talk, you should check in with ScotusBlog tomorrow for new Court orders and cert grants.

Tick Tock

The statute is about to run on the Scott Rothstein case.  And a big indictment came out today against Former regional vice president of TD Bank Frank Spinosa, who is represented by Sam Rabin. Judge Bloom got the case. The new judges have all the fun...

From the Sun-Sentinel article:

Spinosa, 53, was released on $250,000 bond after a brief appearance in federal court. He was placed on house arrest with electronic monitoring and is scheduled for arraignment on Oct. 24, court records show.

His lawyer, Samuel Rabin, said Spinosa will plead not guilty and plans to go to trial on the allegations.

"He's innocent and he wants his day in court," Rabin said.

Spinosa has known for years that he was under criminal investigation and had offered to surrender if the government filed charges against him, Rabin said. He called the arrest at Spinosa's home "totally unnecessary" and "one of those typical Rothstein case flourishes."

The grand jury indictment, unsealed Friday morning, charges Spinosa with one count of wire fraud conspiracy and five counts of wire fraud. Each charge carries a maximum punishment of 20 years in federal prison and hefty fines.

Spinosa is accused of facilitating Rothstein's fraud by giving investors a "false sense of security" and inducing them to invest hundreds of millions of dollars with Rothstein by lying about how much money was in Rothstein's bank accounts and who could withdraw it.

Spinosa signed off on fraudulent so-called "lock letters" that led Rothstein's investors to believe that money in some of Rothstein's bank accounts was being held only for them, according to the charges.

Prosecutors also say Spinosa lied and used a script containing "talking points" prepared by Rothstein when he met with some investors and participated in conference calls with others to help reassure them their investments were safe.

Rothstein's fraud involved fooling investors into thinking they were making huge profits by investing in confidential legal settlements. He told investors they were making a lot of money by fronting smaller lump sums to plaintiffs who had won settlements or judgments and wanted quick access to cash. The investors would supposedly reap huge profits by later collecting the full amount of the settlements.

Rothstein later admitted it was all a lie and he used the money to pay for what he liked to call his "rock star lifestyle." Cash from new investors was used to pay out "profits" to older investors and keep the fraud alive.

"While defendant Spinosa and Rothstein did not discuss the fraudulent nature of the confidential settlements, they did agree to the preparation of the false and fraudulent 'lock letters' and the making of false statements to investors," according to the indictment.