Get Your Tickets: 2025 Bench & Bar Conference

By John R. Byrne 

Though it may not be as rare as Halley’s Comet, our district court's Bench and Bar Conference still only comes around once every two years. You don't want to miss it. For one thing, it's a rare opportunity to hear from and speak with our judges. For another, you can order a latte that has the seal of our district etched in the foam. Good luck finding that at your local Starbucks!

You can buy tickets here. Details below.

• Date: September 12, 2025 from 7:45 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. 
• Price: $210 (with 100 tickets available at a discounted rate for qualifying "new lawyers")
• Location:  The Miami Beach Convention Center (a stunning venue, if you've never been before)

SDFLA News & Notes

 By John R. Byrne

1. Judge Bloom's Judicial Intern Academy, now in its fifth year, had its year end luncheon this past Friday (picture above). It's really hard to land an internship with a federal judge and the program is designed to give more students the internship experience through pairing with former federal law clerks and programming. If you're a former federal law clerk in the SDFLA who might want to get involved, I can connect you to the right people. 

2. With Judge Goodman's retirement, Judge Matthewman is now the chief magistrate judge in our district. Law.com had a nice write up on him that you can find here. Judge Matthewman, who served as a police officer before embarking on his legal career, said one of his focuses will be on judicial security.  

3. Jay Weaver wrote this article about what the blog proprietor has been doing lately. 

4. Big hearing today in front of Judge Ruiz about "Alligator Alcatraz." Lawyers for the detainees there say that immigration judges are cancelling hearings because they don't have jurisdiction over the detainees. Check out the story here.

AI Gone Wild

 By John R. Byrne

Artificial intelligence is changing the world everyday. Sometimes not for the better. A few weeks back we featured an order from Judge Matthewman sanctioning a lawyer for citing a hallucinated case. That attorney's conduct was child's play compared to the fact pattern Judge Leibowitz just confronted. A preview for you--when the lawyer at issue received an order to show cause about the use of AI-fabricated case citations, he filed a response complete with fabricated AI case quotations. Suffice it to say, things did not end well for said attorney. 

Check out the order below. 

DE 42_Order re AI by John Byrne on Scribd

RIP Roy Black

This one really hurts.

He was 80.  And he really was the GOAT of criminal defense lawyers.  There are so many of us that want to be Roy in the courtroom -- commanding, persuasive, funny.  

The hardest working.

The most determined.

And always so positive about winning.

I was lucky enough to try a 6 week trial with him out of town when I was a young lawyer.  I learned so much.  And he often helped me brainstorm my cases and trials after that.  

He is survived by his wife Lea, their son RJ, and his daughter Nora. And his law partners at Black Srebnick, including Howard Srebnick, Scott Kornspan, Maria Neyra, Jackie Perczek, Mark Shapiro, and Jared Lopez.

If you want to hear from the master, here he is on my podcast talking about his win in the Luis Alvarez case.

And I can't think of a greater tribute you can give him than listening to some of his courtroom performances:

Best of luck to Magistrate Judge Jonathan Goodman

 By DOM and John Byrne

His retirement party was Friday.  We will miss Judge Goodman's wit and humor on the bench.  Here's a picture with his clerks and CRDs from the party:

 A big loss for our bench. It was always a joy to be in his courtroom. He was sharp, funny, efficient, and, yes, for a while I hear he had a puppet though, sadly, I missed that era. Going into a hearing with him, you just knew he was going to get it right (which, depending on who you represented, was sometimes good and sometimes bad).

Trump Sues Wall Street Journal

 By John R. Byrne

President Trump has sued the Wall Street Journal over its Epstein reporting. He's represented again by Alejandro Brito, who recently repped Trump in his successful defamation lawsuit against George Stephanopoulos and ABC. Case hasn't been assigned yet. Complaint is below.

Once again, the SDFLA takes center stage...

Trump Complaint by John Byrne on Scribd

Brain drain at the SDFLA U.S. Attorney's Office?

 Jay Weaver covers the recent firings (Michael Thakur, Brooke Watson, and Anne McNamara) and departures from the U.S. Attorney's office here:

In 2023, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland honored Miami federal prosecutor Brooke C. Watson with a prestigious award recognizing her “exceptional dedication” to prosecuting a ring that used fake identities to commit about $50 million in COVID-19 loan fraud. Last year, Watson received another Justice Department award for “exceptional service” disrupting a ransomware group that threatened to steal hundreds of millions of dollars from computer networks worldwide. But on Friday, Garland’s successor, Pam Bondi, fired Watson in a terse email to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami — providing no reason, according to multiple sources familiar with her termination.

***

Since Trump started his second term, the U.S. Attorney’s Office has undergone a “brain drain,” losing not only Thakur and Watson to firings but also many other veteran prosecutors to retirement or career opportunities. Among them: Joan Silverstein, Bob Senior, Dan Bernstein, Kiran Bhat, Tom Watts-Fitzgerald, Jonathan Stratton, Tony Gonzalez, Ignacio Vazquez, Lisa Rubio, Dexter Lee, Jeff Kaplan and Paul Schwartz.

RIP Bob Josefsberg

Very sad news report today -- Miami legal legend Robert Josefsberg has passed away at 86.

 

Bob was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York and received his B.A. degree from Dartmouth College in 1959. He graduated from the Yale Law School in 1962, and was admitted to the Florida Bar in 1962.

Here's some more of his bio, which does not do justice to the impact he had on this community: 

Bob is one of Dade County′s premiere trial lawyers. He has been listed annually since 1987 in the Best Lawyers in America in two categories–Business Litigation and Criminal Law since 2003 and from 2003 he has been listed in Chambers and Partners as one of the top four commercial litigators in Florida. In 2006 he was listed #1 trial lawyer in Florida by Super Lawyers. He has received the Dade County Bar David Dyer Professionalism Award, the Bnai Brith Professionalism Award, the Florida Defense Lawyers Rodney Thaxton “Against All Odds”award, the American Bar Association Senior Section Pro Bono Award , the Florida Bar Tobias Simon Pro Bono Service Award in (2009-2010) and the Florida Bar Foundation’s Medal of Honor Award in 2013.

In 2012, he was awarded the Florida Bar Criminal Law Section’s Selig I. Goldin Memorial Award, the Greater Miami Jewish Federation Theodore “Ted” Klein Special Recognition Award, named as one of the Top 100 Trial Lawyers by the National Trial Lawyers organization, inducted to the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame and named a Public Justice Trial Lawyer of the Year finalist for outstanding contributions to the public interest through his work in the Checking Account Overdraft Class Action litigation.

Bob was a gentle giant.  He will be missed.