RIP James Lawrence King

 An icon. 98 years old and was on the federal bench since 1970... one of the longest serving ever.

From Judge Moreno:

Judge King died this morning. He was a great trial judge particularly in his first 4 decades of service. I tried several cases , including a murder trial in the early 80s and can attest how fair he was pre trial and even at sentencing. He was a great Chief Judge, got the buildings for Miami. Appointed by Nixon in 1970 he served as an active judge until he took senior status as soon as he was eligible to help the court get a replacement in those busier days. He was no

longer taking cases because of illness but served for 55 years. May he rest in peace. FAM

I will post other comments here as well.

Judge Williams Appoints Amici in Trump v. IRS

By Jordi C. Martínez-Cid

Judge Williams sua sponte appointed three friends of the court to opine as to whether the court has subject-matter jurisdiction in the lawsuit President Trump brought against the Internal Revenue Service. The parties had asked for 90 days to explore potential settlement and Judge Williams expressed concerns regarding whether the parties are truly adverse.

Judge Williams appointed heavyweights from outside the district to opine, namley: John Gleeson and David A. O’Neil of Debevoise and Plimpton; Donald B. Verrilli, Jr. of Munger Tolles; and Faith E. Gay, Philippe Z. Selendy, and Corey Stoughton of Selendy Gay. Their memorandum is due on May 21. The order can be found here.

Well-Deserved Award Recipients (Past and Future)

By John R. Byrne

Sharing some news from the awards circuit. This past Tuesday, the American Jewish Committee presented its Learned Hand Award to attorney Bobby Gilbert. In addition to being an exceptional lawyer (and golfer), Bobby is a great person who has done so much for the Jewish community, both here in South Florida and abroad. Plus, he graduated from the best high school in the country, Miami Palmetto Senior High. Several of our state and federal judges were there to celebrate Bobby. 

Next up, on May 28, 2026, Transition will honor federal judge Raag Singhal and state judge Marisa Tinkler Mendez at its Heroes Reception. Transition does important work helping people leaving the prison system reenter our community. 

Well-deserved recipients and causes.  

Vodou Assasination Expert?!

 By John R. Byrne

The big trial involving the assassination of the Haitian president is winding down. Closing arguments could be next week. And this sounds like it's been an interesting one. Just this week, the defense attempted to call a Vodou expert. Yes, a Vodou expert. The theory was apparently that the manner in which President Moise's body was treated after being murdered (both his arms were broken and his face "was destroyed") suggested something more or different than a simple assassination for pay.  

But Judge Becerra wasn't going for it. “I find it curious that a Vodou priest would be able to take the stand and say that he is well-versed in Vodou assassinations, which appears to me to be something, on its face, impossible because it’s not something that that religion condones."

I guess we'll never find out what the hourly rate of a Vodou expert is.

The Herald recaps where things stand here. 

Increasing the Price of Admission to Federal Court

By John R. Byrne

Since 1996, for diversity cases, the price of admission to get your lawsuit into federal court has been $75,000-plus — i.e., the amount in controversy had to exceed $75,000.

It’s safe to say that a dollar doesn’t go as far today as it did back then. And, finally, it looks like Congress may do something about it. Last week, Rep. Laurel Lee introduced the Federal Diversity Jurisdiction Modernization Act. If passed, the Act will raise the amount in controversy from $75,000 to $500,000. To give you some context, $75k in 1996 is roughly equivalent to $158k today, so this is more than just an inflation adjustment.

The reason for the increase? Our federal courts are slammed. Since 1990, federal filings have increased by 30% while the number of authorized district court judgeships has grown by only 4%. Legislation creating more judgeships has stalled out because of political bickering, so this looks like an alternative path to addressing the federal caseload.

This is long overdue. But the Act needs a cooler name. How about the “Don’t Make a Federal Case Out of It” Act?

You can read the press release for the Act here. 

Roy Moore's $8.2 Million Verdict Goes Poof at the Eleventh Circuit

By John R. Byrne

Do you remember Roy Moore? He was the Republican nominee in the special election to fill the Alabama Senate seat Jeff Sessions vacated when he became Attorney General. You may also remember the wave of news coverage reporting allegations that several women had accused Moore of inappropriate sexual conduct when they were young.

Moore later sued a political action committee (Senate Majority PAC) over a political ad that quoted and juxtaposed some of those reports. A jury sided with Moore, finding the ad defamatory and awarding him $8.2 million in compensatory damages.

But Moore will not be collecting a penny. In an opinion issued Friday, the Eleventh Circuit held that the trial court should have granted judgment as a matter of law to Senate Majority PAC. The issue was not simply whether the ad could be read to imply something defamatory (the Court said it could). The problem for Moore was that, because he was a public figure, he had to prove that the PAC acted with “actual malice." The court found the evidence lacking on that front, emphasizing, among other things, that the ad quoted and cited existing news reports and that the PAC had a fact-checking process before publication.

It's just the latest case applying the NY Times v. Sullivan standard, a standard that's come under fire recently from judges in our circuit (both district and appellate). The panel in the case again acknowledged the criticism of the Sullivan standard in a footnote, writing that "unless and until the Supreme Court decides to revisit the actual malice standard, we must continue to apply it."

You can read the opinion here.

Alligator Alcatraz Injunction Vacated

By Jordi C. Martínez-Cid

As a follow-up to the last post about Alligator Alcatraz, the Eleventh Circuit has reversed and remanded the preliminary injunction issued by Judge Williams. Judges Pryor and Brasher were in the majority with Judge Abudu in dissent.

There has been a trend, even in appellate opinion writing, to use simpler, more forceful language. The disssent's conclusion fits right in: "In sum, the majority, under the guise of de novo review, disregards the district court’s well-supported factual findings in favor of its own, thereby blurring in more than just an idiosyncratic way, the important distinction between legal conclusions and factual findings. [...] Therefore, the majority’s decision to vacate the district court’s order is just plain wrong. I dissent."

The full opinion is available at this link.

Judge Eugene Spellman

By John R. Byrne

Today we're featuring the portrait of Judge Eugene Spellman. Like a few of the judges we've featured before, Judge Spellman was a "Double Gator," getting his undergraduate degree from UF in 1953 and his law degree in 1955. Appointed to the federal bench by Jimmy Carter in 1979, he served until 1991 (leaving the bench just a week before his death from cancer at the age of 60). His most historically significant public case appears to be the Haitian-refugee litigation in Louis v. Nelson / Jean v. Nelson, discussed more below.

I don't know much about Judge Spellman, but it's clear that his colleagues must have liked him because the attorney lounge in the Wilkie D. Ferguson courthouse is named after him. 

FBA write up here:

Judge Eugene Spellman was nominated to the district court by President Carter in 1979; he served on the court until 1991. In 1982, Judge Spellman held in Louis v. Nelson, 544 F. Supp. 973 (S.D. Fla. 1982), that a policy by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which resulted in the detention of Haitian migrants, was unlawful, resulting in the release of hundreds of migrants who had been unlawfully detained. Known for his humor and empathy, Judge Spellman was remembered as follows: “His personal and professional integrity and the intellectual rigor with which he confronted his tasks were beyond reproach.”