The SDFLA Blog is dedicated to providing news and notes regarding federal practice in the Southern District of Florida. The New Times calls the blog "the definitive source on South Florida's federal court system." All tips on court happenings are welcome and will remain anonymous. Please email David Markus at dmarkus@markuslaw.com
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By now it should be clear that everyone who posts here (except you) is Anonymous, so in a very real sense, everyone answered your trivia question.
Judge Boynton is also remembered as the federal judge who upheld the conviction by a military commission of Dr. Samuel Mudd, because he provided shelter and medical treatment to President Lincoln's assassin, John Wilkes Booth. Ex Parte Mudd, 17 F. Cas. 954 (SD Fla. 1868). In keeping with SDFL tradition (or perhaps in starting it), Judge Boynton denied relief by refusing to apply the Supreme Court's precedent in Ex Parte Milligan, which would have required that a writ of habeas corpus be granted. He reached his decision by refusing to consider the evidence (sound familiar?), even though he knew there was no evidence to convict Dr. Mudd: "It is a matter of public notoriety that some persons, more or less acquainted with the evidence on which these convictions were based, doubt the fair sufficiency of that evidence to necessitate beyond reasonable doubt the conclusion arrived at. But this is a question with which I have nothing to do."
We should be proud.
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