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
The government perceives two areas in which Mr. Nurik’s representation of the defendant presents a potential conflict of interest which must be addressed. In examining potential conflicts of interest, the Court’s “goal is to discover whether the defense lawyer has divided loyalties that prevent him from effectively representing the defendant.” United States v. Ross, 33 F.3d 1507, 1523 (11th Cir. 1994). As a former employee of RRA, which has been designated as the Enterprise through which criminal conduct was conducted herein, Mr. Nurik has, at a minimum, professional relationships with other employees of RRA who do have apparent criminal culpability in the case, which could conceivably interfere with the undivided loyalty that Mr. Nurik owes to the defendant.
Secondly,* because Mr. Nurik was an employee at RRA, he may personally be in the position to provide exculpatory evidence on the defendant’s behalf, which would be prohibited if Mr. Nurik persisted in his representation of the defendant.
It is the government’s position that, in the instant case, because the aforesaid constitute potential, rather than actual, conflicts of interest, the defendant may waive those conflicts at a properly-conducted Garcia hearing.
*My question -- is "secondly" a word? Or is it just, "second"?
In SDFLA news, the Scott Rothstein plea has been set, but before Judge Cohn will conduct the change of plea hearing, he is having a McLain hearing next week and requiring the government to state in writing whether it is investigating Rothstein's lawyer Marc Nurik.
Scott Rothstein to plead guilty. Here's Curt Anderson from the AP: Disbarred South Florida lawyer Scott Rothstein is negotiating a guilty plea with federal prosecutors on charges of orchestrating a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme using faked legal settlements, his attorney said Tuesday. "I can tell you that there will be a change of plea to guilty," said Rothstein attorney Marc Nurik. "We don't have any finalization on the details at this point." Nurik said he will ask a federal judge Wednesday to set a date for the change of plea hearing. Rothstein, 47, pleaded not guilty in December to a five-count indictment accusing him of racketeering, conspiracy and fraud in a scheme that ran from 2005 to 2009.
Tom Withers covers the memos here. A snippet from his summary:
The Guidance Memo then directs that the discovery review should cover the following: 1) the investigative agency’s files, 2) Confidential Informant/Witness/Source files, 3) Evidence and Information Gathered During the Investigation, 4) Documents or Evidence Gathered by Civil Attorneys and/or Regulatory Agencies in Parallel Civil Investigations, 5) Substantive Case Related Communications, 6) Potential Giglio Information Relating to Law Enforcement Witnesses, 7) Potential Giglio Information Relating to Non-Law Enforcement Witnesses and Fed.R.Evid. 806 Declarants, 8) Information Obtained in Witness Interviews, a) Witness Statement Variations and the Duty to Disclose, b) Trial Preparation Meetings With Witnesses and c) Agent Notes. The Guidance Memo then directs that although prosecutors may delegate the process of review to others, they “should not delegate the disclosure determination itself.”
3. Lots of coverage on the shootings from Las Vegas. Just terrible stuff. Here's the video that is making the internet rounds:
Today at every federal courthouse security will be a little tighter. People will get a second look, maybe a third. There is no correlation between what happened in Las Vegas yesterday and federal court anywhere else. People get angry at the grocery store, at the post office, and at work. But it's like when someone with a shoe bomb tries to blow up a plane, well, you know the rest.We (those who go to court) all have to deal with what happened yesterday. It will happen again, we all know that. But because we cannot stop a sick, angry litigant from sneaking in with a gun, a shotgun, we have to at least pretend we can. The gunman was dressed in black. Watch "no black" be the next addition to the dress code. We can only sigh and understand that this is the world in which we live.It angers me that today I have to mourn the death of a Court Security Officer, a retired cop now one of the guys in blue jackets that waive familiar lawyers through, and say "how you doin' today counsel?". A guy who just "went to work" right after the new year, and left the courthouse dead. Five seconds before he was probably talking to a prosecutor, defense lawyer, or fellow security officer about his New Year's vacation. or the weekend's football games.Pisses me off.
4. Random thought of the day: Why does Blogger say that internet is misspelled?
Judges Graham and Ungaro recently participated in a training program for Judges, lawyers, law enforcement personnel, court administrators and others in Jinja, Uganda. Beth Sreenan also participated as the DOJ representative. From what I understand, it was a great experience.
In other Monday afternoon news, the DBR covers the honest services fraud debate here. And they even have a video:
AFTERNOON UPDATE -- Very sad news: there's been a shooting at the Las Vegas Federal Courthouse leaving a court security office dead, and a marshal in critical condition. The shooter has been shot dead. The link above is from the local Las Vegas paper, which also has a video. Terrible news.
Here's the government's response to Judge Cohn's inquiry regarding whether Marc Nurik is under investigation: he's not. The government explains that he isn't a target or subject in the investigation. But it says:
