Ruling in the Scripps case

The Sun-Sentinel reports here that Judge Donald Middlebrooks dealt a setback Friday to the Scripps Research Institute, ruling that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers did not do a sufficient environmental analysis prior to approving the Palm Beach County biotechnology project.The 62-page decision does not automatically halt the project, but attorneys for two environmental groups who brought the lawsuit said they will now ask him to stop construction and order the project moved to a less environmentally sensitive location.

Comments!

You should check out the comment sections to the last couple of posts -- There are some really interesting remarks, all made by Anonymous. Who are you?

Breaking news

It's not everyday that we get to break news here on the Southern District of Florida blog, so here goes: Pursuant to the Criminal Justice Act, Judge Moreno has appointed Hugo Rodriguez (at a rate of $90/hour) to represent Gilberto Rodriguez-Orejuela, who is accused of once being the largest cocaine distrubutor in the world.

UPDATE: When it rains, it pours. Here is more breaking news -- the government has decided to ask for rehearing on the Cuban Spy decision. Here is the press release they sent out today: "Today, United States Attorney R. Alexander Acosta and the members of the trial team in United States v. Camp, submitted to the EleventhCircuit Court of Appeals a Petition requesting that all twelve activejudges of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals rehear that case. The Petition respecfully expresses a belief, based on a reasoned and studied professional judgment, that the panel decision in this case is contrary tothe decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States and of the EleventhCircuit, and that consideration by the full Court is necessary to secureand maintain uniformity of decisions in the Eleventh Circuit." The press release was emailed to every news outlet in Miami, even though the brief has not even been filed yet in the 11th Circuit.

Answer to trivia

Anonymous (who are you?!) posted the answer late last night -- The youngest federal judge was Thomas Jefferson Boynton, who was 25 when Abraham Lincoln issued him a recess appointment to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida on October 19, 1863.

Slow blogging & Trivia

Sorry about the slow blogging recently, but I'm in trial. The jury went out about 2:30 today and still has not reached a verdict... Waiting is the hardest part. In any event, there have been a bunch of interesting pieces in the DBR (about the porn wars making this District the brunt of jokes) and the Herald (about the AG's visit) the last couple of days. I just haven't had time to write about them... Sorry.

In the meantime, Richard B. Rosenthal has emailed me this trivia question, which I reproduce here. Answer to follow in the next couple of days, but use the comment section if you wanna take a guess: Who is the youngest person ever appointed to the federal judiciary, what President appointed him or her, and on what court did he or she serve?