“Miami is replete with people who utilize illegal funds and live a luxurious, unbelievable lifestyle.”

That was Judge Lenard, sentencing Alvaro Lopez Tardon --convicted of spending in Miami, drug proceeds earned in Spain -- to 150 years in federal prison.  From the Miami Herald:

A federal judge put a uniquely Miami spin on the $20 million shopping spree of convicted money launderer Álvaro López Tardón before sending the accused Spanish drug kingpin to prison for 150 years on Monday.
“I call it funny money, and we have a plethora of funny money here,” U.S. District Judge Joan Lenard declared, as she described López Tardón's use of cocaine proceeds from Spain to purchase exotic cars and waterfront condos. “Miami is replete with people who utilize illegal funds and live a luxurious, unbelievable lifestyle.”
Before Monday's final sentencing, Lenard had conducted a series of hearings in which she spoke about shadowy characters like López Tardón who hang out in sunny places like South Florida. During those hearings, a federal prosecutor and defense attorneys debated the relative harm that the 39-year-old Spaniard actually did to the community by blowing drug money made in Spain on high-priced cars, condos, jewelry and watches in Miami.
In June, López Tardón was found guilty of a single conspiracy charge that carried up to 20 years in prison and guilty of 13 money-laundering charges that carried up to 10 years each. Under sentencing guidelines, the judge had the authority to craft a prison term that effectively added up to life in prison for the Spaniard.

Meantime, Judge Altonaga sentenced a pimp to 29 years in prison:

A Miami federal judge did not believe Damion St. Patrick Baston told the truth when he took the witness stand in his sex-trafficking trial this summer. She also did not detect any sense of guilt or remorse after the jury convicted him.
At his sentencing hearing on Monday, U.S. District Judge Cecilia Altonaga said Baston has a “deviant” and “delusional” personality with a “warped sense of reality.”
Despite her low opinion of the 37-year-old Jamaican, the judge refused to give him a maximum life sentence, instead sending Baston to prison for 27 years. The judge said that, although the trial evidence proved Baston repeatedly victimized young women in the sex trade from Australia to Dubai to Miami, he didn’t kill anyone and, therefore, a “sentence of life would not provide just punishment.”

What do you all think about these very long sentences after trial?  What would they have gotten had they pleaded guilty?

Meantime, down the street, there is a big push to get a new civil courthouse.  It's obviously needed.  Judge Soto looks great in the ad, while the courthouse looks just awful:

RIP Mike Beck

Judge Ed Davis' longtime courtroom deputy and then Northern Division Manager Michael Beck unexpectedly passed away over the weekend.  Mike was a great guy and really funny once you got to know him. 


He knew more about the clerk's office and how things ran than anyone I knew. 


Most people will remember his booming voice -- he would introduce court for Judge Davis every morning with the traditional OYEZ, OYEZ, OYEZ call.  It was really impressive how he did it.  So the judges started using him for en banc hearings and the like. 


Judge Davis' tight-knit federal family has had a rough go of it the last couple of years.  Mike was a big part of that family.  He will be missed.


If you have a good Mike Beck story, please remember him in the comments.

“This is really a story about redemption.”

A great quote on Rosh Hashanah from Bill Barzee about his client, lobbyist Richard Canadia.  Judge Cooke sentenced him to probation and four months of home confinement. From the (newly designed) Herald:

Cooke said she recognized his remorse and the significance of his help. She also recognized he was a vulnerable man who had gone through financial difficulty, a divorce and the death of his parents when he decided to participate in an FBI-orchestrated grant scheme to rip off the federal government.
Cooke, known for her folksy expressions, said the “wheels fell off the bus” in describing Candia’s dire situation. Before that, “I don’t think this was anything you were capable of or thought you would do,” the judge told him.

Pizzi surely hasn't kept his head down since his acquittal.  Here are his comments after the sentencing:

After Thursday’s sentencing, Pizzi called Candia’s deal an “outrage.”

“After three years and millions of tax dollars spent, lying lobbyist Michael Kesti is doing talk shows and lying lobbyist Richard Candia is home watching footballs games,” Pizzi said. “These are two lobbyists who lied to and wanted to corrupt every city in the state in order to make money. One got a big paycheck by conning the government and the other, Candia, a free pass. This is how this operation ended.”

"Who do you think President Obama could appoint at this very day, given the boundaries that we have? If I resign any time this year, he could not successfully appoint anyone I would like to see in the court. [The Senate] took off the filibuster for lower federal court appointments, but it remains for this court. So anybody who thinks that if I step down, Obama could appoint someone like me, they’re misguided. As long as I can do the job full steam…. I think I’ll recognize when the time comes that I can’t any longer. But now I can."

That's Notorious RGB, otherwise known as Justice Ginsburg, in this Elle article. It's an awesome article and worth the read.  Here's one exchange:

It’s part of Washington lore that you and Justice Scalia are good friends and opera buddies. I have to ask, when he says that the Constitution doesn’t necessarily prohibit discrimination against women, isn’t it hard not to take it personally?

Justice Scalia and I served together on the DC Circuit. So his votes are not surprising to me. What I like about him is that he’s very funny and very smart.

[She points to a photograph.] That one shows the two of us in 1994 when we were on a delegation to India. So there we are on a very elegant elephant. My feminist friends say, “Why are you riding on the back of the elephant?” and I said, “Because of the distribution of weight, we needed to have Scalia in the front.”

Does it make a difference having three women justices?

Yes, an enormous difference….When Sandra left, I was all alone…. Now Kagan is on my left, and Sotomayor is on my right. So we look like we’re really part of the court and we’re here to stay. Also, both of them are very active in oral arguments. They’re not shrinking violets. It’s very good for the schoolchildren who parade in and out of the court to see.

In other news, a Miami state judge supposedly told a store clerk "to go and f--- yourself."

Michael Boggs' nomination to district bench in Georgia appears dead

The AP has the story here:

President Barack Obama's controversial selection of Michael Boggs to become a federal judge in Georgia lacks enough votes to survive and the nomination should be withdrawn, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said Monday in what amounts to a rare rebuff of the president from his own party.

The fate of Boggs's nomination has been in doubt for months, after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and other Democrats expressed opposition to him because of positions he has taken on abortion, same-sex marriage and the Confederate flag.

Monday's remarks by the Judiciary chairman, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., signaled what could become an embarrassment for Obama. It is unusual for a president's nominees to be rejected by members of his own party.

Several hours earlier, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Obama did not want Boggs to withdraw his nomination. Earnest gave a modest endorsement of Boggs, saying Obama believes that "Judge Boggs has the necessary qualifications to serve in this role."

After Leahy's statement, White House spokesman Eric Schultz stood by Earnest's remarks.

Leahy's comments came six weeks before congressional elections in which strong support from women and black voters would enhance Democrats' chances of retaining Senate control and limiting expected losses in the House.

Obama last year nominated Boggs, a state appeals court judge, to become a federal district judge in Georgia. Boggs was recommended by that state's two Republican senators as part of a deal to fill seven judicial vacancies there.

***

Boggs served as a Georgia state legislator a decade ago. During that time, he backed measures to post information online about doctors who perform abortions - which opponents said could jeopardize those physicians - and to keep the Confederate battle emblem on the Georgia flag. He also supported a proposed amendment to the state constitution barring same-sex marriages.

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in May, Boggs told the senators that he now believes his vote on abortion doctors was wrong and he's glad the Confederate emblem was later removed from the state flag. He said his views on same-sex marriage "may or may not have changed."

Nonetheless, he was criticized by several Democrats, with some expressing skepticism that he could make impartial decisions.

Abortion-rights groups hailed word that Boggs' nomination was in trouble.

"Everybody wishes this guy would do the right thing and withdraw," said Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. "He's got no pathway forward, and he's taking up time and energy that everybody wishes could be spent on other things."