Case Name: THE FLORIDA BAR, Complainant, v. Gail Anne ROBERTS, Respondent
Court: Florida Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1993-10-28
Citations: 626 So. 2d 658
Docket Number: No. 79555
Parties: THE FLORIDA BAR, Complainant, v. Gail Anne ROBERTS, Respondent.
Judges: BARKETT, C.J., and OVERTON, MCDONALD, SHAW, KOGAN and HARDING, JJ., concur.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 626
Pages: 658–660

Head Matter:
THE FLORIDA BAR, Complainant, v. Gail Anne ROBERTS, Respondent.
No. 79555.
Supreme Court of Florida.
Oct. 28, 1993.
John F. Harkness, Jr., Executive Director, and John T. Berry, Staff Counsel, Tallahassee, and Lorraine C. Hoffmann, Bar Counsel, Fort Lauderdale, for complainant.
John A. Weiss, Tallahassee, for respondent.

Opinion:
PER CURIAM.
We have for review the report of the referee and The Florida Bar's complaint asking that we impose professional discipline on Gail Anne Roberts for ethical breaches. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 15, Fla.Const.
Roberts was conditionally admitted to The Florida Bar in December 1986. The terms of the admission required her to be placed on probation for three years subject to both periodic and random urinalysis to ensure she was not engaging in substance abuse. In early 1990 eleven days after Roberts' conditional admission ended, The Florida Bar filed a petition for an order to show cause why she should not be held in contempt of Court for violating her probation. However, Roberts and the Bar then entered into an agreement extending her conditional admission, and the Bar voluntarily dismissed its petition.
In May 1990 Roberts was arrested for attempting to purchase $40.00 worth of cocaine from an undercover officer in Naples. She later pled no contest to the felony charge of attempting to purchase a controlled substance. Nevertheless, the referee below specifically found that Roberts substantially complied with her periodic urinalysis since October 1989 and has immediately complied when the Bar has sought random testing. Essentially the only violation found by the referee was Roberts' attempt to buy a controlled substance, and in this regard the referee noted that the undercover agent initiated the encounter in which Roberts tried to make the purchase. The referee also found that Roberts' judgment was impaired by alcohol at the time. The referee then concluded that an offense of this type normally would warrant a suspension in the range of ninety-one days to six months. But the referee enhanced the recommended penalty to a three-year suspension because of Roberts' violation of her conditional admission.
The Bar disputes the referee's recommended discipline and asks that we disbar Roberts or revoke her conditional admission. Roberts, on the other hand, asks that we suspend her for only eighteen months followed by three years' probation.
The factual findings of the referee are supported by competent evidence and therefore must be accepted as true by this Court. The Fla. Bar v. Bajoczky, 558 So.2d 1022 (Fla.1990). Although recommendations as to discipline are subject to broader review, we have said that they come to this Court with a presumption of correctness. The Fla. Bar v. Poplack, 599 So.2d 116 (Fla.1992); The Fla. Bar v. Langston, 540 So.2d 118 (Fla.1989). We find nothing in the record or the law sufficient to defeat that presumption.
Accordingly, we accept the facts and recommended discipline. Roberts is hereby suspended from The Florida Bar for a period of three years effective retroactively from April 6,1992, the date of her prior automatic felony suspension. Judgment for costs in the amount of $1,513.98 is hereby entered against Roberts in favor of The Florida Bar, for which sum let execution issue.
It is so ordered.
BARKETT, C.J., and OVERTON, MCDONALD, SHAW, KOGAN and HARDING, JJ., concur.
GRIMES, J., dissents with an opinion.