Title: Cerf v. State
Citation: 458 So. 2d 1071
Docket Number: 64183
State: Florida
Issuer: Florida Supreme Court
Date: September 6, 1984

458 So. 2d 1071 (1984)
David CERF, Appellant,
v.
STATE of Florida, Appellee.
No. 64183.

Supreme Court of Florida.
September 6, 1984.
Rehearing Denied December 6, 1984.
David F. Cerf, Jr., in pro. per.
Janet Reno, State Atty. and Ira N. Loewy, Asst. State Atty., Eleventh Judicial Circuit, Miami, for appellee.
PER CURIAM.
This is an appeal from an attorney disciplinary proceeding in circuit court pursuant to Fla.Bar Integr.Rule, art. XI, Rule 11.14. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 15, Fla. Const. We approve the disciplinary measure recommended by the circuit judge in his written judgment and report of disciplinary matter.
Appellant was the attorney in a child custody proceeding. He was not the original attorney of record; he came into the case after what he thought were improper orders were entered. Appellant represented the mother, who initially was awarded custody of the minor child. However, when the mother was admitted to a psychiatric hospital for treatment of a mental illness, temporary custody of the child was awarded to the father. Upon her release, the mother sought to regain custody of the child in the proceedings which are the subject of this disciplinary action.
During the course of the proceedings, appellant had many heated discussions with the presiding judge in the matter, Judge Jon Gordon. Judge Gordon appointed a guardian ad litem to represent the minor child in the custody proceeding. Appellant, dissatisfied with this appointment, filed numerous motions attempting to have the order appointing the guardian ad litem vacated.
His motions unsuccessful and the child custody litigation terminated adversely to his client, appellant filed a writ of mandamus in the Third District Court of Appeal attempting to have the child returned to his mother. He also filed an appeal from the circuit court judgment. It is primarily the allegations concerning Judge Gordon made in these pleadings to the Third District Court of Appeal that caused this disciplinary action to be brought against appellant.
As a result of the accusations made against him in appellant's pleadings, Judge Gordon, pursuant to Fla.Bar Integr.Rule, art. XI, Rule 11.14, directed the state attorney for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit to file disciplinary proceedings against the appellant. The motion was filed on February 9, 1983, and Judge Vann was assigned to try the case. After trial, the judge entered a written order setting forth his findings. Because the record supports these findings, we will quote the relevant portions. The trial judge found as follows:
Appellant does not deny that he made these statements against Judge Gordon without investigation as to their truth. Indeed, he cannot deny it, since they are documented in his pleadings that are made a part of the record in this proceeding.
Instead he argues in his petition for review to this Court that the trial judge erroneously denied certain motions that he made during the proceedings such as a motion to strike as sham pleading and a motion for summary judgment. Rule 11.14 does not expressly provide that the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure should apply. As such, it was not an abuse of discretion for the circuit judge to deny these motions.
The record clearly shows that appellant made false and unsubstantiated charges against Judge Gordon's integrity. Such conduct cannot be condoned. It is one thing to allow an attorney his truthful criticisms against our judicial system. However, it is quite another to allow an attorney a poetic license to falsely slander a circuit judge with untrue accusations of political corruption and bribery. Such accusations represent more than a personal attack upon that particular judge, but casts slur and insult upon the judiciary as a whole. See The Florida Bar in re Shimek, 284 So. 2d 686 (Fla. 1973).
The findings and recommendation of discipline against appellant of the circuit judge are hereby approved. The publishing of this opinion in the Southern Reporter serves as a public reprimand to the appellant.
It is so ordered.
BOYD, C.J., and OVERTON, McDONALD, EHRLICH and SHAW, JJ., concur.
ALDERMAN, J., concurs in part and dissents in part with an opinion, in which ADKINS, J., concurs.
ALDERMAN, Justice, concurring in part, dissenting in part.
I concur with the approval of the findings and the recommendation as to guilt of David Cerf. His conduct in filing such pleadings, however, was so irresponsible, *1075 impertinent, and scandalous that a public reprimand is not a sufficient penalty in this case. I therefore dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which approves the trial judge's recommended penalty. Instead, I would suspend appellant from The Florida Bar for six months. His conduct was reprehensible and warrants no less. It was contemptuous conduct, and the judges of the district court used unusual restraint when they merely struck portions of his rehearing petition as impertinent and scandalous and when they struck his petition for rehearing filed January 26, 1983. Appellant's reprehensible conduct has not ceased as evidenced by his reply brief in the present proceeding before us wherein he continues to make the same type of slurring comments for which the Court is now reprimanding him.
Appellant should be suspended from The Florida Bar for six months. Nothing less will impress upon him the reprehensibility of his conduct.
ADKINS, J., concurs.