Opinion ID: 56429
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: State Court Case

Text: In Florida state court, appellants Taylor and Fox filed a complaint against defendant Lee Spaziano, a real estate broker, alleging fraud in a real estate transaction. In the state court action, defendant Robert Lerner was Spaziano’s attorney and defendant Cynthia MacKinnon was the judge. Appellants served Spaziano with their state court complaint on October 3, 2006. Spaziano’s answer was due in twenty days, or by October 23, 2006, under Florida’s rules of civil procedure. Spaziano, however, filed a motion for an extension of time to file an answer. It is Spaziano’s motion for an extension of time that gives rise to appellants’ action filed in federal district court. According to appellants, Spaziano and his attorney, Lerner, failed to timely 2 file their motion for a time extension under the Florida civil rules. Appellants contend that the motion did not appear on the state court’s docket as of October 24, 2006, but did appear on the docket on October 30, 2006 as filed on October 23, 2006. According to appellants, Spaziano and Lerner conspired with Judge MacKinnon to back-date the motion so that it appeared to have been timely filed and Spaziano could avoid a default judgment. Appellants also contend that Judge MacKinnon failed to schedule a hearing on appellants’ motion for default judgment and refused to enforce the twenty-day deadline for filing an answer, as required by Florida’s civil rules.