Attorney: Leave ‘emotional evidence’ out of sheriff ’s trial
TALLAHASSEE – The attorney for suspended Broward Sheriff Scott Israel asked the state Tuesday to limit “emotional evidence” at the upcoming trial where he’ll seek to win back his job following last month’s suspension by Gov. Ron DeSantis over the sheriff’s handling of the mass shooting in Parkland.
At a 20-minute procedural hearing at the Florida Capitol, attorney Benedict (Ben) Kuehne said: “I’m hopeful that this proceeding will focus on the allegations and the facts as opposed to the community interest in this matter.”
Kuehne made the request to J. Dudley Goodlette, a former Republican state House member from Naples who was appointed by Senate President Bill Galvano, RBradenton, to serve as a special master or judge in Israel’s case.
Goodlette, 70, a real estate and zoning lawyer, served in the House from 1998 to 2006 and has been a fixture in Collier County politics for decades.
In response to Kuehne’s request, DeSantis’ attorney, Nick Primrose, said that by law, a county sheriff is the “conservator of the peace,” so that “there may be some witnesses or evidence that does have an emotional aspect to it, but does go directly to his duty as elected sheriff.”
Goodlette agreed with DeSantis’ attorney, and said later that he would like as much testimony as possible in the upcoming trial to be from recorded depositions, not in person.
DeSantis, a Republican, suspended Israel, a Democrat, on Jan. 11, accusing the elected sheriff of incompetence in the agency’s response to the mass shooting on Feb. 14, 2018, that killed 17 people and wounded 17 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland.
“Sheriff Israel has repeatedly failed and demonstrated a pattern of poor leadership. He failed to protect Floridians and visitors during the tragic Fort Lauderdale International Airport shooting in 2017. He failed in his duties to keep our families and children safe during the devastating shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018,” DeSantis said in a statement on Tuesday. “These incidents demonstrate Sheriff’s Israel’s repeated incompetence and neglect of duty. The families of the victims deserve accountability. It is my job as Governor to ensure that the safety of our local communities, especially the safety of our children, is paramount. Government officials must be held accountable for their actions, and/or inactions. For these reasons, I suspended Sheriff Israel from office.”
The governor appointed Gregory Tony, a retired Coral Springs police sergeant, as sheriff of the county’s largest law enforcement agency. Israel challenged the suspension and is entitled to a hearing before the 40-member Florida Senate, which is made up of 23 Republicans and 17 Democrats.
All five senators who represent parts of Broward are Democrats: Sens. Lauren Book of Plantation, Oscar Braynon of Miami Gardens, Gary Farmer of Lighthouse Point, Kevin Rader of Boca Raton and Perry Thurston of Fort Lauderdale.
DeSantis issued an executive order Jan. 11 that formed the basis of the suspension. The order cited 21 past interactions between the sheriff ’s office and accused gunman Nikolas Cruz, and his online threats to “shoot up” the school; a school resource officer’s failure to engage the shooter during the Feb. 14 attack; and alleged inconsistencies between the active shooter policies of the sheriff ’s office and “standard law enforcement practices.”
That’s not enough, said Kuehne, who argued that the order was too vague and not specific enough to warrant a suspension.
For example, Kuehne noted, the order, in faulting Israel’s response to the airport mass shooting in 2017, “failed to contain and maintain security, resulting in a breach of airport security.”
Kuehne said he read the final report on the airport shooting and could find no such conclusion.
“From the executive order, short of trying to find a needle in a haystack, it is rather ponderous to determine where that assertion came from,” said Kuehne, who described the suspension order as “wordy but not informative.”
Primrose, the DeSantis attorney, countered that the criticism was based on an internal investigation of the airport shooting. Primrose said the executive order also cited the report by the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Public Safety Commission, which was dated Jan. 2.
“On behalf of the governor, we would object to any [bill of] particulars. We think that the executive order speaks for itself as to what the statutory obligations and failures led to the suspension,” Primrose said during the hearing.
Speaking with reporters after Tuesday’s brief hearing, Kuehne said DeSantis‘ suspension of Israel was politically motivated, and the proof is that DeSantis asserted during his campaign last fall that Israel should have been removed.
“Sheriff Israel was elected by the people of Broward County,” Kuehne said. “It is for the people of Broward County to decide who their sheriff is, not a political appointment by somebody in Tallahassee ... We believe that the facts, the evidence, the law and the Constitution will say Sheriff Israel is to be reinstated.”
During a CNN debate on Oct. 21, DeSantis criticized former Gov. Rick Scott for not suspending Israel from office, and he described the agency’s response to the school shooting as a “failure.”
Goodlette gave the governor until next Monday to flesh out a bill of particulars, and tentatively set Israel’s trial for April 8, the start of the sixth week of the nineweek legislative session. Goodlette will then make a recommendation to Galvano, who will forward it to the full Senate.
Israel is the first prominent elected official in nearly 15 years to challenge a governor’s suspension by demanding a Senate trial.
The last person to do so was also from Broward County: Miriam Oliphant, a former county elections supervisor, was removed from office in 2005 by a 32-7 vote of senators. She had been suspended from office by Gov. Jeb Bush followings a series of irregularities in the 2002 election.