The Democratic National Committee released a second video highlighting U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio’s state GOP party-issued credit card spending when Rubio was Florida House Speaker.

The Dems’ attack ad is curious, however, because it appears to promote Rubio’s opponent Gov. Charlie Crist.

Interspersed with newsclips from MSNBC and FoxNews are interviews with Crist in which he criticizes Rubio’s AmEx spending and comments that if Rubio doesn’t like the flak, “That’s too bad. Welcome to the NFL.”

Rubio racked up nearly $110,000 on his Republican Party of Florida American Express card -including expenditures for items like Internet music, wine and repairs to his family mini-van - that are raising eyebrows on TV news shows nationwide.

The first ad is a take-off on the MasterCard “Priceless” marketing campaign. It also ends with the RPOF’s Tallahassee street address and advises watchers to send their credit card bills there.

The Florida Supreme Court overturned a death sentence for Alwin Tumblin, convicted of murdering a Ft. Pierce auto shop owner in 2004.

The 5-2 ruling also threw out all the convictions associated with the robbery and murder of Jimmy Johns and ordered a new trial for Tumblin.

It is the fifth death sentence the Supreme Court has thrown out in the past four years.

Justices Charles Canady and Ricky Polston, both appointed by Gov. Charlie Crist, dissented.

Tumblin’s accomplice Anthony Mayes testified against Tumblin and provided the only eyewitness testimony to the crimes. There was no DNA evidence linking Tumblin, then 25, to the murder.

The high court ruled that Tumblin’s previous trial should have ended in a mistrial because St. Lucie County Deputy Dennis Smith’s testimony that Mayes was telling the truth could have tainted the jury’s decision.

For more on this topic, read the TCoastTalk post, Supreme Court orders new trial for man convicted of Fort Pierce murder

The Florida Supreme Court today threw out the death sentence of convicted cop killer Paul Beasley Johnson because “the record here is so rife with evidence of previously undisclosed prosecutorial misconduct that we have no choice but to grant relief.”

In October, Gov. Charlie Crist ordered Johnson to be put to death by lethal injection in November.

The high court stayed the execution and heard oral arguments on the case in which Johnson was convicted of going on a drug-induced killing spree in Polk County in 1981. Johnson was convicted of murdering three men, including a Polk County Sheriff’s deputy.

In its ruling today, the court found that prosecutors intentionally got a jailhouse informer to get information from Johnson, take notes and give the notes to investigators. Prosecutors then lied about their role in soliciting the information at Johnson’s trial in 1981.

At a later trial in 1988, a different prosecutor used the same testimony that helped persuade the jury to hand down a 7-5 vote in favor of the death penalty, the court ruled today.

Johnson’s death sentence is now thrown out and he will have to be resentenced.

The court blamed Hardy Pickard, the original prosecutor, for today’s ruling.

“His misconduct tainted the State‘s case at every stage of the proceedings and irremediably compromised the integrity of the entire 1988 penalty phase proceeding. This is not a case of overzealous advocacy, but rather a case of deliberately misleading both the trial court and this Court. It must be emphasized that in our American legal system there is no room for such misconduct, no matter how disturbing a crime may be or how unsympathetic a defendant is. The same principles of law apply equally to cases that have stirred passionate public outcry as to those that have not,” the ruling reads.

“In our system of justice, ends do not justify means. Rather, experience teaches that the means become the end and that irregular and untruthful arguments lead to unreliable results. Lawlessness by a defendant never justifies lawless conduct at trial…The State must cling to the higher standard even in its dealings with those who do not. Accordingly, we must grant relief,” the opinion concludes.

Justice Ricky Polston dissented and Justices Peggy Quince and Charles Canady recused themselves.

The Florida Supreme Court rejected Gov. Charlie Crist’s request for a statewide grand jury to look into corruption.

Crist’s request did not meet the “minimal requirements” necessary to determine that a grand jury is needed, the high court ruled today, by failing to specify what crimes or wrongs occurred and where they took place.

Crist last month petitioned the court to empanel a statewide grand jury to focus on public corruption in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties and the judicial circuit that includes Charlotte, Collier, Glades, Hendry and Lee counties.

The assignment - that the panel investigate public corruption from bribery to other seemingly unrelated crimes such as child pornography and drug offenses - sets forth a “monumental task” so broad as to possibly be untenable, former Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Gerald Kogan, a veteran of anti-corruption efforts in Miami-Dade County, said when Crist filed the petition.
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The Florida Supreme Court refused to grant a stay of execution for John Richard Marek, a convicted murderer scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection at 6 p.m. today.

Marek and Raymond Wigley were convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering Adela Marie Simmons in 1983 when her car broke down on the turnpike near Stuart.

Marek has another appeal pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. A circuit court judge on Monday also denied another hearing to Marek, who claims that Wigley killed Simmons. Wigley was sentenced to life while Marek received the death penalty. Marek’s lawyers argue that he, too, should be serving life in prison.

Marek has spent more than two decades on Florida’s Death Row. Gov. Charlie Crist ordered him to be put to death in May but the Supreme Court halted that. If the execution takes place today, Marek will be the fourth Death Row inmate to be executed since Crist took office in 2007.

A Florida Supreme Court panel recommended court-ordered mediation for all residential home foreclosures except in cases where banks and homeowners come to an agreement on their own.

The high court appointed the Task Force on Residential Mortgage Foreclosure Cases earlier this year to make suggestions on how to deal with the influx of foreclosures in the state’s courts. Florida has the second highest foreclosure rate in the nation.

The panel released its final report today, likening the impact of the increase in foreclosures on the courts to a car-jammed evacuation route during a hurricane.

The recommendations include expediting foreclosures on abandoned properties and dividing foreclosures into three categories: mortgages on homesteaded properties, abandoned properties and rental properties.

The 15-member panel of judges, lawyers and financiers acknowledged that the state’s budget crisis makes appointing more judges and clerks an unreasonable option while addressing the urgency of the situation.

“Instead, their recommendations include “the least of evils that can work on an emergency basis to immediately begin to meet the challenge of these cases. We believe it is imperative that the Florida Supreme Court address the explosion of mortgage foreclosure filings as soon as possible for the welfare of our courts, our communities, our businesses, and our state,” the panel wrote.

Prominent lobbyist and former Florida Supreme Court justice Wade Hopping died today from complications from a stroke and esophageal cancer.

Hopping died a day before his 78th birthday and on the 30th anniversary of founding the Tallahassee law firm Hopping Green and Sams.

Hopping served as a Cabinet aide to Gov. Claude Kirk, who appointed him to fill an opening on the Supreme Court in 1968 but he lost reelection the following year. Supreme Court justices are now appointed by the governor and remain in on the bench by a merit vote.

Kirk, the first Republican governor elected since Reconstruction, credited Hopping and environmentalist Nathaniel Reed with helping to create both the state and national environmental regulatory agencies.

“I didn’t know how to spell conservation or environment but we learned about it,” Kirk, who lives in West Palm Beach, said. “Wade was in the middle of all of that with Nat Reed. With Wade’s help and Nat’s help we got (former President) Nixon to create the President’s Council on the Environment.” The council was the basis of what later became the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Kirk said.

The white-haired, white-bearded lobbyist was an institution in the halls of the Florida Capitol throughout his thirty years of working on behalf of businesses including Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, the Sugarcane Growers Cooperative of Florida and the Florida Marine Industries Association.

Recently, Hopping was instrumental in the state’s $310 million purchase of the 74,000-acre Babcock Ranch Preservation Area in Southwest Florida. The 2006 deal was the largest conservation lands purchase in Florida history.

He frequently drew swords with environmentalists but was a willing and capable compromiser, said Audubon of Florida policy director Eric Draper, who frequently worked against Hopping in issues before the legislature.

“Wade has been a fixture at the capitol for as long as I can remember. He was always pushing firmly with his clients’ agenda but always in a friendly and good-humored way. He was one of the business lobbyists that conservationists were most willing to work,” said Draper, who is running for Agriculture Commissioner. “It’s hard to imagine working on environmental issues without him on the other side.”

Hopping is survived by his wife of 38 years, Mary Hopping of Tallahassee. He is also survived by children Hank and Margaret Hopping of Chattanooga, Jud and Jackie Hopping of Fort Lauderdale, Kiff and Lynn Mendoza of Tallahassee, and Beth Mendoza and Maureen Murphy of Atlanta.

A funeral service is scheduled Thursday at the Faith Presbyterian Church in Tallahassee.

It’s taken seven years and as many court challenges, but the Florida Supreme Court today cleared the way for the Hometown Democracy proposed constitutional amendment to be on next year’s November ballot.

The court at last accepted that the cost of the citizens initiative, the brainchild of West Palm Beach land use lawyer Lesley Blackner and Tallahassee lawyer Ross Burnaman, is “indeterminate.”

The proposal would require that citizens approve changes to local comprehensive growth management plans before they can go into effect.

Two previous financial estimates conducted by state economists predicted the change would cost “millions of dollars” statewide, a premise the court rejected because that assumed that local governments would schedule special elections for the comp plans referenda.

Critics, including the Florida Chamber of Commerce and business-backed associations, of the Hometown Democracy initiative charge that the proposal will effectively halt growth around the state. They’ve got their own ballot initiative that would require allow voters to challenge comp plan amendments - but only if 10 percent of affected voters sign petitions at the local supervisors of elections office within 60 days of the changes being approved by local governments.

That proposal is still hundreds of thousands signatures short of the required 676,811 needed by Feb. 1 to get on the ballot.

Gov. Charlie Crist offered the following response to today’s Supreme Court’s ruling that he overstepped his authority by rejecting a list of judges to fill an appellate vacancy.

“While I am disappointed by today’s decision that the Judicial Nominating Commission cannot reconsider these important nominations, I respect the Supreme Court’s decision and their consideration of this case. I remain committed to ensuring that the diversity of the people of Florida is represented in our judiciary. In respect to the Court’s decision, I look forward to interviewing and considering the nominees for the Fifth District Court of Appeal,” Crist said in a statement issued shortly after the ruling was released.

The Florida Constitution trumps Gov. Charlie Crist’s demand for racial diversity among judges, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

It was the second time in almost a year that the state’s high court rebuked an attempt by Crist to overstep his authority. In July 2008, the court rejected a gambling deal Crist had struck with the Seminole Indians, saying he couldn’t let the tribe offer card games that legislators had outlawed.

In Thursday’s unanimous ruling, the justices said Crist has no power to reject a list of nominees for a judgeship, then leave the post unfilled indefinitely, as he has done with a six-month vacancy on Central Florida’s 5th District Court of Appeal.

The opinion was written by Justice Jorge Labarga, a former Palm Beach County circuit judge who was entangled in a similar nomination scrap before Crist named him to the Supreme Court in January.

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The Florida Supreme Court pushed the judicial system closer to the electronic age by issuing guidelines for electronic filing and keeping of court records.

Clerks of courts have until Oct. 1 to implement the electronic record-keeping standards issued by Chief Justice Peggy Quince today.

“Technology provides benefits for both courts and court users,” Quince wrote in her order.

The courts’ goal is to have electronic court files while in the meantime wanting to allow court users to continue to file paper documents because many do not have access to computers.

With Florida accounting for one of every six foreclosures in the country and legislators showing little interest in addressing the crisis, a handful of judges are exploring ways to keep borrowers and lenders out of an increasingly congested court system.

“It’s very frustrating to recognize that consistently over the last three years we’ve sustained budget cutbacks and staff reductions in the court system and this tsunami has hit with foreclosures,” said Burton Conner, a judge in the judicial circuit that includes St. Lucie, Martin and Okeechobee counties.

That circuit has begun requiring borrowers and lenders to meet before their first court appearances, leading to many cases being settled. Meanwhile, Palm Beach County’s circuit court last week launched a pilot program to help homeowners understand options that could keep them in their houses.

But action from Tallahassee has been limited, even with nearly 11 percent of all mortgages in Florida in foreclosure - the highest rate in the country, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Foreclosures in Florida dropped from April to May but were still up 50 percent from the same time last year, according to numbers RealtyTrac released Thursday.

Story here

Read the Florida Supreme Court’s foreclosure task force interim report here | Complete the court’s foreclosure survey for homeowners, lenders and attorneys here

James E.C. Perry this morning became the fourth justice appointed to the seven-member Florida Supreme Court by Gov. Charlie Crist.

Perry, 65, of Sanford, is a registered Democrat and the fourth African-American appointed to the state’s high court. But despite nearly nine years on the 18th Circuit Court, he’s a little hard to categorize.

Crist’s folks love his narrative (a 1st Lieutenant in the U.S. Army who decided to go to law school the night of MLK’s assassination) and the fact that he was first appointed to the bench by conservative former Gov. Jeb Bush.

But the connection to Bush might not be enough for conservative activists.

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