Judge reprimanded for using 'one of the worst profanities known to the English language,' fined $10K
A Florida judge was reprimanded Wednesday for using “one of the worst profanities known to the English language.”
Judge Jacqueline Schwartz told a convenience store owner in Coconut Grove in June 2014 to “Go f— yourself” and threatened to sue him after he posted an opponent’s campaign sign and refused to post hers. She was subsequently re-elected.
Chief Justice Jorge Labarga also rapped Schwartz, who sits in Hialeah, for interfering with the official record in an unrelated matter, the Tampa Bay Times reports. That’s because the judge made notes on the margins of court documents and then asked a bailiff to erase the notes when a lawyer asked for a certified copies.
“Judges are not privileged simply to erase their potential mistakes from the public record,” Labarga told Schwartz. “This misconduct we cannot and will not tolerate.”
Schwartz, who also agreed to a $10,000 fine and a 30-day suspension to resolve the legal ethics case, said nothing to the supreme court and declined to comment after the reprimand, the Times reports.
She wrote a letter of apology (PDF) to the store owner in May of this year.
