Judge who hit sheriff's patrol vehicle in courthouse parking lot agrees to 90-day unpaid suspension
A judge who made headlines after she and two other jurists working in the same Florida courthouse were all accused of driving under the influence within a seven-month period has agreed to a 90-day unpaid suspension.
Broward Circuit Judge Lynn Rosenthal refused blood and urine tests after striking a sheriff’s patrol vehicle in a courthouse parking lot last year and was not convicted of driving under the influence, reports the Sun Sentinel.
However, she took a plea to a lesser charge of reckless driving several months later and was sentenced to community service.
Rosenthal did take a breath test after the courthouse parking lot incident and it showed she had not been drinking, the newspaper reports. Her lawyer, Brian Silber, said Rosenthal had accidentally taken an overdose of Ambien, a prescription sleep aid, the previous night.
Now, in an effort to resolve a related legal ethics case, Rosenthal and the Judicial Qualifications Commission have agreed to the 90-day unpaid suspension. It must be approved by the Florida Supreme Court before it is final.
Conduct at issue in the legal ethics case includes the judge’s refusal of blood and urine tests, a video erased by her husband from her cellphone after she showed it to county sheriff’s deputies and what the JQC called “misleading or incomplete statements” by Rosenthal during its investigation, the article says.
“Judge Rosenthal now acknowledges that her conduct eroded public confidence in the judiciary and demeaned the judicial office she holds,” said James Ruth, the JQC’s vice chairman, in a written announcement Monday of the suspension agreement.
Attorney Guy Lewis represents Rosenthal in the legal ethics matter. He declined to comment, saying “Our position is expressed clearly in the documents filed to the supreme court,” the Sun Sentinel reports.
Of the two other Broward judges accused of driving under the influence during a seven-month period in 2013 and 2014, one has left the bench. Gisele Pollack resigned earlier this year after the JQC recommended her removal and is now working as a public defender.
Circuit Judge Cynthia Imperato was convicted by a jury last year of driving under the influence and reckless driving and is serving a 20-day term of house arrest in the misdemeanor DUI case, the Sun Sentinel reports.
Imperato had agreed to a legal ethics case resolution that would have imposed a 20-day suspension, but it was rejected in May by the state supreme court. A judicial disciplinary case against her is hence ongoing.
