Former Lawyers Department: Ana Gardiner and Howard Scheinberg

BY BUDDY NEVINS

Karnack The Magnificent says, the answer is Richard Nixon, Ana Gardner and Howard Scheinberg.

And the question: Name one disbarred lawyer and two others who are likely to join them.

And the second answer: Name three people who prove the old adage that the cover-up is often worse than the crime.

The Judicial Qualification Commission charged Wednesday that Circuit Judge Gardiner not only discussed a death penalty case in a bar with prosecutor Howard Scheinberg while he tried the case in front of her.

She also attempted to cover up the crime.

The JQC has records which show an enormous number of calls and e-mails between the judge and prosecutor an average of more than 9.3 every day.  Those records alone appear to prove the JQC’s cover-up case.

When will people learn?  Everybody from Nixon to Bill Clinton to New York Gov. David Patterson have found out that the cover-up often is worse than the original crime.

Gardiner should have admitted charges that she talked about the case outside the courtroom when the JQC came with their questions. Instead, she stonewalled.

Talking about a case improperly is one thing and would have gotten her in trouble.  But not being honest with the JQC is a much more serious offensive that in the end will sink her career.

Sheila Alu, the Sunrise commissioner who was a law student at the time, broke the case.   She overheard  Gardiner and Scheinberg talking about the case in a bar and fed the story to the New Times.

When the story became public,  Gardiner and Sheinberg  apparently tried to cover up the ethical violation by collaborating through phone calls and e-mail.

I am personally disappointed in Gardiner.  She is a friend.  I first met her as a pioneering Latin American political activist in then-white bread Broward who was later chair of the North Broward Hospital District.

In the end, there is no excuse for violating judicial ethics, especially in a death penalty case.  And there is no excuse for the cover up.

She will either resign or be thrown off the bench. She will lose her Bar license and could lose her pension.

Its sad. She’s a bright woman who made a stupid mistake and destroyed her life.  Then again, Nixon was one of our smartest presidents.

And Scheinberg?

The JQC polices the judiciary, not lawyers.  But the Bar should come knocking on his door to examine all those calls and e-mails.

Even before any future Bar hearing, Scheinberg  is no Mr. Lucky.

After leaving the State Attorney’s Office in the midst of the scandal over this incident, he went to work for Scott Rothstein.  You know what happened to that job.



20 Responses to “Former Lawyers Department: Ana Gardiner and Howard Scheinberg”

  1. More to the Story says:

    Given that level of communication, which if likely more than married people or business partners even email and text, the question is was there more of than a “close personal relationship.” I suppose we will never know the text of the text messages. Wonder if there were emails as well.

    New Times provides some of the excerpts of the JQC charging document. 1,166 phone calls and 2222 text messages — with an average of 22 communications a day according to the JQC.

    My point, this is not a singular moment in time where a bad decision is made, or even a decision made under the influence of something that can cloud judgment (other than perhaps more carnal potions). Yes, mistakes can be made and it can be very hard to admit the mistake.

    But, wonder what Alu went through at the State Attorney’s Office? Wonder if there was any retribution? Wonder if she could have even known that a conversation she overheard at a bar could be just the tip of the iceberg.

    So, now Alu has helped on School Board investigation, hammered fellow commissioners in Sunrise, gone after judges, gone after state attorneys office on this and brady problems. May not like everything she says or how she does it, but when is Satz gonna wake up and put her on more public corruption cases?

  2. The Other Side says:

    Gotta read Scheinberg’s response to the Bar. It paints a very different side to the story and is very very detailed.

    In fact, the versions are so incompatible that one or the other has to be invented, in whole or in part. There is no reconciling the events of the Alu affidavit and the Scheinberg response to the bar.

    http://www.sun-sentinel.com/media/acrobat/2010-03/52550436.pdf

    Of course, I suspect that will all be lost because of the overwhelming level of communications with the judge. What lawyer has such a level of communication with a judge who they are are arguing cases in front of? Bizarre. Even if the initial complaint was not entirely meritorious or if there was another side to the story, the end result has undermined public confidence.

  3. Hey Buddy says:

    In Alu’s affidavit, she says that she called her lawyer, Stuart Michelson, paragraph 15. Is that the same one from Sunrise, the one you said was a problem with the no-bid contract?

    FROM BUDDY: Yes, the same one.

  4. Very sad says:

    There will be many who revel in their downfall and lead the tar & feather mob, but I for one will pray that this is over quickly and that they land on their feet. They both have families and long lives ahead.

  5. Very Sad WTH says:

    Very sad: Are you serious? There is a crisis of faith in our institutions. If these two are working at ACME parts, who cares. But, elected judge and state attorney? Can not dismiss so easily. There are legitimate questions.

    True, they will survive this. But, you can not ignore the damage to our institutions!

    FROM BUDDY:
    I think it is sad that Gardiner, who was lucky enough to be given the honor to serve as a judge, betrayed that trust.

    Feeling sorry for someone does not mean I condone what they did. No one can condone the unethical behavior both these individuals are accused of. Gardiner called into question the fairness of our judicial system and for that, she deserves everything coming to her.

  6. The Courthouse Rambler says:

    This is just the tip of the iceberg.

    Other judges have ethics problems.

    Feren?

  7. Jen_Kenne says:

    Ana is and was a disgrace. She wore Felon Jenne’s stars on her robe, an elitist who thought when she spoke, the heavens trembled. She is arrogant,obstinate and an elitist. his is all karma’s doing. It is very difficult for a bad person to act good for an extended period of time. Ana actually tried to date Lynn’s fiance after her death! And they were supposedly friends???? Bad times ahead and rightly so, hopefully FRS will do the right thing and take the pension away, just like they did to me!

  8. CuriousO says:

    To Buddy, re what “Hey Buddy says”:

    Buddy, Please clarify why or how Stuart Michelson is involved? and should he have been involved, was he Ms. Alu’s personal attorney? or her City Commissioner attorney?
    AND WHY IS HE INVOLVED AT ALL IN THIS? I THINK IT IS IMPORTANT TO KNOW EXACTLY WHY HE WAS INVOLVED.

  9. ClaraAg says:

    Buddy you ought to pick your friends better. The same goes for your old newspaper. Because of the blind deference to charismatic politicians Broward has had to endure the likes of Gardiner, Jenne, and Satz. Stop making friends with these people and follow the obvious leads no matter where they may end up. Do your job damnit.

  10. Chaz Stevens, Genius says:

    BTW, I challenged Jack Seiler to a duel and by duel I mean polygraph.

    http://www.myactsofsedition.com/my_acts_of_sedition/2010/03/challenging-jack-seiler-to-duel-by-duel-i-mean-polygraph.htm

  11. CuriousO says:

    to Chaz:

    YOU DID? OH, BOY!! YIPPEE! YOU ARE SO ON POINT, AGAIN, BUDDY WRITES A STORY ON THE JUDICIAL SCENARIO, AND YOU TOUT YOUR CHALLENGING OF THE MAYOR OF FORT LAUDERDALE ON YOUR GHOST BUSTER RADIATION READING IN HIS PARKING LOT, WHERE YOU WERE ILLEGALLY LOITERING AND SOILING.

    THANK YOU, CHAZ FOR BEING SO OFF POINT AGAIN.

  12. Chaz Stevens says:

    Hahahaha. You crack me the fuck up.

    Speaking of fucking up, thing better at home yet?

  13. Thunder says:

    Wasn’t Nixon disbarred about 25 years before Clinton? Why would that be more relevant with most people today?

  14. not college material says:

    I have, with little admiration endured Chaz Stephens gutter mouth for a while now.
    I cannot be the only one who wonders why he usually needs to express himself in a crude, unsophisticated manner.
    Apparently, he has no life outside of posting on this and other blogs (for god’s sake he posts somewhere every five minutes!).
    I am sure that if we looked into his past, we would find a pattern of compulsive and unattractive behavior.
    Please Mr. Chaz, go away.

  15. CuriousO says:

    to Chaz Becker and Poly-eo-Caugh:

    Chaz, I want to challenge you to a Poly-eo-Caugh where we can see who is telling the truth; can we take it in a crowded parking lot where people are trying to work to make it a living (something you might want to consider trying, no evidence exists that you have tried to really work) so we can be nuisances, be obnoxious, be nudges, …. and fun things like that!! Yeah!! What do you say, Prince of the Unemployed (bet you were sweating out what Senator Bunning was going to do to your paycheck, that you don’t earn every week, huh, wink, wink…)

  16. Chaz Stevens, Genius says:

    Are you that interested in me that you worry about my life…

    If I am happy? The unhappy activists isn’t a new thing you know…

    Aristotle in the fourth century B.C. wrote “that all men who have attained excellence in philosophy, in poetry, in art and in politics, even Socrates and Plato, had a melancholic habitus; indeed some suffered even from melancholic disease.”

    This belief was revived during the Renaissance, leading Milton to exclaim, in his poem “Il Penseroso”: “Hail divinest Melancholy/Whose saintly visage is too bright/To hit the sense of human sight.”

    The Romantic poets took the veneration of sadness to its logical extreme and described suffering as a prerequisite for the literary life.

    As Keats wrote, “Do you not see how necessary a World of Pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?”

  17. she-lie alu says:

    Does Sheila Alu have any friends?

  18. CuriousO says:

    to Chazz sissss tee taekwondo belt:

    any yucklehead can go on the internet and pull up philosophy quotes from the great ones….

    hey, i know a parking lot you can aim your portable mattel toy gi joe special radioactive measurer at, if you are bored with seiler’s parking lot (the boys miss you down there, the dumpster divers, those guys…gee wilikers)

  19. Ana Gardiner Quits Bench; Gets Private Job : BrowardBeat.com says:

    […] Here is an earlier post I did about Gardiner’s JQC troubles. […]

  20. Editor says:

    collaberating (sp)

    “She will either resign or be thrown off the bench. She will lose her Bar license and could lose her pension.”

    You know she is not on the bench now. She resigned? Stop Kanacking and start editing. http://www.csklegal.com/people/ana-gardiner/

    FROM BUDDY: This was written more than a year ago when she was still a judge. She has since resigned, as I predicted.