A lot is happening today in the Sixth Circuit. Ray Bradbury and his attorney Tom McGowen will finally have their meeting before Judge Anthony Rondolino to try to persuade him compel the Semblers to bring their suit to trial. But there is also another happening. Attorney Mark A. Adams is also having a hearing. Mr. Adams is an attorney who, along with his client Jeff Smith, was unfairly sanctioned by the Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court before Judge Crockett Farnell. Judge Farnell is the judge who presided over a sloppy attempt by the state to unfairly imprison Ray Bradbury in 1989. [Coincidentally, the law firm who had opposed Mr. Adams was Battaglia. Straight's attorney Anthony Battaglia was a business partner of Straight co-founder Joe Zappala.] Mr. Adam's story is here and here.

Last year The Readers Digest, with a readership of 10 million, conferred upon Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Charles W. Cope one of its annual Broken Gavel awards for the worst judges in America. "Sleazy, corrupt or abusive," reads the headline. Judge Cope was named the worst of the three judges granted the award after a Judicial Qualifications Commission panel found him guilty of public intoxication and improper intimate contact with a woman in California in 2001. Judge Cope had been arrested on a DUI in Naples Florida in 1996 but those charges had been dismissed. Judge Cope resigned before lawmakers could impeach him for the California charges. On November 24, 2004 former Judge Cope was arrested again. This time in Pinellas County Florida on another DUI.

In 2000 Hernando County Judge Peyton Hyslo made the magazine's list for letting repeat offenders back on the street. Two years ago Ambassador Sembler's Treasure Island neighbor and former chief judge for the Sixth Circuit David Patterson committed suicide after being cited for threatening his wife and after getting a DUI.

The Readers Digest's 2004 list should add Judge Logan's gag orders of Ray Bradbury for speaking out against Mel Sembler and Manny Gonzales for speaking out against Kanes Furniture™ at the request of the same attorney Lenny Englander; Judge Logan's participation on a dinner committee with Lenny Englander, Irwin Novack of Kanes Furniture™ and Ambassador Sembler's son; Ambassador and Mrs. Sembler's possible misrepresentation to the court. And now Mr. Adams' story. Last year the widely-read magazine awarded only three Broken Gavels. Will Florida's royal court sweep the slate in 2004?

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