Will State Attorney Kirk Zuelch now go after Judge Mark Jones? It is well known that judges in this county don't cross Zuelch. And Jones may have crossed Zuelch bigtime last week when he suddenly stopped the trial of Nick and Carrie Nowatney and threw out those bogus child abuse charges that were being pushed by Zuelch on behalf of the State Dept. of Children & Families (DCF). In an election year, this has to be a humiliating defeat for Zuelch.
The last judge that crossed Zuelch was Steven Shea, and you know what happened to him. In 1994, Shea had unseated one of Zuelch's longtime cronies. Then, to add insult to injury, Shea refused to take telephone calls from Zuelch to discuss active cases, an illegal activity that Zuelch allegedly practices routinely. Furious, Zuelch set out to ruin Shea.
It wasn't long before Judge Shea found himself before the State Judicial Qualifications Commission (JQC) to answer to more than two dozen charges of alleged misconduct. Interestingly, most of those charges were made by Zuelch's Assistant State Attorneys. It is unlikely that any of these underlings would have attacked a sitting judge without Zuelch's approval and/or instruction.
It worked. Shea has been removed from the bench pending a final appeal.
Before Shea, Judge Ruth Becker also reportedly refused to yield to Zuelch's control. And she, too, found herself in front of the JQC. She was able to retain her seat on the bench, however, but Shea said she told him that she would never again cross Zuelch.
In reading his handwritten order from a yellow legal pad last week, Judge Jones was kind to the State Attorney and to the DCF. At least he didn't come right out and call them incompetent bumblers. But in the end, he said that the state just didn't have enough evidence to label the Nowatneys as child abusers.
Although Attorney Michael Barnes was ready to call more witnesses for the defense, including the Nowatneys themselves, Judge Jones said that he didn't need to hear any more. And he ruled for the family— and against Zuelch.
Whammo!
Zuelch has 30 days to appeal. But it is doubtful that he will want to humiliate himself any more than he has already done by pursuing this case in the first place.
Of course, there is another possible take on the bizarre dismissal of the Nowatney case. Some court-watchers suggest that it was Zuelch who finally decided that this case— which was becoming increasingly high profile and dangerous in this election year— should be over.
But he couldn't just drop the charges, publicly admitting that the snatching of those babies and holding them hostage for 200 days was just for fun. So, some say that there may have been a behind-the-scenes agreement between Zuelch's office and Judge Jones. We don't know, but here's what we do know:
• Until last week, virtually every signal Judge Jones was sending was that he was going to rule for the state. He repeatedly helped Assistant State Attorney Janine Gedmin try her case, even objecting for her at times. Meanwhile, he seemed to be systematically disallowing the Nowatneys' most important evidence. It got so bad that the Nowatneys asked Jones to recuse himself. He refused.
• When Jones made his surprise ruling last week, we understand that Attorney Gedmin didn't even pretend to be surprised. It appeared that she may have been "in on it"; that maybe she already knew what was coming down.
Of course, it is possible that she didn't know anything in advance and was just as surprised as the Nowatneys and their attorney— and that she can simply put on a good poker face.
But considering how hard she worked, literally for months, to ruin this young couple's lives by trying to convict them on bogus child abuse charges, it would seem that she would have had shown some reaction— shock, surprise, anger, something— when the judge abruptly cut her legs off and threw her case into the toilet.
We think this may be the weakest of the possible scenarios. We still want to believe in Judge Jones. A prominent attorney that we trust told us this week, "I don't think Jones would tolerate calls from Zuelch to try to influence his rulings."
We hope that's true.
Now, there is one more possible explanation for Judge Jones' abrupt decision to "do the right thing." Through the internet, the Nowatney case was becoming an international story. A number of influential people— very influential people— outraged by what they were reading, started making telephone calls. Some of those calls got through to Governor Jeb Bush.
We also know that a former candidate for president was working virtually full time to force an investigation of the Nowatney case.
Imagine this possible scenario: Governor Bush calls in Kathleen Kearney, his head of the Dept. of Children & Families.
"What the hell's going on down there in Key West, Kathleen?"
"My people tell me they have a case, Governor. And if there's any possibility of abuse, you know we have to do whatever's necessary to ensure the safety of the children," she says piously.
"According to what I hear, that's pure bull!," the Governor says. "Is it true that your people snatched a breastfeeding baby and held him and his 3-year-old sister in foster care for 200 days?!"
"Well, yes, but, but . . ."
"But, but hell! Make that case go away, Kathleen! Do you know who's been calling me?!"
"But, sir, my people are telling me . . . "
"Your people are incompetent dolts! Make that case go away! Now! Today!"
And the Nowatney case magically disappeared.
Whatever really happened behind the scenes, Jones' ruling validates what we've been telling you every week for 14 weeks. The state never had a case! They moved too quickly in taking the Nowatney children before they conducted any kind of investigation. And, then, when the Nowatneys wouldn't plead guilty to something they didn't do, Zuelch and the DCF conspired to punish them by refusing to return their children.
By this time, Zuelch and the DCF had lost sight of what should have been the goal of both sides: To find the truth. They were too far out on that limb. They couldn't quit without losing face. All they could do is continue to desperately push for the conviction of two innocent people— and hope that no one would notice that they didn't have a case.
One of the medical experts summed it up during the trial: "The initial appropriate concern for the possibility of child abuse . . . quickly gave way to an overly aggressive effort to prove the suspicions true, without attending to the lack of supporting evidence."
In an interview published in the Key West Citizen yesterday, Zuelch said he hoped someday to be able to tell the public the state's side of the Nowatney case. What a crock!
Wasn't that side just recently presented in Judge Jones' courtroom? And wasn't it reported in detail in Key West The Newspaper? And didn't Judge Jones rule that it was insufficient? Is Zuelch going to tell us that the Judge was wrong? And, if so, is he going to attempt to punish Jones for that ruling— like he did Judge Shea?
We have a challenge for Zuelch. If you think you were in the right in taking those children and keeping them in foster homes for 200 days, why don't you brag about it in your reelection brochure?
There are two good reasons we don't think you'll do that. First of all, we think you're ashamed of what you did.
Secondly, you know that there are a lot of parents in this county who vote. And not very many of them will want to vote for a baby-snatcher!
We may never know the inside story of why State Attorney Zuelch and the DCF committed this outrage on this young couple. We may never know why Judge Jones seemed to suddenly realize that the state had no case and abruptly ruled for the Nowatneys. But we're still asking questions.
Stay tuned.