Voters decide judicial racesBy Mark D. KillianManaging Editor If this was supposed to be the year the electorate was poised to unseat incumbents, you’d never know it from the results of the August judicial primaries. In all, 30 of 33 incumbent judges turned back challenges to their seats. Fourteen sitting judges in Broward alone drew opposition — nine 17th Circuit judges and five on the county bench. Yet all 14 won reelection. Ballots were cast in 58 county and circuit court races throughout Florida durin. . . ...

Firms weigh in on attorney websitesBy Annie Butterworth JonesAssociate Editor Eight major law firms protested the recently proposed Supreme Court rules for web advertising in a 66-page comment to the court submitted just before the August 16 deadline. The firms — including Foley and Lardner, White and Case, Holland and Knight, and Carlton Fields — balked at the proposed rules, which would restrict online testimonials, case summaries, and some audio and visual content. Rule 4-7.6 was submitted by the Bar to th. . . ...

Paralegals ask to be Bar licensed and regulatedBy Gary BlankenshipSenior Editor As part of the required three-year review of the Bar’s voluntary Florida Registered Paralegal program, the Bar is looking into the request by some paralegals that they be licensed and regulated by the Bar or the Supreme Court. The Bar Board of Governors, at its July 23 meeting, approved a recommendation from the Program Evaluation Committee to set up a nine-member committee to examine regulating paralegals. “That program [FRP] i. . . ...

Lawyers will be responsible for redacting confidential information in court filingsBy Gary BlankenshipSenior Editor Quick now, do you know what the “Notice of Confidential Information within Court Filings” is? That form, part of Rule 2.420 of the Rules of Judicial Administration, must accompany any court filing as of October 1 that includes confidential information. The form lists 19 specific items that should be confidential in court records, from Social Security and bank account numbers to juvenile delinq. . . ...

Commonly Asked Questions About Trust AccountsPrepared by the Ethics Department of The Florida Bar______________________________________________________________________________ Q. I have recently opened an IOTA trust account and have been informed by the bank that there will be fees for checks and other fees associated with maintaining the account. The bank has declined to provide these services for free and has asked for a transfer from my operating account to cover these expenses. I am concerned about co. . . ...

Rainy Day Dollars Used to Alleviate Foreclosure BacklogsChief judges use one-time allocations to move casesBy Jan PudlowSenior Editor A one-time boost of $6 million to trial courts and $3.6 million to court clerks is buying desperately needed resources to dig courts out of Florida’s foreclosure backlog crisis. Beginning July 1, that total $9.6 million in nonrecurring dollars from the Legislature has been put to work in each of Florida’s 20 circuits. Amounts range from $862,053 for the 11th Circuit, grappl. . . ...

Parks named president-elect of the NBA The National Bar Association, the nation’s oldest and largest association of African American lawyers and judges, has elected Daryl Parks as its president-elect. Parks, who currently serves as managing partner of Parks and Crump in Tallahassee, was elected in August during the NBA’s Annual Convention and Exhibits in New Orleans. The convention commemorated the 85th anniversary of the organization, which has thrived as the leading voice for African American lawyers and. . . ...

He wrote the law he uses to prosecute domestic batterersBy Jan PudlowSenior Editor Attempted strangling, even when the victim blacks out, was no different than a poke in the chest. That flaw in the law bothered Stacy Sharp when he was a deputy for eight years with the Hernando County Sheriff’s Office, where he authored the agency’s domestic violence policy and field training program. So in 2004 he asked his boss, Sheriff Richard Nugent, if he could work on legislation to fix the statute and help write prop. . . ...