Contents:

This web page provides main supporting documents including legal decisions from cases which were initially filed in the Broward County 17th Circuit Court. These cases were heard in front of a judge, and requested injunctive relief or in more layman's terms, a stoppage to the cutting of healthy trees. This webpage also includes some opinions which appeared in the media.

This webpage provides supporting documents to Chapter 5 of the book in the form of court decisions and numerous filings. This webpage is supplemental to Chapters 1 and 9 because the potential legal actions and outcomes, is believed to have altered the course of the CCEP. The legal decisions were in part, blamed by the Department for the failure of the program.

Two myths, which need to be fully discredited. There was never a legal challenge to diseased tree cutting through the 10 years of eradication. Second, a few residents or even several hundred residents, do not have the knowledge to legally challenge the FDACS, which employed outstanding outside attorneys to anyone who challenged their program.

These legal challenges were generally filed in the names of residents whose healthy trees were within the eradication circles and therefore scheduled to be cut. However the real force behind these cases, were the Broward County legal office, particularly attorney Andrew (Drew) Meyers. The issues in the Broward cases, eventually were resolved in the Florida Supreme Court. Joining Broward County in this challenge, was Miami-Dade County (attorneys Duvall and Ginsburg) and other municipalities including Boca Raton, Davie, Fort Lauderdale, Pompano Beach and City of Pinecrest. These challenges generally would required the support of County Commissioners.

I have separated these cases from the Miami-Dade case, although the challenge is similar in regards to illegal entry onto properties. The county won in district court but was the judgment by Judge Friedman was reversed by the Third District Court of Appeals.

These challenges are separate from the compensation cases, now being pursued by attorney Robert Gilbert as a class-action lawsuit. However, the Supreme Court decision forged a link between the two sets of cases using the reasoning in the Corneal decision where a "taking" with compensation was subject to much lower scrutiny or level of evaluation by the court. This stopped further attempts at injunctive relief based on unsound science but really gave a green light to the class action lawsuits.

In a number of cases, the opinions are faxed, copied and then scanned. I apologize for the poor quality. In some cases, the documents were scanned, and additional errors where introduced with optical character recognition (OCR). Fortunately, today there exists many legal databases where the judicial decisions can be found.

In general, I have organized the supporting documents in reverse chronological order, beginning with the Bill of Rights.

I am not an attorney, nor have participated in any of the legal challenges. I can not be party to any class action suit in the future because I never owned a citrus tree during the eradication program.

 

Related Chapters: Primarily Chapter 5, but also Chapter 1 and 9.

Short Notes:

SN 1.6 What is an exposed tree?

SN 5.1 Peer Review of the Field Study

SN 5.2 Attorney Andrew Meyers Comments

Quotes:

This court will not be a pallbearer of the casket containing the freedoms held dear by all freedom-loving persons, freedoms which, once buried, are seldom if ever regained.

Judge J. Leonard Fleet,  decision  in halting the cutting of healthy trees in Broward County.

Published Reviews of the Broward Decision:

Centner and Ferreira, Ability of governments to take actions to confront incursions of diease- a case study: citrus canker in Florida, Plant Pathology. 2012.

Kamprath, M.. 2005, Addressing the Shaky Foundations of Florida's Fight Against Citrus Canker, Journal of Land Use and Environmental Law, 2005.

The Legal Basis for Regulatory Control of an Invasive Citrus Pests in Florida: A Review of the Citrus Canker and Spreading Decline Cases, by Adams et al., National Agricultural Law Center.

Intrusion into backyards by inspectors

Searches without warrants are not necessarily unreasonable searches. The classic example is entry into a building by fire fighters. Similarly, policemen can enter a home in hot pursuit of a suspect in a crime. When a search warrant could frustrate the intent of the search, authorities can assert a right to a reasonable search be conducted without warrans or owners' permissiont.

However, the entry onto backyards ("curtilage") without warrant or owner's permission was considered unconstitutional by the Broward Court and re-affirmed by the Fourth District Court of Appeals on January 15, 2003.

Thr 4th DCA ruled that "exigent circumstances" exception did not apply. They rejected the argument that inspectors were in "hot pursuit" of bacteria, and instead considered the subjects of inspections, namely citrus trees, were stationary. Interestingly, the court gave consideration to evidence presented in the trial court that infected trees were not removed in a timely manner. :

In fact, the Department’s own conduct during the inspections as described at the hearing suggests that even they are not concerned that these trees pose an immediate danger to the citrus industries. Many times infected trees are identified and not removed for days, weeks or months. That is more than sufficient time to honor the constitutional rights of the citizen and obtain a warrant issued by a neutral magistrate.

See pages 12 to 17 of ruling:

January 15, 2003, Broward case 2, Fourth DCA Court , FDACS vs. Haire, 4D02-2584OP.

The question of search warrants first arose in the Miami-Dade case.

Since the eradication program had been premised on a rapid elimination of canker in both residential and commercial areas, the ruling on January 15, 2003 decision should have been a game changer for Department policy. However, it is believed the Department was burdened with their own rhetoric of how destructive and devastating citrus canker would be without the continuation of the eradication program.