We recommend that you read the new opinion of the Florida Court of Appeal (3rd Dist.)– Galleon Bay Corp. v. Commissioners of Monroe County etc., No. 3D11-296, December 5, 2012, reversing the decision of the trial court. And what a reversal! One does not often see an appellate opinion that painstakingly dissects the errors of the trial court in so thorough a fashion. Did we say errors? Actually they may have been more than that.
Suffice it to say that in this case the trial judge made a number of rulings favorable to the owners who had a pretty strong case. Then he retired and the second judge who replaced him proceeded to reverse these rulings and enter a defense judgment for the county. But the appellate court did not like this at all, and proceded to perform an autopsy on the [second] trial judge’s rulings, demonstrating their deficiencies. You gotta read this one for yourself, and you can find a link to the opinion on our fellow blogmeister’s blog, www.inversecondemnation.com
Don’t miss it!
This opinion rings a special bell with us because it reminds us of our last case in the California courts, Metropolitan Water Dist. v. Campus Crusade for Christ, that followed a similar scenario of Judge B reversing Judge A. It too was reversed by the California Court of Appeal with the reversal upheld on the merits by the California Supreme Court in an opinion you can find at 41 Cal.4th 954. All’s well that ends well. To give you an idea how well, Judge B awarded a sum in the $475,000s (with no severance damages), but this judgment was reversed on appeal, and the case eventually settled for some $15 million, we are told.