Rubin v. State
Decision Date | 17 June 1986 |
Docket Number | No. 85-2370,85-2370 |
Citation | 11 Fla. L. Weekly 1357,490 So.2d 1001 |
Parties | , 11 Fla. L. Weekly 1357 Ellis S. RUBIN, Appellant, v. The STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Ellis S. Rubin, in pro. per.
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., and Michael J. Neimand, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
Before HENDRY, HUBBART and DANIEL S. PEARSON, JJ.
This is an appeal from an order holding the appellant, an attorney, in contempt for refusing to comply with the trial court's earlier order requiring the attorney to represent his client, a criminal defendant accused of murder, in a trial scheduled to begin immediately. We affirm.
Nearly a year before the contempt order was entered, this same attorney representing the same criminal defendant (one Russell Sanborn) in the same murder case asked the same trial judge for permission to withdraw as Sanborn's defense counsel, the request being made just before jury selection was to begin. Although clothed in language ostensibly designed to preserve the client's confidential communications to his attorney (e.g., Rubin alleged that the defendant "confided new and contradictory details and heretofore unknown explanations" and "issued certain instructions to Rubin as to the strategy and tactics to be employed at the trial"), Rubin's message to the court was that the defendant had insisted upon testifying falsely at trial. Accordingly, Rubin asked that he be excused from further representation of the client. The trial court denied the motion to withdraw and ordered Rubin to proceed to trial. 1
Rubin sought certiorari review of that order. This court denied his petition and in so doing assured Rubin that he would carry out his ethical obligations as an attorney (as well as render all the effective assistance to the defendant to which the defendant was entitled) by allowing "the defendant to take the stand and deliver his statement in narrative form" and by refusing to "elicit the perjurious testimony by questioning ... [or to] argue the false testimony during closing argument." Sanborn v. State, 474 So.2d 309, 313 (Fla. 3d DCA 1985). Rubin's motions for rehearing and rehearing en banc were denied, and he sought no further review in any other court, state or federal. Despite this, when upon the issuance of our mandate the case was restored to the trial calendar, Rubin again sought to withdraw on the same ground as before. The trial court, scrupulously adhering to its initial ruling and our mandate, again denied Rubin's motion and again ordered him to proceed to trial. When Rubin refused, the contempt order which gives rise to this appeal was entered.
The law of the case, established by this court in Sanborn v. State, 474 So.2d 309, is that even if Sanborn were to testify in the manner Rubin claimed he would, Rubin could ethically represent Sanborn by refusing to specifically elicit or argue such testimony. Rubin contends, however, as he did before the trial court, that our decision in Sanborn v. State is, in his view, wrong, and, because he firmly holds to that view, he disobeyed the lower court's order to proceed.
Rubin is certainly free to disagree and maintain his personal view of what the law is or should be, or indeed his personal view of what some higher law provides. 2 It is, however, the decision of the mortal judges in Sanborn v. State, having not been stayed, much less set aside, by some higher court with jurisdiction over the matter, which Rubin must obey. Thus, even if, arguendo, it might have been later determined that Sanborn v. State was wrongly decided, Rubin's contumacious refusal to follow the undisturbed order to proceed would be nonetheless punishable as a direct contempt. As will be seen, this rule of law is essential to the maintenance of our system of laws as a whole.
It is well settled in this state, and elsewhere, that where a court acting with proper jurisdiction and authority renders an order, an aggrieved party's failure to abide by the order may be punished by contempt even if the order is ultimately found to be erroneous. Health Clubs, Inc. v. State ex rel. Eagan, 377 So.2d 28 (Fla. 5th DCA 1979), appeal dismissed sub nom., Cataldo v. Eagen, 383 So.2d 1191 (Fla.1980) ( ). See also State ex rel. Buckner v. Culbreath, 147 Fla. 560, 3 So.2d 380 (1941); State ex rel. Pearson v. Johnson, 334 So.2d 54 (Fla. 4th DCA 1976); Friedman v. Friedman, 224 So.2d 424 (Fla. 3d DCA 1969); Annot., Right to Punish for Contempt for Failure to Obey Court Order or Decree Either Beyond Power or Jurisdiction of Court or Merely Erroneous, 12 A.L.R.2d 1059 (1950). The reason behind the rule requiring obedience to court orders regardless of their alleged invalidity is that the need for obedience to a court order far outweighs any detriment to individuals who may be temporarily victimized by the order, even if erroneous.
Seaboard Air Line Ry. Co. v. Tampa Southern R. Co., 101 Fla. 468 at 476, 134 So. 529 at 533 (1931).
Rubin's personal view that the decision in Sanborn is erroneous (a far cry from a judicial declaration that the decision is erroneous) quite obviously cannot excuse his disobedience.
This power to punish disobedience of court orders through contempt is unique to the judicial branch of government. As one court explained:
United States v. Dickinson, 465 F.2d 496, 510 (5th Cir.1972),...
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