Your Tuesday Morning Round Up.

Hi kids, big news -- Gwynne Young wins the Florida Bar run off!

Oh I'm kidding, the big news down here, broke by David,  is Gene Stearns convincing Judge Ungaro to grant his 50(b) motion and throw out the jury's verdict against BankAtlantic.

Guess it really was the worst trial Gene's ever seen.

Does this vindicate the overall approach to the litigation by the defendant (which just posted a $22.9 million loss this quarter)?

Hard to say as we're somewhat in uncharted territory, though it's a major concession by the Judge that things could have/would have/should have proceeded differently.

In other news, Glenn Garvin thinks NYT readers are deviant liberals who love big black c*%k.

Hey, I just report this stuff!

(I'm joking, he just randomly selected a few books to highlight the average content of the NYT Sunday book reviews.)

Shorter Gene Stearns: It's All Judge Ungaro's Fault.

I understand there may be a certain amount of settlement posturing to all this, but is Gene going overboard with his very public and very direct "Judge Ungaro screwed up" approach to appealing the BankAtlantic securities verdict?

I mean, this is a guy who already said it was the worst-tried case he's ever seen in his life, and that includes every episode of Judge Judy plus that old Boston judge from The Verdict (ok, I added the last part).

In today's DBR, Stearns continues to focus exclusively on Judge Ungaro:

"I don't blame the jury," Stearns said. "The judge instructed them that Alan Levan made four false statements. And that is, I believe, unprecedented for a judge to tell the jury that one of the defendants made false statements."

Gene also didn't like how the Judge handled the damages expert:

Stearns said Preston's testimony about damages rested on several factual assumptions that the jury did not assess: "The judge refused to allow the jury to decide the factual questions upon which her testimony was predicated. Very puzzling."

Puzzling?  It's downright perplexing!

 In their response, posted here, the plaintiffs take this argument head on:

Even though the Court was not required to submit a special interrogatory regarding Preston’s assumptions to the jury, the jury clearly had the opportunity to consider and reject the assumptions. Preston’s assumptions (found at paragraph 10 of her report, PX726) were published to the jury during her testimony. Trial Transcript (“Tr.”) 2668-69. Defendants vigorously cross-examined her about the assumptions and the significance if Plaintiffs failed to prove them.6 Moreover, the instructions given by the Court were absolutely clear that unless the jury first found liability the issue of damages was not to be reached (DE 635 at 23) and specified that it was up to the jury to decide whether it would rely on the expert’s opinion. Id. at 6. Given these instructions, it is implicit in the jury verdict awarding damages based on Preston’s testimony that the jurors found that the factual assumptions she relied on were proven.

If Judge Carnes gets this, given his penchant for quoting old song lyrics, I hope he updates his references a bit (I've given him a hint above).

Gene Stearns Doesn't Think Judge Ungaro Did That Good a Job Presiding Over His Trial.

Bank Atlantic New Trial Motion

I'm paraphrasing, but that's the takeaway from BankAtlantic's motion for new trial, which through the magic of Scribd you can gaze at above.

Gene Stearns: It Wasn't Me!

Well I guess the big headline this morning is Gene Stearn's rare loss in a rare securities fraud case tried to a jury before Judge Ungaro.

In a case marked by particularly vituperative, some would say overheated rhetoric, Gene now seems to be suggesting it's all Judge Ungaro's fault:

Eugene Stearns, an attorney for BankAtlantic, said the company would appeal on a variety of issues, including U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro’s ruling before the trial that four of the 19 statements were false.

“We are obviously disappointed with the outcome, but in light of the court’s ruling on the four statements, we’re not particularly surprised,” Stearns said. “The probability that they will ever collect a penny on this is infinitesimally small.”

In a DBR article inexplicably not yet online, Gene reportedly added that "he has never seen a case with so many issues to pursue on appeal in his 40 years of practicing law."

Seriously -- most trial errors ever?

Who the hail presided over this piece of dreck anyways?

I can only begin to imagine -- deliciously -- what this thing must have cost in attorney's fees and costs.  For example, I noticed that nine Stearns Weaver attorneys apparently participated in the failed mediation of this matter back in June.