A Miami-Dade judge on Saturday ripped apart, er, ruled against a lawsuit filed by Miami Commissioner Crazy Joe Carollo in an 18-page spanking, uh, decision that basically calls him a sore loser who ran to the court after he failed to get his way on the commission.
Carollo is against the strong mayor referendum that city commissioners voted to put on the ballot in August. He was joined by Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez, who has gone on TV and 
radio against the measure, so it’s a defeat for him as well.
“The essence of the matter before the court is that Commissioner Carollo opposes changing the governing structure of the City of Miami to a strong mayor form of government. In his role as City Commissioner he argued against the issue being presented to, and decided by, the voters in the form of a ballot referendum,” wrote 11th Circuit Court Judge Miguel M. de la O in a final summary judgement for Mayor Francis Suarez and the other defendants in Carollo’s stunt, er, legal challenge.
Read related: Gimenez clan involved in Joe Carollo lawsuit vs strong mayor
“He now asks this court to declare the referendum illegal for a number of reasons, none of which have merit,” the judge continued in his intro. “The question of how the City of Miami should be structured is at its core a political one. Therefore, Commissioner Carollo must rely on his powers of persuasion to convince the citizens of Miami as to the folly of a strong mayor form of government, if it is indeed folly.”
Wait, powers of persuasion? Who says a judge can’t be funny?
De la O didn’t let Crazy Joe use his “powers of persuasion” in court even though Carollo, in true form, “sought to take dozens of depositions, and subpoenaed in excess of 30 witnesses to the October 5, 2018 hearing, all of which this Court deemed unnecessary.”
In other words, nananina said the judge, cutting Crazy Joe off before he could start.
He lays into Crazy Joe and fails all of his counts on what apparently amounts to a frivolous and ridiculous lawsuit:
- The ballot language is, indeed, abundantly clear and complete on the purpose of the referendum and not misleading, the judge said.
- The petition signatures do not need to meet Miami-Dade standards that are not required by the city of Miami charter and, even if they did, the city commission placed the referendum on the ballot, not the petitions, so that is a moot point.
- And the complaint about the pay formula is not only moot, because that’s not the purpose of the measure, it also “misses the mark,” wrote de la O. “First, there is in fact a pay formula now, it is whatever manner and amount the Mayor is currently paid. Commissioner Carollo’s counsel stated at the hearing that the Mayor’s salary is set at the discretion of the Commission. That is a pay formula. It may be purely discretionary, but a discretionary formula is no less a formula.”
In other words: “Duh.”
Was it intentionally ridiculous?
If not, this should be a huge embarrassment for the attorneys because the lawsuit apparently doesn’t have a single leg to stand on. The judge laughs at it throughout the ruling, says that a comparison to a Leon County case under appeal was “remarkably different” and pokes so many holes in it that it almost seems like it was intentional. Like a parody of a lawsuit.
Read related: Joe Carollo files late campaign report, with $60K to mayor’s daughter-in-law
If it is, this could be fraud. Ladra can’t help but wonder how much was paid to Jesus Suarez, the lawyer whose 
name it is under who filed it, and maybe also Tania Cruz, Mayor Carlos Gimenez’s daughter-in-law — the one who got paid $60,000 for “mailers” during the campaign. She was likely advising Carollo on the matter, as evidenced by an email from Suarez to both Tania Cruz and her husband CJ Gimenez two minutes after the lawsuit was filed. “Done,” it said.
The public also needs to know who paid for it? Someone is paying Suarez, at the Genovese, Joblove & Battista law firm. Five other firm emails were ccd as was Carollo campaign attorney Benedict Kuehne. They are not doing this for free. Is Cruz making more from a political action committee? Maybe her Papi-in-law’s PAC this time?
When Ladra first asked City Attorney Victoria Mendez if the city had paid the attorney, she wrote back “No payments have been made at this time.” Which sounded like the city could be paying for this frivolous lawsuit sometime in the future. So I asked again and got the same answer. “There are no records responsive to your request. The City is not paying Mr. Suarez at this time,” she wrote again.
What does that mean?
Neither Carollo nor Suarez returned several calls.
Ladra challenges Joey Flechas or Doug Hanks (since the Gimenez clan is involved) to find out what this lawsuit really was. Payoff to someone for something? Propaganda maybe?
Because the one thing it’s apparently not is a legitimate legal challenge.
Judge calls Joe Carollo sore loser, rips apart strong mayor lawsuit added by Ladra on
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