Posted by Nydia Streets of Streets Law in Florida Family Law Procedure

After a family law hearing, a judge may ask one or both sides to submit a proposed final judgment. When a judge signs a final judgment without making any changes, this may be an issue for appeal because there is an argument that the judge did not perform independent analysis. This was an issue in the case King v. Farah & Farah, P.A., 5D23-20 (Fla. 5th DCA April 12, 2023).

Though not a family law case, this case has relevant information concerning a judge’s adoption of a proposed order. In this case, the defendant moved for summary judgment which was granted by the trial court. The trial court signed a 40-page final judgment proposed by the defendant about six months after the summary judgment hearing. The court instructed the parties not to send their proposed orders to each other because the judge did not want the parties responding to each other’s proposed orders. The plaintiff appealed, arguing the judge’s signing of the defendant’s proposed order was error.

The appellate court agreed, first noting that although sufficient amount of time had passed for the court to consider the proposed order, the fact that no changes were made at all in the 40 pages suggested a lack of independent analysis. This was further evidenced by the fact that “the order cites the wrong standard for summary judgment and had some language that could be interpreted as overly harsh and injudicious.” The court concluded “Because the trial judge adopted the [defendant’s] proposed order word for word, without allowing objection by [plaintiff’s] counsel, and made no factual findings or legal conclusions to guide the parties in preparing their orders, we conclude that independent judgment does not appear to have been exercised as [Perlow v. Berg-Perlow, 875 So. 2d 383 (Fla. 2004)] and our precedent require.”

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