Lawyers for DeSantis and suspended prosecutor Worrell argue before Florida Supreme Court

Lawyers for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and suspended Orange-Osceola State Attorney Monique Worrell argued Wednesday before the Florida Supreme Court, in a case that will decide whether Worrell would need to seek reinstatement through the Republican-controlled state Senate.

Worrell was joined in the courtroom gallery by dozens who traveled to Tallahassee to support her. At the heart of her challenge to the Aug. 9 suspension order is her argument that the governor offered no evidence of policies or practices that her office implemented to avoid aggressively prosecuting certain crimes, from gun and drug offenses to cases involving youth suspects. Florida Chief Deputy Solicitor General Jeffrey DeSousa, who represented the governor, says the validity of her removal from office ought to be decided by Senate lawmakers and not the justices.

At times during the proceeding, it appeared that the justices tended to agree with DeSousa’s arguments, with justices hinting that the allegations in the suspension order, regardless of the lack of specifics, appear to amount to negligence from Worrell’s office.

Justice John Laberga likened the suspension order to a criminal indictment and the reinstatement process as a trial. Justice Charles Canady also noted that their job is not to determine whether allegations of “neglect of duty” mentioned in the suspension order are valid.

“[The suspension order] makes assertions, but it doesn’t have to prove it. That’s what the trial in the Senate is for,” Canady said. “… That’s kind of a political question, it seems like to me: the scope of how the duty is understood and how that’s going to be defined.”

Laura Ferguson, who represented Worrell before the court, said past justices have traditionally towed the line regarding its powers in deciding suspensions. Still, she argued the importance of prosecutorial discretion in Worrell’s case, which she added, did not result in avoiding prosecuting certain cases entirely, contrary to the governor’s claims.

“If a governor were able to remove a prosecutor of a different political party simply because they disagree with their policies then categorize that neglect of duty or incompetence, then that will have a substantial chilling effect on how state attorneys perform their roles or their willingness to serve,” she said.

DeSousa, in his time before the justices, rebutted that discretion does not “insulate prosecutors from suspension.” He claimed prison admissions is low in the Ninth Judicial Circuit, which coversOrange and Osceola counties.

“If we had nothing else, if there was nothing specific she was doing and she was just not effective at prosecuting crime, we think that that would be enough,” DeSousa said.

Typically released on Thursdays, there’s no set timeline for when a decision will be issued, a spokesperson for the Florida Supreme Court said.

Worrell held a press conference outside the courthouse immediately after the hearing, thanking her supporters who carried signs calling for her reinstatement. In her comments to reporters, she said she believes the justices are siding with DeSantis, pointing in part to the comparison of the suspension order to a criminal indictment.

“One of the key parts here that has kind of been the basis of my removal is that we didn’t put out any indictments that didn’t actually have facts in them. That’s a huge problem for the governor,” Worrell said. “In the same way he wanted me to prosecute cases without facts and without evidence, that is the type of case that the governor’s lawyers have sought to prosecute.”

The ousted state attorney has long held that her office refused to prosecute cases when law enforcement lacked evidence in their investigations. In the past, she mentioned the drug trafficking cases handled by the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office in 2022 mentioned in the suspension order, many of which she said were unsubstantiated.

Worrell further pushed back against DeSousa’s use of prison data, arguing that crime has dropped throughout her time in office since she prosecuted cases “based on facts and evidence.”

“As state attorney, I don’t have a duty to maximize incarceration rates,” she said. “I have a duty only to seek justice.”