She's back!

The knucklehead Judge in Broward County is back in the news. This time people in the Broward County Public Defender's office are claiming Judge O'Connor is forcing or intimidating defendants into taking plea deals.

I'll say it again, this woman is a menace and needs to be removed from the bench.

The full Sun-Sentinel article can be found at- http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-coconnor14jun14,0,317735.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines

`Jury duty' judge gets challenge for tough attitude on plea deals
By Jon Burstein Staff Writer
Posted June 14 2005

Broward Circuit Judge Eileen O'Connor has a policy that forces criminal defendants to take plea deals or live in fear that refusing will result in harsher sentences, the Public Defender's Office alleged Monday in court documents.

The Public Defender's Office argues that O'Connor is improperly taking on a prosecutorial role and she's not examining cases on their individual merits.

The accusations came as the Public Defender's Office asked O'Connor to remove herself from the case of a Lauderhill man accused of stealing $217 in batteries from a drug store.After Milton Stewart, 42, rejected a plea offer from prosecutors to serve nine months in jail, O'Connor said she wouldn't approve any future deal in the case.

Stewart now must either fight the case or take an "open plea," meaning he would plead guilty to the single theft charge and let O'Connor decide the sentence.

O'Connor received national media attention two months ago after she sentenced a prospective juror to four months in jail when he failed to disclose during jury selection that he had been arrested before. The 19-year-old juror spent 30 days in jail before O'Connor released him on an appellate bond.

Local attorneys and experts alike said they had never heard of a prospective juror getting such a harsh sentence.

Court transcripts show Stewart was one of at least three defendants who went before O'Connor on June 2 and were told that, because they had rejected the plea offers before them, they wouldn't get second chances at deals.

Stewart said in a written affidavit he thinks O'Connor indicated she would give him a jail sentence of more than nine months if he pleads guilty to the charge or is convicted by a jury. Stewart, who has multiple theft convictions, faces up to five years in prison if he is found guilty of stealing the batteries.