Law360 is providing free access to its coronavirus coverage to make sure all members of the legal community have accurate information in this time of uncertainty and change. Use the form below to sign up for any of our weekly newsletters. Signing up for any of our section newsletters will opt you in to the weekly Coronavirus briefing.
Sign up for our Florida newsletter
You must correct or enter the following before you can sign up:
Thank You!
Law360 (June 26, 2020, 5:27 PM EDT) -- The Florida Supreme Court has backed Gov. Ron DeSantis' social distancing orders aimed at slowing the spread of the new coronavirus, rejecting a legal challenge brought by a former attorney after finding that a pandemic qualifies as a "natural emergency" within the State Emergency Management Act.
DeSantis has been taking heat in recent days from critics who say he needs to impose more stringent restrictions on the public and businesses as the state has tallied record daily increases in reported COVID-19 cases, but Palm Beach resident William S. Abramson continued to insist Friday that the governor's previous executive orders overstepped his authority and said the state's highest court left a state of tyranny with its one-page ruling Thursday denying his petition for an order voiding them.
"It was all legal conclusion. There was no factual basis for what they wrote," Abramson told Law360 in a phone interview. "We are officially a tyranny. Laws no longer apply in the state of Florida. The governor can do whatever he wants without any justification or proof or anything."
Abramson, who accepted a disciplinary revocation of his law license last year while facing three disciplinary cases, complained that the Supreme Court did not address individual points in his May 5 petition, including his argument that the lack of an existing emergency plan for pandemics proves that the Emergency Management Act was not intended to cover the current situation.
"If you can't disprove it, you just say nothing," Abramson said, calling the ruling disrespectful and disingenuous. "I think they made themselves look ridiculous."
The order, which was written by Chief Justice Charles Canady and joined by the court's five other current members, said that Abramson had not challenged any of the specific provisions of the governor's executive orders, so it did not address any.
Abramson contrasted the pandemic to when a hurricane hits the state, saying that under the latter situation there is a clearer start and end to the emergency and the state has already formalized an emergency plan, as contemplated by the Emergency Management Act.
"It's not just at the whim of the person in charge at the moment," Abramson said. "No one had a chance to say anything [about the pandemic response]. It's called due process. It's the most fundamental part of our [democratic] system."
Abramson, who practiced traffic and criminal law for nearly 30 years before losing his license, said he was working at the Cucina Cabana restaurant in North Palm Beach and as a substitute teacher before the coronavirus struck but lost both jobs during the pandemic and is now working in construction.
In his petition asking the high court to issue a writ of quo warranto finding the governor's emergency orders null and void, Abramson said the Emergency Management Act was enacted in 1993 after the state was caught unprepared for Hurricane Andrew the year before, and that its entire purpose is to "facilitate the opening of the state, not closing it."
The law defines a "natural emergency" as being caused by a natural event such as a storm or flood but did not contemplate the virus pandemic as falling under its auspices, he contended. In support of his position, he pointed to requirements for state officials to establish emergency preparedness plans, which he said they did not do in anticipation of this pandemic or after the SARS and H1N1 epidemics in recent years.
He said Friday that he hopes someone in the Florida Legislature will introduce a bill excluding viruses and other diseases from the Emergency Management Act. He also suggested that he might look into filing another lawsuit challenging the state's announcement Friday that it was suspending the sale of alcohol at all bars due to the recent spike in COVID-19 cases.
The governor's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Supreme Court's ruling in Abramson's case.
Abramson is representing himself.
The governor is represented by Joe Jacquot, Nicholas A. Primrose and Joshua E. Pratt of the Office of General Counsel in the Executive Office of the Governor.
The case is Abramson v. DeSantis, case number SC20-646, in the Supreme Court of Florida.
--Editing by John Campbell.
For a reprint of this article, please contact reprints@law360.com.
