DeSantis’s sus­pen­sion of state pros­e­cu­tor upheld by Flori­da Supreme Court

By a 6–1 deci­sion, the Flori­da Supreme Court upheld Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R‑FL) sus­pen­sion of State Attor­ney Monique Wor­rell.
DeSan­tis sus­pend­ed Wor­rell, who worked in the 9th Judi­cial Cir­cuit rep­re­sent­ing Orange and Osce­o­la coun­ties, on Aug. 9, 2023, for “neglect­ing her duty to faith­ful­ly pros­e­cute crime in her juris­dic­tion.”
DeSan­tis said Wor­rell had pre­vent­ed attor­neys in her office from seek­ing “min­i­mum manda­to­ry sen­tences” for both drug traf­fick­ing offens­es and gun offens­es, allow­ing for “vio­lent crim­i­nals to escape the full con­se­quences of their crim­i­nal con­duct.”
In his exec­u­tive order, DeSan­tis not­ed that the Osce­o­la Coun­ty Sheriff’s Office referred 58 non­homi­cide rob­beries with a firearm to pros­e­cu­tors in 2021 and 2022, but only one of those cas­es result­ed in a min­i­mum manda­to­ry sen­tence of 10 years.
A month after her sus­pen­sion, Wor­rell filed a pe …