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CLEARWATER, FLA----Indirect contempt charges filed against Tampa attorney Mark A. Adams were dismissed Monday by Sixth Judicial Circuit Court Judge Robert Beach but on Thursday, Adams begins trial in Hillsborough County on ethics charges brought against him by the Florida Bar Association. If found guilty, Adams license to practice law could be revoked.
Beach granted Adams' motion for reconsideration of the order to show cause why Adams' shouldn't be held in contempt and ruled that the misleading document that attorney Timothy W. Weber filed that he purported to be an affidavit was not sufficient to invoke the court's jurisdiction to issue an order to show cause.
Adams had been arrested last January on contempt charges brought against him by Judicial Circuit Court judge Crockett Farnell and attorney Weber of the politically connected Battaglia, Ross, Dicus and Wein law firm of St. Petersburg.
Farnell had signed the order and issued a warrant for Adams' arrest on the basis of Weber's purported document.
Although the contempt charges have now been dismissed, Adams is scheduled to stand trial beginning Thursday, Dec. 1 on charges before the bar association. Both Farnell and Weber filed a complaint against Adams, primarily due to Adams' attempts to disqualify Farnell from hearing any proceedings against him. Weber's boss, Anthony Battaglia, is a former member of the bar's Board of Governors and a former chairman of the Sixth Judicial Circuit Judicial Nomination Committee. Adams' trial on the bar complaint will be before Judge Greg Holder at the Hillsborough County Courthouse, 800 East Twiggs St., Tampa.
After Farnell repeatedly refused to remove himself from the case, he finally did so last December just as the contempt charges were moving towards trial and at least one Florida TV station had requested permission to tape the proceedings.
http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/112705TampaAttorney.html
11-29-05
© 2005 North
Country Gazette
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