BY CHRIS FELKER
Three attorneys are vying for the Group 30 seat on the 15th Judicial Circuit bench to replace retiring Palm Beach County Circuit Court Judge Lucy Chernow Brown. Early voting starts Monday, and the election will be held on Aug. 26.
Brown will leave office next January after 24 years on the bench, making her one of Palm Beach County’s longest-serving circuit judges.
The candidates to replace her are: Maxine Cheesman, 58, a partner in a West Palm Beach law firm; Jaimie Goodman, 56, of Jupiter, who moved his law practice from Michigan to West Palm Beach 15 years ago; and Peggy Rowe-Linn: 58, of West Palm Beach, a family law attorney.
Goodman has run unsuccessfully for the bench twice, in 2010 and 2012, while both his opponents have applied for vacancies via appointment.
So far during the campaign, the main issue has been the kinds of qualifications and how much experience are sufficient for an incoming judge.
Goodman and Rowe-Linn each have nearly 30 years invested in practicing law, but Cheesman has only been a lawyer since 2005.
However, Cheesman had a previous long career in public service. She served as a division director for the South Florida Water Management District for 15 years, and was a chemist, hydrogeologist and environmental inspector with the Miami-Dade County Department of Environmental Protection for 12 years before that, drawing on her education in chemistry. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of the West Indies and a master’s degree in that subject from the University of Miami before earning her law degree from Nova Southeastern University.
Goodman, who was born in Queens, New York, has a bachelor’s degree in industrial and labor relations and a law degree from Cornell University. His focus is in employment litigation. He previously represented General Motors for a decade, with five years as in-house counsel, before opening his own firm in Detroit in 1993. Six years later, he moved his practice to West Palm Beach.
Rowe-Linn, who holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Florida State University and earned her juris doctorate from Nova Southeastern University, set up her own West Palm Beach law firm 26 years ago and has handled more than 1,000 cases since then, having tried 300 of them before a judge and filed 100 appeals. She specializes in family law, is trained as a volunteer guardian ad litem to help children who are involved in court cases, has been a parenting coordinator and is a volunteer worker for organizations including the Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts and the Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County.
Cheesman admits she is not the typical judicial candidate. “I have 27 years in public service already,” she said. “My background as a scientist makes me very analytical, so my approach to the law is very analytical and very impartial, and I use that to my benefit.”
She cites her 19-year residence here and steady public service, including a wide range of pro bono work, as reasons voters should support her. “I’ve been totally dedicated to serving the needs of the county. I do countless pro bono hours for residents of Palm Beach County,” Cheesman said.
She said her work at the SFWMD made her a good arbiter of human issues and a good manager of complex disputes. “It was so complicated — so many different contracts and projects — and everything had to be kept on time and flowing accordingly,” Cheesman said. “My experience in handling those kinds of things prepares me to handle a courtroom.”
She added that during her nearly 10 years of private legal practice, she has successfully litigated in four of the circuit court divisions: foreclosure, probate, civil litigation and family law.
Cheesman said she has been attending many community forums to get her campaign message out due to limited financing. “The response has been really very good,” she said. “I’ve been doing door-to-door canvassing because I don’t have the money of my opponents, and it has been going very well.”
Goodman, who has faced accusations from Rowe-Linn that he lacks Palm Beach County Circuit Court experience, extols his depth and breadth of experience in making his case to voters that he’s the superior candidate.
“I’m a veteran lawyer with more than 30 years of courtroom experience in complex civil litigation. I have the most jury trial experience of any candidate in the race,” he said. “I have broad experience representing Fortune 500 companies, including General Motors, as well as representing hard-working people. I feel I have an understanding of the real-life problems of people in the workplace, and I also understand the corporate decision-making process.”
Goodman said that his varied experience makes him more qualified. “My experience over the course of 30 years in complex civil litigation, which includes employment cases, trade secret cases, non-compete cases, some product liability litigation and occupational safety and health cases, gives me the broadest background of all the candidates,” he said.
Goodman noted that he believes voters should be looking for a hard worker for their next judge, and said he fits the bill.
“The most important thing I think people should be looking for in a judge is a strong work ethic, jury trial experience, patience and demeanor, and compassion,” Goodman said. “And I specifically think that that’s important when you look at some of the folks who are community leaders who have endorsed me and who know me, such as Jess Santamaria, Anne Gerwig, Dave Aronberg and a number of attorneys… I think endorsements are important because they’re a sign people have trusted you.”
Rowe-Linn claims that she is the most experienced candidate in the race. “I have practiced law exclusively in Palm Beach County for decades. I have literally tried hundreds of cases in several divisions of the court: juvenile, the civil court, the family division, and I have represented creditors in the mortgage foreclosure division,” she said. “The only division of the court in which I have not represented someone is in the criminal/felony division.”
She draws a sharp contrast between her résumé and Goodman’s.
“Mr. Goodman has never tried a case in circuit court in Palm Beach County, the position which he seeks to become judge. He claims that he has more jury trial experience as a result of trials he claims he had in Detroit, Michigan, prior to getting his bar license in Florida,” Rowe-Linn said. “Mr. Goodman has never appeared in any division of the court in Palm Beach County except for the civil division, and that was at what I call motion hearings, never at a trial. That is why I believe I am far more experienced than he is. That is also why more than 180 members of the Palm Beach County Bar have endorsed me.”
She added that she is uniquely qualified for two divisions of the court where the chief judge often has difficulty finding volunteers — the marital/family law and juvenile areas.
“I’m a big child’s rights advocate. That’s my claim to fame. I was on the original board of directors for the Center for Children in Crisis, which ultimately became the prototype for the Child Protection Team in Palm Beach County. I do think it is a niche that needs to be filled,” Rowe-Linn said. “I also feel very strongly, though, that if you put my education, my training and my experience next to Mr. Goodman’s or Ms. Cheesman’s, and if we’re truly voting for the most qualified candidate, there is no doubt that Peggy Rowe-Linn must be the person you vote for.”
Goodman disputes Rowe-Linn’s contentions.
“I’ve tried cases in Palm Beach County, jury trials, and I’ve tried jury trials in federal district court in Florida, and at the end of the day, I’ve tried more jury trials in Florida than she has,” he said. “Over the course of my career, I’ve tried eight times more jury trials than Ms. Rowe-Linn, and in fact if you look over the records, I don’t think you’ll see one jury trial that she has ever tried on her own. I question whether she’s ever even picked a jury, and I think it’s important to have a circuit court judge who’s familiar with voir dire.”
Cheesman said she is troubled that many voters don’t seem to pay much attention to judicial races.
“I just hope that when the people of Palm Beach County listen to us and look at what our depth of experience is, that they will judge it for what it is,” she said. “My main platform is to tell people, ‘Look and see what all the candidates are doing. Because you have the power to choose who judges you. You need to know who your judges are, who you’re electing. Because at one point, you may stand in front of them.’ A lot of people don’t seem to care about it, but they should.”
ABOVE: Maxine Cheesman, Jaimie Goodman and Peggy Rowe-Linn.
