The Dirty Dozen of 2007

Cheryl Aleman — If you've read Alice in Wonderland, you'll recognize Broward Circuit Court Judge Aleman. She's the imperious Queen of Hearts who shouts "Off with her head!" Aleman apparently would love to lop the heads off many of the lawyers and defendants who come to her court. We've met her before, of course: In July 2003, she refused to give early release to a nonviolent drug offender who was dying of AIDS. A number of her decisions have been overturned by the Fourth District Court of Appeal, including one in which she ruled that children be removed from a low-income family after the parents came late to a hearing because they had to rely on unreliable public transportation. Aleman was recently summoned before the state Judicial Qualifications Commission after defense attorneys complained that she unfairly threatened to bring contempt charges against them and to jail them. DM reading: 9 (Way too biased to be a judge.)