Judge Ayers let Husband's lawyer quit his case at a hearing held on one day's notice, twenty-four days early, over his two written objections. Asked if that was fair, she answered: "That's not the legal standard." She then ruled Husband had failed to prove the lawyer should stay.
Due process gives a client notice and a real chance to answer before his lawyer leaves. The withdrawal motion already had a date, January 6, 2025, and the expedited motion itself said "There are no other hearings scheduled in the matter." Judge Ayers keeps the January date or states on the record what cannot wait, and she reads the client's filed objection.
- Dec. 11 to 12, 2024: at 4:09 PM counsel filed an expedited motion. At 11:17 PM Husband wrote chambers asking for more time: "I have never practiced in circuit or county Court in my life." At 9:09 AM chambers: "I will schedule the expedited hearing for 12/13/24 at 4:30 pm". Eight minutes later, Husband: "I object to the hearing occurring without me." N-014Read them: Husband's emails, Docs 167 and 168 (link pending redacted copy)
- Dec. 13, 2024, 4:30 PM: Husband pointed to his filed objection. Judge Ayers: "correspondence between you and your attorney, which would be privileged. So I did not read it". Husband: "I am waiving any attorney-client privilege." She cancelled "an open docket for January on Motion to Withdraw" "because we're doing it right now." Asked "is it fair to give me 24 hours' notice": "That's not the legal standard." N-014Read them: Hearing transcript, Dec. 13, 2024, pp. 3-4, 17 (link pending redacted copy)
- Jan. 9 to 13, 2025: "In an abundance of caution, I concurred with you that setting it in one day's notice might have been a little soon." Then: "You have not given me any legal basis on why I should not allow them to withdraw." The order: "The Husband failed to establish a legal basis for the Court to deny the Expedited Motion to Withdraw". N-014What required a motion already set for January 6 to be heard on December 13, on one day's notice?Read them: Hearing transcript, Jan. 9, 2025, pp. 15-16 (link pending redacted copy) · Order, Doc 100, Jan. 13, 2025 (link pending redacted copy)
Judge Kelly A. Ayers (the setting, through chambers; the grant; the rehearing order). Vivian Cortes Hodz, Husband's counsel (the expedited motion). One motion, one setting, one hearing. Every duty here arises from due process on this motion alone; no other card is needed to establish it.
Art. I, s. 9, Fla. Const. and the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard before a ruling that affects a party's rights. A withdrawal motion must be timely and must give the client an opportunity to respond (Garden v. Garden, 834 So. 2d 190, 192 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002)). Rule 4-1.16(b) supplies the grounds.
The details are where it lives: full record, receipts, related cards
Husband's own counsel, Vivian Cortes Hodz, had a withdrawal motion on file since December 3, 2024,
set for hearing thirty-four days out on January 6, 2025. On December 11 at 4:09 PM she filed an
expedited motion. At 5:22 PM on December 11, chambers offered three dates, December 13, 16 and 18. At 9:08 PM, counsel confirmed the earliest, December 13 at 4:30 PM, stating only that she and opposing counsel were available.
At 11:17 PM that night the client objected in writing. He asked for more time, described the
prejudice, said "I have never practiced in circuit or county Court in my life," waived his
attorney-client privilege, and stated his unavailability. At 9:09 AM the next morning chambers
confirmed the December 13 setting for 4:30 PM. Eight minutes later he objected again, expressly: "I
object to the hearing occurring without me." Nothing changed.
The hearing went ahead on December 13 at 4:30 PM, two days and twenty-one minutes after the
expedited motion, on one-day notice, per the court's own recital in its order. The expedited
motion rested its urgency on the client's own conduct and allegations, which it said "necessitate the Court's immediate attention"; no basis for moving the date up appears in the order or in the transcript. Judge Ayers
granted the withdrawal from the bench over Husband's objection and cancelled the January 6 setting
from the bench. A motion for judicial default premised on the unanswered petition was filed at 8:32
that same morning (N-013), and Husband answered self-represented three days later. Whether the
extended response deadline fell on the hearing date itself is not pinned in the records reviewed,
and the sequence does not depend on it. [DENIED]
Due process means notice and a real chance to be heard, and for a withdrawal that means notice timely enough for the client to respond (Garden v. Garden). The lawyer who wants out over the client's objection carries the burden of justifying it under Rule 4-1.16(b); the client carries nothing. Moving a hearing up twenty-four days rests on a stated emergency. The expedited motion said the client's conduct and allegations “necessitate the Court's immediate attention” and, in the same filing, “There are no other hearings scheduled in the matter.” Judge Ayers later said so herself: setting it “in one day's notice might have been a little soon.”
a withdrawal motion that had been set thirty-four days out was heard twenty-four days early, on one day's notice, on a motion that rested its urgency on the client's own conduct; the client had objected in writing twice before it began, and it ended his representation.
- Doc 056, the 12/3/24 withdrawal motion.
- Doc 058 paras. 1, 5, and 8, the 12/11/24 4:09 PM expedited motion; p. 4 recites that counsel "has sought all appropriate extensions of time and communicated the same so as to ensure no interim prejudice to the Husband,"
- Doc 167, the Wednesday 12/11/2024 11:17 PM EST objection email, with the privilege waiver at p. 2.
- Doc 168, the Thursday 12/12/2024 9:17 AM EST objection, which embeds the court's own 12/12 9:09 AM setting email eight minutes before it.
- Doc 100 para. 1, the court's own "one-day notice" recital, and Doc 100 as the 1/13/25 re-grant despite that recited notice.
- Doc 158, transcript of the December 13, 2024 hearing, Tr. 17:13-17. Doc 090, transcript of the December 19, 2024 hearing, Tr. 16:22-24.
- Doc 109, transcript of the January 9, 2025 hearing, Tr. 15:20-16:3 for the quoted concession that one day's notice "might have been a little soon."
- Doc 059 p. 2 and Doc 061 p. 3, opposing counsel's written refusal of any further extension: "I cannot agree to an extension of time. He should be required to adhere to the same standards."
- Doc 075, the 8:32 AM default motion of 12/13/24. Doc 079, Husband's self-represented answer of 12/16/24.
- Doc 214 p. 1, Filing #227245890, the 10/21/24 email from counsel, found 8/7/26; quoted in text at N-023.
- The velocity distribution under the successor judge: N-123 (about 4 hours, a non-party's proposed order), N-128 (19h54m, opposing counsel's exit order), N-134 (about 25 hours, an order billing Husband $3,000), against N-139, where a filed motion, a proposed order, and acceptance of the court's own offered dates drew no hearing, no order, and no reply.
- Related decision points: N-151.