Prosecutor DeSantis Fired Sues to Get Her Elected Position Back

A liberal prosecutor fired by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for alleged “neglect of duty” and “incompetence” sued Wednesday in the state Supreme Court demanding to get her job back.

Orange and Osceola County State Attorney Monique Worrell alleged that DeSantis didn’t have any grounds to replace her and that his justifications for putting a conservative prosecutor in her elected post violate state law.

“To the extent the Governor disagrees with how Ms. Worrell is lawfully exercising her prosecutorial discretion, such a disagreement does not constitute a basis for suspension from elected office,” she said in her petition. “Ms. Worrell was elected to serve as State Attorney, not the Governor.”

The case puts squarely before the conservative court an issue a majority of the justices punted on earlier this year when another prosecutor DeSantis fired for refusing to enforce the state’s abortion laws sued. In that case, the court majority held the prosecutor waited too long to sue DeSantis and was barred from relief—but that won’t be an issue for Worrell.

On Aug. 9 DeSantis replaced Worrell in an executive order claiming that it was dereliction of her duty to allow her assistant prosecutors to seek sentences below state mandatory minimums, along with other claims that her office was taking it easy on criminal defendants in defiance of state standards.

Worrell’s petition claims that stats showing decreased jail time and incarceration rates don’t equate to incompetence or neglect because it is her purview, as the choice of the people in her district, how to apply proprietorial discretion.

“Mere disagreement between a Governor and a state attorney about where within the lawful range of discretion that discretion should be exercised falls far short of the constitutionally required showing of neglect of duty or incompetence,” Worrell said in her petition.

The case is Worrell v. DeSantis, Fla., No. SC2023-1246, 9/6/23.