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Should Judge Margaret W. Hudson Recuse Herself From The Luis Toledo Case? Evidence Suggests That Judge Hudson's Spouse Has Connections With The Sheriff Department. |
February 25, 2014 |
"Police throughout the United States have been caught fabricating, planting, and manipulating evidence to obtain convictions where cases would otherwise be very weak. Some authorities regard police perjury as so rampant that it can be considered a "subcultural norm rather than an individual aberration" of police officers."
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VolusiaExposed.Com suspects that Circuit Judge Margaret Hudson may have a conflict of interest, regarding her assignment as the judge, in the Luis Toledo murder prosecution.
Records would appear to support that Judge Hudson is married to a Dave Hudson. These records further tend to support that the Hudsons co-own a Port Orange home.(see below right) Sheriff department records indicate that Dave Hudson was the former head of their investigative services division (a slotted position on the VCSO's organizational chart), prior to his 2005 retirement from the VCSO. ----------> To Stop Music Video John Mellencamp - Authority Song Recently obtained records from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement supports, that since his 2005 retirement, Mr. Hudson has been a part-time deputy within the VCSO. |
Scroll Down To Review Past VCSO Media Releases Supporting Mr. Hudson's Ranking Position Within The VCSO  
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VolusiaExposed has redacted the personal information (address, telephone numbers, etc) off of these inclusive public records, as not to create a possible safety issue for the Hudsons.
In October 2013, Luis Toledo was arrested under the charge of domestic battery against his wife, shortly thereafter, additional charges of murder were filed against him, after the Volusia County Sheriff Department failed to locate his wife and her two small children. According to sheriff investigators, Toledo confessed to killing his wife, but denied being involved in the alleged murders of her children.  |
Scroll Down To Review Supportive Docs  
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Judicial Administration
Rule 2.330
Judicial conflicts of interest are defined in Rule 2.330 of the Florida Rules of Judicial Administration and are further defined in Code of Judicial Conduct.
We invite you to review the above linked rules and determine for yourself whether a conflict of interest exists. Obviously, per the rule, a spouses' involvement / attachment to the matter being litigated could cause a conflict of interest.
However, per the rules, it would appear to be necessary for a party within the litigation to declare their belief that a conflict exists.
There also exists the possibility that this probable conflict of interest has been shared (by Judge Hudson) with the Toledo defense team. Such declarations generally are the expected practices of officers of the court. Judge Zambrano's recent conflict declaration in a un-related lawsuit against the Volusia County Sheriff Department would be a good example of this practice.
In The L.L. vs Sheriff Ben Johnson Lawsuit
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In January 2011, L.L. (name redacted due to her being an alleged victim of a sexual assault) was arrested by the Volusia County Sheriff Department under the charge of domestic violence.
Shortly after her arrest, L.L.'s custody was transferred from the arresting deputy to transport Deputy Carl Willard. Deputy Willard's assignment was to transport L.L. to the county jail. According to allegations filed by L.L., Deputy Willard took her to a somewhat secluded area and proceeded to touch / grope her in a sexual manner. Due to her allegations, the VCSO opened an internal affairs investigation - however, prior to the completion of the investigation, Deputy Willard committed suicide. The internal investigation was completed after the death of Deputy Willard - he was cleared of any serious misconduct. L.L. has a current open lawsuit against the VCSO, and during a court hearing, Judge Zambrano advised her attorney that he had worked closely with Deputy Willard when he (Zambrano) was in the State Attorney's office. Based on that declaration, L.L.'s attorney filed a Motion to Recuse with the court, and Judge Zambrano recused himself. |
VolusiaExposed's Earlier Article The Deputy Willard Allegations Scroll Down To Review    |
Earlier this month (February 2014), VolusiaExposed conducted a search of the Volusia County government email server.
During this search, we located an email from a senior Volusia County staffer, who has DIRECT connections to the Toledo court case. This email was a thank you from Mr. Hudson, regarding the county staffer referring a client to his PI firm.
This email is currently (Feb. 23, 2014) in the possession of county staff for review and redaction purposes - we hope to make this email available for your review - but don't count on it - we suspect the county will declare a public record exemption.
So, here we have Dave Hudson, the apparent spouse of Judge Margaret Hudson, a retired senior staff member of the VCSO, who still maintains part-time employment status with the VCSO, and receives client referral(s) from at least one current county senior staff member with direct connections to the Toledo court case. Do you see a probable conflict of interest?
Ponder this for a moment - did Mr. Hudson's PI firm financially benefit from client referral(s) from county staff(ers)? If so, does Judge Hudson automatically also financially benefit from those referral(s)? Could there be a reasonable argument made that some possible "Quid Pro Quo" exist between the referrals and the judicial decisions?
So are we,(VolusiaExposed) making allegations that there is some type of nefarious conspiracy between county officials and court personnel? The simple answer to that is NO WE ARE NOT. We are only expressing concerns and asking questions that obviously need to be asked.
Now, on to some more questions.
Does The Clerk Of The Court Have A Rotating Judicial Assignment Policy?
VolusiaExposed attempted to discover how exactly did Judge Hudson get assigned to the Luis Toledo case. In many jurisdictions, it is the luck (or un-luck) of a random rotating assignment policy.
According to an email from Court Communication Officer, Ludmilla Lelis, first degree murder indictment cases are assigned by the clerk of the court on a rotational basis.
Lelis provided VolusiaExposed with a copy of a 2012 court administrative order in alleged support of this rotational assignment system. However, upon review of the order, it only appears to say that these cases are "assigned equally" between certain court divisions.(see attached link - green highlighted area within link)
Lelis also invited VolusiaExposed to make contact with Chief Deputy Clerk, Laura Roth for further verification of this rotation system. VolusiaExposed made email contact with Roth, and she responded stating that she would attempt to find further verification of this rotation system's existence. Currently (February 23, 2014), we have received no such verification from Roth.
VolusiaExposed secured a copy of the Brevard County Court's Administrative Order covering judicial assignments.
The Brevard Administrative Order clearly outlines a rotational judicial assignment system - it even uses the term "rotation".
Frankly, in our opinion, the manner in which judicial assignments are accomplished within Volusia County is VERY unclear - to wit - even the Chief Deputy Clerk of the Court must search for documents, in an attempt to justify that a judicial rotation system even exists.
Whether the assignment of Judge Hudson to the Toledo case was some type of nefarious conspiracy by county / state officials is unclear. What is fairly clear is that an argument can be made that there is a conflict of interest attached to Judge Hudson's assignment to the Toledo case. Within this argument, could it also be alleged, that the county / state are attempting to resolve some of the legal potholes in the Toledo prosecution, by cherry picking the judge assigned to the case?
A simple GOOGLE SEARCH regarding the Luis Toledo prosecution will reveal that there has been a few legal problems attached to it.
VolusiaExposed invites our readers to review the below linked media articles for a more detailed explanation of these legal potholes.
The first "bump in the road" came regarding the initial arrest of Mr. Toledo - was it even a legal arrest, and therefore was the evidence collected in that arrest (to include the alleged confession) even legally obtained?
The next "bump" is attached to whether the Volusia County jail is possibly violating Toledo's sixth amendment right to privately confer with his counsel.
Finally, the fact that Toledo has been assigned an attorney from the Office of Criminal CONFLICT and Civil Regional Counsel speaks for itself.
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Just More Trouble In An Already Troubled Prosecution? 
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To Review News-13 Article 
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Why We Always Fight Authority
Some might alleged that by us (VolusiaExposed) questioning the how and why of Judge Hudson's assignment to this criminal case, that somehow makes us pro Luis Toledo. For those people we say - YOU ARE WRONG !. The fact is - IF Luis Toledo is guilty of the charges filed against him - then he should face the ramifications of not following the laws of our society. What we are saying, is that society can NOT bring Toledo to justice by violating the ethics of the criminal justice system.
The United States of America is a great country, grounded in the honorable principles developed by extraordinary men, our founding fathers. Further, countless men, and now women, of this country's military have fought and died in defense of these principles.
Therefore, VolusiaExposed's loyalty lies within those beliefs that our fighting men and women have died to defend. Now, as far as the politicians connected to the arrest and prosecution of this murder case, which do you imagine is their biggest priority - justice or re-election?
In as far as our fight with authority - authority must remember - that their authority comes from the people - our fight is to constantly remind them of that fact.
Judge Hudson declined comment Monday (Feb. 24, 2014) through a spokeswoman.
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If you found this article to be thought provoking, we (VolusiaExposed.Com) invite you to review, the below linked, Special Investigative Report, exposing law enforcement corruption with the State of Florida.
SPECIAL INVESTIGATIVE SERIES ON LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRUPTION
by Matthew Doig and Anthony Cormier
Volusia County Sheriff's Department
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