District Court of Appeal of Florida

A petition for certiorari review of an order granting a doctor's motion for a protective order in a medical negligence action is granted where the trial court departed from the essential requirements of law in authorizing decedent's physician, who was not a party to the litigation, to have ex parte communications concerning decedent's medical care and treatment with an attorney hired by a representative of defendant-hospital.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/16/2006
• Published 11/17/2006

Judges

• THOMAS, J.

Court

• District Court of Appeal of Florida

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• John S. Mills of Mills & Carlin, P.A., Jacksonville;  James W. Gustafson, Jr., of Searcy Denney Scarola Barnhart & Shipley, P.A., Tallahassee;  and W. Roderick Bowdoin, Lake City, for Petitioner., V. Julia Luyster of Bernstein, Chackman and Liss, Hollywood;  Tracy Raffles Gunn of Fowler White Boggs Banker, P.A., Tampa;  and Jeffrey Bigman of Smith, Hood, Perkins, et al., Daytona Beach, for Amicus Curiae Florida Defense Lawyers' Association., Alan E. McMichael of Stripling, McMichael & Stripling, P.A., Gainesville, for Amicus Curiae The Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers.


• For Appellees:
  
• Susan L. Kelsey of Anchors Smith Grimsley, Tallahassee, for Respondents Steven Roper, M.D., and Shands Teaching Hospital and Clinics, Inc., Ronald L. Harrop of Cooney, Mattson, Lance, Blackburn, Richards & O'Connor, P.A., Orlando, for Respondent Steven Roper, M.D., John D. Jopling, Gainesville, for Respondent Shands Teaching Hospital and Clinics, Inc., Jennings L. Hurt, III, and Henry W. Jewett, II, of Rissman, Weisberg, Barrett, Hurt, Donahue & McLain, P.A., Orlando, for Respondent Robert Spindell, M.D., John S. Derr, Tallahassee, for Respondent B.S. Hegde, M.D.