Judge Elizabeth Scherer announces resignation

Judge Elizabeth Scherer sentences Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz at the Broward County Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on Nov. 2, 2022. The Florida judge who gained a national profile while presiding over the Parkland school shooting trial announced Wednesday, May 10, 2023, that she is resigning on June 30 to pursue unspecified career opportunities. (Amy Beth Bennett/South Florida Sun-Sentinel via AP, Pool, File)

Judge Elizabeth Scherer, the Florida jurist who presided over the Parkland mass shooter’s penalty phase and clashed with the defense, has announced her resignation and cryptically says she is working on projects that would take her career “in a more creative direction.”

“I was appointed at a young age, 35 or 36, which to me was very early in my career, and I knew fairly soon this was not going to be my forever job,” she said in a statement to Law&Crime.

This follows Scherer handling the Parkland case, in which a former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Nikolas Cruz, fatally shot 17 people and tried to kill 17 others in a mass murder.

She notably butted heads with the defense, including when she called out an assistant public defender for laughing and flipping the bird in court. She hugged prosecutors after the jury handed down a life sentence. Scherer used to belong to their office as an assistant state attorney in the Seventh Judicial Circuit until then-Gov. Rick Scott appointed her in 2012.

The state’s public defenders organization filed a complaint over her “hostility.” Justices with the Supreme Court of Florida recently disqualified her from a separate death penalty case because of the hugs.

Scherer said on Thursday that she told the chief judge amid the Parkland case about her plans to eventually leave the bench.

“When I was assigned this trial, I gave the Chief Judge my word that I would stay through the completion of the trial for the purposes of continuity because of the magnitude of the case, to maintain continuity and avoid the litigants from having to change judges,” she said. “When the trial was over, I told him I’d be pursuing other career options and would likely resign in the next few months. During those months, I got everything settled in the office and decided to move on.”

Chief Judge Jack Tuter told Law&Crime she discussed her resignation plans last year.

“Judge Scherer approached me last year to advise she would soon be leaving the bench,” he told Law&Crime in a statement. “During her service, Judge Scherer handled one of the most challenging cases in Broward County’s history. She did so in a professional and dignified manner. On behalf of the 17th Circuit, we wish Judge Scherer good health and prosperity in her future endeavors.”