Justice Labarga to trial lawyers — ‘Please object at trials’

'I spent half my life on the Supreme Court living in fundamental error land because someone doesn’t object'

Trial lawyers should remember to make timely objections, Justice Jorge Labarga, the Florida Supreme Court’s longest-serving member, told a Criminal Law Section symposium June 18.

Addressing an Orlando conference room full of criminal law practitioners at the 2026 Florida Bar Convention, Labarga said failing to preserve the record for an appeal is one of the biggest sources of regret for trial lawyers, and a source of frustration for many appellate judges who review their cases.

“Please object at trials,” he said. “I spent half my life on the Supreme Court living in fundamental error land because someone doesn’t object.”

Born in Cuba in 1952 and raised in Palm Beach County from the age of 11, Labarga recounted his early career as a prosecutor, public defender, and private practitioner before becoming a judge.

The public defender who hired him, Richard Jorandby, wisely assigned all new hires to an appellate division, Labarga said.

“I would encourage that to any of you out there who are elected public defenders,” he said. “I was in appeals for a year, writing briefs, reading transcripts, and doing oral arguments at the district court of appeal, and you really learn how to lay out the record and, most importantly, you really learn the law.”

Former Gov. Lawton Chiles appointed Labarga to the 15th Judicial Circuit bench in 1996, four years after Labarga co-founded the law firm of Roth, Duncan & Labarga in West Palm Beach, where he focused on personal injury.

One morning in 2000, as he was preparing to go to the courthouse, Labarga said he was nervously watching a Today Show anchor predict that a Palm Beach judge could decide the highly contested presidential election.

Returning from lunch that afternoon, thinking he had avoided the assignment, Labarga learned that several colleagues had recused themselves — and the chief judge was looking for him.

“He asked me, are you going to punt like all the others?” Labarga laughed. “So, I took the bench, and there was Barry Richard, and David Boies on the other side, and there was a CNN camera, and the rest is history.”

Labarga said he marveled at the way each attorney could make long, persuasive arguments extemporaneously.

“You look down and they’re not reading from anything,” he said. “They were great attorneys.”

In 2008, former Gov. Charlie Crist appointed Labarga to the Fourth DCA, and a year later, to the Supreme Court. In 2014, he became Florida’s 56th chief justice.

Labarga acknowledged that he often disagrees with his colleagues, but he stressed that the court remains highly collegial.

“My colleagues and I have a different view of the role of our judicial system in our constitutional form of government,” he said. “I have a different view, I come from the Warren court era, and they come from this originalist era, and I really enjoy my colleagues, we go to lunch, and we talk about that with ease.”

Labarga won’t be on the court much longer as he nears mandatory retirement age.

“I’m going to reach the age of constitutional senility in about a year and a half, in no uncertain terms,” he said. “I’m going to retire when I reach 75.”

When he does step down, it will be with few regrets, he said.

“The greatest thing I will remember is public service and the things that you can provide the people,” he said.