Monique Worrell

Monique Haughton Worrell is a prosecutor and Democratic politician who has served as the state attorney for the Ninth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida since January 2021. On August 9, 2023 Florida Governor Ron DeSantis suspended Worrell from her office and appointed circuit judge Andrew Bain as acting state attorney for the remaining duration of her term. Worrell ran for a second-term against Bain. In 2024, Worrell was re-elected to a second term.

Life

Worrell earned a J.D. from the University of Florida Levin College of Law.

Worrell worked as an assistant public defender and private criminal defense lawyer. She taught at her alma mater for 16 years and served as the founding director of its criminal justice center. Worrell was hired in 2018 by state attorney Aramis Ayala as the director of the conviction integrity unit. In 2019, she became the chief legal officer of Reform Alliance. In October 2020, she returned to the conviction integrity unit.

In April 2020, Worrell, a Democrat, announced her bid to succeed her supervisor, Ayala. Her campaign was endorsed by vice president Kamala Harris, senator Bernie Sanders, and musician John Legend. She campaigned as a progressive and criminal justice reformer. In November 2020, she was elected with almost 66 percent of the vote against non-affiliated Jose Torroella.

She took office in January 2021. Worrell became the second African-American elected as state attorney in Florida and the first of Caribbean descent. She has had contentious interactions with Republican state officials. In March 2023, Worrell announced her reelection bid. On August 9, 2023, Florida governor Ron DeSantis suspended her and appointed an acting state attorney to operate the office. He accused Worrell of "neglect of duty and incompetence." In September, she filed a lawsuit against DeSantis in which she asked the Florida Supreme Court to reverse his order. This lawsuit causes a delay in the consideration of her suspension in compliance with Senate Rule 12.9 which states, in relevant part, the Senate process shall be held in abeyance and the matter shall not be considered by the Senate until final determination of a court challenge and the exhaustion of all appellate remedies. She has stated she will seek reelection in 2024. On June 6, 2024, the Florida Supreme Court denied her Worrell’s petition for a writ of quo warranto and dismissed her petition for writ of mandamus, upholding her suspension by Governor Ron DeSantis.

A detailed review into the allegations against her by the Orlando Sentinel found that Osceola County sheriff's deputies errors had undermined the prosecution. Osceola County Sheriff Marcos López claimed Worrell hadn’t prosecuted a single one of the 74 drug trafficking arrests his office made in 2022. The investigation found that several of those cases resulted in convictions and that nearly half were still in process. It concluded that Worrell successfully prosecuted some drug trafficking cases while judges and state crime labs dismissed the others.

On November 5, 2024 she was elected as State Attorney for the Ninth Judicial Circuit a second time after securing 57.5% of the vote.

Electoral history

See also

* Andrew H. Warren, state attorney suspended by DeSantis

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Worrell, Monique
Year of birth missing (living people)
Living people
Place of birth missing (living people)
State attorneys in Florida
21st-century African-American lawyers
African-American women lawyers
American women lawyers
American politicians of Caribbean descent
21st-century African-American politicians
21st-century African-American women politicians
Florida Democrats
Women in Florida politics
21st-century American women lawyers
21st-century American lawyers
Fredric G. Levin College of Law alumni
University of Florida faculty