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U.S.
Monday, Aug. 18, 1986
All in the Family
Even as she showered her sons with the proceeds from
her $10 million tobacco fortune, Margaret Hitchcock
Benson lived in fear of them. There were constant fights
and drugs and a nightmarish unhappiness that led her
to believe that one or another of them was stealing her
funds and wanted her dead.
Her apprehension was well founded. A year ago, as she
sat in her station wag- on in the driveway of her home
in the wealthy South Florida city of Naples, a powerful pipe bomb
exploded between the front seats. Margaret Benson, 63, and her
adopted son Scott, 21, were killed immediately. Her daughter
Carol Lynn, now 42, was seriously injured but escaped from the
car moments before a second bomb blast.
Last week, after deliberating 11 1/2 hours on testimony heard
during a four- week trial, a jury in nearby Fort Myers found her
son Steven Benson, 35, guilty of two counts of first-degree
murder, two of felony murder and five relating to arson and
unlawful explosives. Judge Hugh D. Hayes Jr. said he intended to
heed the jury's recommendation for life in prison when formal
sentencing occurs next month.
Prosecutors presented 52 witnesses who painted Steven as an
improvident drifter whose business failures apparently led him to
misappropriate some of his mother's fortune. Only days before the
explosions, Margaret Benson asked a family lawyer to investigate.
Steven, the prosecutor argued, feared disinheritance. Experts
testified that his handprints were found on receipts for a length of
4-in.-diameter pipe ($36.08, including tax) and two pipe
endpieces ($28.05 total) of the kind used in the fatal bombs.
Steven's sister, her face bearing ugly burn scars from the
bombing, told the court tha t he left the car just before the blast,ostensibly to get something from the house, and kept his back to
her as she screamed for help.
Steven's lawyers contended that the killings could have been the
work of young Scott's enemies, made during a fast-track life of
girl chasing and drug buying. Scott, it was disclosed after the
murders, was the out-of-wedlock son of Carol Lynn; he had been
legally adopted by his grandmother.
Steven, considered mild-mannered around Naples, where the
freshly widowed Margaret Benson had moved from Lancaster,
Pa., in 1980, wept twice during the trial. When the verdict was
pronounced, he sat in choked silence. The defense planned to
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8/8/2019 TIME Hugh D Hayes PUBLIC REPRIMAND Supreme Court Opinion 73502
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No. 73,502
INQUIRY CONCERNING A JUDGE
RE: HUGH D. HAYES
[March 2 3 , 1 9 8 9 1
PER CURIAM.
We have for review the report of the Florida Judicial
Qualifications Commission recommending that Judge Hugh D. Hayes,
Circuit Judge of the Twentieth Judicial Circuit of Florida, be
given a public reprimand for the violation of Canons 1, 2 and
3A(6) of the Code of Judicial Conduct. We have jurisdiction.
Art. V, § 12, Fla. Const.
The Judicial Qualifications Commission instituted formal
proceedings against Judge Hugh D. Hayes alleging that
[dluring the murder trial of Steven Benson in1986, while serving as presiding judge in thattrial, [Judge Hayes] discussed with journalist
Michael Mewshaw on multiple occasions theprogress of the trial, [his] opinions andreactions to the conduct of participatingattorneys, witnesses and the jury, withknowledge that such discussions, comments andexpressions of opinion, though given "off therecord," would be used by journalist Mewshaw inmaterial that he was preparing for publication.Direct quotes in such publication entitled Monevto Rurn: The Storv of the Benson F&lv Murdersattribute to [Judge Hayes's] gross unjudicialstatements.
8/8/2019 TIME Hugh D Hayes PUBLIC REPRIMAND Supreme Court Opinion 73502
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* ' .Judge Hayes and the Commission stipulated that
(i) Judge Hayes does not contest the matters set
forth in the Notice of Formal Charges (the
"Notice") instituting this inquiry; (ii) Judge
Hayes has demonstrated that he has otherwiserendered commendable service to the public as a
conscientious judicial officer during his tenure
on the bench; (iii) Judge Hayes does not contestthe recommendation of the Commission as set
forth below . . . .
We hereby adopt the stipulation and recommendation of the
Judicial Qualifications Commission. The publication of this
order in the Southern ReDorter will constitute a public reprimand
of Judge Hugh D. Hayes for his conduct as a Circuit Judge of the
Twentieth Judicial Circuit of Florida.
It is so ordered.
EHRLICH, C.J., and OVERTON, McDONALD, SHAW, BARKETT, GRIMES and
KOGAN, JJ., Concur
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION AND, IF
FILED, DETERMLNED.
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c
Original Proceedings - Florida Judicial Qualifications Commission
Roy T. Rhodes, General Counsel, Florida Judicial QualificationsCommission, Tallahassee, Florida,
for Petitioner
Hugh D. Hayes, in proper person, Naples, Florida,
for Respondent
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