Florida Rejects “More Stringent” Abuse-of-Discretion Review for Fraud-on-the-Court Dismissals; Adopts Traditional Layered Appellate Review

I. Introduction

In Publix Supermarkets, Inc. v. Jonida Goga (Fla. July 9, 2026), the Supreme Court of Florida resolved a recurring and outcome-determinative conflict among the district courts: what standard of appellate review applies when a trial court dismisses an action with prejudice for “fraud on the court.”

The petitioner, Publix Supermarkets, Inc., sought review after the Fourth District in Goga v. Publix Supermarkets, Inc., 383 So. 3d 490 (Fla. 4th DCA 2024), affirmed the trial court’s finding of fraud but partially reversed the sanction, relying on a “more stringent abuse of discretion standard” drawn from its own precedent, including Beseler v. Avatar Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., 291 So. 3d 137 (Fla. 4th DCA 2020). Publix argued express and direct conflict with the Third District’s factually analogous decision in Willie-Koonce v. Mia. Sunshine Transfer & Tours Corp., 233 So. 3d 1271 (Fla. 3d DCA 2017), which upheld dismissal in similar circumstances.

The Florida Supreme Court used the case to clarify not only which party should win, but the appellate framework that should govern all such cases going forward—bringing uniformity to an area where “stringent” review had been inconsistently applied (sometimes to sanctions, sometimes to factfinding, sometimes to everything).

II. Summary of the Opinion

The Court held that the “more stringent” or “narrowed” abuse-of-discretion standard is erroneous in the fraud-on-the-court dismissal context. Instead, appellate courts must apply the traditional, issue-by-issue standards of review, as the First District did in Pro Choice Remediation, Inc. v. Old Dominion Ins. Co., 400 So. 3d 789 (Fla. 1st DCA 2024):

  • Trial court factual findings: reviewed for competent, substantial evidence.
  • Trial court legal conclusions: reviewed de novo.
  • Trial court choice of sanction (including dismissal): reviewed for abuse of discretion (ordinary, not “more stringent”).

Applying that framework, the Court quashed the Fourth District’s decision and ordered reinstatement of the trial court’s dismissal of Goga’s entire complaint with prejudice. The Court also disapproved Willie-Koonce “insofar as it applied a standard of review inconsistent with the framework” adopted.

III. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited (and How They Shaped the Court’s Rule)

1. Conflict Jurisdiction and the Need for a Uniform Appellate Rule

The Court grounded jurisdiction in express and direct conflict under article V, section 3(b)(3) of the Florida Constitution. It relied on Askew v. Fla. Dep’t of Child. & Fams., 385 So. 3d 1034 (Fla. 2024), and Kartsonis v. State, 319 So. 3d 622 (Fla. 2021), for the “substantially the same controlling facts” articulation of conflict. These cases matter here because the Court’s principal objective was systemic: to eliminate inconsistent district-court outcomes driven by inconsistent review standards.

2. The Fraud-on-the-Court Doctrine and Dismissal as a Sanction

The Court traced the doctrine to its own early recognition of courts’ authority to prevent abuse of process, citing Rhea v. Hackney, 157 So. 190 (Fla. 1934). But the modern Florida articulation of “fraud on the court” comes through the districts.

The Court highlighted Cox v. Burke, 706 So. 2d 43 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998), as a foundational district decision. Cox imported the definition from Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp., 892 F.2d 1115 (1st Cir. 1989), describing fraud on the court as a “sentiently” initiated “unconscionable scheme” designed to interfere with the judiciary’s impartial adjudication. Cox also emphasized balancing: adjudication on the merits versus integrity of the judicial system, and it stressed dismissal is “most severe” and reserved for “extreme circumstances,” citing Kornblum v. Schneider, 609 So. 2d 138 (Fla. 4th DCA 1992). Further, Cox endorsed dismissal of the whole case where lies “permeate[] the entire proceeding,” citing Savino v. Fla. Drive In Theatre Mgmt., Inc., 697 So. 2d 1011 (Fla. 4th DCA 1997).

The Supreme Court’s key move was to keep these substantive principles (clear-and-convincing proof; “scheme”; “permeation”; severe sanction) while rejecting the districts’ later procedural innovation: an invented “more stringent” appellate review standard.

3. The Origin and Spread of the “More Stringent” Abuse-of-Discretion Standard

The Court identified Jacob v. Henderson, 840 So. 2d 1167 (Fla. 2d DCA 2003), as a crucial source for the “more stringent abuse of direction [discretion] standard.” Jacob relied on Young v. Curgil, 358 So. 2d 58 (Fla. 3d DCA 1978), which cautioned that dismissal for fraud should be “cautiously and sparingly exercised.” Later cases repeated and varied this idea, including Ramey v. Haverty Furniture Cos., 993 So. 2d 1014 (Fla. 2d DCA 2008), and Howard v. Risch, 959 So. 2d 308 (Fla. 2d DCA 2007). The Third District used similar phrasing in Empire World Towers, LLC v. CDR Créances, S.A.S., 89 So. 3d 1034 (Fla. 3d DCA 2012), which was then quoted in Willie-Koonce.

The Court also pointed to more recent applications that blurred review categories, such as 940 Ocean Drive, LLC v. Sobe USA, LLC, 403 So. 3d 1048 (Fla. 3d DCA 2025), which described the standard as accounting for the heightened evidentiary burden and demanded an “evidentiary basis” as a condition of discretionary dismissal. The Supreme Court treated that approach as part of the problem: it encouraged appellate reweighing and merged factfinding with discretion.

4. The Correct Template: Pro Choice

The Court adopted the First District’s methodology in Pro Choice Remediation, Inc. v. Old Dominion Ins. Co., 400 So. 3d 789 (Fla. 1st DCA 2024), which applied traditional standards to discrete components of the ruling. The Court endorsed Judge Winokur’s caution (quoted in Pro Choice via Philip J. Padovano, Florida Appellate Practice) that attaching a single review standard to an entire “kind” of ruling invites unhelpful generalization.

5. Standards-of-Review Cases Used to Build the Framework

To justify the doctrinal structure, the Court relied on mainstream standards-of-review precedent:

  • Alahad v. State, 362 So. 3d 190 (Fla. 2023), and Van v. Schmidt, 122 So. 3d 243 (Fla. 2013), for de novo review of legal questions (including the standard-of-review question itself).
  • Cartenuto v. Just. Admin. Comm’n, 260 So. 3d 908 (Fla. 2018), and Fla. Dep’t of Fin. Servs. v. Freeman, 921 So. 2d 598 (Fla. 2006), for competent, substantial evidence review of factual findings.
  • Stephens v. State, 748 So. 2d 1028 (Fla. 1999), and Shaw v. Shaw, 334 So. 2d 13 (Fla. 1976), emphasizing deference to live credibility determinations.
  • Rivera v. State, 260 So. 3d 920 (Fla. 2018), Bryant v. State, 901 So. 2d 810 (Fla. 2005), and especially State v. Coney, 845 So. 2d 120 (Fla. 2003) (quoting White v. State, 817 So. 2d 799 (Fla. 2002)), articulating abuse of discretion as whether “no reasonable person would take the view adopted.”
  • Mercer v. Raine, 443 So. 2d 944 (Fla. 1983), and Ham v. Dunmire, 891 So. 2d 492 (Fla. 2004), for the idea that sanction severity and the availability of lesser sanctions are already accounted for under ordinary abuse-of-discretion review.

B. Legal Reasoning

1. The Court’s Core Distinction: What Is “Discretionary” and What Is Not

The opinion’s central analytic move is categorical: appellate courts should not label an entire fraud-on-the-court dismissal order as “discretionary.” Rather, such orders contain (i) findings of historical fact (what the party did and said), (ii) legal conclusions (whether those facts constitute fraud on the court and whether it “permeated” the case), and (iii) a sanction choice (what remedy to impose). Different components trigger different deference levels.

The Court rejected the “more stringent” abuse-of-discretion label because it presupposes the entire decision is discretionary and then “tightens” review. That approach, the Court reasoned, is conceptually confused: if a trial court lacks discretion to do something, the issue is legal error, not abuse of discretion; and if it has discretion, ordinary abuse-of-discretion review already incorporates reasonableness limits.

2. Mixed Question Framing—and the De Novo Component

The Court characterized “fraud on the court that permeated the entire action” as a mixed question of fact and law. The “what happened” findings are factual (competent, substantial evidence). But whether that conduct constitutes an “intentional scheme” that undermines impartial adjudication is a legal conclusion applied to those facts, reviewed de novo. This is a meaningful recalibration: some district opinions had effectively folded the legal characterization into a “stringent” discretion review, risking different outcomes depending on the reviewing panel’s instincts about harsh sanctions.

3. Sanction Review: Ordinary Abuse of Discretion, Not a Sliding Scale

The Court acknowledged dismissal is severe and must be imposed cautiously, but held that the severity is handled within the ordinary abuse-of-discretion inquiry, consistent with Mercer v. Raine and Ham v. Dunmire. The Court also emphasized that abuse-of-discretion review “cuts both ways”: in appropriate circumstances, even declining to dismiss after finding pervasive fraud could be unreasonable, citing Metro. Dade County v. Martinsen, 736 So. 2d 794 (Fla. 3d DCA 1999).

4. Application to the Record: Why the Fourth District Was Reversed

Using the traditional framework, the Court concluded:

  • Facts (competent, substantial evidence): investigator videos supported findings that Goga repeatedly lied about physical limitations; credibility determinations against her were supported.
  • Law (de novo): those lies constituted an intentional “scheme calculated to interfere” with impartial adjudication under Cox v. Burke (quoting Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp.); the fraud “permeated” the action, contrary to the Fourth District’s implicit compartmentalization.
  • Sanction (abuse of discretion): given the “abundance and gravity” of lies, dismissal of the entire complaint was within the range of reasonable responses; the fact that other judges might choose lesser sanctions is not a basis to reverse.

The Court also rejected the Fourth District’s medical-expense carve-out and was “unpersuaded” that any of the claims could be supported by “purely objective” evidence independent of the plaintiff’s credibility and fraud.

C. Impact

1. Uniformity and Predictability Across Districts

The immediate impact is doctrinal: Florida appellate courts must stop using “more stringent” or “narrowed” abuse-of-discretion review as a special fraud-on-the-court standard. This should reduce the district-to-district variability that the Court identified as driving conflicting results on analogous facts.

2. Clearer Appellate Roles: Less Reweighing, More Category Discipline

The Court’s critique of the “stringent” standard is partly institutional. It warned that such a standard “invites the appellate court to reweigh the evidence” and blurs the lines between factfinding, legal characterization, and discretionary sanctioning. After this decision, appellants challenging fraud dismissals should expect:

  • significant deference to credibility-based factfinding (competent, substantial evidence);
  • robust appellate scrutiny of the legal conclusion that the proven facts meet the fraud-on-the-court definition (de novo); and
  • traditional reasonableness review of the sanction (abuse of discretion), without rhetorical “tightening.”

3. Substantive Deterrence and Litigation Strategy

While framed as a standards-of-review case, the practical message is deterrent: once a trial court finds (with record support) pervasive, intentional falsehoods designed to influence adjudication, dismissal of the entire action will be hard to overturn. Parties accused of fraud can no longer rely on an appellate doctrine that “narrows” discretion via a heightened review label; instead, they must attack (i) factual support, (ii) the legal fit between facts and the fraud definition, or (iii) the reasonableness of dismissal compared to lesser sanctions—under ordinary abuse-of-discretion principles.

4. Relationship to Florida’s Access-to-Courts Policy

Justice Labarga’s dissent foregrounded article I, section 21 of the Florida Constitution and argued that removing “more stringent” review risks subordinating adjudication-on-the-merits values to integrity concerns. The majority’s response is structural rather than rhetorical: it preserves adjudication-on-the-merits considerations within (i) the substantive fraud definition (requiring an egregious scheme proven clearly and convincingly) and (ii) ordinary abuse-of-discretion review that already accounts for severity and lesser sanctions. The doctrinal consequence is that access-to-courts balancing happens primarily at the trial-court sanction stage, not via a specialized appellate label.

IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

1. “Fraud on the court”

Not every lie in litigation is “fraud on the court.” The doctrine targets an intentional, unconscionable plan to corrupt the court’s ability to decide fairly—such as by misleading the factfinder or crippling the opponent’s ability to present a case. Florida’s commonly used formulation comes from Cox v. Burke (quoting Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp.).

2. “Permeates the entire proceeding”

This means the deception is not peripheral. It is so central to the claims or defenses that it infects the case’s integrity as a whole, making ordinary trial tools (impeachment, cross-examination) insufficient to cure the damage.

3. The three appellate review lenses

  • Competent, substantial evidence (facts): If there is enough credible evidence supporting the trial judge’s factual findings, the appellate court does not redo the factfinding.
  • De novo (law): The appellate court independently decides whether the facts meet the legal definition of fraud on the court.
  • Abuse of discretion (sanction): The appellate court asks whether the trial judge’s chosen sanction was within the range of reasonable responses—not whether the appellate judges would have chosen differently.

V. Conclusion

Publix Supermarkets, Inc. v. Jonida Goga establishes a clear statewide rule: appellate review of fraud-on-the-court dismissals must follow traditional, component-specific standards—competent, substantial evidence for facts; de novo for legal conclusions; and ordinary abuse of discretion for sanctions. The Court rejected the district courts’ “more stringent” or “narrowed” abuse-of-discretion standard as conceptually flawed and inconsistently applied.

On the merits, the Court held that Goga’s repeated misrepresentations about physical limitations—contradicted by surveillance video—supported the trial court’s finding of an intentional scheme that permeated the action, and that dismissing the entire case with prejudice was a reasonable sanction. The decision is likely to reduce appellate second-guessing framed as “stringent” review while sharpening the analytic separation between factfinding, legal characterization, and sanction choice in Florida’s fraud-on-the-court jurisprudence.