PEMPROKE PINES, FL — Pembroke Pines has suffered another setback in its attempt to obtain the text messages at the center of the city’s months-long legal battle with its police union, according to court records.
According to a June 17 order, a federal judge struck down a motion accusing union president Scott Kushi and Pembroke Pines Police Department officer Joel Cuarezma — members of the Florida State Lodge Fraternal Order of Police’s Pines branch — of wrongly withholding the details of a year-old text conversation about the union’s collective bargaining agreement during a May deposition.