The Florida Supreme Court has appointed three new members to the Florida Board of Bar Examiners, which implements the court’s constitutional authority to oversee and regulate admissions of new attorneys to The Florida Bar.
The new members come from the Panama City and the Tampa-St. Petersburg areas. They are:
- Major General William F. Hodgkins (United States Air Force – Retired), of Lynn Haven, Florida, has been appointed to membership on the Florida Board of Bar Examiners by the Supreme Court of Florida to succeed retiring Member Janet M. Sermon of Tallahassee, Florida. His term of office will extend through October 31, 2020.
General Hodgkins was born in Lansing, Michigan. He is a graduate of Auburn University, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Education and a M.Ed. in Educational Administration. He also attended Carnegie Mellon University’s Program for Executives, and an International Securities Studies Program at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. General Hodgkins retired from the U.S. Air Force in 2006 after 32 years of service. Among his assignments, he was a former Wing Commander at Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City, FL. After his retirement from the Air Force, he worked for The Boeing Company’s Defense, Space and Security business as a Senior Executive responsible for Boeing’s business development offices in Colorado, California, Texas, Nebraska, New Mexico and Louisiana. General Hodgkins retired from Boeing and relocated to Florida in 2012.
- Jennifer Martinez Mooney of Land O’Lakes, Florida, has been appointed to membership on the Florida Board of Bar Examiners by the Supreme Court of Florida to succeed Scott N. Richardson of West Palm Beach, Florida. Her term of office will begin November 1, 2017, and extend through October 31, 2022.
Ms. Mooney works in the Legal Department of the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit, in Tampa, Florida. She was admitted to The Florida Bar in 1998 and was the Chairperson of the Florida Bar’s Unlicensed Practice of Law Committee from April 2011 to February 2016. Ms. Mooney is an alumnus of the University of South Florida and Stetson University College of Law.
- Elaine Terenzi, of Tampa, Florida, has been appointed to membership on the Florida Board of Bar Examiners by the Supreme Court of Florida to succeed retiring Member David Carl Lyles, of Jacksonville, Florida. Her term of office will extend through October 31, 2020.
Ms. Terenzi was born in Brooklyn, New York. She earned a Master of Business Administration from the New York Institute of Technology, and a Master of Arts and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from The New York School for Social Research and John Jay College of Criminal Justice, respectively. Ms. Terenzi served as Chief U.S. Probation Officer for the U.S. District Court Middle District of Florida from 1996 to 2012, and is currently president of Independent Business Group, LLC, and a volunteer Guardian ad Litem.
The Florida Board of Bar Examiners is an administrative agency of the Supreme Court charged with the responsibility of enforcing the Rules of the Supreme Court Relating to Admissions to The Bar. This involves the supervision of character background investigations as well as the administration and grading of the Florida Bar Examination.
The Board’s website, located at www.floridabarexam.org, has the Board’s computerized Bar Application forms available to applicants free of charge. The website also features the full text of the Rules of the Supreme Court Relating to Admissions to the Bar, Frequently Asked Questions and links to other agencies, including The Florida Bar and the Supreme Court.
