Florida's Fourth District Court of Appeal removed a Broward judge from a case, even though it noted his "understandable frustration" with a case in which he had already allotted three hours to what is typically an hourlong proceeding.

But in the end, the panel agreed with the litigant that the trial judge had denied him due process, and "did not allow him to present his case-in-chief."

Broward County Circuit Judge Michael Davis had been presiding over a divorce between Ivan Domnin as the petitioner and his wife Oksana Domnina.

In the appeal, the jurists weighed in on the husband's petition for writ of prohibition, and granted the request.

"We can appreciate the circuit court judge's understandable frustration, expressed several times during the hearing, regarding the hearing's length, and what the circuit court judge perceived as the parties' lack of focus on the required factual determinations to be made on the motion," the appellate panel wrote.

At trial, for instance, Davis noted in the court transcript that the court typically gives about an hour for these types of hearings. "We have now had over three. It's a balancing test between the needs for both parties," the lower court judge said.