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objection to a Special Trial Judge’s recommended findings of fact
and conclusions of law. Nevertheless, Rule 183(c) does not
provide a bar to new proposed findings of fact and leaves the
matter within the discretion of the reviewing Judge. Moreover, a
Judge who is assigned a case under new Rule 183 is obliged to
review a Special Trial Judge’s recommendations against the entire
record in the case and determine whether the recommended findings
of fact and conclusions of law merit adoption. In this regard,
new Rule 183(d) establishes a number of options that the
reviewing Judge normally may exercise during the review and
adoption process.16 Among these options, the reviewing Judge may
adopt, modify, or reject the Special Trial Judge’s
recommendations. Thus, the Court does not feel constrained from
correcting manifestly unreasonable findings of fact or making
additional findings of fact, so long as any additional facts find
direct support in the case record. With this understanding in
mind, we turn to the standard of deference to apply in reviewing
the recommended findings of fact and conclusions of law contained
in the STJ report.
16 Some of the options contemplated under new Rule 183(d),
such as receiving additional evidence or recommitting the
recommended findings of fact and conclusions of law with
instructions, are not available to the Court in these cases due
to limitations prescribed by the Courts of Appeals for the
Eleventh and Fifth Circuits when they remanded these cases.
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