Montgomery Law Group, PLLCNorth Palm Beach, Florida
Illustration of a scoreboard over a courtroom judge’s bench reading Motions Denied, Fisher Island Day School 4, The Family 0. Illustration

Case update · Miami-Dade County, Florida

Fisher Island Day School asked four times to get this case out of court or put on hold. Four times, the answer was no.

Twice it tried to force the case out of court and into arbitration. Twice it asked to pause the case while it appealed. Now it wants the trial pushed back four months.

Fisher Island Day School asked the court to throw out all of the parents’ claims and to move the case out of court into arbitration. The court refused both and kept 7 of the 9 claims.

The school appealed and asked both the trial court and the appeals court to put the case on hold during the appeal. Both said no.

Now the school wants more delay. It asks the court to push the trial back four months.

On 10-01-2026 the Third District denied Defendants’ motion for a stay pending appeal, “finding no abuse of discretion.” The trial order sets a projected trial date of 05-25-2027 and says the parties should expect trial in that period “without continuances.” Defendants now ask to move it to 09-27-2027. The family’s 10-25-2026 opposition asks the court to deny that request and the motion to strike.

4rulings against Defendants since 07-02-2026
7 of 9counts survived Defendants’ motion to dismiss
124days Defendants want added to most case deadlines
05-25-2027projected trial date in the judge’s order

Temporary appellate stay 08-28-2026 to 10-01-2026, then denied.

The score so far

What Defendants asked for and what the courts ruled.

  1. Send the case to private arbitrationDenied
  2. Dismiss all nine counts7 of 9 survive
  3. Reconsider the arbitration rulingDenied
  4. Trial court, halt the case during the appealDenied
  5. Third District, pause the case while it decidesTemporary stay; lifted 10-01-2026
  6. Third District, halt the case during the appealDenied

Pending.

  1. Strike the family’s discoveryPending
  2. Move trial to 09-27-2027Pending
  3. Compel fuller disclosures from the familyPending

The family filed its opposition to the motion to strike and the motion to move trial on 10-25-2026. Each result opens the order or motion.

Procedural rulings. Allegations disputed. The arbitration appeal continues. No liability or damages decided. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

03-31-2026 · The lawsuit

The parents sued the school and two of its leaders.

Chris Miseresky and Lauren Coleman sued Fisher Island Day School, Head of School Arthur Viscusi and Board Chair Jana Neff on 03-31-2026, individually and on behalf of their child, A.M.

Their verified amended complaint alleges that on 11-07-2025 the school placed A.M. on “Academic Watch,” a label that “appears nowhere in any contract, handbook, code of conduct, or policy,” and at the same time told the parents to apply to other schools. It alleges that administrators decided his reports were “too positive” and had teachers make them more negative. In court, Defendants deny that teachers were told to change the reports. In a 03-13-2026 letter to the parents, the school’s Board of Trustees wrote this about the Assistant Head of School:(Verified amended complaint, pp. 2–3; ¶ 19, p. 5; ¶ 28, p. 6; ¶ 59, p. 9; ¶ 124(e), p. 19; answer ¶ 59, p. 6; ¶ 124, p. 10.)

“Ms. Bose was directing the teachers to make their narratives more accurate[.]”

Fisher Island Day School Board of Trustees, letter to the parents, 03-13-2026, p. 1

The same letter says the teachers were told they “should not sugar coat the narratives.”(Board letter, 03-13-2026, p. 1.)

The complaint alleges that the school retaliated against the parents when they spoke up and forced A.M. out in mid-March 2026. Defendants deny the allegations. Their answer says A.M. “was not dismissed on March 13, 2026 or on any other date.” The same answer admits that the school told the parents he was “subject to heightened academic monitoring,” suggested they “consider other schools,” and told them enrollment contracts for the next school year “would not be offered.”(Verified amended complaint, pp. 2–3; ¶ 79, p. 12; answer ¶¶ 19, 28, p. 4; ¶¶ 68, 79, p. 7.)

Read our 04-01-2026 report on the family’s complaint.

Illustration of an empty courtroom jury box under a single lamp, for the trial court rulings that kept the Fisher Island Day School lawsuit in court. Illustration

07-02-2026 to 07-29-2026 · Trial court

The case stays in court. Seven of nine counts survive.

Defendants asked Judge Abby Cynamon to send the family’s lawsuit to private arbitration. Failing that, they asked her to dismiss each of the nine counts. On 07-02-2026 she denied arbitration, dismissed two counts and kept the other seven. Defendants asked her to reconsider. She denied that request on 07-29-2026.(Defendants’ 05-08-2026 motion, p. 2; 07-02-2026 order, ¶¶ 1–2; 07-29-2026 order.)

The dismissed counts are false light and equitable accounting. The seven that remain are breach of contract, tortious interference with an advantageous business relationship, civil conspiracy, negligent misrepresentation, fraudulent misrepresentation, promissory estoppel and fraudulent inducement. None of these rulings decides liability or damages.(07-02-2026 order, ¶ 2; verified amended complaint, Counts I–IX.)

Illustration of three empty judges’ chairs under a spotlight. Illustration

08-24-2026 to 10-01-2026 · The appeal

Two courts denied a stay pending appeal.

Defendants appealed the arbitration ruling and asked Judge Cynamon to halt the case while the appeal ran. She said no on 08-24-2026. Defendants then asked the Third District Court of Appeal. That court entered a temporary stay on 08-28-2026. On 10-01-2026 it denied Defendants’ motion and lifted the temporary stay.(08-24-2026 order; 08-28-2026 order; 10-01-2026 order.)

“Upon consideration, finding no abuse of discretion, we are constrained to deny Appellants’ Motion for Stay Pending Appeal[.]”

Third District Court of Appeal, 10-01-2026. Read the order

The order ends, “The temporary stay previously entered on August 28, 2026, is lifted.” The case now moves forward in the trial court while the arbitration appeal continues. The order did not decide that appeal. It did not decide whether the family’s claims are true.(10-01-2026 order; motion to amend, p. 2 (“The appeal remains pending.”).)

Where the appeal stands

The Third District’s online docket for case 3D2026-1660 shows the appeal open. Defendants filed their initial brief on 08-20-2026. The family filed its answer brief on 10-01-2026. The last entry is the 10-01-2026 order denying the stay. The docket shows no reply brief, no oral argument and no decision on the appeal.

(Third District online docket, 3D2026-1660, viewed 10-26-2026.)

10-21-2026 to 10-22-2026 · Defaults and the answer

The family moved for defaults. Defendants answered the next morning.

Family moves for defaults10:45 p.m.10-21-2026
Defendants answer9:37 a.m.10-22-2026

The family filed motions for default against the school, Viscusi and Neff, arguing that Defendants had not answered by the court’s deadline. Defendants answered at 9:37 a.m. the next morning, less than 11 hours later. Their answer denies the allegations, raises 21 affirmative defenses, and is filed “subject to, and without waiver of,” their claimed right to arbitrate. The docket shows no ruling on the default motions.(School default motion; Viscusi default motion; Neff default motion; answer, p. 1; p. 20.)

The family’s 10-25-2026 opposition lays out the timing. The 07-02-2026 order gave Defendants 20 days to answer. Even the full extension Defendants asked for ran out on 08-05-2026, more than three weeks before the Third District’s temporary stay began on 08-28-2026. Defendants then went 78 days without filing an answer, including 21 days after the stay lifted. The family’s deadlines were still running when the stay began. The opposition argues that the stay paused deadlines that were still running, but “did not revive one that had already expired.”(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 6–7; 07-02-2026 order, ¶ 3.)

Illustration of a brass hourglass with falling sand beside a closed folder on a courtroom table, for the dispute over moving the trial date in the Fisher Island Day School lawsuit. Illustration

10-22-2026 · The trial date

The stay lasted 34 days. Defendants want most deadlines moved 124 days.

Projected trial date05-25-2027Case management order
Defendants’ requested date09-27-2027Requested only

On 08-28-2026 the appeals court paused the case temporarily, “pending further order of this Court,” until it ruled on Defendants’ stay motion. On 10-01-2026, “finding no abuse of discretion,” it denied that motion and lifted the temporary stay, and the case moved forward. The pause lasted 34 days. Defendants’ motion asks to push all but one case deadline back 124 days, counted from the day the judge entered her case management order, 05-30-2026, to the day the stay lifted. For the other 90 days no court had stopped the case.(08-28-2026 order; 10-01-2026 order; motion to amend, p. 1; pp. 7–8.)

Defendants want 124 more days added to the case deadlines. The Third District stay covered 34 of them. No stay was in place for the other 90.More days Defendants want added to the deadlines124903405-30-2026 to 08-28-2026. No stay in place.08-28-2026 to 10-01-2026. Third District stay. Defendants want 124 more days added to the case deadlines. The Third District stay covered 34 of them. No stay was in place for the other 90.More days Defendants want added124903405-30-2026 to 08-28-2026. No stay in place.08-28-2026 to 10-01-2026. Third District stay.

The motion attributes the lost time to the fight over arbitration, the reconsideration motion, the appeal and the stay. Defendants asked for each of them. The trial court denied each motion. The Third District entered a temporary stay on 08-28-2026, then denied the stay motion and lifted the temporary stay on 10-01-2026.(motion to amend, p. 1; 07-02-2026 order; 07-29-2026 order; 08-24-2026 order; 08-28-2026 order; 10-01-2026 order.)

“Parties should expect that the case will be tried during the projected trial period specified, without continuances.”

Judge Cynamon’s case management order, 05-30-2026, ¶ 1. Read the order

The same order warns that motions to continue trial “are disfavored and will rarely be granted, and then only upon good cause shown.” Defendants answer that the trial date “is a projection” and that moving it is “the necessary result” of resetting the deadlines that come before it. The motion says, “Defendants do not ask for open-ended delay.”(Case management order, p. 6, ¶ 15; motion to amend, p. 8; p. 9.)

The family’s opposition answers that Defendants let the schedule stand for 145 days without objection. This circuit’s administrative order on case management gave the parties 30 days from receipt of the case management order to ask for an amended one, and that window closed on 06-29-2026, two months before any stay. Defendants’ motion says the need for a reset “became known on October 1, 2026.” They then waited 21 days, until the 10-17-2026 deadlines had passed and the family had served its discovery. The opposition calls the request 124 days to cure a 34-day stay, and “a stay pending appeal under another name.” The docket shows no ruling on this request.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 3, 10–12; motion to amend, p. 7.)

Illustration of a great ocean wave made of cream and red paper carrying crumpled pages of the filed motion to strike and motion to reset the schedule, for the discovery motions section of the Fisher Island Day School lawsuit. Illustration

10-22-2026 to 10-23-2026 · Discovery

Two motions aimed at parents, minutes apart.

At 12:34 p.m. on 10-22-2026, Defendants moved to strike the initial disclosures and written discovery the family served on 10-19-2026. The motion says the disclosures “came 22 days after the September 27 deadline.” It asks the court to rule that Defendants “need not respond” to the family’s discovery and to award them attorneys’ fees.(Motion to strike, p. 1; p. 4; pp. 6–7.)

At 12:45 p.m. they filed the motion to reset the schedule. It says that the disclosure deadline and two others “fell on September 27, 2026, while the Third District’s stay was in force.” Of the deadlines that had passed, it says, “Neither side met them.”(Motion to amend, p. 1; p. 3.)

Defendants offer the two motions as alternatives. If the judge resets the schedule, they want the family’s 10-19-2026 papers treated as served on the date of the new order, which restarts their time to respond. If she does not, they want the papers struck. On 10-23-2026 they also moved to compel fuller disclosures from the family if the court does not strike them. The docket shows no ruling on any of these motions.(Motion to amend, pp. 10–11; motion to compel, p. 2; p. 7.)

10-25-2026 · The family’s response

Parents respond to yet another set of motions

On 10-25-2026 the family filed one response opposing both the motion to strike and the motion to reset the schedule. It argues that the family served on time, that Defendants are holding the family to a rule they do not apply to themselves, and that Defendants caused the delay they now want more of.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 1–3.)

“Defendants claim the stay for their dates and deny it for Plaintiffs’.”

The family’s opposition, 10-25-2026, p. 2.
  1. The stay paused the clock. When the Third District’s stay began on 08-28-2026, 30 days remained before the 09-27-2026 disclosure deadline and 50 days remained before the 10-17-2026 discovery deadline. Counting that time after the stay lifted, the family had until 11-02-2026 for its disclosures and 11-20-2026 for its written discovery. It served both on 10-19-2026. The opposition also argues that 10-17-2026 fell on a Saturday, so Monday service was on time even without the stay.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 2, 4, 6–8.)
  2. Same stay, same rule. Defendants served their initial disclosures on 10-23-2026, four days after the family, under the same order and the same stay, and asked the court to strike only the family’s. In the opposition’s words, “If the stay moved Defendants’ date, it moved Plaintiffs’.”(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 2–3, 8.)
  3. No one was harmed. Defendants’ motion told the court, “No party is prejudiced. No written discovery has been answered. No deposition has been taken.” The opposition argues that striking the family’s disclosures and every discovery request would decide the case on a timing technicality.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 2, 9; motion to amend, p. 9.)
  4. The delay came from Defendants. The opposition quotes Defendants’ motion: “The next four months went to deciding where this case belongs,” through their arbitration motion, reconsideration motion, appeal and stay request. Both courts denied their requests for a stay pending appeal.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 2, 10–12; motion to amend, p. 1.)
  5. No real conference. The opposition argues Defendants did not confer in good faith before filing. Their lawyer offered a call for Friday morning, 10-23-2026. Defendants filed both motions on Thursday, 10-22-2026.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 3, 4–5, 13–14.)

What the family asked for

The opposition asks the court to deny both motions and to rule that the family’s disclosures and written discovery were served on 10-19-2026, with responses due from that date. If the court finds any schedule change necessary, it asks the court to keep 10-19-2026 as the service date, limit any change to the work that remains, and not extend or excuse Defendants’ expired time to answer. It also asks the court, after an opportunity for hearing, to award the family its reasonable expenses, including attorneys’ fees, for opposing the motion to strike.(Plaintiffs’ opposition, filed 10-25-2026, Filing # 259938549, pp. 14–16.)

The court has not ruled on either motion. Defendants have scheduled a hearing on both motions before Judge Cynamon for 11-05-2026 at 4:00 PM.(Court notice of pending hearing, issued 10-26-2026.)

Joseph W. Montgomery, Esq.

Counsel for the family

“The School asked to take this case out of court. The trial judge said no. The appeals court would not halt it while the appeal is pending. We are getting ready for trial.”

Joseph W. Montgomery, Esq.Montgomery Law Group, PLLC · Counsel for the family

Case at a glance

The family’s lawsuit

Trial court
Circuit Court of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit, Miami-Dade County, Florida. Case No. 2026-006626-CA-01.
Appeal
Third District Court of Appeal. Case No. 3D2026-1660.
Plaintiffs
Chris Miseresky and Lauren Coleman, individually and on behalf of A.M.
Defendants
Fisher Island Day School, Inc.; Arthur Viscusi; Jana Neff
Status
The stay is lifted. The arbitration appeal is pending. Defendants’ motions to strike, to reset the schedule and to compel are pending; the family opposed the first two on 10-25-2026. The allegations are contested, and liability and damages have not been decided.

Orders, filings and case status

Judge for yourself.

Every fact in this report comes from the complaint, a court order, a court filing, the court’s docket or the school Board’s 03-13-2026 letter to the parents. Quoted comment from our firm is marked as comment. Where a party asks for something, argues something or alleges something, the report says so.

  • Verified amended complaint (exhibits omitted)PDF
  • 05-30-2026 case management orderPDF
  • 07-02-2026 arbitration and partial-dismissal orderPDF
  • 07-29-2026 reconsideration orderPDF
  • 08-24-2026 trial-court stay orderPDF
  • 08-28-2026 appellate temporary stay orderPDF
  • 10-01-2026 appellate stay orderPDF
  • 10-21-2026 default motion, schoolPDF
  • 10-21-2026 default motion, ViscusiPDF
  • 10-21-2026 default motion, NeffPDF
  • 10-22-2026 answer and affirmative defensesPDF
  • 10-22-2026 motion to amend the case schedulePDF
  • 10-22-2026 motion to strikePDF
  • 10-23-2026 motion to compelPDF
  • 10-25-2026 family’s opposition to the motion to strike and the motion to amend, Filing # 259938549PDF
  • Third District docket, 3D2026-1660Online

This post reports public court filings and rulings in a pending case. It is for information only and is not legal advice. The defendants deny the allegations. The arbitration appeal is pending, and liability and damages have not been decided. Images labeled Illustration are dramatizations, not photographs of actual events or places. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Media contact

Lynn Teti
Montgomery Law Group, PLLC
EducationLawyers.com
media@educationlawyers.com