Sugar growers launched a two-pronged legal assault Wednesday on the federal judge who has overseen the Everglades pollution case for 15 years, saying he's so biased against them that he should be removed from the case.

In court filings in Miami and Atlanta, growers cited recent rulings in which U.S. District Judge William Hoeveler criticized the legislature, water managers and Gov. Jeb Bush's advisers while denouncing a new state Everglades law as "defective."

The growers said Hoeveler also overstepped his bounds by discussing the case with newspaper reporters, including a St. Petersburg Times writer who quoted the judge as saying he no longer trusts Bush.

"He's no longer impartial," said Jorge Dominicis, vice president of Florida Crystals Corp., which filed one of the motions through a related company. "Obviously it's made him a celebrity, but that's not what his role is supposed to be."

Lawyers for U.S. Sugar Corp. compared Hoeveler's actions to those of Thomas Penfield Jackson, the federal judge who ordered Microsoft broken up three years ago. An appellate court reversed the order and threw Jackson off the antitrust case, saying he broke ethical rules by granting interviews in which he likened the software giant to a street gang.

If successful, the requests to remove Hoeveler would have just as profound an effect on the Everglades case. Environmentalists call Hoeveler their last best hope for undoing this year's legislation, which postponed final deadlines for the state's pollution cleanup from 2006 to 2016. 

"This is definitely an obstructionist tactic that's designed to sow disinformation and confusion," said Dexter Lehtinen, attorney for the Miccosukee Indian tribe, who filed the Everglades suit in October 1988 as acting U.S. attorney in Miami.

Lehtinen also accused the growers of trying to intimidate Hoeveler, who is scheduled to hold a hearing Tuesday on appointing a federal overseer for the cleanup. He added that he doesn't see anything in Hoeveler's comments to the media that shows bias against anyone.

"Poor sugar," said Hobe Sound environmentalist Nat Reed. "They're not making enough money -- they just want to run the state of Florida and the federal bench."

Audubon of Florida lobbyist Charles Lee added, "We're shocked and dismayed but not surprised."

But Dominicis and U.S. Sugar Senior Vice President Robert Coker said they've long respected Hoeveler, who has acquired a sterling reputation since President Jimmy Carter appointed him in 1977. The Florida Bar's yearly prize for judges' professionalism is called the William M. Hoeveler Judicial Award.

"This was a very painful decision for us," Coker said. "We have been shocked by his complete change in the way he has approached the matters before his court."

U.S. Sugar filed its request in Miami with Chief U.S. District Judge William Zloch.

New Hope Sugar Co., a corporation owned by the Fanjul family of Palm Beach, filed a separate motion with the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.

Hoeveler is perhaps best known for presiding over the drug-trafficking trial of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega in 1991 and 1992. He also presided over the custody case of Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez before being sidelined by a stroke.