He served in the United States Marine Corps during World War II and later graduated from the University of Miami School of Law in 1948.

Boyd was reprimanded by his fellow justices in the mid-1970s for accepting a secret draft opinion from utility company lawyers.

The Florida House of Representatives also investigated but declined to impeach him in 1975, after he agreed to take a psychiatric exam.

One of those cases was when he disagreed with the majority of the justices who had ordered The Miami Herald to give equal access on its editorial pages to a political candidate.

The federal justices, though, agreed with Boyd and ruled that would violate the First Amendment's freedom of the press protections.