Posted on June 20, 2019 in Sex Crimes

There are different types of Miami prostitution crimes, and some of them, such as repeat solicitation offenses, are punished harshly. In a recent Florida appellate court decision concerning prostitution, the government appealed from a county court order in which the court didn't assess a civil penalty under Florida Statute section 796.07(6), finding on its own that the code section was unconstitutional. On appeal, the government argued that the statute was constitutional and that the court refusing to impose the mandatory penalty made the sentence unlawful.

The case arose when the defendant allegedly offered to pay an undercover cop for oral sex and was arrested for soliciting prostitution under section 796.07(2)(f). The public defender negotiated a plea with the government that the defendant would plead no contest to solicitation of prostitution and in exchange, the court would withhold adjudication, require the defendant to perform 75 community service hours, and put the defendant on probation for six months. The defendant also agreed to pay $5000 in a mandatory civil penalty that section 796.07(6) required. Before the plea was entered, the defense attorney asked if the lower court would put him on a payment plan for the penalty, and the judge said he would. The sentence was pronounced, but a colloquy was had in which the judge noted that he was allowed to consider statutes to be unconstitutional if they were irrational and found that the statute mandating the civil penalty was unconstitutional.

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 Posted on January 18, 2019 in Juvenile Criminal Defense

Grand theft is a felony charge. For a Florida third-degree grand theft conviction, you may face a sentence of 5 years in prison or on probation, in addition to a fine. However, if you receive probation, you need to be aware that there are certain conditions you'll need to meet. Even if the defendant is a juvenile, failure to meet those conditions can result in penalties.

In a recent Miami appellate decision, the juvenile defendant appealed two contempt orders and sentencing. These were imposed because the court had found he'd committed indirect contempt of court by repeatedly violating home detention orders. It was determined that the lower court didn't violate the statutory blueprint of chapter 985 of the Florida Statutes as related to a juvenile who'd been committed to the Florida Department of Juvenile.

The case arose when the court found the juvenile, who was 14 at the time, delinquent in five different matters, including petit theft charges and strong-arm robbery. He was placed at a minimum risk nonresidential restrictiveness level under Florida Statutes section 985.441(1)(b). This meant he'd live at home with his mom and go to a day treatment program.

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 Posted on December 14, 2018 in Juvenile Criminal Defense

Sometimes detention is a mandatory enhancement for disposition of a Florida juvenile criminal matter. In a recent Florida appellate case, the government appealed a delinquency decision in which the lower court didn't commit a minor to a mandatory 15 days in secure detention for committing armed burglary of a conveyance.

The case arose when a witness reported seeing four males in a parking lot. They were trying to open car doors. Officers came to the scene and set up a perimeter. A particular minor was arrested. While he was detained, the police officers found a handgun had been stolen from a vehicle burglaries by the four suspects. The minor told them he knew where the handgun was and took them to retrieve it from a particular location.

Another suspect said that a third suspect had given him the gun and he'd hidden it in the bush where the police found it. However, he didn't say who stole the gun from a car.

The minor was charged with resisting without violence, armed burglary of a conveyance, grand theft of a firearm, and burglary of a conveyance. He pled to these charges. At his plea hearing, the government said that because it was a firearm case, 15-day mandatory detention was required under Florida Statutes section 790.22(9)(a). The minor's attorney said he didn't possess the gun personally so it was difficult to understand why he should face an enhancement. The court reset the case so the attorneys could do more research.

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 Posted on December 07, 2018 in Theft

If you are convicted of grand theft in Miami, you may be sentenced, at least partly, to probation. There are a number of conditions you must follow if you are put in probation, and if you fail to meet those conditions, you may be sentenced to prison. It is always best to reach out to a Miami grand theft attorney if you have questions that relate to a charge of this nature.

In a recent case, a defendant sought to reverse the lower court's order revoking probation and his sentence of 5 years imprisonment. The appellate court reversed, concluding there was no substantial or competent evidence to support the lower court's finding that the defendant willfully and substantially violated the probation conditions that he not possess firearms or possess cannabis with intent to sell. It did find, however, that he'd violated one probation condition by associating with people involved in crime.

The case arose in 2013 when a defendant pled guilty to grand theft of a vehicle and was put on reporting probation for three years. This probation was modified and lengthened for a year in 2016. The following year while driving, the probationer was stopped by the police for an infraction. Three other people were riding as passengers in his car, in both the front and back seats. The police officer could smell marijuana coming from the car when he stopped it.

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 Posted on November 07, 2018 in Civil Rights

The rule of completeness is an important rule that can offer protection against the misuse of a recorded statement you make to the police in a Miami criminal case. However, this rule has its limits. In a recent Florida Supreme Court case, the Court considered the rule of completeness, as well as the evidence rule that permits impeachment of hearsay declarants.

At issue was whether section 90.108(1) (the rule of completeness) allows a defendant to require the government to put into evidence an entire video recording of his statement to the cops where the government questioned a detective about the defendant's inculpatory statements without putting the recording into the record. Also at issue was whether the government could impeach a defendant under section 90.806(1), which permitted an attack on a hearsay declarant's credibility.

The case arose when a 68-year-old retired man took a 27-year-old man home with him from the beach. When the victim didn't arrive at his friend's house for dinner as planned, the friend went to the victim's house where he found the victim lying facedown inside. Witnesses told a detective they'd seen the victim eating with someone younger earlier that day. The medical examiner decided that the victim had the kinds of injuries that were consistent with being choked and decided it was likely that he'd been killed by force. Other evidence, including video surveillance footage from stores, showed that the defendant had used the victim's credit card.

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 Posted on September 11, 2018 in Violent Crimes

In a recent Florida appellate decision, the court considered a case in which a burglar hit an 80-year-old man in the head and badly beat him up such that he suffered a brain hemorrhage. The old man was released before the hemorrhage resolved, and he died in his home. The defendant was charged and convicted of first-degree murder. He appealed on the grounds that the prosecution hadn't proven that his own actions caused the death of the old man. If you have been charged with a homicide, it is important to have a knowledgeable Florida criminal defense attorney by your side throughout the process.

The case arose when the 80-year-old victim came home after a day shopping with his adult daughter. When he and his daughter got out of their car in their garage, the defendant attacked the old man. The victim collapsed and then the defendant sat on him and kept beating him up before running away.

At the hospital, the victim underwent a CT scan. The staff found there was no bleeding in the brain. He was discharged. After he was released from the hospital, his CT scan was reviewed again, with the doctor finding there was a little bit of bleeding. He came back to the hospital again the next day and underwent more scans. The doctor found the bleeding had resolved, but after being discharged, the victim collapsed on his bed at home and passed away.

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 Posted on August 04, 2018 in Theft

In a recent Florida burglary decision, two burglaries of the same home had occurred. These burglaries were separated by five days. The defendant had been convicted of burglary with more than $1,000 in property damage, but he was acquitted of the other residential burglary. He was also convicted of grand theft of property that was worth at least $20,000.

The defendant argued that the lower court had made a mistake in denying his requests for acquittal because the state failed to show: (1) the amount of property claimed in the burglary charge and (2) the value of what was stolen in the grand theft offense.

At the lower level, the defendant was charged with residential burglary with intent to perpetrate theft and triggering property damage of more than $1,000. He was also charged with burglary with intent to perpetrate theft. The third charge was grand theft of assets worth at least $20,000 from victims' homes.

The prosecutor claimed that the homeowners of the burglarized home had been away on a cruise. Their son checked on the home and found out they'd been burglarized. There was also damage to parts of the property and objects thrown all over the place. He called the police, who came to the scene. They discovered a cigarette butt from which they were able to pull DNA. The DNA matched the defendant's.

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 Posted on July 13, 2018 in Sex Crimes

If you are required to register as a sex offender in Broward County, you should be aware that any discrepancies in your information or failure to register can trigger an investigation. Recently, a Florida man who was already a registered sex offender was charged with a federal criminal complaint of soliciting child pornography over the Internet. The county case was closed. Investigators claimed that a detective looking over the man's sex offender registration information found that his Facebook account was not in his true name. Accordingly, a detective sent him a friend request, in which he pretended to be a 13-year old girl.

The man and the detective pretending to be a child engaged in multiple online conversations. Eventually, the man raised sexual activity and suggested that they meet to have sex. He again asked the detective posing as a child to meet up in person and transmitted a sexual photo a few days later. He later asked the person he believed to be a child to send him a picture of her genitals. Soon after he was arrested. In 1994, he was convicted of aggravated indecent assault in another state and his sentence required him to register as a sex offender.

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 Posted on May 08, 2018 in Criminal Defense

Only hours after the Miami Herald reported that an arrest warrant was issued for New York Jets wide receiver Robby Anderson after he failed to appear for a Broward County court date on May 1, ESPN reported that the arrest warrant was being set aside. Anderson's attorney told ESPN that the missed court date was the result of miscommunication and a new court date was set for July 19.

Anderson was supposed to appear for an arraignment relating to a misdemeanor reckless driving offense in January. According to ESPN, the incident initially resulted in nine charges - including two felonies - but was reduced to the misdemeanor charge of reckless driving and threatening a public servant or family member.

ESPN reported that the Broward County State Attorney's Office dropped the felony charges in April due to insufficient evidence. Anderson's attorney told ESPN that he "never received notice from any court to appear" and called it a "clerical error."

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 Posted on March 28, 2018 in Criminal Defense

Florida's so-called 10-20-Life law, established under § Florida Statute 775.087, has been in effect since 1999 and has largely accomplished its primary goal to sentence thousands of people to mandatory prison terms because of certain convictions involving firearms or other dangerous weapons. The prosecutor is the only person with the power to waive a mandatory minimum sentence, and judges are only allowed to deviate from mandatory minimum requirements when an alleged offender is a youthful offender.

One key provision of Florida Statute 775.087 that was amended, however, by Senate Bill 228 (SB 228) when Governor Rick Scott signed the bill into law on February 26, 2016, related to convictions for aggravated assault involving the possession of a firearm, destructive device, semiautomatic firearm, and its high-capacity detachable box magazine, or machine gun. Whereas such convictions automatically triggered mandatory three-year prison sentences, SB 228 deleted that requirement.

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