As a Jacksonville Criminal Defense Lawyer I scour the local, national, and world news to stay informed on current Criminal legal issues. Just recently a news article by Foxnews.com sparked my interest. The article titled “Cocaine Bust Lands Curvy Model in Italian Jail,” was a colorfully written article. The article…
Balzourt v. Florida comes before the 2nd DCA on appeal from the Circuit Court for Polk County. The appellant is appealing his first-degree murder charges under two different legal theories. First dealing with the Rules of Evidence and the admissibility of collateral crimes. Second dealing with the State’s burden of…
Imagine that the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office sends a police officer to your home for questioning. You hear a knock on your door, and you are not sure why the police officer is there. He begins to question you about a recent Jacksonville Florida crime. Due to his line of questioning,…
How can I get my Jacksonville criminal charges dropped? There is not a clear answer to this question. Every Jacksonville criminal case must be evaluated on a case by case basis. The Duval County State Attorney Office may chose to drop charges for different reasons, but it is completely within…
A Florida man was charged and convicted of felon in possession of a firearm. In Powell v. Florida, this Florida Criminal Defendant was arrested in the apartment in which the gun was found and taken to the police station where Florida police officers questioned him. Police officers testified that Powell…
If you are arrested in Jacksonville, Florida, you have certain rights provided by the United States Constitution. The Supreme Court held, in Miranda v. Arizona, that police must inform persons in custody that they have the right to remain silent, anything that they can be used against them, they have…
In J.D.B. v. North Carolina, 131 S.Ct. 2394 (2011), a uniformed officer questioned a 12-year-old boy at school about a string of local burglaries. The officer told the boy he was free to leave, but also told him that a court could order juvenile detention. The school’s assistant principal told…
As a Jacksonville Criminal Defense Lawyer, I have represented juveniles that were questioned by police officers in their schools. Recently, in a 5-4 ruling, the United States Supreme Court addressed this issue. For the first time, the Court ruled that children questioned by police in school must be given Miranda…
The Florida Times-Union’s website (Jacksonville.com) posts occasional surveillance photographs of recent crimes in Jacksonville, Florida in an effort identify the suspects. The Florida Times Union in Jacksonville titles these articles, Perp of the Day, and runs the stories with photographs which are picked up by other online media sources. The…
The Fifth Amendment is applied to Florida, and all the other States, through the Fourteenth Amendment. It protects a person from self-incrimination and is meant to “assure that an individual is not compelled to produce evidence which later may be used against him as an accused in a criminal action.”…