Florida Criminal Lawyer Blog

It is unlawful for any licensed dealer, manufacturer, or importer willfully and intentionally to request criminal history record information under false pretenses, or willfully and intentionally to disseminate criminal history record information to any person other than the subject of such information. Any person convicted of a violation of this prohibition commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided by statute. Moreover, any licensed importer, manufacturer, or dealer or any employee or agency thereof who violates the above provisions commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided by statute. Any person who knowingly acquires a firearm through purchase or transfer intended for the use of a person who is prohibited by state or federal law from possessing or receiving a firearm commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided by statute.

There is a mandatory three-day waiting period, excluding weekends and legal holidays, between the purchase and the delivery at retail of any handgun. It is a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided by statute (1) for any retailer, or any employee or agent of a retailer, to deliver a handgun before the expiration of the three-day waiting period and (2) for a purchaser to obtain delivery of a handgun by fraud, false pretense, or false representation.

Caution: The three-day waiting period does not apply (1) when a handgun is being purchased by a holder of a concealed weapons permit and (2) to a trade-in of another handgun.

Florida personal injury attorneys argue that an action for three-fold damages may be brought by a person who has been injured due to certain specified prohibited conduct involving a pattern of "criminal activity," which is defined to include a crime chargeable by indictment or information under the statutory provisions relating to weapons and firearms.
He or she is also entitled to minimum damages in the amount of $200, and reasonable attorney's fees and court costs in the trial and appellate courts, but not punitive damages.

Although there is authority holding that self-defense is not a viable defense to a charge of unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, it has also been held that there may be circumstances under which a convicted felon's possession of a firearm would be justified. According to this latter view, a convicted felon's temporary possession of a firearm does not constitute a crime if the following five circumstances are present:
(1) defendant is in present, imminent, and impending peril of death or serious bodily injury, or reasonably believes him- or herself or others to be in such danger;
(2) defendant must not have intentionally or recklessly placed him- or herself in a situation in which it was probable that he or she would be forced to choose the criminal conduct;
(3) defendant must not have any reasonable, legal alternative to possession of the firearm;
(4) the firearm must be made available to defendant without preconceived design; and
(5) defendant must give up possession as soon as the necessity or apparent necessity ends.
Necessity or justification may constitute a valid defense to a charge of unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon based on the circumstances, and in such event, the defendant is entitled to a jury instruction on such defense.
A person found guilty of a felony may not defend against a charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon on the ground that he or she lacked knowledge of his or her status as a convicted felon. However, the antique firearm defense was available to a defendant charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon as the statute expressly provided that the class of firearms a convicted felon is prohibited from possessing excludes "antique firearm."

If you have been arrested in Fort Lauderdale, contact our criminal lawyers today.

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A single criminal conspiracy may have for its object the violation of two or more criminal laws or two or more substantive offenses, but the conspiracy is still one offense, if a single agreement exists, no matter how many repeated violations of the law may have been the object of the conspiracy. Whether an information properly charges multiple conspiracies or a single ongoing conspiracy depends upon analysis of the proof adduced at trial.
An agreement is the primary element of a conspiracy, and the agreement may go on for a long period of time and include the performance of numerous transactions and have multiple objectives.
A criminal conspiracy continues to exist until consummated, abandoned, or otherwise terminated by some affirmative act. The State has the burden to prove the conspiracy has been consummated, abandoned, or otherwise terminated.

Fort Lauderdale Criminal Lawyer Illustration: The defendant and several other persons agreed to purchase and sell large quantities of cocaine. The evidence showed there was one overall conspiracy to traffic by co-conspirators making a series of trips to Miami, and the cocaine was thereafter distributed in Florida and Georgia. The State failed to demonstrate that the original conspiracy was consummated, abandoned, or terminated by some affirmative act, and the defendant could only be convicted of one conspiracy charge.

A defendant may not be put in double jeopardy by trial for the same conspiracy to commit a different criminal act, such as where the State fails to demonstrate that the original conspiracy was consummated, abandoned, or otherwise terminated by some affirmative act.
Where the trial evidence does not support convictions for two counts of conspiracy to commit murder when there is a single express agreement between the defendant and an accomplice to commit the murder of one individual, the fact that another individual happens to be at the scene and is also killed does not alone render the agreement a double conspiracy.