Florida Criminal Lawyer Blog

The recent arrest of Miami Dolphins defensive tackle Tony McDaniel highlights issues we believe are important in any case of alleged domestic abuse. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported Feb. 7 that McDaniel, 25, was arrested the day before and charged with misdemeanor battery of his girlfriend. The arrest report said McDaniel and Alaina Smith had an argument outside their Davie home Saturday morning that turned into a shoving match. The two have different accounts of the reasons for the fight as well as the physical part of the confrontation. This he-said, she-said problem is one of the most common situations affecting our practice as Fort Lauderdale domestic violence criminal defense attorneys.

According to the article, Smith was returning to the house with food around 8:30 a.m., around the same time McDaniel was coming home from a night out. Smith said McDaniel confronted her about not answering the phone the night before, then grabbed her purse. During their struggle for the purse, she said she fell and hit her head. She ran into the house, she said, asked her guests to call 911 and ran out to find McDaniel smashing her phone on the ground. McDaniel told police Smith was upset at him for staying out all night and started scratching and slapping him. Police found scratches on both parties, but no head injury on Smith, who declined medical treatment. The houseguests said they saw the argument, Smith’s fall and McDaniel smashing the phone. He was arrested and released on $3,500 bail the next day.

As Miami-Dade spousal abuse criminal defense lawyers, we see stories like this time and time again. Each person claims the other started the fight; the physical evidence doesn’t say much; and there are few, if any, witnesses. This means the police are forced to choose the story they think fits the situation better. More often than not, police choose to believe the woman and arrest the man, following outdated gender stereotypes. The truth is that people of both genders can be guilty of domestic violence, and Florida law recognizes that either spouse can be a victim. Arresting the husband or boyfriend at the first sign of trouble may stop the fight, but it can also unfairly and unnecessarily get him into major, life-changing legal trouble.

Continue reading "Miami Dolphins Player Arrested for Domestic Violence After Fight With Girlfriend" »

As Fort Lauderdale criminal defense attorneys, we were interested to see that a law with major implications for South Florida government is going all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. According to a Jan. 31 article in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, the court is expected to rule in the next few months on the legality of a federal law that has sent several politicians to prison in Broward and Palm Beach Counties. The “honest services fraud” law is a 28-word add-on to the federal law prohibiting wire and mail fraud. It can be used in private business, but is most often used to criminally charge government figures who are accused of using their offices to get material advantages that don’t meet the stricter definition of bribes. In the Supreme Court case, an Alaska politician convicted of corruption is challenging the law as unconstitutionally vague.

In Weyhrauch v. United States, former Alaska state senator Bruce Weyhrauch was convicted of failing to disclose that he was seeking employment with an oil company before he voted in that firm’s interest on a tax bill. In South Florida, politicians were prosecuted for honest services fraud for actions like taking money to help businesses get municipal contracts, or using decision-making power to profit from secret land deals. Prosecutors like the law because it allows them to prosecute politicians who didn’t accept an outright bribe, but still lined their pockets instead of working for taxpayers. Detractors say the statute is so broad that it’s impossible for an average person to understand what’s prohibited. The language of the law says “For the purposes of this chapter, the term ‘scheme or artifice to defraud’ includes a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services.”

We know arguing in favor of allegedly corrupt politicians does not always make attorneys popular. But as West Palm Beach criminal defense lawyers, we agree that the language of the law seems like it may be overly broad. The article quoted Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who observed that the law could prohibit using personal or political influence to get a restaurant reservation. In fact, depriving someone of honest services could be an act as small as goofing off at work. Without clarity about what the law actually prohibits, both public and private employees are at risk of prosecution for any action the local prosecutors don’t happen to like. This not only creates injustice, but opens the door to politically motivated prosecutions that abuse the law.

Continue reading "Supreme Court to Rule on Anti-Corruption Law Used Against South Florida Officials" »

Our Miami-Dade tax evasion criminal defense lawyers were very interested in the IRS investigation of Swiss bank UBS and its clients who are American taxpayers. That case is nearly settled, although a recent Swiss ruling may stymie matters. However, clients of at least one other bank got an unpleasant surprise recently when the New York Times ran a piece about a whistleblower at another Swiss bank, the privacy-focused Julius Baer. The newspaper reported Jan. 19 that Rudolf M. Elmer, a former Julius Baer employee, began meeting with tax authorities last week to disclose information he says shows that his ex-employer and numerous American banks knowingly helped Americans hide their assets from the IRS.

Elmer worked for Julius Baer for 15 years in Switzerland and another eight years as the COO of a branch in Grand Cayman, a Caribbean island. He claims that he discovered evidence of tax evasion in 2002, the same year he was dismissed from his job. Specifically, Elmer claims to have documents showing that American investment companies steered clients who wanted to avoid taxes to Julius Baer. The Swiss bank, in turn, backdated documents establishing tax shelters and funneled high-value transactions for American investment firms through the bank’s Caribbean entities, where they could avoid U.S. taxes. His attorney said this information helps confirm information the IRS has already recovered through its voluntary disclosure program, although the IRS declined to confirm this. The IRS did say that it is investigating banks other than UBS.

Julius Baer claims Elmer is a disgruntled former employee seeking revenge for losing a promotion, his dismissal and what he perceives as an insufficient financial settlement. It also said he stole documents while at the bank, and that he has forged documents in order to trump up evidence against the bank and its clients. Swiss authorities are investigating the stolen-documents claims, but Elmer was already jailed briefly, in 2005, for breaking Swiss banking secrecy laws. In fact, each side accuses the other of borderline violence.

As West Palm Beach tax fraud defense attorneys, we will watch the IRS closely this year to see whether it pursues a case against Julius Baer clients who pay taxes in the United States. If Elmer’s claims are true, many very wealthy individuals who were not involved with UBS will now have to face the possibility of audits, investigation and criminal charges. To make matters worse, the IRS no longer offers its special voluntary disclosure program, which gave lenience and lower fines to taxpayers who come clean and share information with the government. The agency does offer a normal voluntary disclosure program, but the special rules from last year do not apply. That’s why it’s even more important now for taxpayers considering a disclosure to get help from an experienced tax crimes defense lawyer

Continue reading "Swiss Bank Whistleblower Exposes More American Clients to Tax Evasion Charges" »

Our West Palm Beach traffic ticket defense attorneys were appalled by a news report about an elderly woman who was in jail over Thanksgiving because she failed to respond to a DHSMV letter. BrowardBulldog.org reported Jan. 11 that Gabrielle Shaink Trudeau, 78, was held in Broward County Jail for 15 days and given $2,000 bail for traffic charges. Trudeau had no previous criminal record when she failed to appear in court on charges of driving with a suspended license. She was arrested and appeared in court wearing heavy chains, prompting a sharply worded speech from the judge who released her.

Shaink Trudeau’s license was suspended in late August because she failed to respond to a letter from the DHSMV about undisclosed medical issues. A few weeks later, she was pulled over for driving too slowly and issued a ticket for driving on a suspended license. However, in mid-September, she received a letter saying her license was reinstated. Believing that letter resolved the ticket, she didn’t appear at an early October court hearing. The judge in that case issued a bench warrant for her arrest, and Broward County deputies eventually showed up to arrest her in her own kitchen.

Pretrial workers found Shaink Trudeau a good candidate for release without bail, and some were on duty during her bail hearing. But neither they nor the two public defenders on duty advocated for her or suggested that her case needed special handling. As a result, the magistrate simply set a predetermined amount of bail and zipped on to the next defendant. After the bail was set, Shaink Trudeau said she made a confused gesture to her neighbor, but nobody saw. She said she never paid the $2,000 bail during the next two weeks she spent in jail because someone kept telling her it wasn’t necessary. Finally, at her Dec. 2 arraignment, prosecutors dropped the charges because they incorrectly believed her license hadn’t been suspended when she got the ticket. It was reinstated afterward -- but suspended again while she was in jail because she failed to obtain a medical reevaluation.

We wonder how many other Gabrielle Shaink Trudeaus are out there. This case underscores multiple important problems with Florida’s justice system: overly harsh traffic laws, confusing communications and court workers who are too busy or too disinterested to notice when a case requires special attention. Many of our clients, like Shaink Trudeau, don’t realize their licenses were suspended until after they have been pulled over and ticketed. From there, it takes very little to end up arrested and jailed -- all over something small like a speeding ticket or a medical examination requirement. Without a Fort Lauderdale traffic offense criminal defense attorney or another advocate, these drivers could end up jailed indefinitely, and not all of them are as sympathetic as a 78-year-old woman.

Continue reading "Palm Beach County Grandmother Jailed 15 Days by Mistake" »

A recent article about a drug arrest caught the attention of our Fort Lauderdale drug crimes defense attorneys. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported Jan. 8 that the Port Everglades terminal was evacuated and a cruise ship passenger arrested after a customs agent found a “suspicious” liquid on the passenger. After sniffing the liquid, the agent reported feeling lightheaded and having an elevated heart rate. He was seen and released from the hospital, and laboratory tests of the liquid have suggested that it’s harmless. However, the passenger, 25-year-old Casey Flynn, was found with marijuana and arrested for drug possession. As a precaution, authorities also evacuated the terminal for about three hours.

The Sun-Sentinel said customs agents and the Broward Sheriff’s Office were scanning the crowd for people with outstanding arrest warrants on the morning that Flynn was disembarking from a five-day, music-themed cruise. As he was leaving the ship, an agent saw him drop a container of liquid and stopped him. After the agent reported feeling unwell, authorities evacuated about 300 people from the terminal. More of the cruise ship’s 2,750 passengers were required to wait on board the ship until hazardous materials investigators cleared the terminal to reopen. Laboratory tests found the liquid harmless, but these results were deemed inconclusive and the samples were sent for additional testing. Flynn may face charges related to the liquid in addition to the marijuana possession charge.

As Miami drug possession defense lawyers, we think Flynn may have a strong case for defending himself against both charges, if a second charge is even brought. As a rule, evidence obtained from illegal searches cannot be admitted in court. This includes evidence that forms the backbone or entirety of a criminal case, such as the marijuana found on Flynn. It’s not clear from the article whether the search was legal, but judging by the description, the customs agent may not have had probable cause to search him. After all, travelers routinely carry liquids like shampoo and mouthwash. If the search is thrown out, the marijuana possession charge, and any charge related to the mysterious liquid, may also have to be thrown out. And to charge Flynn in connection with the evacuation, prosecutors would have to show that he, and not law enforcement overreaction, was responsible for causing it.

Continue reading "Cruise Ship Passenger Held After Customs Agent Finds Suspicious Liquid" »

Just before the holidays, the Orlando Sentinel undertook an investigation that amused our Fort Lauderdale traffic ticket defense attorneys. According to the Dec. 22 article, Florida Gators team members have racked up a total of 251 traffic tickets in Alachua County, where Gainesville is located, between 2006 and 2009. Thirty-two of those cases have not yet been resolved, meaning the ticket has not been paid or the charges were not resolved. This includes traffic citations of all types, including tickets that didn’t lead to an arrest as well as high-profile incidents like the DUI arrest of Carlos Dunlap on Dec. 1. The newspaper counted citations among 96 students who participated in Gators games or were listed as participants in the organization.

The traffic offenses were not evenly distributed throughout the team, the investigation found. Twelve Gators players have seven or more tickets. By contrast, 32 have no tickets at all. Among them is quarterback Tim Tebow, as well as 11 students who haven’t yet been on campus for a full year. Most of the traffic offenses counted were citations rather than criminal charges, for offenses like speeding and expired registration. Dunlap had the only drunk driving charge, but others on the team had been arrested for repeatedly driving with a suspended license. A state’s attorney told the newspaper that this is a common problem in Florida because too many unpaid traffic tickets of any kind can trigger a suspension. A driver caught with a suspended license will be issued yet another citation for that offense -- but failure to pay that ticket could lead to arrest.

As West Palm Beach traffic citation criminal defense lawyers, we see this process at work for all kinds of drivers, most of whom are not football stars. Younger people aren’t always the most responsible drivers, which is one reason why their auto insurance rates are higher. Getting traffic tickets, and failing to pay them, is not the best behavior, but they’re not unusual for young adults getting their first taste of freedom. As the article notes, Florida’s license-suspension process is almost notorious for leading to surprise arrests, for people who had no idea that failure to pay tickets could mean jail. And many of the Gators players are famous, which means they may be victims of officers’ eagerness to show that they don’t play favorites.

Continue reading "Investigation Shows Gators Players Have 251 Traffic Citations Team-Wide" »

As Naples DUI criminal defense lawyers, we were pleased to see a recent series of articles focusing on DUI enforcement in the Daytona Beach News-Journal. Just in time for New Year’s Eve, which law enforcement says is the biggest drinking holiday of the year, the newspaper is running a three-part series on the large percentage of drunk driving cases in Volusia County that end with dropped or reduced charges. The second installment, published Dec. 28, focuses on the way intoxicated driving is handled in the city of Port Orange. The city has the highest rate of DUI arrests in the county, the newspaper said -- but also the highest rate of dropped and reduced charges.

The Port Orange Police Department has a reputation for being aggressive in its DUI enforcement and prevention efforts, and has even won an award for its traffic safety work. The News-Journal said the city has consistently had the most DUI arrests of any city in Volusia County since 2000. However, the newspaper said almost 64% of Port Orange cases involving a single-charge DUI end with dropped or reduced charges. That’s the highest rate in the county and substantially greater than the 53% rate in Daytona Beach Shores. Drunk driving defense attorneys told the newspaper that it tends to be easier to find flaws in cases from Port Orange than in cases from other cities. At least one lawyer told the newspaper he believes Port Orange police make arrests for crimes that wouldn’t result in arrests in other cities.

The article outlined some of the most common problems with DUI arrests that can lead to a dismissal or reduction of charges. Among them are mistakes with either the initial traffic stop or the administration of the breath test. Our Fort Myers drunk driving criminal defense attorneys frequently use mistakes by police during these vital phases of the arrest to help our clients. For example, as the article notes, Florida law does not compel motorists to give blood samples without a warrant. If a police officer has told one of our clients that it does, any evidence resulting from that interaction may be illegal. This can allow us to ask the judge to throw it out, weakening the prosecution’s case. Without much of a case, the prosecution is substantially more likely to offer a reduced charge like reckless driving in exchange for a guilty plea.

Continue reading "Aggressive DUI Enforcement Comes With High Rate of Dropped or Reduced Charges" »

As Sarasota drunk driving criminal defense lawyers, we were disappointed to see news that showed two DUI checkpoints in as many weeks in the greater Fort Myers-Cape Coral area. According to a Dec. 12 article in the Fort Myers News-Press, the North Fort Myers police conducted a roadblock in that city last Friday night, resulting in six DUI arrests and 13 written warnings. Officers at the checkpoint also issued 33 traffic citations and found three drivers without a valid license and five others with suspended licenses. On Dec. 14, the same newspaper reported that the Fort Myers police plan another checkpoint this coming weekend, at an undisclosed location in the city. The article said the goal is not only to remove intoxicated drivers from the road, but to deter drunk driving and raise public awareness of the problem.

A sobriety checkpoint is a roadblock in which drivers passing the location must stop and be checked for signs of intoxication, even if there’s no special reason to suspect them. Those the officers believe to be intoxicated are generally directed off the road and into a special area where they are asked to submit to field sobriety tests and a breathalyzer. Despite the fact that this violates our legal system’s presumption of innocence until proven guilty, and our constitutional right to be free of illegal searches, the Supreme Court has ruled that DUI checkpoints are perfectly legal. (Many South Florida DUI defense attorneys call this “the DUI exception to the Constitution.”) In fact, they are especially likely to be used during the holidays, when police agencies believe more intoxicated drivers than average are likely to be on the road. This may explain why law enforcement agencies have planned two in two weeks in the same metropolitan area.

Our Naples drunk driving defense attorneys are against drunk driving -- but we also believe DUI roadblocks have serious flaws. Despite the Supreme Court’s ruling, enough Fourth Amendment concerns about the practice remain that several states have outlawed sobriety checkpoints entirely. On a more practical level, there is also an argument that sobriety checkpoints don’t work as well as larger numbers of patrols at finding intoxicated drivers. Roadblocks rely on chance to find drunk drivers, and drivers who have already passed through are free to warn their friends to take another route. By contrast, heightened patrols can seek out and stop erratic drivers who may be intoxicated, without wasting police time on sober people. According to the newspaper, the North Fort Myers checkpoint processed 966 vehicles but made only 6 DUI arrests -- 0.62% of all the drivers they saw. And roadblocks are considerably more expensive than sending extra officers out to patrol the streets.

Continue reading "Police Run Multiple Holiday Sobriety Checkpoints in Fort Myers-Cape Coral Area" »

As West Palm Beach drunk driving criminal defense attorneys, we were interested to see a recent article from the Vero Beach Press-Journal. The Dec. 3 article said that according to the Florida Highway Patrol, about 36% of Florida drivers refuse to take a breath test after being pulled over on suspicion of drunk driving. This is not without consequences for the driver, the article said, but refusing the Breathalyzer can also have serious consequences for law enforcement. Because the breath reading is vital evidence in a DUI case, not having a breath sample can considerably weaken prosecutors’ case against the driver. That was one reason the Vero Beach Police Department tried making a policy of routine blood tests in suspected DUIs, only to suspend the program for lack of qualified personnel.

In order to obtain a DUI conviction in Florida, prosecutors must prove that the accused was in control of a vehicle while having a breath or blood test reading of 0.08, or while under the influence of alcohol or drugs “to the extent that the person’s normal faculties are impaired.” Without test results, prosecutors must rely on the much more subjective “impaired faculties” standard. If the driver took field sobriety tests, prosecutors may introduce these as evidence. However, the article notes, Florida drivers may legally refuse to take field sobriety tests. Furthermore, any test results that do exist are subject to challenge in court, because many field sobriety tests are so unreliable that it’s possible to fail even when completely sober. Observations by officers at the scene, such as a statement that the officer smelled alcohol, may be even less reliable. That means it’s harder for prosecutors to convict someone of DUI without a BAC reading.

However, the article said, refusing a breath test is not without consequences. In Florida, people who refuse the Breathalyzer on a first DUI automatically lose their licenses for a year. That’s twice as long as the minimum license suspension for an actual conviction. A second refusal is a misdemeanor crime. However, as with all license suspensions, drivers may apply for a “hardship” license to get to work. Those who refused breath tests may apply for this license after serving 90 days of their license suspensions. And of course, refusing the breath test is unlikely to make a driver popular with the arresting officers.

Nevertheless, Balliro, Galasso, Leskovich & Seltzer tells its DUI clients to think carefully about whether to submit to a breath test. We understand that prosecutors need evidence to prove their cases, but as Fort Myers DUI defense lawyers, we also believe there are problems with breath tests that can lead to a false positive and wrongful charges. Breath tests using Intoxilyzer machines are under suspicion in Florida because of court rulings that they are not admissible due to reported false positives, legal problems and the lack of accountability from its manufacturer. Older breath tests can be thrown off by weather, the subject’s health, timing problems or even things the subject has eaten. Given the pain, inconvenience and financial costs of a DUI charge, some drivers may be better off refusing the breath test and living with the license suspension.

Continue reading "Florida Law Enforcement Has Problems Proving DUI When Breathalyzer Refused" »

As Naples drunk driving defense lawyers, we were pleased to see that an experiment in routine DUI blood testing has stopped, at least temporarily. According to a Nov. 30 article on TCPalm.com, the city of Vero Beach has suspended its routine use of blood tests in every intoxicated driving case in which the driver refuses to take a breath test. The policy was made only ten days earlier, on Nov. 20, but the city soon realized that its staff was too limited to keep up with demand. The Indian River County Fire Department may step in to help, the article said, but it doesn’t want to lose too much staff time to the project.

The policy began after a Nov. 19 DUI arrest, in which officers obtained a search warrant in order to draw blood from a woman who refused a breath test. The only other arrest under the policy happened three days later, on Nov. 22. Vero Beach is the first city on the Treasure Coast to use such a policy, although Florida cities like Jacksonville and Palm Bay also use routine blood tests. Without it, DUI blood testing in Florida is typically limited to accidents that caused a death or a serious bodily injury. Law enforcement likes the policy because it allows them to obtain vital evidence in DUI cases, even when drivers refuse to submit to a breath test. However, Florida DUI defense attorneys told the newspaper that universal blood testing on a mere hunch is an unreasonable invasion of drivers’ privacy.

Our Punta Gorda DUI defense attorneys agree -- but we also see significant practical problems with the policy. As the article notes, law enforcement must obtain a search warrant to draw the blood, which means several hours can pass before the actual test occurs. This could routinely create unreliable outcomes, because alcohol can be processed by the body during those hours. That can result in false negatives or, with very recent drinking, false positives. Because blood testing detects substances that breath testing does not, blood tests can also turn up evidence of drugs even when there was no suspicion of drug intoxication. And according to the article, no police officers are trained to draw the blood, which casts doubt on the reliability and safety of the results once they are turned over to law enforcement.

Continue reading "City of Vero Beach Stops Routine Use of Blood Tests in Suspected Drunk Driving Cases" »

Our Sarasota drunk driving defense attorneys were disappointed to see a recent ruling from a judge in nearby Manatee County. According to a Nov. 14 article in the Bradenton Herald, Manatee County judge Diana Moreland denied a motion to suppress the use of breath test results obtained from a machine called the Intoxilyzer 8000 in a DUI case involving 31-year-old Janet Landrum of Ellenton. The order affects every DUI case in Manatee County, not just Landrum’s, which means the order allows the use of Intoxilyzer 8000 results in more than 100 cases. The South Florida DUI defense lawyer for Landrum has also challenged the accuracy of the test results.

The ruling is the latest in a controversy over whether the Intoxilyzer 8000 and its cousin, the Inxotilyzer 5000, should be admissible in Florida. Courts around Florida have previously ruled on whether the machines are admissible, a history that includes rulings in Manatee and Sarasota Counties against using them. Under Florida law, law enforcement may use only breath test machines approved by the federal Department of Transportation. The list of DoT-approved devices does include an older version of the Intoxilyzer 8000, but the machine has seen software changes since then. This has created confusion in Florida courts, with different counties ruling different ways on whether the machines’ results are admissible at all.

Complicating matters further, some Fort Myers DUI defense attorneys have also argued that the Intoxilyzer 8000’s test results are not reliable. In some cases, they say, software problems create a false positive when the machine should really show that results are inconclusive and the driver should blow again. This has led at least one state to ban the use of the machine entirely, on the grounds that no one should be convicted because of an inaccurate reading. Intoxicated driving defense attorneys and their clients argue that they are entitled to see the source code of the software the Intoxilyzer machines use so they can determine their accuracy. But the machines’ manufacturer, CMI Inc., refuses to disclose the source code, saying it’s a trade secret. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement has an ongoing case before the courts to decide ownership of the source code.

Our Punta Gorda intoxicated driving criminal defense lawyers hope the courts eventually decide that Florida’s law enforcement community -- and the drivers it serves -- are entitled to the source code. As things currently stand, there’s nothing stopping Florida drivers from being convicted of DUI on a false positive from an Intoxilyzer machine that nobody can double-check. Ideally, we’d prefer that Intoxilyzer results be declared inadmissible throughout Florida until this question, and the question about whether the machines are authorized, are both resolved. A drunk driving charge is very serious in Florida, carrying jail time, fines, license suspension and an immediate spike in auto insurance rates, among other things. To serve justice, those accused should be entitled to be judged on test results not tainted by doubts and lack of accountability.

Continue reading "Manatee County Judge Rules Intoxilyzer Machine Results Admissible in DUI Cases" »

Our Fort Myers tax evasion criminal defense lawyers have closely followed the voluntary disclosure program offered by the IRS throughout 2009, because we offer aggressive legal defense for taxpayers in just that situation. The voluntary disclosure program allowed taxpayers who failed to declare income from overseas accounts to come forward with that information, in exchange for reduced penalties and very little chance of prison time. That was particularly important because the IRS was also in negotiations with Swiss bank UBS for most of the year to learn the names of U.S. taxpayers that the bank had admittedly helped to evade their taxes. The voluntary disclosure program ended Oct. 15, and according to a Nov. 17 article from the Associated Press, it saw unprecedented participation from a total of more than 14,700 taxpayers.

However, UBS still intends to turn over names of 4,450 more accountholders as part of its legal settlement with the federal government. And UBS accountholders are far from the only overseas accountholders likely to be affected by the ongoing IRS crackdown on tax evasion. Our West Palm Beach tax evasion criminal defense lawyers can still represent these clients in negotiations with the IRS -- or, if it comes to this, in tax court. If you're in this situation or think you might be and you'd like to learn more, don't wait to call Balliro, Galasso, Leskovich & Seltzer for a free consultation. You can reach us toll-free from anywhere in Florida at 1-866-ARRESTED or contact us through our Web site.