Articles Posted in Federal Criminal Defense

A person who kills another human being may not only have committed homicide. Homicide can be divided into murder and manslaughter. Cases differ from one another and it is the examination of every single detail that will determine if someone will be charged with either manslaughter or murder. You may wonder what the difference is. In the counties of Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach and Broward in South Florida, when a person kills another without having malice aforethought, it means the person has committed manslaughter. When we say malice aforethought, we mean the premeditation to commit the murder. Many times, manslaughter occurs due to negligence by the perpetrator towards another human being.
In South Florida, a person would have committed murder when he or she planned the killing before the event actually occurred. It is the State who will have the burden of proving that the perpetrator of the homicide had premeditated his actions.

If you are being charged with murder or manslaughter in Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, Miami, or other areas in South Florida, you have to call an experienced and qualified criminal attorney for a free consultation on your case.

The U.S. constitution makes pre-trial release, called bail or bond, a right. That right exists more in the law then for those arrested in South Florida and charged in federal court. U.S. District Courts are in Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach. Federal courts are for cases and controversies of limited jurisdiction in civil matters and have exclusive jurisdictions for violations of federal criminal laws. The bulk of those arrested in Florida and brought before federal judges are drug importation and distribution charges (known as trafficking in Florida courts), immigration arrests, wire fraud, money laundering and an increasing number of federal arrests for violations of our Patriots Act (terrorist related charges). If you have been arrested and charged in a federal court the first judicial officer you’ll see is a U.S. Magistrate. Magistrate’s handle all bond, bail (pre-trial release) matters. In federal court you can be held in custody for three days simply on the request of the U.S. Attorneys’ Office. This is called pre-trial detention. The statute to read is U.S.C. 3142(f), the federal “first appearance” statute. For most your detention hearing is also the first appearance hearing. Magistrates in South Florida will rarely grant release on any condition if the charges involves drug trafficking in any amount more than person use amounts, weapons charges and charges brought under the Patriots Act. In the fall of 2010 a Boynton Beach Police Officer arrested by the U.S. and charged with drug trafficking was granted bail and fled to Brazil. As a result of that the Magistrates’ are ever more skeptical of granting any pre-trial release conditions, even though the right is embedded in the Constitution. Most defendants who are granted pre-trial release are able to do it because their South Florida Criminal defense attorney worked with the Assistant United States Attorney (the prosecutor in federal courts) and came before the Magistrate with an agreed set of conditions. If you are arrested and charged in Federal court you should insist on an experienced federal criminal lawyer from the day of your arrest.

The most litigated area of criminal law in South Florida concerns when a court should grant a South Florida criminal defendant’s motion to suppress evidence. Criminal law is mostly constitutional law: and the most focused constitutional amendment is the right to be secure in one’s property and to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures. A search incident to an arrest and a search incident to a stop are different. An officer can stop and search an individual or a place when he has probable cause: the issue before the three panel of judges held in Fort Lauderdale concerned the issue of marijuana smells coming from a car and the legality of the search by a South Florida policeman who found cannabis in the car and in the clothing of the south Florida criminal defendant. The arrest for marijuana possession came after the officer searched the individual and found a plastic bag with marijuana in the defendant’s underpants. The area of law: search and seizure is fact specific: that means the actual totaltality of the circumstances are filtered through the search and seizure law as it currently exists. If you were arrested in Fort Lauderdale, Davie, Pompano Beach, Weston or any South Florida county (Palm Beach, Miami and Broward) speak to a South Florida criminal defense attorney and discuss your rights and your standing to object to the introduction of evidence obtained during a search. The area of law is very complex and the cases are constantly shaping and reshaping the law, so you must seek experienced criminal lawyers for advice on the current state of the law on search and seizure. Most South Florida criminal defense lawyers will give you a free consultation to discuss your rights if you are arrested for a possession of narcotics, possession of cocaine or possession of marijuana criminal charge.

With apologies to Elmer Fudd and Disney we headline the news that Wikileaks founder Julian Asange announced on January 17th, 2011 that a former executive at a major Swiss Bank had turned over a computer disc containing 2000 names of prominent individuals who, allegedly, engaged in tax evasion through offshore banking. Money-laundering and other white-collar crimes, a specialty of the writer, usually involves wire fraud, money laundering, or tax avoidance. Money-laundering crimes involved the failure to disclose the source of funds or attempts to obscure the source of funds deposited into the US banking system. Rudolf Elmer, the former executive for the Swiss Bank reportedly ran a major Swiss Bank’s operations in the Caribbean until his discharge in 2002. Initial reports indicate that names have not been revealed. However Wikileaks indicated that it will name names at a future date. Many of these white-collar crimes will be prosecuted in South Florida federal district courts where attorney Ralph Behr practices. South Florida criminal defense attorneys see many federal money laundering and wire fraud cases in our federal district courts. Stay tuned for further news as this story breaks.

UBS, the European banking giant has a problem with federal authorities in the U.S. Two individuals have been indicted and charged with avoiding taxes on funds deposited in an off shore UBS account. The bank is drawn in by allegations by federal prosecutors that the bank knew of the tax fraud and assisted by opening accounts and handling funds. Money laundering is always an uphill fight for federal prosecutors because of the political power banks wield in the Congress. Years ago Bankers Trust was targeted for assisting in the transfer of illegal funds from Russian sources and the matter was dropped. Noriega’s removal by force is another example of bankers and US armed forces uniting to thwart a takeover of money laundering for drug cartels.

Criminal prosecutions, like skirt heights, seem to go up and down with the economy. White collar crimes, such as money laundering, telemarketing fraud, embezzlement, counterfeiting, kickbacks and honest services fraud cases are increasing in federal court. Criminal law doesn’t change, but prosecutors in federal court focus on certain crimes when the economy changes. And things have changed. Derivatives dissolved but security fraud cases have gone up, as have other federal prosecutions. Criminal defense lawyers have seen federal court white collar crimes become an increasing focus of federal prosecutors in Miami and Fort Lauderdale. If you are a “person of interest” in a federal or state criminal inquiry, call for a consultation. Know your rights and understand the process and gain some insight into how your constitution works and how the police can twist the constitution until most criminal lawyers can’t believe we are all in the same country under the same constitution. Knowledge is power.

The chief law enforcement officer of the Federal Government (our protectors/masters in DC) Attorney General Eric Holder announced his marching orders: Arrest all those who commit “economic crimes”. In his speech to the National Sheriffs’ Association’s at their 2010 Winter Conference he set out on his warpath to end economic crimes. (He omitted to address bankers and stock brokers). In his speech he said the Feds plan ….”To give particular emphasis to initiatives aimed at tackling economic crime, international organized crime, youth violence and the exploitation of children. “South Florida criminal lawyers, like your host, have been inundated with mortgage fraud, credit card fraud and identify theft cases. In fact the Office of the Statewide Prosecutor has a staff working fulltime on prosecuting mortgage fraud cases.

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Here are a few questions to ask when you are interviewing to hire a federal criminal lawyer:
1. Does he/she have a PACER CM/ECF number? If the answer is “what’s a PACER CM/ECF number? Hang up the phone and call the next lawyer on your list.
2. Does he/she have a subscription to the publication ‘Florida Law Weekly Federal’, it’s expensive and most lawyers won’t pay the $500.00 yearly cost, but if he/she doesn’t read it weekly then he/she is definitely NOT on top the law and federal criminal law IS CONSTANTLY changing.

3. How many federal cases are active in his/her office? Most competent and active federal criminal lawyers have, at a minimum, five active cases in federal court. Don’t bother to ask their success at trial because most federal trials end up in conviction because federal courts have become famous for railroading defendants into convictions.

Winning in a federal criminal prosecution is only a possibility if your federal criminal lawyer is a wiz on procedure, can nail evidentiary issues hard and fast, and has earned the respect (and fear) of Assistant United States Attorneys in the local federal criminal courts. Power in Federal court is earned by fighting and winning motions and procedural issues. Federal court can be a sinkhole if your Florida criminal lawyer isn’t a real federal criminal lawyer, and that means in court, in front of judges and dealing with federal court cases in a significant number of cases. At a minimum it should be 30% of a criminal lawyer’s practice before they can be a real federal criminal lawyer and not a local lawyer trying to grab-off a case that is beyond their capabilities.

Federal criminal lawyers must be current with the explosive increase of Federal criminal laws, federal criminal procedures, federal criminal evidence and the inscrutable PACER Federal online document filing system. It is almost impossible to be an effective and competent lawyer in federal court unless the attorney devotes significant ongoing time keeping current with federal criminal law. Federal court is hobbled by arcane procedural rules, almost Byzantine local rules that overlay the federal criminal rules and procedures, and……it gets worse…… THIS ARTICLE CONTINUES ON PAGE TWO….

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Federal criminal defense attorneys in Florida appear before the federal district courts in Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach. Federal criminal prosecutions require defense lawyers who are skilled in federal criminal practice, know the law and statues for federal crimes, have defended white collar crimes such as mortgage fraud, money laundering, cash transaction reporting statutes, wire fraud, federal drug trafficking and drug possession law, know the federal evidence code and federal criminal court rules. A Florida federal criminal lawyer, to be effective, should know federal criminal laws backward and forward: something that comes from years in federal criminal courts. Federal criminal lawyers learn their skills by appearing in federal criminal courts, defending those accused of federal crimes in Florida and out of Florida. [this article continues on page 2 ]

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