Pinellas County Florida Criminal Lawyer Blog

The answer is YES!!!  Why?  Because many times the judge won't listen to you without one.  The domestic violence courts are overrun with frivolous accusations and the dockets are crowded.  Even if you have evidence and witnesses that support your case, a judge often won't let you present it.  In Pasco County, the judge's have actually told me that I am allowed 15 minutes to present my case.  Unfortunately, that is the way it works.  And if the judge has any reason to think that the allegations are untruthful, or true, they grant or dismiss the injunciton immediately, with barely any testimony from either side. 

Let me give you a perfect example:  A man in St. Petersburg was recently arrested for kidnapping and raping his girlfriend.  They had dated for approximately six months, according to the St. Petersburg Times.  He also hid in the trunk of her car and popped out, forced her into the passengers seat and drove her to his house where the offense occured.  These are not the actions of a first time offender. 

In 2007 and 2008, another woman whom he was dating filed two seperate petitions for domestic violence injunctions against him.  On both occassions, a hearing was held at which time I am assuming the woman presented her testimony to the court. On both occassions, the injunctions were dismissed for insufficient evidence.  I wonder if the judge's would believe this woman now?  If she had a lawyer to represent her in court, she may have gotten those injunctions.  Note he did not have a lawyer either, and he was able to prevail. 

The point is that generally, in domestic violence situations, it is better to have an attorney if you have something to say.   Call me if you have any questions - I would be more than happy to represent you or point you in the right direction. 

Both the St. Petersburg Times and the Tampa Tribune printed articles about a St. Petersburg police officer who resigned rather than being fired. Although the resignation, nor the almost firing are really important to me, he was about to be fired for lying and cheating.  The reason for being untruthful is what bothers me. 

Apparently, according to the papers,  Reynaldo Smith and his girlfriend were in some kind of argument which worried his roomates enough to call the police. Note his girlfriend didn't call the police, someone else did. This always says something to me, because for someone else to get involved in anyone's domestic problems, it had to be bad.  Plus, whoever called the police had to know he was a cop, and how much trouble he could potentially be in if he was arrested for beating his girlfriend - or what he might do to them when he realized they were the ones who called.

When Hillsborough deputies arrived they find Mr. Smith to be entirely uncooperative, and refusing to leave his girlfriend's side while telling her not to talk to the police.  Hmmm . . . this SCREAMS domestic batter to me. I see this behavior all the time because I handle so many  domestic violence cases, but I would think a police officer, knowing how someone usually goes to jail in a domestic dispute, would know better than to act like this. Additionally, he refused to give up his weapon. (note in the Hillsborough County Clerk website there's a motion for return of property which was granted by the Court. Although I do not know exactly what property he was requesting be returned, I can guess.) If anyone knows the girlfriend, please talk some sense into her, this guy is an accident waiting to happen.

The Pinellas County State Attorney's Office just convicted a guy named Allan Burney for murder, two counts of attmepted murder, and shooting into an occupied vehicle. While I'm usually not in agreement with the prosecution, in this case, I will have to say the State did the right thing.

Let me give you a little background on this guy. Burney and his buddy make DVD's called "DA HOOD GONE WILD", depicting himself and his neighborhood friends fighting, holding guns, and degrading women.  I didn't believe it myself until I Googled the wonderfully eloquent title and found his website. There's a picture of him on the site, looking like a refugee from "In Living Color". The website says it's "REACHIN OUT TO THE HOOD".  Call me crazy but I thought the whole idea was to get out of the hood.  If you want, you can order the Gangsta 2 pak for around $45.00.  Can you think of a better way to spend your money?  Do the people who actually order this stuff have credit cards? 

What made me so pro prosecution in this case was Mr. Burney's self promotion on Youtube.  Specifically the promo for DVD #2.  Because I think he deserves no more self promotion, I won't include the video on my blog.  However, for your viewing pleasure,or disgust,here's the link to YOUTUBE.

It gets even more ridiculous when you see his cell phone video from jail. Note, this is him on the other side of a plastic wall, wearing jail blues, telling his "peeps" it ain't no thing.  Really?  I'll let you know what he's sentenced to next month.  It may be a "thing" for him when he gets life.