Articles Posted in Drug Crimes

When police find drugs such as marijuana, crack, cocaine and methamphetamine in a particular place, they often arrest everyone in the vicinity of the drugs because they are not sure who exactly owned and/or was in possession of the drugs. However, this is not proper under Florida law, and criminal defense lawyers can often get these cases relying on constructive possession of drugs thrown out of court.

In Florida, there are two ways to possess drugs which can lead to a valid possession of drugs charge. The obvious one is actual possession. If you are holding a bag of marijuana or have a bag of cocaine in your pocket, that is actual possession of drugs. However, even if you do not have the drugs on you, you can still be charged with possession of drugs. The other kind of possession is constructive possession which can also lead to a legitimate possession of drugs charge if the elements can be proven. In order to establish constructive possession, the state has to show that you knew about the drugs and maintained some control over the drugs. For instance, if the police find a bag of marijuana in a room that you live in by yourself in a drawer with your wallet and other items belonging to you, you may not be in actual possession of the drugs but there is an argument that you are in constructive possession of the marijuana. As another example, I am not in my car, but I know I have CD’s in my locked car and I have control over them so I am in constructive possession of those CD’s.

On the other hand, if I go over to a party at a friend’s house and police come in and find a bag of cocaine in the closed cookie jar next to where I am standing, I am not in constructive possession of that cocaine because it cannot be proven that I knew the cocaine was in there or that I had any custody or control over the cocaine. Of course, an incriminating statement admitting knowledge of the drugs can go a long way towards disrupting that defense.

Police in Columbia County, Florida (which is just over an hour west of Jacksonville, Florida) arrested a man after they allegedly found 112 grams of cocaine in his home, according to an article on News4jax.com. When police arrest someone for being in possession of any drug, whether it is crack, cocaine, marijuana, methamphetamine or some other drug, the quantity of the drugs often dictate what the actual criminal charge will be. If there is a small amount of drugs, the charge is often simple possession of the drugs. This will be a misdemeanor if the drug is marijuana and the amount is less than 20 grams. Otherwise, for small amounts of drugs like crack, cocaine, heroine, methamphetamine and pills without a prescription, the possession charge will be a third degree felony which carries a maximum sentence of 5 years in prison but is often considered much less seriously by the state and the judge.

However, when the quantity of illegal drugs found is larger, the possible penalties under Florida law get much larger as well. For cocaine, that threshold amount is 28 grams or more. If a person has between 28 and less than 200 grams of cocaine in his/her possession, he/she can, and likely will, be charged with trafficking in cocaine which carries a minimum mandatory sentence of three years in prison. Of course, the sentence is always negotiable by the criminal defense lawyer and prosecutor, but when the amount of drugs reaches that trafficking threshold, the state has much more leverage because of the three year minimum mandatory prison sentence.

A doctor in the pulmonary medicine department at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida was arrested for allegedly obtaining controlled substances by fraud, according to an article on News4jax.com. As criminal defense attorneys in Jacksonville, we have handled many cases involving obtaining controlled substances by fraud. What that charge typically means is that someone is suspected of obtaining prescription drugs without a prescription. As opposed to well know illegal drugs such as cocaine, crack, heroin, methamphetamine or marijuana, the drugs in these cases are often painkillers such as Percocet, Vicodin, Oxycontin and similar drugs.

These crimes most often involve people who have developed an addiction to highly addictive painkillers rather than people distributing or trafficking the drugs for profit. Quite often, the person developed the addiction after being prescribed the drugs after an injury or medical procedure and is unable to withstand the pain without the drugs after the prescription runs out. This makes this kind of crime less serious, in our opinion, than more traditional drug crimes.

However, the Florida legislature has enacted laws that provide for extremely harsh penalties for people charged with this kind of crime. For instance, it only takes a few pills to reach the trafficking in controlled substances threshold which, at the lowest level, carries a minimum mandatory sentence of three years in Florida state prison. For this reason, any charge involving obtaining prescription drugs or controlled substances by fraud must be taken very seriously and addressed at the earliest opportunity.

When people think of the crime of trafficking in illegal drugs and drug traffickers, they think of people moving large amounts of illegal drugs in and out of Florida. The people charged with drug trafficking charges in Florida are alleged to be major drug dealers because it is supposed to take a large quantity of illegal drugs to reach the level of trafficking. The crime of trafficking in illegal drugs such as cocaine and methamphetamine requires a large amount of drugs because the penalties associated with those crimes are very severe. Otherwise, for smaller quantities of illegal drugs consistent with someone who just uses them should come with more minor penalties.

For marijuana and cocaine in Florida, this is often the case. A person has to be in possession of more than 25 pounds of cannabis (marijuana) to be charged with trafficking in marijuana. It is difficult for someone to argue that more than 25 pounds of marijuana is for personal use. A person has to have 28 grams or more of cocaine to be charged with trafficking in cocaine. 28 grams does not actually appear to be a large quantity of anything, but it is certainly more than what one would consider a personal use amount.

However, for illegal pills that are obtained without the appropriate doctor’s prescription, a person can have very few pills and be charged with the serious crime of trafficking. It only requires possession of 4 grams or more of pills such as Vicodin, Percocet, Oxycodone, Oxycontin and other similar pills to be charged with trafficking. While those pills actually have just a very small amount of the actual drug in them (most of those pills are comprised of other substances), it is the weight of the entire pill, not just the portion of the actual drug in the pill, that is relevant to the trafficking quantity determination. Four grams of illegal pills are not very much. If a person has a few pills without a prescription, he/she could be subject to a trafficking charge that comes with a minimum mandatory prison sentence of 3 years.

The police in Columbia County, Florida (about an hour west of Jacksonville, FL) executed a search warrant and allegedly found two of the residents flushing bags of crack cocaine down the toilet, according to an article on News4Jax.com. The article indicated that the two Columbia County suspects flushed more than 80 grams of crack cocaine down the toilet, but the police were able to retrieve it from the septic pipe. Eighty grams of crack cocaine is well over the amount needed for a trafficking in cocaine charge.

As criminal defense lawyers handling cases, including many drug cases, throughout Northeast Florida, we have seen similar cases where people are accused of trying to destroy, or otherwise get rid of, drugs when police come to a residence or hotel room. Many times, when the police search a home, hotel room or other location that is often occupied by multiple people, the police will find drugs somewhere on the premises, but it will not be clear who actually owned or possessed the drugs. The police will often arrest everyone at the premises, or the people closest to the drugs. However, these are often weak constructive possession of drugs cases. If the police and the State cannot prove who actually knew about and had some control over those drugs, the drug charges will not stick.

However, in cases where the police come in and they actually observe a person trying to dispose of the drugs, that is no longer a constructive possession case. If the police can prove that a person actually possessed the drugs and knew what he/she had was illegal drugs, that is an actual possession of drugs case that is often stronger than the constructive possession of drugs cases. If the police come in a home with a search warrant and see someone flushing a large quantity of crack cocaine down the toilet, that is obviously a stronger case than the one where drugs are located somewhere on the premises but not immediately near any particular person.

As criminal defense lawyers in Jacksonville, Florida, we handle a lot of drug cases from smaller possession of marijuana cases to more serious trafficking in marijuana, crack cocaine, pills and methamphetamine cases. One question that arises fairly often is: What is the difference between possession of illegal drugs and trafficking in illegal drugs?

Most people think of a major drug dealer moving large quantities of drugs when they think of drug traffickers. However, that is not necessarily the case, particularly when dealing with possession of illegal pills such as Lortab, Percocet, Vicodin, Oxycodone and Oxycontin, among others, without a prescription. It only takes a few pills to meet the requirements for a trafficking in pills charge. For other drugs like crack cocaine, powder cocaine or methamphetamine, there is a bigger difference between drug trafficking and possession. It takes 28 or more grams of cocaine to be charged with trafficking in cocaine and 14 or more grams of methamphetamine to meet the requirements for trafficking in methamphetamine. However, while those amounts are clearly more than short term personal use amounts, when you see them, they still are not the huge quantities of drugs some might expect for a trafficking charge.

With respect to trafficking in marijuana, it takes 25 pounds of marijuana to be charged with trafficking. So for marijuana at least, there is a pretty clear difference between simple possession and trafficking.

We have written many times on this criminal law blog about drug cases that were dismissed because they were weak constructive possession cases. In other words, drugs were found near (or sometimes not even near) multiple people, and the police tried to pin the drugs on one or more of those people without being able to prove that any of them had knowledge and actual control over the illegal drugs. However, sometimes, the police and the state can prove a drug case against a person based on constructive possession of illegal drugs.

When the police and the state rely on constructive possession in Florida, that is not always an automatic dismissal of the drug charges. Many of the constructive possession of drug cases are weak, however some of them have some merit to them. We recently read about a case that took place just south of Jacksonville, Florida in Daytona Beach where a person was convicted of possession of crack cocaine on a constructive possession theory.

In this case, two people were in a car that was stopped by police. The driver was arrested for driving with a suspended license, and the car was searched. The police found a bag of crack cocaine on the floorboard on the passenger side of the vehicle where the defendant had been sitting. He was charged with and convicted of possession of cocaine.