Podcast appearances and mentions of brad post welcome

Brad Post: Welcome back to this edition of Create the Movement podcast. Josh Rich joins us. Josh Rich: Hello everyone. BP: How are you? JR: Doing good Brad. How are you? BP: Good. Josh is our Online Marketing Specialist, and has been on several podcasts with us. JR: Talking about when to trust Google, and when to not trust Google. It’s a pretty interesting topic in the SEO-world, whenever Google puts out a public statement – what to with that? BP: Got it JR: These public statements come in lots of different forms. Sometimes it will be like a ‘Help’ document. They put one out a couple of weeks ago to just clarify on like what a bounce rate is. Or, what an impression is. Or, just different things like that. And so, obviously it’s very handy to have this official definition according to Google, so that way, you know what you’re doing. But other times, it’ll come, you know, like in some sort of like an interview, or like an SEO-roundtable discussion with other people. And it will, just kind of like, not necessarily be this planned thing, but something where they’re like, I don’t want to say it slips out by accident. But they’ll just kind of, like allude to something and everyone freaks out, “Oh, my gosh! They finally said this, or that!”  Obliviously, other times, it’ll be like in that vein. When it’s like this really big long process, and they like, know what they’re doing. And it’s very organized, sometimes it is at least. So, but either way, whatever form it comes in there’s always a lot of discussion whether it’s valid or not. For example, something that recently happened is that they basically said, and I forget who said it or how they said it, but someone from Google said that whatever kind of 3.0-blank re-direct you do, whether it’s 3.01, 3.02, 3.07 or whatever, it all passes page rank. So, we were like, “Oh, that’s kind of cool.” But the funny thing is, anytime Google says something like that, people immediately start doing experiments. And so people start testing that. And they basically found that 3.01s pass page rank way, way better than anything else. So, it’s kind of this little bit of confusion. Like, when you say it passes page rank, do you mean it passes page rank equally, or is there some sort of scale of how well it passes it? Or, are there other ranking factors we don’t know about? So, there’s always this kind of weird confusion in a lot of the discussion that spawns after Google puts out these statements. So, what we do, is we have 4-step system here whenever something like that happens to kind of check them and see if they’re really telling the truth. Or, if they’re lying, or if they don’t know what they’re talking about, or what happened. Look At the Data It’s like I said, anytime that Google puts out a public statement, that is half-way controversial or revolutionary, someone, somewhere will do an experiment to test to see if it’s true. And so, BP: Usually multiple places. JR: Multiple places. Yeah. People like MOZ does a lot. SEMrush. And then like everyone, all the big boys will do something, typically, to test how well that’s working. Like I said, in the case of 3.01 redirect, that was proven false. That’s happened multiple times. So, like I said, the first step: look at the data, look around, see if someone does an experiment, and then base your plan of action off that data. Remember Google Is A Massive Company With A Massive Algorithm. Second thing to remember is that Google is a massive company with a massive algorithm. And so, a lot of times, especially if it is someone that’s just doing an interview, or like a podcast, or like a roundtable discussion, they might get asked a question that they’re not necessarily qualified to answer. And so, they’ll just kind of say something, “Oh yeah, this is what it is.” It might be someone in like search quality department is answering a question about AdWords, or something like that. So, they don’t really know what they’re talking about, but they jus...

Brad Post - Welcome to Create the Movement Podcast My name is Brad Post and I’m here with Liz Montgomery. Liz Montgomery - Hello BP - Liz, how are you doing? LM - I’m excellent. BP - Today, it’s kind of early in our podcasting but we are going to be talking about websites. For instance why would a small business or a law firm need a website? LM - Why would they need a website, Brad? That is a good question. Well, first of all nowadays, and maybe this wasn’t true five to ten years ago before we had smart phones and ipads so many electronics devices available to access information. But, now when you want to find a new service or a new product or if someone needs an attorney the first thing they are going to do is pick up their phone or go to their computer and google, find the best person, right. So this is why SEO is so important on a site. But a small business needs a website because they need to be found. If someone says I’m opening a bakery downtown how is anyone going to know about it except for the people who live on that street. It’s important to have a presence online. BP- I kind of feel too that traditional advertising, which is expensive, like radio ads, billboards, television can be expensive. Websites can be less expensive than traditional marketing. LM - That is true. If you are on a budget as a new business starting out it could be a more cost effective way to get your name out there. If you do it right. And you can do it right for not a billion dollars. Then you can create a lot of engagement online and that will attract people to your business and will put the word out about you. BP- You mentioned the SEO. It is important. Would you say an optimized website is important? You kind of touched on when you google something. LM - What is an optimized website, some would ask. What is SEO and what does that mean. So, search engine optimization is what SEO stands for. The reason it is important that your website is optimized is because you want to show up in search engine results. What you have are hundreds of thousands of other businesses competing for those keywords. And depending on what market you’re in or maybe what city you are in, you will have different levels of competition for different keywords. BP- Keywords are what people are searching for, right? LM- Exactly, so if I just got into a car accident and i don’t know, do I need an attorney? I might google “car accident attorney Tulsa” or where ever I am. So you will start going down the list and the first folks on that page that showed up on your search list. Also, it’s really cool that google tells you the way to optimize you website so you show up in their search results. It’s almost like having a healthy website that google responds well too. BP - Google gives you certain guidelines such as meta-descriptions and title tags, right? And how you should follow their rules in order to show up well. LM- It is definitely down the  rabbit hole of information because it is very complex and there are a lot of terms that could get confusing. Even saying that meta-description and title tags for someone that doesn’t know anything about the website industry could be easily confused by that. Having somebody who knows all those standards and is familiar with those best practices from google and is setting up your website according to that, it’s like night and day in terms of how you are going to show up in search engine results. BP- It’s not just about having an amazingly pretty website, you also have to make sure it is optimized. LM- Right, you need both things. Because we also come across websites that are not beautiful but they are really well optimized and the problem with that is that they may show up really well in search engine results and then you go to the website and then you leave it really quickly. Like, this isn’t giving me the information that I need or it’s just not nice to look at. Or that it doesn’t look updated so it doesn’t look ...

Brad Post: Welcome to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast. We are speaking to Tampa Firearms Defense Lawyer Mike Kenny. Mike, how are you today?   Mike Kenny: I’m doing great. How are you?   BP: Doing well. Let’s kind of get into—A concealed firearm: that’s kind of a big thing going on.   MK: Sure. You know, the firearms law in the state of Florida is—I don’t want to say simple—but there aren’t a lot of restrictions on ownership of a firearm. There’s nothing really illegal about owning a firearm. You don’t need a special permit to own one. You don’t need a special permit to keep one in your house. Obviously you have to keep one safely in your home, especially if there are children in your home, but there’s nothing to where there’s a registry of people in Florida or you have to apply to have permission like you might in some other states. The unique thing about firearms is it comes up in two different areas where it becomes a crime. If it’s used in a criminal manner (if you’re shooting at somebody or committing a robbery), that brings you into a whole different scenario into Florida’s 10-20-Life law where possession of a firearm gives you a minimum mandatory of at least 10 years in prison if you’re using it to commit an enumerated felony. But what you normally see in firearms cases is just the possession of it in and of itself. A person who possesses a firearm, if they have it concealed on their person or so near their person that it’s considered on their person, that’s carrying it concealed. That’s illegal in the state of Florida unless you have a special permit that allows you to carry a concealed firearm. The alternative to that is, you also can’t just go walking around with a gun in your hand in the state of Florida. For instance, you can’t walk into a store and have a gun sitting on your hip in an open holster. That’s open carry, and that’s illegal. Walking around with a firearm in your hand is called an improper exhibition of a firearm potentially, depending on how it’s being held or displayed. So you can’t really have it open and you can’t have it concealed unless you have a license. Some people find themselves getting into trouble. The best way to go is—for anybody who is going to own a firearm, it makes a lot of sense to get a concealed weapons permit, and they require you to take certain firearms safety courses and go through specific background checks. (You obviously can’t be a convicted felon.) And that would allow you to carry a firearm in places you’re allowed to carry it. There are certain places you may not be allowed like an airport or bar, obvious places of nuisance. The unique thing about the carry and conceal firearm statute is there’s been a lot of cases addressing the two things the state needs to prove to convict someone of carrying a concealed firearm. For instance, I had a trial just last week where a person was charged with carrying a concealed firearm, and that case was unique. In that case, my client was pulled over, subject to a complaint about firearms being used in a potential crime. Officers came out, and officers, when they do a stop in a situation where they believe a person in the vehicle might be armed, they do what’s called a felony traffic stop. A felony traffic stop is when the officers come out with their guns already drawn, and it’s not like they turn their lights on and walk up to your window nicely and say, “Hey, I want to talk to you.” They’re concerned and want to make sure they get home to their families. So they come out with their guns drawn, and they have all of their lights on. They have special take down lights. They have special spotlights. They want to see every aspect of the car. And at the trial, the testimony was the officer saw my client, who was seated in the back of the vehicle, holding a firearm essentially over his shoulder, and kind of turned a little bit and throw his firearm over his shoulder into the back compartment of the car. And it went basically from the passenger component of the car into the trunk. They said they ordered my client out of the car, they secured him, they spoke with him, and my client maybe made some incriminating statements, according to the officers. And then the officers searched the trunk and found a gun sitting right there in the open compartment. Seeing this, the officers charged my client with carrying a concealed firearm. So instantly, when I was hired for that case, a couple of questions went through my mind. Question one was, I’m not really sure how concealed that is. Question two was, if it is concealed, is that firearm considered carried? Is that on the person or so near to the person that it’s readily accessible and considered on the person? Those are the two things the prosecutor has to establish. During the testimony at the trial, surprisingly, no one knew how the firearm got from the passenger part of the vehicle into the trunk. And we all probably can surmise how it happened—these backseats have these fold-back seats, and you can reach right into the trunk if you wanted to. For whatever reason, and it kind of surprised me in the middle of the trial, but there were really no photographs of what these seats looked like, just testimony of my client dropping something over his shoulder. There were no measurements performed when the firearm was seized. No pictures taken. So all you have was the officer’s word saying the guy dropped something over his shoulder, and then I found, when I cross-examined them, the officers could not clearly tell us where it was found in the trunk. So I told the judge, “That raises some issues.” The issue that it raises is, if they were going to consider that a concealed firearm, how could they show that my client could easily reach that? I don’t even know how it got back there. I don’t know if it was a big hole, a little hole. I don’t know if he could fit his body in there. In the end, the court agreed—although I think the court reluctantly agreed. I think the court was concerned about the facts in that case. The court had to abide by the law, and with the law as it is, the state wasn’t able to prove that my client could have accessed that firearm because there was no testimony that showed that. So the bottom line is, I think my client especially walked into that case thinking things weren’t going to be particularly great for him. Don’t ever do your own lawyering. Don’t ever do your own thinking. I mean, you can have some common sense and kind of see a picture on the wall and realize, “This isn’t very good.” But don’t ever wave the white flag before you hire a lawyer. Hire a lawyer. Have somebody do the work for you. Have somebody do the research because amazing things can happen when somebody sits down and dedicates themselves to defending you. In that set of circumstances, things worked out really well.   BP: All right. Anything else on firearms?   MK: No. BP: All right. You’ve been listening to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast with the Bauer, Crider, and Parry Law Firm, and we’ve been speaking to Tampa Firearms Defense Attorney Mike Kenny. 

Brad Post: Welcome to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast. We are speaking to Tampa Drug Crimes Attorney Mike Kenny. Mike, how are you doing today?   Mike Kenny: I’m doing well. How are you doing?   BP: Good. Well, we’ve been in this series on drug crimes. We’ve talked about cocaine. We’ve talked about marijuana. We’ve talked about the overview. Today we’re going to be talking about prescription pills, and just kind of the other drugs.   MK: Right, and this is probably the category that has, in the past five years, risen steadily. I think it’s because of the ease of access—anybody could open up their bathroom cabinet or their aunt’s bathroom cabinet, and they’re probably going to find these controlled substances. As a result, the ease of access has made it a bigger problem for law enforcement and definitely a bigger problem for young adults. These controlled substances are pills that you might get a prescription for from your doctor such as oxycodone, hydrocodone—even morphine, which is a lot higher-powered of a substance—those items are punishable if you do not have a prescription. It’s really called “possession of a controlled substance without a prescription”. And those crimes are punished the same way as possession of cocaine, for instance. They’re third-degree felonies, and they’re punishable by up to five years in prison. And weight is significant here, because if a person has a significant weight of that controlled substance, simple possession can bring you into a trafficking amount. I mentioned in a podcast some time ago about a person who might be an addict—an addict who has maybe taken a jar of pills of oxycodone when they were visiting a friend’s house or a relative’s house—and they have this legally obtained jar of pills that is no longer in the house where it should be. They can be charged—even though they’re addicted and plan on using it themselves—with a trafficking amount of possession and sent to prison for a minimum of three years. The trafficking statute, the way it’s laid out, addresses all of these types of controlled substances. It’s any person who possesses a minimum of four grams of more of any morphine, opium, oxycodone, hydrocodone, hydromorphone, or any salt, derivative, isomer, or salt of an isomer thereof, including heroine, is guilty of trafficking. Four grams or more or any mixture containing any such substance but less than 30 grams commits a felony of the first degree, punishable by three years with the Department of Corrections and a $50,000 fine. The next level up from that, 14 grams or more but less than 28 grams, is a 15-year mandatory prison sentence and a $100,000 fine. I will tell you, it’s not impossible to get 14 grams in one or two pill bottles. For 28 grams or more but less than 30 kilograms is a 25-year minimum mandatory prison sentence and a $500,000 fine.   BP: And those are all listed at the 893.135 trafficking statute?   MK: Right. And that last level is 30 kilograms or more, and that’s the same thing as cocaine—it’s a life felony.   BP: Wow. And what are some of the other drugs that you see?   MK: Some other things that come up, which I’ve found to be very common, are Xanax—the brand name for alprazolam, which is the generic term for it—that’s a third-degree felony to possess. That’s not punished as a trafficking amount. It doesn’t matter the weight in that scenario; you can’t have a trafficking amount of Xanax. But it’s something that, the more it is (the more you have), the prosecutor might be thinking you’re not using it for private consumption and might want to consider a sentence that might be appropriate based on the weight. So I don’t want to say the weight is completely irrelevant, but it doesn’t bring you into a trafficking amount. What else you see now is—and we’ve all probably heard about it; you’ve seen it on TV shows—is meth. Crystal meth is something that is very cheap to acquire, cheap to produce, and you find it in a lot of communities where these people are making these items. It’s a very dangerous drug. You see the effect that it’s having on these individuals, and it’s punished very severely. Just the chemicals—just having a combination of chemicals, maybe like Sudafed and a couple of different items together—can get you a charge of a felony, which is called “possession of listed chemicals” because there’s been an all-out desire to eradicate that drug and make it very difficult to create. That’s why, when anyone goes into the store and buys these Sudafeds and stuff like that, they basically have to sign their name on a list, and that list is actually put into a database where, if law enforcement was to view later who made certain purchases at certain times, they can do that because it’s a problem they’re trying to get their head around.   BP: Anything else, Mike, on these other types of drugs?   MK: No.   BP: All right. You’ve been listening to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast, and this is Mike Kenny, Tampa Drug Crimes Attorney with the Bauer, Crider, and Parry Law Firm.  You can find out more on their website atFloridaDefense.com.

Brad Post: Welcome to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast. We are speaking to Tampa Cocaine Defense Lawyer Mike Kenny with the Bauer, Crider, and Parry Law Firm. How are you doing, Mike?   Mike Kenny: I’m doing well. How are you?   BP: Well let’s kind of talk about today. We’ve talked about an overview of the three different categories of drug crimes. We’ve talked about marijuana. Now let’s talk about cocaine. Crack cocaine. Is it kind of the same? Different categories?   MK: Yes, we do have different categories. The first thing we should point out is that cocaine or crack, as a lot of people might refer to it—that hard, rock-like substance that has a cocaine mixture in there—both are treated exactly the same. There isn’t a harsher punishment for one versus the other.   BP: Whether it’s a powder or a rock, I guess?   MK: Exactly. Whether it’s in powder or rock form, what’s punished in the state of Florida is the ingredient that makes it illegal, and it doesn’t matter because with the way the statute is written, it’s “any mixture thereof.” So it can be a mixture of anything, and if it has cocaine in it, then you have yourself in a situation where you’ve got a possession of a controlled substance. It kind of reminds me—talking about that “any mixture thereof”—when I was a prosecutor several years ago, I had a very unique trial where an individual literally had a bag of baby powder. It was 99.9% baby powder, and for whatever reason—and you kind of figure out why these folks do what they do—but for whatever reason, there was just a pinch of cocaine added to that powder. And I don’t know if the pinch was added so it would look like it for testing, but it was going to be sold to basically trick someone who was buying it. But whatever the reason, there was just this very small amount, and I remember when we sent that item away for testing, they said they had to take several testings that came out powder, powder, powder, powder, and there was just one small—I mean not even maybe one-tenth of a gram that they were able to find—and it tested positive for cocaine. Now, I can tell you that, if you wanted to be an absolute literalist to the statute, because there was one-tenth of a gram of cocaine in there “and any mixture thereof”, and then you weigh the entire amount—and the entire amount could be 30 grams or 40 grams—that person was facing a trafficking charge of cocaine for having one-tenth of a gram, a very decimally small amount of cocaine mixed in this bag. I will say the prosecutor has discretion, and in that particular set of circumstances, we decided not to prosecute that person with a trafficking charge. But it’s a dangerous scenario when people start thinking all they have to be concerned about is the amount of the drug. But it’s not the amount of the drug, it’s whatever it’s mixed with to make it the product that is that’s penalized, and that’s what’s weighed—the total product.   BP: So is there the misdemeanor, the felony, the trafficking with cocaine?   MK: Well, with cocaine, there is no misdemeanor possession charge. Now, there is the paraphernalia used to hold the cocaine, to store the cocaine, and to maybe ingest the cocaine—like a pipe that might be used to smoke the cocaine or a crack rock—that would be a misdemeanor. But the actual substance itself is always punished as a third-degree felony, punishable by up to five years in the Department of Corrections. And then, there’s the other level, which is the trafficking level. Like I mentioned in a podcast or two ago, trafficking can be accomplished in a couple of different ways. It can be accomplished by transporting drugs into the state. It can be constituted by selling, so if you sell a certain amount and it’s over a certain weight. Or it can be just simple possession, and when I say simple possession, I mean just being in possession of an item that weighs a certain amount is enough to basically get yourself situated with a trafficking charge. So the minimum amount you have to have to qualify for a trafficking charge is 28 grams. With 28 grams or more, but less than 200 grams—with that comes a three-year minimum mandatory prison sentence if convicted and a $50,000 fine. The next level up from that is 200 grams, so if a person has 200 grams or more but less than 400 grams, that carries with it a seven-year minimum mandatory prison sentence and a $100,000 fine. The next category up from that is 400 grams or more but less than 150 kilograms, and that carries with it a minimum mandatory sentence of 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. And the last one is 150 kilograms or more commits a first-degree felony of trafficking cocaine, and you get life imprisonment. There is nothing less that you can get. I mean, less than 150 kilograms is a significant amount, but it’s also life imprisonment just for possessing that amount.   BP: Okay. Anything else on cocaine?   MK: Just the fact that cocaine is a different drug than marijuana. The one unique thing about it is—the state of Florida, in several cases, has determined that with certain drugs, you can prove they are the drugs that they are just by observation, just by looking at it, maybe by the odor that it has. And marijuana is a drug that qualifies for that. An officer can go into court and basically say, “Based on my training and experience, I can tell you that this green, leafy substance with this distinct green odor is marijuana.” An officer can do that—they don’t have to send it away for testing. In a possession of cocaine case, although officers do have significant training and experience, cases still suggest that a person needs to actually test it (and that means chemically test it). What you have happen a lot in the field is a person gets stopped by law enforcement for whatever reason, the officer encounters the individual, and through the investigation, the officer determines that the person is in possession of cocaine. What the officer will do before he actually arrests the person is he will test it. And he will test it with what’s called a field presumptive kit. A field presumptive kit isn’t really something that would be admissible in court necessarily, because the officer is given this little vial, he throws some of the substance in the vial, shakes it, and it turns a certain color. The officer probably couldn’t even tell you how it works, or how it’s performed, or how reliable it is. So that is the presumptive kit—that’s enough for them to arrest you. That’s enough for them to write an affidavit of probable cause for a judge to review and determine that you should be held in custody or at least get a bond. But what has to happen in a trial, if you’re going to be convicted, is they have to send that off to some agency for testing—they need an actual chemist—and the reason why that’s significant is, what happens over time in a lot of circumstances is that certain things, like crack cocaine, for instance—because it’s a water-based mixture, a lot of times that will dry up. And I can tell you again when I was a prosecutor many years ago, I had a trafficking trial with an individual, and in the case, the person disappeared at one period of time, and he was arrested a long time later, so when he finally went to trial, it was a long time after these drugs were sitting in the evidence locker. And over that period of time, when we had it weighed, the drugs ended up weighing about 27 point something grams, and the number I needed was 28 grams. So it just goes to show that, if it sits in a locker and the water evaporates and then you just have the powder left over, then it ends up weighing less. In that particular case, we had evidence that it was weighed at the sheriff’s office prior to being sent off for testing, so we still were able to meet our requirements. But it’s unique that these things have to be tested—they have to be sent off for weighing and testing, and it’s different than marijuana. A lot of times I don’t make the decision when I’m representing a client until I see those results from law enforcement because there have been cases when people will have what they believe is cocaine and it turns out to be something else, or some other controlled substance. Or it turns out the weight isn’t exactly what people think it is.   BP: All right. Anything else, Mike?   MK: That’s it.   BP: All right. You’ve been listening to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast. We’ve been speaking to Attorney Mike Kenny of the Bauer, Crider, and Parry Law Firm. 

Brad Post: Welcome to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast. We are speaking to Tampa Marijuana Defense Lawyer from Bauer, Crider, and Parry, Mike Kenny. Mike, how are you doing today?   Mike Kenny: I’m doing well. How are you?   BP: Good. Well in the last podcast, we kind of just had a quick one, a drug crimes overview. You talked about the three different categories of crimes, misdemeanor, felony, and trafficking. Today we’re going to be talking about a pretty interesting subject. Marijuana. Cannabis. Pot. Weed. Let’s start there.   MK: All right. Yeah, I think marijuana is an interesting subject. Probably when I was going to law school, I never would have envisioned such a movement that I have seen where different states have actually been successful in having recreational pot use or marijuana use. It’s interesting to me. In this state, there have been attempts to do that, but still, it’s illegal to possess marijuana. It’s illegal to possess marijuana for any use—whether it be medical use or for private use. The possession of marijuana comes in three groupings. The first grouping is simple possession of marijuana, where you’re in possession of marijuana, or a pot plant, or some item that is under a certain weight.   BP: Does that also include certain paraphernalia? A pipe with residue on it, or…   MK: It could. It really depends on the facts and the prosecuting authority. But possession of paraphernalia is technically not a drug in itself. Paraphernalia means a drug used to carry, store, conceal, ingest, or inhale. For instance, a marijuana pipe would be used to inhale or ingest marijuana. So that in and of itself is a misdemeanor of the first degree, and that’s punishable the same way but does not carry with it a driver’s license suspension. So that’s pretty significant with people who are concerned, especially people who may have some significant prior criminal history. Now, if there’s enough residue inside of that pipe—and I’ve seen it happen before, where people are charged with both possession of marijuana and paraphernalia based upon a little oil that’s found, or maybe a little bit of burnt residue that’s found inside the pipe. The prosecuting authority can certainly try to convict somebody based on that if they have it, but the idea is having enough to test it and having enough to show that it actually is something that can be identified as marijuana.   BP: So you said there are three categories, possession…   MK: The next one is felony possession. Felony possession is the possession of any amount of marijuana that’s greater than 20 grams. That would be a more significant amount—it’s a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison for a first-time offense. It’s usually not that significant of a crime; it’s usually a probationary type of sentence. Finally, there’s the trafficking amount of marijuana. Marijuana is unique. It requires a very large amount to be considered trafficking by possession. But the trafficking statute says that any person who is in excess of 25 pounds of cannabis or 300 or more pounds of cannabis plants commits a felony in the first degree known as trafficking. In excess of 25 pounds but less than 2,000 pounds—that’s punishable by three years in the Department of Corrections and a $25,000 fine. If it’s 2,000 pounds but less than 10,000 pounds, or if it’s 2,000 or more cannabis plants, it’s a seven-year minimum mandatory prison sentence and $50,000 fine. And the last category, if it’s 100,000 pounds or more, or is 10,000 or more cannabis plants, the person will be sentenced to a mandatory minimum imprisonment of 15 years in the Department of Corrections and a $200,000 fine. And those are minimum mandatory prison sentences. What that means is that the person serves 100% of that sentence. They don’t get out any earlier than 15 years, for instance, if they are sentenced to that. And the judge has no discretion. If a person is convicted of that charge, the judge must sentence that person subject to a very few exceptions.   BP: Okay. And I’m not trying to encourage our audience by this question, but so you’re saying that if you have 24 pounds—   MK: Then it wouldn’t be trafficking. And that seems like a lot. I mean, marijuana is one of those few drugs that you need a much larger quantity to get into that ultra significant penalty phase, that trafficking amount. For instance, a drug like oxycodone is 4 grams. So we’re talking 4 grams opposed to 28 pounds. A lot of that, I think, is based in large part because, with the marijuana plant in general, there’s a lot of plant materials to that—that thing can get heavy pretty quickly. So that might be part of the reason why there needs to be such a significant amount.   BP: And so, just like in the last podcast we talked about, whether you get a felony or a trafficking, even just possession, the point would be to hire a criminal defense attorney early, right?   MK: Sure, because there are a lot of reasons why you wouldn’t want any kind of conviction, whether it be a misdemeanor or a felony. One of the things that happens is, for every one of these, you’re going to get a driver’s license suspension. And in the state of Florida, we don’t have the same public transportation that they would have in the state of New York. It’s very difficult to maintain a living without the ability to drive to work, drive to school, drive to the store to get what you need like food. So it’s particularly burdensome. Also, to prove possession is unique. A lot of times these possession cases come up involving more than one person, meaning usually it’s not just one person who is stopped. Usually it’s in a group of folks. And a lot of legal issues are raised, because it’s called constructive possession. This comes up when there’s more than one person who could have exercised dominion or control over the substance. It’s very difficult, in my mind, for the prosecutor to prove constructive possession if they don’t have the necessary statements from witnesses or if they don’t have the necessary statements from your client. Some people might think that all is lost and want to just go in and give up, but there’s a lot more to it than just being caught in a car with drugs.   BP: Right. Well, Mike, anything else on marijuana?   MK: No, sir.   BP: All right. You’ve been listening to the FloridaDefense.com Podcast with Attorney Mike Kenny of the Bauer, Crider, and Parry Law Firm.

Brad Post: Welcome to Your Best Defense Podcast. We are speaking to Oklahoma City Criminal Defense Attorney Jacquelyn Ford. Jacqui, how are you doing today?   Jacquelyn Ford: I’m doing very well, thank you.   BP: Good. We have some specific topics we’re going to talk about today, and we’ll just jump right into it. Why would someone need to hire a defense attorney?   JF: Well, certainly if the government is accusing you—or if someone is accusing you of a crime or a wrong against them, you’re going to need someone to be able to defend that. So you want to hire a defense attorney because what criminal lawyers do is very different than what divorce lawyers do. What criminal defense lawyers do is very different than what a car wreck lawyer does. The law is very different, and how we get things done is very different. If you’re hiring a doctor, you want to hire a doctor who specializes in what you need. So you hire a criminal defense attorney to stand up against the man.     BP:  This kind of brings up my next question—when to hire a criminal defense attorney. JF: I think the answer to when is early. As early as you can. There are different things lawyers can do at different stages of the proceedings, and one of the things that our office provides that a lot of criminal defense lawyers don’t provide is something we call pre-filing representation. It’s during the investigative process. While law enforcement is investigating and making a decision on whether or not to file charges, you should have a lawyer right then. You should have someone advocating on your behalf long before they’ve filed the charges and the warrant has been issued, you’ve been arraigned, and now the ball is already rolling. If you’ve waited that long, it’s okay, but certainly if you know that charges might be coming, I would encourage you to contact a criminal defense attorney right away because there are things we can do on the front end to maybe keep the charges from being filed, negotiate an appropriate charge that would be filed. And the people who are making the decision—you know, the District Attorney’s office—the more information they have, the better, more informed decision they can make, too. So they appreciate it when counsel comes forward early, and it shows a lot of things about the client. It shows they are very interested in taking this seriously, that they are going to step up and do what they need to do. It shows initiative. These are all good things. A lot of people, I think, are afraid that hiring a criminal defense lawyer, especially before charges are filed, might mean that they look guilty or something. I’ve heard that, and I think that’s a very unfortunate misperception. My friends in law enforcement, if they’re in trouble, they’re hiring a lawyer early, not late. Part of the things that we do in a pre-filing representation is that we check every day. When we’re representing someone on a pre-file basis, we check warrants morning, afternoon, and evening. Anna, our office manager and my assistant who we adore, takes that part of her job very seriously. She has a list, and every morning when she comes in, it’s one of the first things she does. Do we have any live warrants today? That matters because, if the warrant has gone active, then you don’t have to wait for them to come get you. We can help set you up with a bondsman and do a surrender. It’s a much less traumatic experience for the client. We set you up with a bondsman, they take you over to the jail, and it’s all pre-arranged—it’s called a walk-through. So you’re not being arrested and placed in handcuffs and dragged downtown in the back of a police car. They’re not showing up at your home and taking you from your family or your job. You are self-surrendering, so it takes some of the trauma and the stress off of the client too, to be able to do it that way. We notify the client and arrange for a surrender, hopefully within 24 hours. We don’t ever want to be seen as fleeing or running, but clients have to make arrangements with their jobs and their families too, so we make arrangements and they surrender that morning. If the charges are here in Oklahoma County, you are arraigned that afternoon—every county does things differently. But you will know what’s going to happen. My best advice is to contact a lawyer as early as you can so you can start getting good advice. The sooner the better. It’s not going to help you to wait because the waiting creates the snowball, the traumatic arrest, the traumatic experience.  The people don’t know how the system works. That’s why you hire a criminal defense lawyer—this is what I do every single day. I know how it works, and if I don’t know, I know the person to call to find out.   BP: All right, you’ve been listening to Your Best Defense Podcast with Attorney Jacquelyn Ford, and you can check out her firm at www.fordlawokc.com.