Pumphrey Law Blog

March 12, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

Witnesses are incredibly important in criminal cases. Witness testimony provides essential evidence, expert knowledge on dispositive issues, character assessments, and personal knowledge. There are three types of witnesses that generally are called to testify for the state or the defense. These include lay witnesses, expert witnesses, and character witnesses. Lay Witnesses According to Florida Evidence Code 90.701, if a witness …

March 12, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

The metaverse is a hot topic right now. With tech giants like Mark Zuckerberg and Satya Nadella referring to it as the future of the internet, many people are clamoring to get in on the action and predict how it will change life as we know it. Now, what exactly IS the “metaverse”? Well, it’s not a specific, easily definable …

March 12, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

In Florida criminal defense proceedings, defendant can generally take their case to trial before either a judge or a jury of their peers. A trial in front of only a judge is referred to as a “bench trial.” Jury trials are definitely more common and encapsulate the image brought to mind when the public at large hears about a trial. …

March 11, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

Gainesville Initiating ‘Fair Chance Hiring’ to Avoid Rejecting Applicants from Jobs Based on Past Arrests A new law is being proposed in Gainesville that deals with the hiring process. It is meant to ensure that individuals who have been arrested in the past are not prevented from getting hired. In the past, people who have criminal records have had a …

March 10, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

Should Lower Bail Amounts from COVID be Permanent? Officials Debate Over New Stats Showing Crime Rates Didn’t Rise One of the many results from the COVID-19 pandemic was the push to lower the jail population. In Palm Beach County, one of the ways they tried to accomplish this was to lower the cost of bail for defendants. While there was …

March 10, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

Does Police Misconduct or Negligence Automatically Result in Evidence Suppression? Whenever the authorities conduct a search and/or seizure, there are specific rules that need to be followed. If there have been any illegal searches that have taken place, most people assume that the evidence is automatically suppressed and not used during the trial. However, the rules are a bit more …

March 10, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense Social Share

Judicial notice refers to when a court accepts something as a fact without evidence to support its truth. This commonly applies to “common sense” principles like times of sunset and sunrise, known historic events, and the sky is blue. It can also apply to accepting knowledge from official records without other evidence to establish its accuracy, like court records, temperature …

March 10, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense, Drunk Driving/DUI Social Share

Operation Safe Tracks Leads to Citations, Warnings, and Arrests in Palm Beach County Tragic Accidents Last month, Palm Beach County experienced three different accidents within a four-day period that involved a Brightline train striking a vehicle. Brightline is a privately run inter-city train company that runs between Miami and West Palm Beach. The accidents have occurred as a result of …

March 10, 2022 Don Pumphrey, Jr. Criminal Defense, News & Announcements Social Share

Supreme Court Allows Law enforcement to Conduct Warrantless Video Surveillance Amicus briefs filed by the Institute of Free Speech, the Institute for Justice, the Cato Institute and Rutherford Institute, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the American Islamic Congress and Muslim Public Affairs Council urged the Supreme Court to grant the petition for certiorari in the case of United States v. …