Legal Question in Constitutional Law in Florida

The State of Florida passed a law some years back allowing drivers license suspension for failure to pay fines..The law allows them to go back through your entire life and suspend your license even though the statutes did not allow drivers license suspension for the offence at the time..Is this not double jeopardy because they are doing something to you twice??? I know driving is a privilege and that's not my point.. The fact that they are using the same case number to suspend your drivers license for a crime I've already been punished for, years after the fact just because the county I live in is broke and needs money is my point. This seems like clear double jeopardy because, in one way or another, they are coming back years after the facts and doing something to me again on the same case.. Please help me..


Asked on 12/19/10, 5:03 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Edward Hoffman Law Offices of Edward A. Hoffman

You're not facing double jeopardy because you aren't being prosecuted a second time for the same offense. A better question would be whether this is an ex post facto law, because it is retroactively imposing a consequence of your earlier actions. I'm afraid, though, that the answer to that question would also be no.

Retroactively imposing a new *punishment* would violate the Constitution's ban on ex post facto laws, but not every consequence is a punishment. The fines that were originally imposed upon you were a kind of punishment, and had you paid them your license would not be suspended now. The suspension is a direct consequence of your failure to pay the fines, not of the underlying crime. It is only an indirect consequence of the crime -- and it is one you could have avoided. You thus are not being punished a second time.

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Answered on 12/24/10, 12:59 pm


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