Legal Question in Criminal Law in Florida

unlawful imprisonment

I was arrested at a hotel in orlando for an outstanding warrant from 1999. I was arrested in dec 2005. My case was dissmissed in mid march due to the fact that the information was filed after the statute of limitations expired. My criminal attorney said the state took over 3 months of my freedom from me. many people have said I should file a civil suit against the state of fl. Is this grounds for that?


Asked on 8/23/06, 1:43 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Richard Hornsby Richard E. Hornsby, P.A.

Re: unlawful imprisonment

The defense of of raising the Statute of Limitations is an affirmative defense, meaning it must be raised by your attorney. Failure to raise it is means you have waived it. Therefore the State did nothing wrong with continuing forward.

Quite frankly you should be more concerened with your attorney. The fact it took him three months to identify the SOL defense and to move to dismiss based upon it is borderline ineffective.

So, no I do not believe you have much of a civil suit. You should have had a bond and if not, your attorney was acting poorly.

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Answered on 8/23/06, 2:11 pm


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