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Amended Law Provides Additional Ways to Avoid Prison

By Ron Chapman

          Earlier this month, I published an article on this website entitled Florida Sentencing and Drug Court Programs in which I noted that if a criminal defendant has more than 44 total sentence points on the sentencing guidelines, he is supposed to be sentenced to state prison.             But on July 1st of this year, the Florida Legislature amended Florida Statute Section 948.20 ["Drug offender probation"] in such a way that some individuals who might previously have been sentenced to prison can now instead be placed on drug-offender probation or into a treatment-based drug court program.  Section 948.20 now provides that:             "If it appears to the court upon a hearing that the defendant is a chronic substance abuser whose criminal conduct is a violation of [Florida Statute Section] 893...continue to full post

Full post as published by Palm Beach Criminal Defense Blog on October 25, 2009 (boomark / email).