Order Granting Defendant Rule 3.850 Motion & Vacating Sentence

The client violated his probation and was arrested. He was represented by private counsel. He denied the allegations in the affidavit of violation of probation and proceeded to a violation of probation hearing. After the hearing the trial court found the client willfully and substantially violated his probation and sentenced him to 20-years in prison.

The client’s wife hired The Law Office of Robert Malove after the client filed a pro-se rule 3.850 motion, a pro-se amended 3.850 motion, and a pro-se supplemental 3.850 motion. After obtaining the client’s entire case file, reviewing all the transcripts, and all his pro-se motions, we determined that the client overlooked and failed to raise his only meritorious claim in any of his pro-se motions. A review of the case file showed that our clients trial attorney attempted to inform the trial court before the VOP hearing that the State offered a plea of 10-years and he never had a chance to advise the client about this offer. The State, however, advised the trial court that the plea was no longer on the table and that trial counsel was told that the offer would be revoked if the State had to prepare for the VOP hearing and subpoena all of the witnesses.

Upon learning this, we filed a third amended Rule 3.850 alleging trial counsel was ineffective for failing to advise the client about the 10-year plea offer. The trial court granted us an evidentiary hearing and at the conclusion of the evidentiary hearing the trial court made a finding that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to advise the client about the 10-year plea offer and re-sentenced the client to 10-years in prison.

It was a very emotional moment when the judge re-sentenced our client and reduced his sentence from 20-years to 10-years. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. The client’s expiration of sentence date went from 2032 to 2022. He will be home much sooner than later and we were happy to assist him in achieving it.

Attention to detail, continuing in our studies of the law and most of all, caring about what we do is what continues to bring our clients success.

[Related] Take a Look at the Order Granting Defendant Rule 3.850 Motion and Vacating Sentence

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