{"id":108,"date":"2017-10-10T12:07:23","date_gmt":"2017-10-10T16:07:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tampacriminallawyer.net\/?p=108"},"modified":"2026-01-07T12:37:36","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T17:37:36","slug":"florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida Appeals Court Affirms Aggravated Battery Conviction but Overturns Conspiracy to Deliver Cannabis Conviction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The punishments for Florida drug crimes are often harsh. The legislature has not only criminalized the possession of illegal drugs but also has criminalized a plan, or conspiracy, to sell illegal drugs. As shown in a recent Tampa drug crime case, law enforcement attempted to convict a defendant for conspiracy to deliver cannabis, even though there was likely never any intent to actually make a drug sale.Three friends from the Tampa area made arrangements to meet the defendants to acquire cannabis. One of the passengers called the co-defendant multiple times to find out where to meet. When they arrived at the designated meeting spot, there was no one to meet them. After five or six minutes, the passenger called again. The conversation was suspicious, and the passengers continued to wait in the car. The defendants walked up to the vehicle, where one of the passengers held cash out of the door. The defendant approached the vehicle with a square piece of paper to distract one of the passengers. Instantaneously, the co-defendant pulled a gun from his waistband. The driver sped away but only made it a few feet before the co-defendant fired and shot one of the passengers in the face, causing serious permanent injuries. Florida&#8217;s Second District Court of Appeals <a href=\"http:\/\/www.2dca.org\/opinions\/Opinion_Pages\/Opinion_Pages_2017\/October\/October%2006,%202017\/2D16-1035.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">affirmed<\/a> the defendant&#8217;s aggravated battery conviction but overturned his conspiracy to deliver cannabis conviction.<\/p>\n<p>Although the co-defendant physically committed the battery offense, Florida law criminalizes accomplices to a battery. The State is required to prove that the defendant intended for the battery to occur and did some act or said some words that assisted or furthered the battery.<\/p>\n<p>The court of appeals <a href=\"http:\/\/www.2dca.org\/opinions\/Opinion_Pages\/Opinion_Pages_2017\/October\/October%2006,%202017\/2D16-1035.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">found<\/a> the evidence at trial to be sufficient. It was possible that both defendants created the cannabis sale as a ruse to commit another crime. The defendant also acted as a distraction so that the co-defendant had time to retrieve his firearm from his pants and shoot one of the victims. It appeared as though it were a pre-planned, coordinated effort in which the defendant intended to participate.<\/p>\n<div class=\"read_more_link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/\"  title=\"Continue Reading Florida Appeals Court Affirms Aggravated Battery Conviction but Overturns Conspiracy to Deliver Cannabis Conviction\" class=\"more-link\">Continue Reading \u203a<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The punishments for Florida drug crimes are often harsh. The legislature has not only criminalized the possession of illegal drugs but also has criminalized a plan, or conspiracy, to sell illegal drugs. As shown in a recent Tampa drug crime case, law enforcement attempted to convict a defendant for conspiracy to deliver cannabis, even though [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1387,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aggravated-battery","category-drug-trafficking"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>FL Appeal: Aggravated Battery &amp; Pot Case<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Facing aggravated battery or cannabis charges in Florida? Find out how this appeals ruling could shape your case and defense options.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"FL Appeal: Aggravated Battery &amp; Pot Case\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Facing aggravated battery or cannabis charges in Florida? 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Find out how this appeals ruling could shape your case and defense options.","twitter_image":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/fl-appeals-aggravated-battery-cannabis-conspiracy.webp","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Hanlon Law, PA","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/"},"author":{"name":"Hanlon Law, PA","@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8b1bbe17dcab105246cd4cb867e91837"},"headline":"Florida Appeals Court Affirms Aggravated Battery Conviction but Overturns Conspiracy to Deliver Cannabis Conviction","datePublished":"2017-10-10T16:07:23+00:00","dateModified":"2026-01-07T17:37:36+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/"},"wordCount":578,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/fl-appeals-aggravated-battery-cannabis-conspiracy.webp","articleSection":["Aggravated Battery","Drug Trafficking"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/","url":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/","name":"FL Appeal: Aggravated Battery & Pot Case","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/florida-appeals-court-affirms-aggravated-battery-conviction-overturns-conspiracy-deliver-cannabis-conviction\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/fl-appeals-aggravated-battery-cannabis-conspiracy.webp","datePublished":"2017-10-10T16:07:23+00:00","dateModified":"2026-01-07T17:37:36+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.criminalattorneytampa.net\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8b1bbe17dcab105246cd4cb867e91837"},"description":"Facing aggravated battery or cannabis charges in Florida? 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