Aggravated Assault with a Firearm and Carrying an Unlicensed Firearm Dismissed in Pompano Beach
Scott L. was arrested at gunpoint by the Broward County Sheriff’s Office for charges of aggravated assault with a firearm and carrying an unlicensed concealed firearm. We got both charges dismissed and Scott was able to his job and protect his reputation.
Scott is a 45-year-old blue collar worker who was never arrested before in his life. Scott was petrified by his situation and did not want to hurt anyone. Scott was afraid of being charged with a felony, as that could affect his job and reputation.
Scott was walking to his car one morning before work in Pompano Beach when he got into an argument with a man outside his house. The man was a traffic control worker who was putting up construction signs around his development.
Noticing the argument, two other construction workers came over to see what was going on. The three men were rude and nasty to Scott, but they parted ways and Scott forgot about the incident.
The next morning, Scott left his house at 8:50 a.m., but then a car drove by and stopped on the street to block him in his driveway. The same guy from the previous morning got out of the car and soon the other two workers joined him. They converged around Scott’s car, yelling and screaming at him. Scott was already inside his car, but got out to address the situation.
After a few more minutes of yelling, Scott got back in his car and tried to drive away. As he was pulling out, the three men walked onto Scott’s property and threw their hard hats on the grass. The men became aggressive, trying to aggravate Scott and get him to leave his car. Scott didn’t know what to do and wanted the situation to end, so he got out of his car and pulled a gun on the three men in self-defense.
Scott tried to rack the gun, but did not know how to do it properly. Scott was shaking and terrified, as he did not know how to best handle the situation. As Scott racked the gun, it jammed, and three bullets fell on the ground. The three men started laughing at Scott and called him names. Amused by the situation, the three men walked away and Scott got back in his car.
Normally, Scott has a gun case in his car where he keeps his gun securely encased. Rushing to work, Scott put his gun in the mesh pocket on the back of the driver’s seat. Scott was at work for the entire day, forgetting about the incident with the three men that morning and not remembering that his gun was in the seat pocket.
When Scott drove to his Pompano Beach home that afternoon, he was met by police officers waiting outside his house. Unbeknownst to Scott, the Broward Sheriff’s Office (BSO) was investigating the case all day after the three men called the cops that morning. During their investigation, the police officers found out Scott’s license was suspended.
Police officers surrounded Scott’s car with M4 assault rifles, yelling and inciting fear in Scott. Scott immediately told the cops what happened, but the cops shut him down and kept saying they were arresting him due to his license and that they weren’t talking about it or even asking him any questions. The police automatically believed what the three men had said, and did not let Scott make his case, resulting in an unfair and dishonest investigation. Scott was arrested and charged with aggravated assault with a firearm and carrying a concealed firearm.
In reality, Scott’s license was only suspended due to a clerical error in which he paid for a ticket and the clerk did not check the box off correctly. Even though the suspension was not his fault, the police officers used it as a reason to pull Scott over a block from his house to arrest him.
Scott’s mom found our firm online and hired us immediately. Scott’s mom came in with him for the first consultation.
The day Scott got out of jail he looked to see if any of his neighbors had surveillance cameras. His neighbor directly across the street had two cameras, but Scott had problems getting the videos from both. The first camera, that would have shown the entire incident, was not plugged into a power source. The second camera, which showed 95% of the incident, could not be downloaded. Scott, however, took a video of the second surveillance camera’s film on his phone that proved that the three men had, at minimum, committed trespassing and, at maximum, committed a burglary.
We also obtained body camera videos from the police officers on the investigation. The workers called the police to the scene after Scott left for work. The videos showed the police officers rushed to a judgment of Scott and didn’t even try to find surveillance videos of the incident. The body camera videos even showed the officers talking badly about Scott and siding with the three workers.
We took the body camera and surveillance video evidence to the case filing department, and the case filer agreed to drop the aggravated assault charge. He would not drop the concealed weapon charge, though, claiming Scott had all day to put the gun back into his lock box and failed to do so. We argued that Scott did what any normal person would do when put in a stressful situation. But the case filer would not budge.
As we were working Scott’s case, the BSO filed a risk protection order in an attempt to take away Scott’s gun, saying that Scott was dangerous. We talked to BSO’s lawyer and showed her the surveillance videos, and she had the order dismissed immediately. We also put pressure on the sheriff’s office and decided to go to the case filer’s supervisor and show her the evidence. The supervisor agreed with us, and dismissed the concealed weapons charge.
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