Port St. Lucie, Florida Criminal Attorneys

Nicholas Christopher Ferro was denied a third trial for the death of Marques Butler in 2009.

Ferro's first trial had ended in a hung jury. In his second trial, he was convicted of murder in the second degree last September.

However, he had asked for a third trial with Miami attorney Carlos Gonzalez pointing out several things, the main of which is that the charges should not have been murder in the second degree because of the scant amount of time that Ferro and Butler have known each other before the incident happened.

According to Ferro's defense, a murder in the second degree charge would require that the perpetrator and victim are familiar with each other thus the need for a time requirement on how long they have known each other basing on the murder laws of Florida.

However, the judge said the amount of time is not required.

With Ferro's demand for a third trial denied, a life imprisonment sentence looms for him.

Kevin Keheley can breathe a sigh of relief after a jury exonerated him of theft.

Keheley was accused of defrauding a man after entering into a contract of developing an application for a smartphone, which he was never able to produce.

The contract was for $17,000 and Keheley was paid up front with $10,000.

Keheley then relocated to Austin but promised to finish the application. This, however, never happened.

Denver criminal lawyer Laurie Schmidt, who defended for Keheley, said that what happened was a business dispute.

Schmidt added that Keheley had no intention of running away from giving back the money that he received as evidenced by emails showing his intention to pay the money back.

Richard Thomas may only be 16 years old but he will be facing the charges filed against him as an adult.

Thomas is facing several charges including "hate crime" after he set another teenager, Luke "Sasha" Fleischman, 18, on fire.

Both were riding on a bus when the incident happened with Fleischman wearing a skirt.

Fleischman's parents said their son does not identify himself either as a male or female.

According to police, Thomas had told them he set Fleischman on fire because he is homophobic.

San Francisco defense attorney Michael Cardoza said his client, Thomas, if convicted would be facing a longer sentence because of the hate crime charge.

Donnell Deshawn Stean was cleared of manslaughter charges for the death of Bernard Howard Jr. whom he shot during an altercation.

The jury had found that Stean had only shot Howard in defense.

Howard was found to have more than the legal limit of alcohol in his blood while Stean had tested positive of an ingredient found in marijuana.

Howard was one of the people whom Stean found in his apartment when he went home on the night of Nov. 3. They were drinking and helping out a roommate of Stean's who was moving out.

The group got upset when Stean hit an older man who was also living in the apartment.

Howard had punched Stean, who retaliated by pulling out his gun.

Sacramento defense attorney Alan Whisenand said his client, Stean, had felt threatened by the group thus his actions.

Stean was also cleared of seriously wounding the female roommate's brother during the incident.

Willie C. Jones will be spending the rest of his life in jail with no chance of parole after the jury convicted him for the death of his daughter.

Before her death, four-year-old Tyasia Phillips, who incurred a head wound, had been connected to a life support after she was severely beaten and burned by the man whom she called dad.

Jones had alleged that his daughter had injured her head when she tried to escape from him.

Augusta attorney Katrell Nash, defending for Jones, appealed to the jury to consider the likelihood that the little girl had gotten the head wound while playing with other kids.

At first, Jones had denied hurting his daughter but later admitted to the crime saying that he had beaten her for her insolence.