DUI
Breath and blood testing, field sobriety, and the administrative license suspension that runs on its own clock at the DHSMV.
IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE
ELEVENTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT
IN AND FOR MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA
ELEVENTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT
IN AND FOR MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA
The State of Florida,
Plaintiff,
v.
Your name,
Defendant.
Defendant.
CASE NO. ______________
Former prosecutor · Based in Miami · All of Florida
I used to sit at the State's table.Now I sit at yours.
Every criminal case in Florida begins the same way: a filing attorney at the State Attorney's Office reads a police report and decides what to charge. That was my job. I know which cases get filed, which ones fall apart, and how to reach that decision before your name is ever typed onto an information.
Miami office · Every Florida courthouse · Free consultation · Se habla español
The other side of the file
Knowing the law is the minimum.
Knowing the office is the advantage.
A prosecutor's file is built long before you ever see a courtroom. Here is what happens on that side of the aisle — and what I do about it.
How the State builds a caseHow we take it apart
The first plea offer is calibrated to a file, a score sheet, and a division's standard practice.
We know what that division's offers actually look like, where the room is, and when the first number is not the real one.
Officers write reports expecting they will never be questioned line by line.
Florida permits depositions in felony cases. We take them under oath, on the record, and build motions out of what does not hold.
Stops, searches, and statements are written up in the language most likely to survive review.
We test each one against the Fourth and Fifth Amendments and litigate out what should never have entered the case.
Volume is the system's default. Files move; people become case numbers.
One attorney handles your matter start to finish, and you have her number.
The pre-file window is the part most people miss
An arrest is not a charge. Between the two there is a window in which the State decides whether to file at all, what to file, and how many counts. Clients who reach a lawyer inside that window are sometimes never charged. If you have been arrested and formal charges have not been filed yet, call today — not after your arraignment.
Practice areas
Every area of criminal law in Florida state court.
Drug offenses
Possession through trafficking, including constructive possession, search issues, and drug court and diversion eligibility.
Theft & property crimes
Petit and grand theft, burglary, dealing in stolen property, criminal mischief, and restitution negotiation.
Violent offenses
Battery, aggravated battery, assault, robbery, and homicide — including self-defense and Stand Your Ground litigation.
Domestic violence
Injunction hearings, no-contact orders, and the collateral consequences that arrive long before any verdict does.
Weapons & firearms
Carrying offenses, possession by a convicted felon, and the mandatory minimums that make early strategy decisive.
Sex offenses
Defense at every stage, from the first detective's call through trial, with close attention to registration exposure.
White collar & fraud
Identity theft, credit card fraud, organized scheme to defraud, and investigations that begin long before any charge is filed.
Violations of probation
No bond as of right, a lower burden of proof, and the same judge who sentenced you. These are won on preparation.
Juvenile
Delinquency proceedings, diversion, and protecting a record before it follows a young person into adulthood.
Traffic offenses
Driving while license suspended, reckless driving, racing, fleeing and eluding, and leaving the scene — criminal charges that arrive looking like tickets.
Appeals & post-conviction
Direct appeals, motions to withdraw plea, sentence corrections, and 3.850 relief.
Where I practice
Based in Miami.
Serving all of Florida.
Home office
Miami-Dade
Eleventh Judicial Circuit
Miami · Hialeah · Miami Beach · Coral Gables · Kendall · Homestead · Aventura
Broward
Seventeenth Judicial Circuit
Fort Lauderdale · Hollywood · Pembroke Pines · Pompano Beach · Coral Springs
Palm Beach
Fifteenth Judicial Circuit
West Palm Beach · Boca Raton · Delray Beach · Boynton Beach · Jupiter
Monroe
Sixteenth Judicial Circuit
Key West · Marathon · Plantation Key · Key Largo · Islamorada
My office is in Miami, and that is where most of my cases are filed. The rest are a drive or a flight, and I make it. The courthouse changes; nothing about how your case is handled does.
All 67 Florida counties
Alachua · Baker · Bay · Bradford · Brevard · Broward · Calhoun · Charlotte · Citrus · Clay · Collier · Columbia · DeSoto · Dixie · Duval · Escambia · Flagler · Franklin · Gadsden · Gilchrist · Glades · Gulf · Hamilton · Hardee · Hendry · Hernando · Highlands · Hillsborough · Holmes · Indian River · Jackson · Jefferson · Lafayette · Lake · Lee · Leon · Levy · Liberty · Madison · Manatee · Marion · Martin · Miami-Dade · Monroe · Nassau · Okaloosa · Okeechobee · Orange · Osceola · Palm Beach · Pasco · Pinellas · Polk · Putnam · St. Johns · St. Lucie · Santa Rosa · Sarasota · Seminole · Sumter · Suwannee · Taylor · Union · Volusia · Wakulla · Walton · Washington
Police investigations
A call from a detective
is not a courtesy.
By the time an officer wants to hear your side, a file already exists and you are in it. Nothing you say gets you out of that file — it only decides what goes in. The most valuable work in a criminal case happens here, before an arrest, while the record is still being written.
I represent people who have not been charged with anything: targets, suspects, and the merely nervous. I speak to the agency so you do not have to, find out what they actually have, and put what helps you in front of the people making the decision — the detective, and then the filing attorney.
Talk to me before you talk to them- “We just want your side of the story”
- There is no off-the-record conversation with law enforcement. You are not obligated to give one, and declining is not evidence of anything.
- An invitation to come in voluntarily
- Voluntary means you may leave — and it also means no lawyer was appointed, because you have not been charged. Bring your own.
- A search warrant, or a request for your phone
- Consent and a warrant are not the same thing, and what you hand over voluntarily is far harder to suppress later.
- A recorded call from someone you know
- Controlled calls are a routine investigative tool. They are recorded, and the person on the other end is not calling to catch up.
- An arrest that has not happened yet
- If a warrant is coming, it can often be handled by arranged surrender with bond already addressed, rather than by patrol officers at your door or your workplace.
Sealing & expunging records
The case ended.
The record did not.
A dismissed case still surfaces in a background check. It shows up when you apply for a job, a lease, a professional license, or immigration relief. Florida gives you a way to close it — usually only once in your lifetime, which is exactly why it is worth doing correctly the first time.
I handle the eligibility analysis, the application to FDLE, and the petition and hearing in the county where the case was filed.
Find out if you qualify- Expunging
- Generally available where the charge was dropped, never filed, or resolved in your favor. The agencies holding the record destroy it; FDLE retains one confidential copy.
- Sealing
- Generally available where adjudication was withheld and no conviction was entered. The record continues to exist but is closed to public inspection.
- The certificate of eligibility
- Both routes begin with an application to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement — a paperwork-driven process in which small errors cost months.
- What disqualifies a case
- An adjudication of guilt on any charge, certain enumerated offenses regardless of outcome, and any prior sealing or expunction. Eligibility is fact-specific and worth confirming before you file anything.
- Automatic and juvenile routes
- Some outcomes qualify for automatic sealing or for juvenile-specific relief without a petition at all. Worth checking before you pay anyone.
What happens next
A Florida case, in the order it actually unfolds.
Nothing about this process is designed to be legible from inside it. Here is the sequence, and where the real openings are.
Arrest
Booking
Say nothing beyond identifying yourself. The interview that happens here becomes evidence, and it is the part of a file I most often wish I could undo for a client.
Within 24 hrs
First appearance
A judge reviews probable cause and sets bond or conditions of release. Counsel at this hearing can change the number, the conditions, and whether you go home.
Pre-file
The State decides whether to charge
The filing attorney reviews the report, the evidence, and anything defense counsel brings. Cases get no-actioned, reduced, or quietly closed here — and most people still have not hired a lawyer.
Arraignment
Formal charges are read
A not-guilty plea is entered and the case is assigned to a division. The speedy trial clock starts running: 90 days for a misdemeanor, 175 for a felony.
Discovery
Evidence, then depositions
We demand the State's file — reports, video, lab work, witness lists — and in felony cases put officers and witnesses under oath before trial. Cases are frequently won here rather than at trial.
Motions
Suppress, dismiss, exclude
An unlawful stop, a defective search, a statement taken without warning, or facts that never amounted to a crime. A granted motion can end the case outright.
Resolution
Dismissal, diversion, plea, or trial
Every one of these stays on the table until you close it. You decide, with a clear accounting of what each path costs you now and ten years from now.
After
Clearing the record
A good outcome is not the end of it. We move to seal or expunge so the case stops surfacing in background checks. See sealing & expunging.
For victims and their families
The case is the State's.
The harm was yours.
When a crime is committed against you, the prosecution belongs to the State of Florida. You are the witness, not the client. That arrangement is not unfair on its face, but it means your interests are represented only as far as someone carrying two hundred other files has time to represent them.
Marsy's Law gives Florida victims real, enforceable rights — to be informed, present, and heard at every stage; to confer with the prosecutor; to restitution; and to protection from the accused. Rights nobody asserts on your behalf are easy to overlook in a busy division. I assert them, in writing, at every hearing.
I spent years at the State Attorney's Office beside victims and families who had lost loved ones. I know what the system owes you and where it tends to fall short.
Speak with me confidentially- Being kept informed
- Notice of hearings, releases, plea offers, and outcomes — before they happen, not after you read about them.
- A voice in the resolution
- Your position on a plea offer conveyed to the assigned prosecutor and placed on the record, and a victim impact statement prepared properly for sentencing.
- Protection
- Injunctions for protection against domestic, dating, repeat, and sexual violence or stalking, and no-contact conditions enforced when they are broken.
- Depositions and testimony
- Preparation before you are questioned, and someone present who represents you rather than the case.
- Restitution
- Documenting what the offense actually cost you and pursuing an order that reflects it.
Miami-Dade County.
About
Melissa Rodriguez
I began my career at the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office in the County Court division. As Assistant Chief of that unit, I supervised the prosecution of misdemeanor sexual offenses, traffic fatality cases, and DUIs. From there I was promoted to the Felony unit, where I prosecuted cases ranging from third-degree felonies to charges punishable by life in prison. I did not only try those cases; I also decided which ones were worth filing, what the appropriate charges were, and when they should be let go.
Along the way, I learned how charging decisions are really made, what plea negotiations look like from the other side, and how thin some files turn out to be once you open them.
I now use that experience for one purpose: to protect my clients as they navigate the criminal justice system. My practice is criminal defense, representing both those who have been accused of a crime and those who have been victimized by one. My office is based in Miami, the city where my career started, but I carry that practice to courtrooms across Florida, from the Keys to the Panhandle. What clients can expect from me is an honest read on their exposure, a strategy rather than a script, and an attorney who answers the phone.
- Prior serviceMiami-Dade State Attorney's Office
- TriedMisdemeanors through felonies punishable by life
- CourtsFlorida state courts — all 67 counties
- LanguagesEnglish · Español
Contact
If you have been arrested, call before you explain yourself to anyone.
Consultations are free and confidential. The office is in Miami; the practice reaches every courthouse in Florida. If charges have not been filed yet, time matters more than anything else on this page.
- Phone(786) 495-7849
- Emailmelissarodriguezlaw@gmail.com
- Main officeMiami, Florida
- Also servingBroward · Palm Beach · Monroe
- HoursCalls answered nights & weekends
Do not send confidential or time-sensitive details through this form. Submitting it does not create an attorney-client relationship. For anything urgent, call.