A friend of mine was arrested in Florida for transporting cocaine. He was caught with 417 grams and is being told that this much cocaine carries a mandatory 15 year sentence. Is it true that anything over 400 grams carries this sentence? I was trying to find out as 3 different lawyers have given me 3 different numbers.

Yes, it is true that in Florida, conviction for selling, purchasing, manufacturing, delivering possessing or importing into Florida more than 400 grams of cocaine or 400 grams of any mixture of a substance containing cocaine results in a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of 15 calendar years and a fine of $ 250,000. There are sentencing guidelines in Florida which will determine the exact length of your friend''s sentence. If the guidelines come out at less than 15 years, your friend will still be sentenced to 15 years. If the guidelines are higher than 15 years, your friend will be sentenced according to the higher guidelines. That is what is meant by a mandatory minimum sentence. Judges have little or no discretion to depart from these tough sentences. If your friend were to cooperate with the state by providing valuable and incriminating information about other persons, or by setting up other persons to be arrested, the sentence might be able to be reduced. Also, Florida still has parole, so your friend would not only earn good time, but also could be released some years earlier in the discretion of the parole board. Perhaps the different numbers given to you and your friend by the various lawyers pertained to estimates of how much time your friend would actually serve under the guidelines or before being eligible for parole. But the bottom line if he is convicted is, unless he cooperates and turns in someone else, the starting point for the calculation of his sentence will be fifteen years. As a point of comparison, if your friend were to be charged in federal court in Florida (or any other state), there would be no mandatory minimum sentence for 400 grams of cocaine. Under federal law, the mandatory sentencing laws for cocaine do not apply unless the amount is over 500 grams. Amounts between 500 grams and 5 kilograms carry a five year mandatory minumum penalty for a first offense. Amounts over 5 kilograms carry a ten year mandatory minimum sentence. And, it is the state or federal government that decides whether the defendant will be charged in state or federal court, not the defendant!