Editorial Standards

Legal information is only useful if readers can check it. This page explains how our content is researched, written, updated, and corrected.

How guides are researched

We start from primary sources and work outward:

1. Primary law: the Florida Statutes, the Florida Constitution, the Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, and decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court and Florida courts.
2. Official agencies: for example the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, the Sixth Judicial Circuit, the Pinellas County Clerk of the Circuit Court, and the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office.
3. Secondary sources: used only for context, never as the sole support for a statement about what the law requires.

How sources are cited

Statements about penalties, deadlines, and procedures name the statute or rule they come from and link to the official text. Each guide ends with a list of the sources used.

Who writes the guides

Guides are written by the Pinellas Criminal Law editorial team. They are not written or reviewed by an attorney unless the guide says so and names the reviewer. We do not display credentials, reviews, or endorsements that we cannot verify.

How we write

• Plain English, with legal terms defined and linked to the glossary.
• A direct answer first, then the detail and the exceptions.
• No promises about outcomes and no fear-based language.
• Statutory maximums are described as maximums, not as predictions.

Updates

Every guide shows the date it was last updated. A separate “last reviewed” date appears only when the guide was actually re-checked against its sources. We do not change dates to make a page look newer.

Corrections

If we find an error, or a reader reports one, we check it against the primary source and correct the page. To report an error, use the contact page and tell us the page and the statement you believe is wrong.

Education, not legal advice

Everything on this site is general information. It is not legal advice, it is not tailored to any person’s situation, and it does not create an attorney-client relationship. See the disclaimer.

Tools

Our interactive tools are educational. They do not predict outcomes or determine eligibility for anything, and what you enter into them stays in your browser. See our methodology.