Criminal private investigator Miami Florida
If you need a criminal private investigator, McGuinness and Associates is an experienced and talented criminal defense investigation firm in Miami Florida.
Our detectives in Florida or private investigators have years of experience in investigating major crimes such as rape, murder, serious assault, fraud, and any other offences that require complex detection and investigation. Our private investigators have the ability to accurately investigate a diverse selection of criminal cases. Below are examples of our criminal private investigation experience:
DOMESTIC TERRORISM
Mr. McGuinness was a defense team investigator for over 15 months and led a team of two other investigators conducting the Army of God investigation, a component investigation of the overall defense strategy. He worked directly for Birmingham Alabama defense attorney, Richard Jaffe and for lead attorney San Diego based, Judy Clarke, former president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys. Ms. Clarke had previously represented the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski and others over the years in complex federal capital cases.
The criminal defense investigation spanned four states and the review of thousands of items of evidence by McGuinness and other members of the defense team.
The investigation involved arduous hikes in the mountains of North Carolina. Mr. McGuinness and lead criminal private investigator, Bill Proctor hiked to Rudolph's winter and summer camps with FBI agents in order to video-document and photograph the camps which Rudolph utilized over the five years he was on the run from federal authorities. It was the largest federal manhunt in U.S. history.
Rudolph ultimately pled out to multiple life terms in order to avoid the death penalty for his admitted roles in the bombings of the Atlanta Olympics and abortion clinics in Birmingham and the Atlanta area.
Aggravated assault with a firearm
Washington Redskins player, Sean Taylor had been charged with aggravated assault when attempting to recover his own stolen property. He was represented by noted Miami criminal defense attorney Edward Carhart and others.
McGuinness was retained early in the case by Ed Carhart to conduct the criminal defense investigation: interview and obtain statements from key witnesses. He was also responsible for crime scene documentation: photography and for locating some difficult to find witnesses that the defense needed for their case. The State's case ultimately fell apart when it became known that just prior to trial, the state's key witnesses who were the alleged victims were arrested with stolen property quite similar in nature to the property stolen from the NFL star.
Sean Taylor was exonerated and a sad chapter in his life closed. Ironically, he was the victim of a home invasion robbery two years later, and, while protecting his wife and young child, was brutally gunned down in his own home. Sean Taylor was a hero in many ways not only on the ball field. He was an outstanding young man and an inspiration to many.
Investment fraud
We conducted the criminal investigation for counsel representing the former CEO of Premium Sales Corp., a wholesale grocery supply diverter firm. Miami trial attorneys, Nathan Clark and Russell Rosenthal had a monumental task before them.
The Discovery documents alone totaled over two million pages. The client was charged in a 169 count indictment involving money laundering and investment fraud. The case generated a great deal of media coverage including several articles in Forbes and Time magazines and a segment on NBC's Dateline.
The indictment alleged that the defendant defrauded over 1800 investors out of over $200 million. The Miami Herald described the investment scandal as the largest fraud case in Florida's history. As the criminal private investigator, we were responsible for back-grounding hundreds of witnesses and interviewing investors. This was a large and complicated case. We spent countless hours interviewing our client in this highly complex financial fraud case. The case resulted in the CEO - lead defendant, accepting a plea just prior to trial.
Judicial corruption
Our office was retained several years ago as a criminal private investigator by defense counsel, Edward Carhart, then with Miami's prestigious Law Firm of Bailey, Gerstein & Carhart. In addition to Mr. Carhart, a highly respected trial attorney, the firm partners included F. Lee Bailey and former Dade County State Attorney, Richard Gerstein.
We conducted the criminal defense investigation on behalf of the defendant, a Circuit Court criminal judge in this highly publicized judicial corruption case code named "Operation Court Broom".
Mr. McGuinness also testified for the defense as to the layout of the courthouse and judge’s chambers in order to challenge prior wiretap testimony. Several judges were indicted and some were sentenced to prison. This was reportedly the largest judicial corruption case in U.S. history. Our client was acquitted on 30 of 34 counts and the jury was hung on the remaining four counts.
DRUG CONSPIRACY
We were retained several years ago by a South Florida family whose son was serving time in Leavenworth Prison. We were to assist famed criminal appellate attorney, Professor Alan Dershowitz from Harvard Law School by locating and interviewing the government's lead prosecution witness from the Federal criminal trial a few years prior. We were to search in Miami, St. Louis and Nicaragua.
We were successful in locating and interviewing this individual in St. Louis. He was a former bodyguard for a Contra leader and a Federal informant in the drug trade. The case involved highly creative fact finding & witness location techniques as it was rumored that the FBI was looking for this individual for possible violations of the US Neutrality Act, reportedly training Contras.
Aggravated assault against a security guard
We were retained by prominent Miami defense attorney, Joseph Beeler, to assist in the representation of a young woman falsely accused of a felony / aggravated assault against a security guard. The woman was a union representative who helped organize several hundred protesters at a shopping center. The protest turned into a confrontation which drew extensive media coverage.
We conducted interviews and assisted in the editing of a critical videotape. After the defense team provided the State Attorney with the videotape (a compilation of live and slow motion footage from several TV news stations), the prosecution agreed to a Pretrial Intervention program and the case was dismissed. The footage showed our client struggling with the guard as she was forcefully ejected from the premises. Her hands never reached the guard's neck as, claimed, nor was the guard likely in fear for her life.
Continuing criminal enterprise / 28 counts marijuana importation conspiracy
Our firm's criminal private investigator service was retained by well known Miami trial attorney, Edward Carhart, to assist in the defense of a former Vietnam pilot and the owner of a small aircraft rental firm. The client was charged with using a fleet of crop dusters from central Florida to fly to Colombia and Belize, Central America in order to import marijuana into the United States.
The case involved travel by Mr. McGuinness to Belize in order to locate and interview an important government witness. We were successful in locating and interviewing this key witness. The case also involved months of investigative work in central Florida: conducting interviews and background investigations.
FIRST DEGREE MURDER CASE APPEAL
John Doe was receiving pro bono legal representation while sitting on Florida's Death Row for a murder committed 13 years prior in Tampa. He was represented by the prominent Washington DC law firm, O'Melveny & Myers, reportedly one of the ten largest law firms in the world.
We were retained by the firm to conduct the criminal defense investigation into the original murder. We traveled throughout the U.S. locating and interviewing witnesses including a number of never before heard-from witnesses. We successfully assisted winning a new penalty phase trial, whereby the defendant had his sentence commuted to 25 years.
FIRST DEGREE MURDER CASE
Brenton Butler, a 15 year old young man was scooped off the street by police for being black. Police went looking for a young black man who had murdered a Georgia tourist less than two hours earlier. He was put in a police cruiser and taken to the crime scene where the victim's husband positively identified him from fifty feet away as the man who shot his wife. He was represented by someone very close to me, my twin brother, Patrick McGuinness, a Duval County Public Defender for over 30 years. I assisted Pat in the location of two key witnesses for this high profile murder trial.
Pat and his co-counsel, Ann Finnell, also a highly experienced criminal lawyer, did a phenomenal job in representing Brenton. The trial is documented in the film, Murder on a Sunday Morning, which won an Academy Award for Best Documentary feature. I attended the screening in Paris with over 200 French criminal lawyers at the Ministry of Justice and photographed Pat and Ann receiving the Medal of the Paris Bar for their work in representing this young man. It was a memorable experience.
McGuinness and associates Florida is a private investigation agency in Miami Florida and we can help you with your criminal investigations. Many times the outcome of a trial is determined by questions of fact and propositions of law. Our criminal private investigators, retired police officers, homicide investigators have many years’ experience dealing with a broad scope of criminal investigations in Florida.
Our team of Florida criminal private investigators can discover facts and evidence that may refute the elements of the crime charged against the defendant. In most litigation, questions of fact exert greater influence than propositions of law on the litigation's outcome. The government has the burden of proof. They must prove beyond a reasonable doubt all the elements of the crime (propositions of law).