Released, Then Charged Months Later: A Hillsborough Ruling on Florida’s Speedy Trial Clock

A letter saying the State won’t file charges feels like the end of a case. In a Hillsborough County case the appeals court decided on November 6, 2026, it was the middle of one. The driver got that letter in May 2024. Eight months later the State charged him with trafficking, based on a liquid the officers had taken from his car on the day of the first arrest.

A trial judge found that the delay had run out his speedy trial time and discharged him. The Second District Court of Appeal, which hears appeals from Pinellas, Pasco, Hillsborough, Manatee, Sarasota and DeSoto counties, reversed. The reasoning matters to anyone in Tampa Bay who was arrested, released and is now waiting on a crime lab.

A Traffic Stop, a Sock Under the Hood and a Cup in the Console

According to the opinion, a detective stopped the car on April 16, 2024, for speeding and failing to stay in its lane. In the center console, in plain view, were a two-liter Sprite bottle and a Styrofoam cup, each holding a purple liquid. The detective believed it was hydrocodone. The driver said it was “codeine.” The detective did not have access to a field test that could independently verify whether it contained hydrocodone.

The driver consented to a search. Under the hood, officers found a black sock holding three bags of substances that tested presumptively positive for fentanyl and cocaine. He was arrested that day on those drugs, and two days later the purple liquid went to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for testing.

On May 7, 2024, the State sent a letter of release saying it would not file charges in the fentanyl and cocaine case. FDLE finished its analysis of the liquid on November 26, 2024, and the opinion describes the result as showing it contained codeine. On January 8, 2025, the driver was arrested again and charged by information the same day with trafficking in hydrocodone, 300 grams or more but less than 30 kilograms.

His lawyer moved for discharge under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.191. The trial court granted it. It ruled that the hydrocodone stemmed from the same factual nexus, his possession of controlled substances in his vehicle, which made it part of the same criminal episode. It also found that the State’s dismissal of the other drug charges did not toll the speedy trial period, and that the delay in charging was not reasonable.

What the Appeals Court Decided

The case was decided under the 2024 version of rule 3.191, which gave the State 175 days from arrest to bring a felony to trial. The clock could start on a charge that hadn’t been filed yet if that charge grew out of the same criminal episode as the arrest. So the question on appeal was whether the liquid in the cup and the drugs under the hood were one episode or two.

Judge Atkinson’s opinion says two. The opinion relied on earlier Florida appellate cases holding that crimes belong to the same episode only when they rest on substantially the same acts, and that conduct which is “merely related” isn’t enough. It then drew the line on where and how the drugs were kept:

• The liquid was a different substance from the drugs he was first arrested for.
• It sat in an open Styrofoam cup within reach, with more in the Sprite bottle to refill it, which the opinion read as kept for drinking.
• The fentanyl and cocaine were wrapped in a sock in a closed compartment under the hood, which the opinion read as hidden for transport.
• Nothing in the record showed the drugs were part of one sale or one trip to sell them.

The opinion also said the analysis “depends on the activities of the defendant, not the activities of the police investigating the defendant.” Finding everything during one traffic stop did not make it one episode. And in a footnote, it said the speedy trial period does not begin when probable cause is established; under the old rule, it began when the person was taken into custody as a result of the conduct or criminal episode that gave rise to the crime charged. Because the hydrocodone was a separate episode, the clock on that charge started at the January 8, 2025, arrest, and the discharge order was reversed.

Two details from the opinion are worth knowing. Judges Black and Smith concurred in result only, so they agreed with reversing the discharge without joining Judge Atkinson’s reasoning. And the opinion distinguished an older Second District case where a driver arrested for DUI on a drug was later charged with possessing the same marijuana: the opinion noted that this driver was never charged with DUI for drinking the liquid while driving.

The Rule Changed in July 2025

The Muhammad case is an old-rule case. On March 13, 2025, the Florida Supreme Court rewrote rule 3.191 on its own motion, and the changes took effect July 1, 2025. Four of them matter here:

• The speedy trial time now starts when the person is “formally charged with a crime.” Under the rule, that means an information or indictment, or for a misdemeanor, whatever documents constitute a formal charge. The arrest no longer starts it.
• The old subdivision that barred the State from getting around the rule by dropping a charge and refiling a new one “grounded on the same conduct or criminal episode” was deleted.
• The recapture window grew from 10 days to 30. After the defense files a notice that the speedy trial time has expired, the court holds a hearing within 5 days and, unless a reason in the rule applies, orders trial to start within that window.
• A discharge under the rule is now without prejudice, unless the court finds the constitutional speedy trial right was violated.

Put those together and the fight in Muhammad mostly disappears for a new arrest. If you were arrested last week, released and not yet charged, the rule’s 175 days hasn’t started, however long the lab takes. It starts when the information is filed.

Justice Labarga dissented from the amendment. He wrote that the amendments go further, “potentially placing the start of the speedy trial period even further down the road” and increasing “for affected individuals” the likelihood of what he had described in an earlier dissent as “procedural limbo.” For someone waiting on a lab result, that is a fair description of the months between release and charge.

What Still Protects You While You Wait

The waiting time isn’t entirely unregulated. When the Supreme Court amended rule 3.191, it also amended rule 3.134, which sets the time for filing formal charges.

• If you are held in jail, the State must file formal charges within 30 days of the arrest. If it doesn’t, the court must order release on your own recognizance on the 33rd day, or on the 40th day if the State shows good cause, and no one may be held past 40 days without a formal charge.
• If you are out on pretrial release, the State must file within 60 days of the arrest. If it doesn’t, the court must order release on your own recognizance on the 63rd day, or for good cause may keep you on pretrial release up to another 30 days. Once that time runs out, on a motion with notice to the State, the court shall release you from all requirements of bail and all conditions of pretrial release unless you’ve been formally charged.

That remedy is about your bond, your ankle monitor and your no-contact conditions. It is not a dismissal, and it doesn’t stop the State from filing later. In Muhammad, the State filed eight months after its release letter.

The other protection is the constitutional right to a speedy trial, which has no fixed deadline. Courts weigh the length of the delay, the reason for it, whether you asked for a trial and whether the delay hurt your defense. My speedy trial page explains how that test works and when it is raised.

What the Ruling Doesn’t Decide

• It doesn’t decide whether the driver is guilty. The case goes back to the trial court, and the trafficking charge is an accusation he is presumed innocent of.
• It doesn’t decide whether the liquid contains hydrocodone. The opinion describes the lab result as showing codeine, and the charge is trafficking in hydrocodone; the appeal didn’t turn on that.
• It left open a different set of facts. The court said it did not need to answer whether drugs being carried together for one or more sales would be one episode, because the record had no evidence of that.
• The concurrences mean the reasoning carries the name of one judge. Two judges agreed only with the result.

If You Were Released and Are Waiting on a Lab

Drug cases, pill cases and many blood cases depend on a lab result that can take months. A release with no charges, or a letter saying the State isn’t filing, often means the State is waiting on that result.

• Keep every paper from the arrest and the release: the arrest affidavit, the bond paperwork and any letter of release or no-information notice. The dates on them are the starting point for every deadline above.
• Don’t treat the release as the end. The State may still file once a lab result comes back, as it did here.
• Follow every bond condition until a court releases you from it. The 60-day rule gives a route to have conditions lifted, but it takes a motion.
• Don’t talk to anyone about what was in the car. In Muhammad, what the driver said at the scene, that the liquid was “codeine,” is in the opinion.
• If you are charged, note the date of the formal charge. For a felony that is usually the information, and it is the date the speedy trial rule’s clock starts.

I defend drug charges in St. Petersburg and across Tampa Bay, including trafficking cases with mandatory minimums, and my page on challenging the drug evidence covers the lab side of these cases. A strategy session is where we go through your paperwork and the timeline together.

Common Questions

Can the State charge me after releasing me without charges in Florida?

Yes, it can. In State v. Muhammad, the State sent a letter of release in May 2024 and filed a trafficking charge in January 2025, after the lab finished testing evidence taken on the day of the first arrest. The appeals court reversed the order that had discharged him on speedy trial grounds.

When does the speedy trial clock start in Florida?

Under rule 3.191 as amended effective July 1, 2025, it starts when you are formally charged: by information or indictment, or for a misdemeanor by whatever documents constitute a formal charge. Without a demand, the State then has 90 days for a misdemeanor and 175 days for a felony.

Does waiting on a crime lab count against the State’s speedy trial time?

Not under the current rule if you haven’t been formally charged yet, because the time starts at the formal charge. Under the old rule, the clock could start at the arrest for charges from the same criminal episode, which is why Muhammad turned on whether the drugs were one episode or two.

What happens if the State doesn’t file charges within 60 days of my arrest?

Under rule 3.134, if you are on pretrial release and still uncharged after 60 days, the court must order release on your own recognizance on the 63rd day, or for good cause may continue pretrial release up to another 30 days. Once that time runs out, on a motion with notice to the State, the court releases you from bail and pretrial conditions. It does not dismiss the case or stop a later charge.

What is a “criminal episode” for speedy trial purposes?

Florida courts treat crimes as one episode when they rest on substantially the same conduct, even if they lead to different charges. In Muhammad, the lead opinion said drugs found in the same car during one stop were separate episodes because they were different substances, kept in different places and showed different purposes.

Further Reading

The sources behind this post, so you can read what I read.

1. State v. Muhammad, No. 2D2025-0756 (Fla. 2d DCA Nov. 6, 2026)
2. In re Amendments to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.191, No. SC2022-1123 (Fla. Mar. 13, 2025)
3. Florida Supreme Court reworks speedy trial and formal charges timeline, The Florida Bar News, March 14, 2025
4. Florida Rules of Court Procedure, including Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure 3.134 and 3.191
5. Second District Court of Appeal

This post is general information about the law, not legal advice, and it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Anyone charged in the case discussed is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty. Past results do not guarantee a similar outcome. The law discussed is Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure 3.191 and 3.134 as amended effective July 1, 2025, rule 3.191 (2024), State v. Muhammad, No. 2D2025-0756 (Fla. 2d DCA Nov. 6, 2026), and In re Amendments to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.191, No. SC2022-1123 (Fla. Mar. 13, 2025), as of November 9, 2026. The Muhammad opinion is subject to revision before official publication.