I would like to know what this man's chances are in a Florida court. Here are the facts:
In September, this man was arrested on a 1st offense misdemeanor petty theft charge. He pled no contest, and was adjudicated guilty by the court. He was sentenced to 6 months of supervised probation and was charged a fine of a couple hundred dollars.
Last month, this man was arrested again for petty theft....this time at a Target while he was with his son (who he has joint custody over. The mother is divorced from him). As he was walking out of the store, security caught him and they contacted the police and he was arrested. He had in his possession a very expensive GPS tracking device valued over $1000.
In addition, it was revealed that the day before he was arrested he was at the same Target and shoplifted the very same device. This was caught on tape as well but security was not able to catch him before he left, but they were on the lookout for him if he returned.
Both times he shoplifted at Target he was with his son who is 11 years old.
So Target has two separate occasions where this man walked into the store to steal a GPS device, they have video evidence of each occasion, and they caught him with the one of the devices in his possession, and I believe they were able to recover the other one from his home.
This guy faces a felony arraignment today, and he will be charged with grand theft. He intends to plead not guilty, and will use a "sickness" defense, one where he intends to tell the court that he is a sick man, with leukemia, and that he was prescribed drugs that affected his behavior in adverse ways. He already has made the decision to sue his doctor. He hopes that this will result in the court finding him innocent. It is going to be a jury trial.
So, in summation, this guy was caught in September for shoplifting at another store, pled no contest and was adjudicated guilty on a misdemeanor charge and then put on probation for six months. Last month, he was caught shoplifting again at a Target while on probation. He appeared before the court and admitted his probation violation and was adjudicated guilty, but only had his probation reinstated and was sentenced to time already served as he was placed in jail for a week for his probation violation. While in jail, he said he was in pain and was instead relegated to a hospital instead of a jail cell.
Anyway, the felony arraignment is today. What are this guy's chances of success? I would really like to know. Will the court sympathize, or will they see right through his BS? Will the fact that he shoplifted, and subsequently arrested, in front of his son matter at all in court?
Thank you.

