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Judge's Error Gives Tampa Man An Out In Drug Case

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By THOMAS W.  KRAUSE | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 15, 2007

TAMPA - A man who claimed his conviction on drug-trafficking charges was improper because he had a prescription for the pills police found in his truck pleaded guilty today to the lesser felony charge of possessing hydrocodone.

He accepted a sentence of the time he already has served in prison.

Mark O'Hara was released from prison this year after serving two years of a 25-year sentence. An appeals court determined that the trial judge made an error, leaving the jury with a faulty interpretation of the law.

At trial, doctors testified that O'Hara had a prescription for the painkiller hydrocodone, often sold under the brand name Vicodin. Still, Circuit Judge Ronald Ficarrotta agreed with prosecutors and said O'Hara's attorney could not tell the jury that having a prescription was a legitimate defense to the charge.

After O'Hara's release, prosecutors pushed forward toward a new trial, where O'Hara would have been allowed to use his prescription defense.

Assistant State Attorney Darrell Dirks said pharmacy records show O'Hara got 40 brand-name Vicodin tablets in December 2003. He then got 40 generic hydrocodone tablets in May 2004. When arrested in August 2004, O'Hara had 58 generic tablets in an unmarked bottle.

If the pharmacy information was correct, Dirks said, that is evidence that a crime might have been committed.

The two years O'Hara's served in prison were not his first.

In 1981 and 1982, he served eight months of a one-year prison sentence for possession of hallucinogenic drugs. In 1986 through 1988, he served two years of a five-year prison sentence for trafficking in cocaine and dissuading a witness.

In August 2004, O'Hara was at Tampa International Airport driving a bakery delivery truck. O'Hara repeatedly drove through the arrival and departure areas, drawing the attention of airport police.

After several trips through the areas, O'Hara stopped the truck, got out and left it along the curb. Leaving unattended vehicles is not allowed at the airport, so police walked up to the truck to investigate.

O'Hara had left a lit marijuana cigarette in the cab of the truck.

The marijuana allowed police to search O'Hara. They found a prescription bottle without a label and filled with hydrocodone.

O'Hara told the officers that he had a prescription and gave them the phone number of his doctor. When the officers could not reach the doctor, they arrested O'Hara. Without a prescription, 58 tablets of hydrocodone are enough to warrant a trafficking charge.

In court, after the jury convicted O'Hara of drug trafficking, the punishment was a mandatory 25 years in prison.

Reporter Thomas W. Krause can be reached at (813) 259-7698 or tkrause@tampatrib.com.

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