Breaking News

MIAMI, FL – The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has upheld the convictions of three men caught transporting cocaine on a stateless vessel in the Caribbean, rejecting their constitutional challenges to the Maritime Drug Law Enforcement Act and arguments over jurisdiction. The defendants, Santo Rosario-Rivera, Francisco Rijo-Rijo (also known as David Ernand), and Placido Rivera-Rodriguez, were intercepted by the U.S. Coast Guard in 2022 while aboard a vessel located approximately 130 nautical miles off the coast of Aruba. The vessel displayed no indicia of nationality, and none of the men identified a master or made a nationality claim for the vessel, rendering it stateless under 46 U.S.C. § 70502(d)(1)(B). The Coast Guard recovered 18 bales of cocaine during the search...

MIAMI, FL – The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has affirmed the conviction of Adam Marc Twinley, a British citizen who was found guilty of possession of a firearm by an alien unlawfully in the United States. Twinley was convicted in the Southern District of Florida under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5)(A), case number 2:24-cr-14012-AMC-1. The case was appealed under Eleventh Circuit case number 25-11774. Court records show that Twinley entered the country on a P-1 nonimmigrant visa in 2013 and overstayed. Although his wife’s I-130 petition was approved in 2020, he never filed an I-485 adjustment application. In 2023, while awaiting a removal hearing, Twinley used his friend’s firearms at a shooting range and was later charged. At trial, Twinley argued that he mi...