Echsner, Steve

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Over the course of his fourteen-year legal career, attorney Mark J. O'Brien has handled many of the most complex state and federal criminal cases in this and numerous other jurisdictions. Having been both a prosecutor and a large defense firm practitioner, Mr. O'Brien decided to combine his experiences to form a countrywide and statewide, multi-focused, multi-faceted, criminal litigation defense firm. Mr. O'Brien is admitted to practice law in federal court for the Middle District of Florida, the Northern District of Florida, and the District of Massachusetts. Mr. O'Brien is a member of the following appellate courts: all Florida and Massachusetts state appellate courts, the First Circuit Court of Appeals located in Boston, Massachusetts and the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals located in Atlanta, Georgia. Mr. O'Brien is also admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States. Although the firm's principle office is centrally located within the State of Florida in Tampa, Mr. O'Brien takes on federal and state cases throughout the country. Since his start as a lawyer, Mr. O'Brien has litigated matters before federal courts in Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Ocala, Orlando, Jacksonville, Tampa, Pensacola, as well as in Del Rio, Texas, Beckley, West Virginia and Jackson, Mississippi along with criminal matters in state courts such as Dade, Broward, Orange, Lee, Levy, Collier, Charlotte, Citrus, Palm Beach, Port Charlotte, Sarasota, Pasco, Citrus, Sumter, Marion, Pinellas, Manatee, Hernando, and Hillsborough counties. Further, Mr. O'Brien has litigated in state courts in the Northern Berkshire District Court in Massachusetts and the Supreme Court of New York. Additionally, Mr. O'Brien has taken on appellate matters before the Second, Third, and Fifth District Courts of Appeal, the Federal Court for the Middle District of Florida and the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals located in Atlanta, Georgia.

Mr. O'Brien, a graduate of Siena College located in Albany, New York, is a former first degree and life felony prosecutor with the Office of the Miami-Dade County State Attorney's Office. During his two plus year span as an Assistant State Attorney, Mr. O'Brien prosecuted over thirty jury trials, averaging over one trial a month, and at the same time litigated literally thousands of felony cases. His career case load was diverse and complex; including homicide, armed robbery, armed cocaine trafficking, armed heroin trafficking, armed sexual battery and numerous other narcotics, economic, white collar and violence related cases. After spending his formative years as a prosecutor, Mr. O'Brien left Miami in the spring of 2001 after being asked to join the Tampa office of a Miami-based, statewide defense litigation firm as a defense litigation associate. After gaining invaluable experience working in this large Miami defense firm, on January 1, 2003, Mr. O'Brien set out on his own to form what is now the criminal defense law firm O'Brien Hatfield, PA. After having taken and passed on his very first attempts the Florida and Massachusetts bar examinations simultaneously during July of 1998, Mr. O'Brien is currently licensed to practice law in the State of Florida and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Mr. O'Brien is also a past and/or current member of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America, the Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Florida Bar Association and the Federal Bar Association. Mr. O'Brien is also a twelve-time, special faculty member of the nationally recognized Intensive Trial Advocacy Program (ITAP), held yearly just outside of Philadelphia, teaching trial advocacy skills. Mr. O'Brien is also the author of "Strategies For Defending Identity Theft Cases" by Aspatore Books."

On May 25, 2012 Mr. O'Brien was honored as one of the "Top 40 Under 40 Trial Lawyers in Florida" by The National Trial Lawyers. Only 40 lawyers under the age of 40 in the State of Florida received this distinction.