Third District Court of Appeal

State of Florida 

Opinion filed March 23, 2022.

Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

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No. 3D22-393

Lower Tribunal No. F12-24759

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Jose Miguel Cebez,

Petitioner,

vs.

Daniel Junior, etc., et al.,

Respondents.

A Case of Original Jurisdiction – Habeas Corpus

The Horenstein Firm, P.A., and Bradley E. Horenstein, for petitioner.

Geraldine Bonzon-Keenan, Miami-Dade County Attorney, and 

Benjamin D. Simon, Assistant County Attorney, for respondent, Daniel 

Junior; and Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Linda Katz, Assistant 

Attorney General, for respondent, The State of Florida.

Before FERNANDEZ, C.J., and LINDSEY and HENDON, JJ. 

HENDON, J.
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Jose Miguel Cebez petitions this Court for a writ of habeas corpus. 

For the reasons that follow, we deny the petition.

Mr. Cebez was charged by information with one count of falsely 

reporting the commission of a crime pursuant to section 817.49, Florida 

Statutes (Count 1); one count of uttering a forged instrument pursuant to 

section 831.02, Florida Statutes (Count 2); one count of first degree grand 

theft pursuant to section 812.014(2)(a), Florida Statutes (Count 3); one 

count of false or fraudulent insurance claims/$100,000 or more pursuant to 

section 817.234(1), Florida Statutes (Count 4); and one count of organized 

fraud/scheme to defraud/$50,000 or more pursuant to section 

817.034(4)(a)(1), Florida Statutes (Count 5). 

In May 2015, Mr. Cebez entered into a written plea agreement, and 

during a plea colloquy, Mr. Cebez was placed under oath and voluntarily 

accepted the terms of the plea agreement. Pursuant to the written plea 

agreement, as to Count 1, he was sentenced to time served, and as to 

Counts 2 through 5, he was sentenced to five years of probation followed 

by eighteen months in prison. As a special condition of probation, he 

agreed to pay $174,770 in restitution to Fireman’s Fund Insurance 

Company on an agreed-upon schedule during his probation. He agreed 

that if he violated his probation, he would be sentenced to twenty-five years 
3

in prison. Further, paragraph 15 of the plea agreement states:

15. At the time of surrender (commencement) of the state 

prison sentence imposed on Counts 2 through 5 of the 

Information, which shall be five (5) years from the date of 

sentencing or earlier if by order of the Court, the Defendant 

herein acknowledges and agrees that there are no 

circumstances, other than Paragraph 14, by which his, the 

Defendant’s, eighteen (18) month State Prison Sentence on 

Counts 2 through 5, can be altered, reduced, or mitigated.[1]

 

In October 2021, following Mr. Cebez’s completion of probation, the 

trial court entered an order terminating Mr. Cebez’s probation and 

discharging Mr. Cebez from supervision by the Department of Corrections. 

Thereafter, Mr. Cebez did not surrender himself to serve the eighteen 

month prison sentence, and the State then filed a motion to enforce the 

plea agreement, requesting that the trial court order Mr. Cebez to surrender 

himself to serve the eighteen month prison term.

The trial court conducted a hearing on the State’s motion to enforce 

the plea agreement. Mr. Cebez, through counsel, argued that the trial 

court did not have jurisdiction to hear the motion to enforce the plea 

agreement because it had terminated Mr. Cebez’s probation. In granting 

the State’s motion, the trial court stated that the prison term was not a 

condition of probation, and it was not ruling that Mr. Cebez violated his 

probation. Following the hearing, the trial court entered its written order 

1 Paragraph 14 is not applicable in the instant case.
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granting the State’s motion to enforce the plea agreement and ordering Mr. 

Cebez to surrender on March 2, 2022, which he has done. 

Mr. Cebez filed the instant emergency petition for writ of habeas 

corpus, arguing that because the trial court terminated his probation, it did 

not have jurisdiction to hear the motion to enforce the plea agreement. We 

disagree.

“A plea agreement is a contract and the rules of contract law are 

applicable to plea agreements.” See Johnson v. State, 225 So. 3d 930, 

932 (Fla. 3d DCA 2017) (quoting Garcia v. State, 722 So. 2d 905, 907 (Fla. 

3d DCA 1998)); see also State v. Gutierrez, 10 So. 3d 158, 159 (Fla. 3d 

DCA 2009). Here, Mr. Cebez entered into a negotiated plea agreement 

and accepted the benefits of the agreement. The plea agreement clearly 

provides that his sentence of five years of probation would be followed with 

eighteen months in state prison. Mr. Cebez is bound by the terms of the 

plea agreement. The fact that the trial court entered an order terminating 

Mr. Cebez’s probation following his successful completion of probation 

does not eliminate the trial court’s jurisdiction to enforce the remaining 

portions of the plea agreement. Accordingly, we deny Mr. Cebez’s petition 

for writ of habeas corpus.

Petition denied.