PANAMA CITY — The criminal contempt of court case against a Panama City attorney came to an anticlimactic end Thursday afternoon in the same courtroom where it started four months ago.
Bill Price was facing up to six months in jail if Judge James Fensom found him guilty of the misdemeanor criminal charges, but he ironed out the details of a plea agreement as his trial was set to begin.
Under the agreement, Price will not be adjudicated guilty and reserves his right to appeal the charge, but he must pay a $300 fine and will serve 10 hours of community services and six months of probation. Price must complete four hours of Florida Bar-approved legal education courses in the areas of evidence and ethics, because those are the areas where he crossed the line with the judge.
Fensom also required a letter from Price to himself outlining the missteps Price made during a February felony trial and apologizing for them. Fensom admonished Price for his behavior during the trial, which he said was “at the bottom” compared to the conduct of every lawyer in every trial in which Fensom had ever been involved.
“I became completely frustrated in the trial through your actions,” Fensom told Price after accepting his no contest plea.
Fensom charged Price with indirect criminal contempt following the February trial of Juliana Ellzey, whom Price defended against charges of leaving the scene of a crash involving death.
Fensom, who twice declined to disqualify himself from the case at the separate requests of Price and his attorney Walter Smith, said he nearly charged Price with direct criminal contempt, which would have resulted in an immediate hearing during which Price wouldn’t have had a right to an attorney and could have been punished immediately. Ellzey’s trial was an especially emotional ordeal for her and her family, and Fensom didn’t want to add a contempt hearing in the middle of it, he said.
The case was followed with interest in the local legal community especially, and the courtroom was crowded Thursday with defense attorneys and prosecutors alike.