It stinks to think about going to a sporting event and having to worry about arrests being made, but it happens more often than you might think. Here in Orlando, we have a brand new professional sports franchise. Orlando City Soccer Club held their first Major League Soccer game ever on March 8th at the Citrus Bowl. There were over 62,000 in attendance, and a large police force there to enforce criminal law.
We’ve seen the wild scenes in the stands before at soccer or “football” games overseas. Unfortunately, we can expect some wildness to occur this season at home games for Orlando City. A common arrest we might hear about on the news will be “battery on a police officer”. Sometimes when the police try to break up a fight out in the parking lot, the police are assaulted as well as the fans duking it out.
Orlando City SC has made a firm pledge to not tolerate any type of fan misbehavior. Any fans that violate Orlando City SC and Major League Soccer’s fan code of conduct will be swiftly punished with significant sanctions, including being banned from future matches.
Soccer hooliganism will get you banned from the stadium, but more importantly it will put you in handcuffs and behind bars. If you are arrested for disorderly conduct (usually involving alcohol), or vandalism, or battery/assault while at the game, you will need a criminal defense attorney ASAP.
What might start out as a fun day at the game, might end up with you fighting for your freedom in a court of criminal law.
