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Archive for the ‘Criminal Law’ Category

When it comes to hiring a criminal attorney, the average defendant doesn’t know exactly what he or she should be looking for. Often, it simply comes down to a recommendation or an ad in the yellow pages. While there is nothing wrong with these methods, you should make sure you get what you’re paying for. Hiring a defense lawyer is about much more than simply having someone to file paperwork. There is a minimum standard you should expect from your lawyer. If he isn’t giving it to you, think about finding someone else.

Protecting Your Rights

One of the most important roles of the criminal attorney is protecting the rights of his client. The justice system would not function were it not for these rights, which are inalienable. If they have been trampled, it is up to your lawyer to bring this to light, whether it be to the jail, the judge, or before the jury.

Evidence

A criminal attorney should spend an appropriate amount of time reviewing the evidence given over to the defense during discovery and finding ways to combat this evidence in court. He should also become an investigator in his own right, looking for exculpatory evidence and witnesses who will testify on your behalf.

Negotiation

Not all charges result in a trial. Depending on your wishes and the amount of evidence stacked against you, it may very well be in your best interests to negotiate a plea deal. Prosecutors are typically happy to work something out, saving them the time, cost, and risk of a trial. If you have a lawyer who knows how to negotiate, you’ll get a much better deal.

Interviewing

Too many lawyers go into court cold. This means they don’t do any pre-interviewing of the witnesses. Some don’t even bother to run over testimony with their own witnesses. This is a disaster waiting to happen, and it often makes the defense look ill prepared in front of the jury. If you notice that your criminal attorney isn’t conducting any interviews, you could be in for a letdown.

Naturally, it’s impossible to list all of the things you should expect out of a good criminal attorney, but this is a good starting point. Perhaps more than anything else, you should expect your lawyer to believe in you and be willing to do anything within the realm of the law to get you the best possible outcome. If you get the feeling that this isn’t the case, you might want to switch representation before it’s too late.

Your criminal defense attorney can guide you through the entire legal process, from arrest to court appearance. Throughout this process, you may hear some legal jargon that’s unfamiliar to you. In order to avoid confusion and embarrassment throughout the process of arrest, litigation, and sentencing, it may help you to review the meanings of some key legal terms for aspects of the process.

Arrest

While this term is probably familiar to you, you may not be aware that your being arrested does not mean that you will be presumed to be guilty; it simply means that you have been accused of a crime and are being taken into custody. If you suspect an impending arrest, it’s best to seek out a criminal defense attorney before that arrest takes place so that you can be advised about how to handle the situation, as well as to possibly negotiate on your behalf, in order to avoid the arrest.

Booking

This is the event following an arrest, in which the police take you to the station, separate you from your personal belongings, take your photograph (or mug shot), and get your fingerprints. If the crime of which you’ve been accused is a misdemeanor, you may actually be released after the booking. In some cases, you will be held in jail until a court date, or until bail is posted. In some circumstances, it’s possible that a criminal defense attorney could arrange for you to be released until that date on your “own recognizance.”

Arraignment

After a waiting period, you’ll be asked to come to court for an arraignment. This initial appearance in court will serve to inform you of the details surrounding the charges brought against you. At this time, your criminal defense attorney will be provided with a copy of the complaints, as well as any other documents relating to the crime with which you’re being charged.

Plea

It’s important to note that your lawyer may advise you to “plea” differently than you would think. For instance, even if you are admittedly guilty of the crime, a lawyer might recommend a “not guilty” plea in order to lay the burden of proof on the prosecution. Basically, if your defender thinks that the prosecutor would have a hard time proving your guilt, a “not guilty” plea may well be in your best interest. If your case does end up in court, any doubt of your guilt in the minds of jurors should prompt your release.

Inadmissible

Any information or evidence that’s been obtained in an illegal manner is disallowed from being used to prosecute or defend you. Part of a lawyer’s job is to determine whether any such details are being used by the prosecution as well as to make sure not to attempt to use such information to defend you.

As your criminal defense attorney guides you through this sometimes confusing process, you can at least feel a bit less frustrated when you understand the basic steps involved.

There are many, many statutes that can expose you to criminal liability for your actions with underage persons or for viewing child pornography on the internet; far too many to discuss in this article. But, you should be aware of some basic information about these crimes.

In most states and in the federal system the age of consent is 16 years old. There are states where the age of consent is lower. These states have statutes permitting sexual intercourse with younger aged children in certain situations like marriage and are a carry over from times when it was advantageous or a practice to have your child marry early so that the burden of caring for the child was transferred to another. There are statutes in many states that provide the age of consent is higher if at the age of 16 the person has not had sexual intercourse. In these states, even though the age of consent is 16, sexual intercourse at 16 is statutory rape or rape if the person is a virgin. So, you can only have sexual intercourse at age 16 if you have committed the felony of statutory rape prior to the age of 16. Confused? Try this example. If you wait until your girlfriend is 16 years old before having sexual intercourse – say on her 16th birthday, the lawful age of consent, you can only have sexual intercourse with her if she has had sexual intercourse before she was 16 years old, say 13, 14, or 15 years old, which is a felony! These statutes do exist so it is best to be aware of the criminal laws in your jurisdiction.

Pretty much every state has a statute or statutes that allow a parent or guardian to request that the Courts allow an underage person to marry even if the age of consent is 16. It is highly unlikely, though, that any state will permit marriage of a girl below the age of 14 years, but in some states, there is no limitation or “threshold” age written into the statute.

The penalties for child porn are very severe. You can be charged with production, dissemination, receipt, and possession under many state and federal statutes which carry decades of jail or prison. These statutes are designed to stem the dissemination of child pornography that has become readily available on the internet.

Chat rooms are the most prevalent source of “trading” child pornography. Persons who use these “chat” rooms are solicited by pedophiles to trade images they may find on the internet. This community of pedophiles operates on a “one hand washes the other” principle. If you want someone to continue to send you images of child pornography, then you will be required to send images of child pornography. There is a premium interest in never before disseminated child porn so chat partners are encouraged and instructed on how best to “groom” children into modeling or committing acts of a sexual nature.

You cannot protect from these images if you open an internet file or image containing child pornography. The authorities can find these images on your computer and reconstruct them even if you delete the images, your history, or your temporary files. Encryption does not protect. The authorities have very sophisticated software that can reconstruct the images and chats once they gain access to your hard drive.

There is a difference between child porn and child erotica.

Child Porn is unlawful. This would be an image or movie in which the child is depicted committing or having a sexual act committed on them, a child posing in a sexually provocative manner, or otherwise intending to excite the prurient interest of the viewer. Do not be under any delusions, there are very graphic images of very, very young children committing very explicit sex acts on the internet!

Child Erotica is not unlawful but can put you on the radar. An image of a nude child at play, not intended to excite prurient interests, is considered child erotica. This is how nudist sites get away with publishing these images. As an example, it is not unlawful to purchase modeling competition videos taken at nudist camps of children. There is no escaping the purpose for the purchase of these videos. But the Supreme Court has ruled that no matter the reason for the purchase, possession, and viewing of these videos or images, if the images are not pornographic, they are not unlawful.

Sex crimes are very complex. Sex crimes charges can destroy your life even if they are baseless and unfounded. You need competent counsel if you are charged with any of these crimes.

The death penalty or capital punishment continues to be a contentious issue in the United States. There are two opposing views. A large portion of the population want the retention of the death penalty. Other individuals and groups advocate the abolition of it. For instance Amnesty International has for a long time now run a campaign calling for the removal of the penalty as a sentencing option for American Judges. Most recently Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, who heads the state’s judicial branch and its highest court, said in an interview that the death penalty is no longer effective in California and suggested she would welcome a public debate on its merits and costs.

It is clear that the actual administration of Capital Punishment comes at such a huge financial cost if not politically so. Capital Punishment trials cost so much as much as one million dollars each. One of the reasons to revoke the penalty is that it is so remarkably easy for a mistake to be made. Such a mistake in a capital case becomes irreversible. If the penalty has already been carried out then an injustice cannot be reversed. Prosecutors, Governors — such as Governor John Kitzhaber of Oregon — and even judges, such as Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and fellow retired justices John Paul Stevens and Sandra Day O’Connor, are raising doubts about the death penalty.It is puzzling to me how we can show our outrage at the crime of murder by killing the perpetrator. The murder may have been committed in a fit of passion, or it may have been provoked, or the murderer may have a mental disorder in which normal human empathy is lacking and therefore cannot understand what all the fuss is about. But the executions are carried out in cold blood by people who know full well the horror of what they’re doing.

Two-thirds of all cases involving a black or Hispanic killing a white result in the death penalty. Overall, a black person is 5 times more likely to get the death penalty than a white defendant in similar circumstances. If white people were sentenced to death in the same proportions as Hispanic’s and Blacks I contend that there would be a public outcry to abolish the death penalty. The recent introduction of DNA evidence has highlighted the flaws within the current justice system. Too often suspects that have been sitting on cells in deaths rows for years have been exonerated. Thanks largely to the likes of The Innocence Project who have fought tooth and nail to get certain cases reviewed. Without which many of the newly found innocent detainees would have otherwise been executed. For instance DNA evidence freed Ray Krone after 10 years in prison, (four on Arizona’s death row). We know that no matter how many safeguards are put in place the foibles of human systems mean makes will always be made.