Criminal
Defense Attorneys
California’s Bail System There is growing concern in California that its bail system is unjust and many in the legal community are calling for reform. The average bail amount in California is five times that of the national median amount. This gross disparity has many in the legal community concerned that the current bail system results in undue monetary punishment…
Getting a traffic ticket can be expensive. Failing to pay the ticket can lead to getting your driver’s license suspended and even more fines for not paying the original fine or failing to appear in court. Many have found themselves in a downward spiral of getting a ticket, not having the money to pay the fine and then losing their…
Expungement offers a great opportunity for people with criminal convictions to start over with their lives. Through expungement, your past criminal records will be cleaned up, and the case legally dismissed. This gives you the chance to find gainful employment without the fear of being rejected or criticized due to any past record. Technically speaking, companies are not allowed to…
In November of 2014 Proposition 47 passed giving certain low-level, nonviolent felony convictions the opportunity to be reduced to misdemeanors on old criminal records. The law itself reclassified several categories of theft and drug possession crimes from felonies or “wobblers” (crimes that can be charged as either a felony or misdemeanor) to straight misdemeanors. Prop 47 is a benefit to…
Facebook and other social media can be fun and informative. It can also be abused and abusive. Where is the line drawn? When is it protected free speech and when does it become a criminal threat? The United States Supreme Court weighed in on that question in Elonis v United States (decided June 1, 2015). In this case, Mr. Elonis sent a…
We all know from watching TV that you have the right to remain silent when arrested. But is that true? Can you simply refuse to say anything or do you have to say some kind of “magic words?” In 2007 while speeding, Richard Tom collided with another vehicle carrying a mother and her two children. The accident injured one child…
Recently, it has been revealed that nearly a third of American adults have their names listed in an FBI criminal-records database, many of which include arrests without charges. This has become a concern for many people today since numerous companies use this online database for conducting a background check on an individual. If this is affecting you, one way to…
The Importance of Having a Good Attitude Mike , founder of The criminal justice system can be a harsh mistress. It is not very sympathetic or caring. Sometimes people screw up and make mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes rise to the level that law enforcement gets involved and people are prosecuted. If this ever happens to you, you need to determine…
Over the past four decades, our country’s incarceration rate has more than quadrupled and is now the largest in world history. About one in every 31 people is either incarcerated, on probation or on parole. The Southern Law Poverty Center has stated that “this vast expansion of the corrections system-which has been called ‘The New Jim Crow’, is the direct result…
The United States Supreme Court in Grady v North Carolina, held on March 30, 2015 that the North Carolina’s satellite-based monitoring program (the equivalent of California’s GPS system) of sex offenders constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment. They remanded the case back to the state court to determine whether this search was unreasonable. What does this mean for sex offenders…
