Friday, September 9, 2011

Denver criminal defense lawyer / crime elements

One of the strongest parts of the criminal justice system favoring the defendant (and there are few of these) is the requirement that the prosecution basically do all the work. That means your Denver criminal defense lawyer does not need to do anything at all to get an acquittal. After the prosecution is done presenting its case, he can simply stand up and say "we don't believe the prosecution proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt. Because the state did not meet its burden of proof, the jury must acquit."

To understand why this can be such a powerful weapon in the hands of a Denver criminal defense lawyer, you need to understand a little bit about how the legislature defines crimes. Every crime is composed of a number of elements. As an example, here are the elements of drunk driving offenses in Colorado. Basically, these are parts of a crime. Some of them are fairly easy to prove, such as that the offense occurred in a certain county, or a certain act was committed by a particular person. But others are incredibly difficult to prove. For example, first degree murder has an element that the killing occurred with "malice aforethought" at least traditionally. Getting a jury to understand what that means can be hard enough. Then the prosecutor has to prove what the defendant was thinking, doubtless over the Denver criminal defense lawyer's strenuous objections.

The key with elements is that every single one of them must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. If there are eight things the prosecution has to prove, no matter how stone cold the proof on seven of them, the tiniest smidgen of reasonable doubt can result in an acquittal. That's why the prosecution has to check all the boxes. Meanwhile, the key for the defense attorney is to focus on the smallest areas where he has a chance of showing reasonable doubt.

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