Denver criminal defense lawyer / expanding record sealing

Some interesting news from New York State regarding record sealing. It appears the Bar Association is pushing for legislation that would allow those convicted of most misdemeanors and minor felonies to have their record sealed after after a statutory waiting period (five years for misdemeanors and eight years for felonies). Any Denver criminal defense lawyer will tell you that it's considerably harder to get your record sealed in Colorado. Basically no convictions can be sealed except for deferred judgments (which technically aren't convictions at all, they are dismissals) and a narrow set of minor drug related offenses. Denver criminal defense lawyers also would bemoan this policy, and with good reason. I don't see how it serves any real purpose.

For some reason the District Attorneys of New York are opposing this rule change. Again I have no idea how anybody is served by giving those convicted of minor offenses a lifelong criminal record. It seems pretty unlikely that this would have any deterrent effect. If you're not deterred by jail time or hefty fines, how would you be deterred by the possibility of it coming up in a background check when applying for a job 10 years later? And it's not like these crimes are going to indicate serious moral short comings. The New York law specifically excludes any crimes against the elderly or against children, and as stated above it's limited to relatively minor offenses.

I suppose an argument could be made for transparency. Employers may have a right to know if people they are about to hire has kept his nose clean. But that's pretty hard to justify in light of our other policies. Don't juries then have the right to know about all the evidence that's been suppressed at trial? Or about the defendant's criminal history? It just seems like the state makes these sorts of decisions all the time, and really the criminal record is more a form of continued punishment than any sort of transparency mechanism.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / deferred judgments

A common plea agreement that Denver criminal defense lawyers can negotiate for their clients is a deferred judgment. This is somewhat confusing for a lot of defendants. What in the world is it? Basically this is a situation a defendant pleads guilty on the condition that he will not actually be sentenced for the crime. The court takes the guilty plea in open court on the record, but does not make the judgment final or "enter" the judgment. The judge also does not sentence the defendant. Instead, the judgment and sentencing are deferred for a certain period of time. At that point, if certain conditions are met, the case can be dismissed.

Functionally, this whole thing appears a lot like probation. The conditions involve things like community service, and not committing additional crimes for a stated period, a year or six months. Your Denver criminal defense lawyer can advise as to the actual consequences. In any case, even though it resembles a probationary sentence, if the conditions are fulfilled the case can be dismissed, unlike in the case of a probationary case where it is actually a conviction.

Because the conviction is never finalized and because there is technically no sentence, sometimes these cases are eligible for record sealing. Again, your Denver criminal defense lawyer can advise you on the possibility of this. However this is not an option in every case, so you should learn about it before you plead guilty and accept the deferred judgment. Although a conviction will not show up on your record, the police records and charges will. For some people this will be problematic, and record sealing can help with that. For others it will be no big deal.

In any case, the big things with deferred judgments are to know and follow the conditions of the judgment, and also know the exact consequences of your deferred judgments. Because like with just about everything else, every deferred judgment case is different.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / out of state traffic offenses

One question a lot of folks have for me as a Denver criminal defense lawyer is what happens to your driving record if you commit a traffic offense out of state? Basically, the process is split into two parts. A Denver criminal defense lawyer can help with either. The part with the DMV is treated more like a regulatory crime. This is where you may or may not lose your driver's license. A state's DMV only has the power to regulate driver's licenses issued by them.

By contrast, the criminal aspect of the case is where a court can hand out fines and prison time. If you are from out of state and commit a crime in Colorado, you will be subject to the jurisdiction of the state of Colorado and the court for whichever county or district that crime occurs in. That means out of state defendants should hire a Denver criminal defense lawyer to aid in their defense.

On the other hand, the Colorado Department of Revenue (the department that runs the Colorado DMV) only has control over Colorado drivers licenses. That doesn't mean an out of state driver is off scot free. Colorado and most other states participate in the Driver's License Compact. That means they report any crimes or violations to the state where the license was issued. That state's DMV or Department of Revenue or corresponding department decides how to handle the suspension or lack thereof. Although most states have pretty similar traffic laws, they aren't all the same. That means that it's important for you and your criminal defense lawyer to know the consequences of the conviction in one state on your driver's license in your home state. Otherwise a defendant can end up with a nasty surprise in the form of either a license suspension he didn't see coming, or an increase in insurance rates due to extra points.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / discovery

If you are charged with a crime, you'll want to know what kind of evidence the state has against you. Under the United States Constitution, you are entitled to know this information. This is a part of due process: if you don't know what evidence the prosecutors have against you at trial, how are you supposed to rebut the case or decide whether to take the plea bargain? Another part of your due process rights is the right to be represented by a Denver criminal defense lawyer. To fulfill this obligation, each District Attorney's or City Attorney's office has established a way to get discovery. Generally you send a letter or a fax to the office asking for all the information in your case, you will get a call a few days later, and go pay a fee to pick up the discovery.

So getting discover is not that complicated, and you may not need a Denver criminal defense lawyer for that. Generally the offices have a policy of including all the information that is relevant to your case, that you would be able to see. That means it's not a huge deal how the request is worded. The part where you may need a Denver criminal defense lawyer is in figuring out what it all means. Discovery generally includes a variety of reports that can be difficult to decipher simply because of format. That means it can help to have someone who has looked at them before.

Additionally, police reports tend to mix fact with opinion quite a bit. It's not always clear where the officer drifts from the facts to simply his interpretation. Although the officer's opinion might be admissible at trial, it also is not nearly as strong as direct observation. So a professional opinion can help figure out how strong the evidence is and determine whether you should take a particular plea bargain. Finally, an attorney can help to determine how best to use the information to bolster your case at trial.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / informants

One question people will inevitably have for their Denver criminal defense lawyer is what kind of evidence the government will be able to bring in court. Basically, anything that cannot be objected to is fair game. Of course, the evidence is limited by how much time and money the prosecutor can spend putting the case together. How much time and money does the government have to put evidence together? The answer to that is probably more than you do, and they can probably outgun most Denver criminal defense lawyers simply with the massive power of the government.

The U.S. government has paid Sagastume $9 million for his work as an informant over the last 15 years, the story says. The biggest chunk of the money—$7.5 million—was from two rewards for work he did for the Drug Enforcement Administration. He earned another $1.6 million for work on 150 investigations, although some of the money covered his expenses.

So essentially if you are accused of a crime, you are going up against an opponent that can pay witnesses enough to live for a lifetime for testimony against you. This is just an example of how the deck is stacked against Denver criminal defense lawyers and their clients.

Now naturally this is a federal case. Most people aren't charged with federal crimes. The vast majority are charged in state courts with state offenses. State prosecutors do not have nearly this sort of money at their disposal. However, it still is a glaring illustration of the resources available. If the testimony is not forthcoming, they can pay a lot of money for it. Now of course the defendant can ask that witness if he got paid for his testimony. However, a lot of times these payments are to get somebody to testify when they are being intimidated. This line of questioning can just serve to make the defendant look even worse.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / states of mind

One critical argument a Denver criminal defense lawyer can make, besides technical arguments like exclusion of the evidence based on lack of probable cause, is that the prosecution failed to prove each of the elements of the case. The elements of each case is different obviously. The Denver criminal defense lawyer in a DUI case will probably be arguing about whether the driver was in a condition to safely operate the car. In a murder case, maybe there will be a contest as to whether "that defendant" actually committed the crime. That will allow the Denver criminal defense lawyer to argue an alibi, or a mistaken identity. But basically the elements of all the crimes can be classed into a few different categories.

The one I want to talk about is states of mind. No, the government cannot make it a crime to think something. That would be against the First Amendment. But that's not really what states of mind are about. For example, everybody would agree that it's a lot worse to wait for someone at home, then bludgeon them to death with a blunt object than to kill somebody in a knifefight. Yes, both crimes are murder. The person killed somebody and they shouldn't have. Yes, both crimes are bad. However, we as a society should make a distinction between these two things. The only real distinction here is what the person was thinking in killing them. So as hard as it may be to figure out what somebody was thinking when they committed murder, it is still important and necessary for that to be a crime element.

The states of mind go all the way down from intentional down to negligent. One reason I was thinking about this post is because of the Reno air crash. Some people have asked me if there could be criminal convictions for that. The answer is probably no, and it comes back to states of mind. In a few cases, you can be criminally convicted for being negligent. But those cases are exceptional and usually regulatory crimes (i.e. there has to be a regulation specifically in place that someone knew about). Otherwise the lowest state of mind would be recklessness. You would have to argue that the people who run the show were reckless in allowing the old aircraft to fly, or reckless in having the stands so close to the action. Since that would be very hard to prove, it is almost certainly a better case for a civil action. In a civil action, the plaintiffs can get money for proving basic negligence.

Denver criminal defense lawyer / right to free speech

The right to free speech is a little bit of a different right than the other rights I've talked about here, like your right to remain silent or your right to a Denver criminal defense lawyer. At the same time, it's in the First Amendment, so obviously it's the most important, right? Well, sort of. Generally your right to free speech lets you say anything you want. You can tell a cop to shove it (though that's probably not smart), you can criticize the president, you can say racist stuff, and none of it is a crime. No matter how nasty the stuff you say is, generally your Denver criminal defense lawyer will be able to argue that your right to speak is protected by the First Amendment, and you'll be off scot-free. The law you're convicted by is probably actually not even allowed to exist.

There are a couple of reasons why the government can make speech against the law. A lot of them apply to civil litigation. In some cases if you say something inaccurate and damaging, you can get sued. But since this is a Denver criminal defense lawyer blog, we'll only talk about the criminal applications. Basically there are two reasons that speech can be a crime. The first is for either a call to violent action or a threat of violent action. If you speak at a Klan rally where everyone has guns, and you scream "let's go kill some black people," that is a call to violent action. But it can't be a vague call to action. You have to know the people you are calling to action are actually going to listen, and you have to know they are capable of doing it. So writing a manifesto about overthrowing the U.S. government would be OK.

The second is a little weird. It's called a breach of the peace. In some cases, the stuff you say will be apparently so annoying that it will actually cause violent action. That's a breach of the peace. Why it's the fault of the guy who said the annoying or offensive thing that the other guy punched him is unclear to me, but I don't make the law. The Supreme Court does by interpreting the constitution. So there you have it. Mostly your right to speak is protected, except in a few cases where it's a crime.