As A Criminal Defense Attorney, How Do You Evaluate A New Case?

Bail Bond Cowboys wants the public to have answers to the myriad of questions that surround the criminal justice system and your constitutional rights. We bring those answers to you in the form of video interviews by Attorneys.Media of legal experts in your area and across the country.

Ray Hrdlicka – Host – Attorneys.Media

“Andrew, when somebody comes into your office, what happens? How do you evaluate the case and create a game plan for that person?”

Andrew Dósa – Criminal Defense Attorney – Alameda County, CA

“I am glad you asked. Ray, there are usually two approaches. There’s a first step and a second step. My first step is to ask the client ‘how he or she found themselves in the clutches of law enforcement?’ I don’t ask them ‘what did you do to get busted?’ I say ‘how is it that you found yourself to be arrested?’ And that’s an appropriate question for a lot of cases because people will get arrested when they haven’t really necessarily done anything.

I represented someone today who was arrested because they allegedly bought marijuana from a confidential informant. Right? So I asked ‘how is it that you got arrested?’ He said ‘well, I bought the weed and they snapped the cuffs on me’. But, the second part of that case was that he was actually arrested a year after the incident, because the people that the informant was snitching on….they got arrested because they were part of a much bigger criminal enterprise. My client was on the periphery.”

Ray Hrdlicka – Host – Attorneys.Media

“He just got snatched up….”

Andrew Dósa – Criminal Defense Attorney – Alameda County, CA

“He got snatched up because the informant was simply selling drugs while trying to get information about the gang that was the target of law enforcement.

So I would ask the question ‘how is it that you got arrested?’

‘I was minding my own business…I just wanted to buy some weed for the weekend, and suddenly I am looking at, gee, I am part of a criminal enterprise’.

I said ‘okay, let’s talk about the facts, but not right now’. And that takes me to the second step.

I like to get the discovery, at least, initially the police reports, from law enforcement and from the District Attorney. Then I send a copy of the report to the defendant, my client, and ask him or her to review it. Then we sit down and I say ‘what’s wrong with this report? What are the facts in this report that aren’t true?’ From there we begin to define and distinguish between what law enforcement says and what the District Attorney is presuming.”