Criminal Defense

In Virginia, the felony theft threshold is $200. Setting aside the injustice of such a low threshold for distinguishing between facing up to a year in jail for misdemeanor theft and twenty years for felony theft, the prosecutor must prove that $200 value threshold beyond...

Most criminal defense lawyers have a high number of clients who actually committed a criminal act. That reality does not automatically preclude an outright acquittal or dismissal.

Prince William County, Virginia, police officer Ashley Guindon was slain when responding to a domestic violence call,

Trial judges have nothing to lose and often much to gain by permitting at least brief voir dire/cross examination of prosecution witnesses before a damning exhibit is offered into evidence.

Many times I write about addressing challenges in dealing with clients, judges, juries, prosecutors and witnesses. Another challenge sometimes arises in dealing with fellow criminal defense lawyers, including in the following ways:

Rather than my amplifying opinions that already have been stated about the court order for Apple to help the FBI with a backdoor around its iPhone security protection, I provide the following additional thoughts and court documents.

When police fall short of their obligations, their failures must not be shifted towards and into the victimization of criminal suspects and criminal defendants. To do otherwise will turn the Bill of Rights into more of a farce than they already have been turned into...

Shoplifting collections letters are part of retailers' larger efforts to minimize loss from theft. For that reason alone, a person cannot expect to pick his or her nose or scratch his or her butt in a large store without being caught on security camera.

In Virginia, a person who "willfully inflicts inhumane injury or pain not connected with bona fide scientific or medical experimentation" is guilty of a class 6 felony if death results from such behavior.

I was about to say how much former officer Melendez's brutality against Floyd Dent -- compounded by the other numerous assembled cops acting as a united front with Melendez rather than stepping up against his brutality -- shows how so much in this world is...