Criminal Defense
Self improvement links and steps for your Virginia criminal & DUI defense
Self-improvement / rehabilitation — what I sometimes also call homework — can sometimes help criminal defendants with case negotiations with the prosecutor, and with any case sentencing in the event of a conviction. As a Fairfax criminal lawyer, I know it is ideal criminal defendants to talk...
Terry MacCarthy’s positive approach to persuasion
Long ago I watched a video of Terry demonstrating what he calls look good cross examination, where the cross examiner persuades not just with his or her words and with emphatically delivering those words, but also with his body language, for instance re-enacting a shooting...
Clearing the distractions to success – Effectively standing up for what is right without being merely reactive
A key to personal and professional success is to start by looking inward. Yes, we must engage with the reality and world around us. Yes ,we must help others as well as ourselves, and not just ourselves. To engage and help others and ourselves the...
Virginia Supreme Court rules 4-3 on the wrong side of the law for exigent searches
Praised be the three Virginia Supreme Court justices who on September 17, 2015, dissented from the four-justice majority that affirmed a warrantless apartment search purportedly conducted pursuant to exigent circumstances. Evans v. Virginia, , ___ Va. ___ (Sept. 17, 2015). The search found a substantial...
Former Virginia government Bob McDonnell obtains rare Supreme Court prison stay
Sentenced to two years in prison for public corruption, former Virginia governor Bob McDonnell has by now spent substantially more funds than any financial benefit he obtained from his convicted corruption, on top of great angst and likely losing any chance of becoming president or...
In Trial Battle, Relax and Practice, and Be Ready for Vomit and Other Messes
My blog entries on trial practice boil down to relaxing and practicing, just as amazing taijiquan teacher Ben Lo reminds his students that the key foundation of excelling in taijiquan is “relax and practice”. For relaxation, I mean active relaxation, not collapsing. Certainly, brittleness is...
Virginia Ct. App. okays limits on challenging identification of a robber
People misidentify others all the time. We think we see our best friend in the grocery store and realize it is a stranger. We meet a group of people and mistake two from the crowd for each other. We pay a store clerk at one moment...
Fourth Circuit reverses conviction of pro se defendant, due to no sufficient waiver of counsel
Today, the United States Court of Appeals confirmed that said court has “never held that counsel can be relinquished by means short of waiver.” Consequently, the trial court’s finding of forfeiture of counsel by felony defendant Phillip Ductan’s uncooperative pretrial behavior during his criminal trial was...
Sifting intelligence gems out of police hollering
Recently, I asked a police officer a few very direct questions about his actions with my client. Had I asked the questions more gently, I may have gotten no less a beneficial result, but I asked them as I did. The officer got irritated. He...
