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What to look for in a New York Criminal Defense Lawyer
Interviewing Criminal Defense Lawyers
Before you can even get to
the point where you are choosing from different lawyers you have met,
you have to have actually met with and interviewed more than one lawyer.
Many potential clients feel
uncomfortable or even intimidated when speaking to a lawyer about a
case. You need to realize, however, that you are the one doing the
interviewing. You are entitled to ask questions of the lawyer.
Beware of lawyers who make you feel intimidated. They should be
intimidated of you. If you are not satisfied with them, YOU will
take your business elsewhere.
There are standard questions that people are often told to
ask lawyers, but you are essentially at the mercy of the lawyer for most
of them. In most cases you are essentially going to simply have to
take the lawyer's word for the answer.
For example, the lawyer who tells
you how wonderful he is as a trial lawyer is something you will have to
take his word for unless you have seen him on trial or know someone who
he took to trial. Likewise when you ask whether or not the lawyer
does mostly criminal defense, you will likely be simply stuck with his
answer. When he says "yes" how will you know if the opposite is
the truth?
Asking a lawyer about his "record" is also an
unproductive exercise. Asking a lawyer about his "record" is like
asking someone to talk about his dreams. They can't resist
exaggerating. Lawyers will tell themselves and others all kinds of
things that make them think they have incredible records. It seems
that nobody ever loses cases.
Instead of inviting the potential lawyer to spin
exaggerated tales of his own brilliance try simply asking for
explanations of the pros and cons of your case or your type of case, the
likely progress of your case, and an explanation for all the terminology
you don't understand.
An ability to talk to you in
detail and in a manner you will understand is something you should
appreciate. If he can make you at ease and make you understand a
complex situation, then he just might be able to make the same sense to
a jury about your case.
Is the lawyer willing to
talk to you in detail and answer all your questions or is the lawyer
"too busy" to talk long before being retained? Does the lawyer try
to pressure you to retain him immediately or does he seem confident
enough to let you walk out without fast talking some reason to get him
on the case immediately?
Does the lawyer seem like
someone you feel comfortable talking to? If you hire him you will
need to be able to share your thoughts with him without the slightest
hesitation.
One way to get at a lawyer's
experience with criminal defense without asking the direct question is
to ask the lawyer what led him to choose to be a criminal defense
lawyer. This will force the lawyer to relate experiences about his
early legal career that will likely reveal much about who you are
dealing with and what motivates him.
The lawyer will likely have
questions for you. Here is a list of a few basic questions you are
likely to be asked that will give the lawyer a sense of what your case
is all about and likely to involve:
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The date and time of arrest
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The date of the arraignment
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The name and telephone
number of the lawyer who represented you at arraignment
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The amount of bail or bond
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The next court date
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The name of the courtroom
for the next court date
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The docket number of the
case
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Whether or not you made
statements to the police
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Whether or not you were in a
lineup
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Whether or not any physical
property were recovered from your person, your automobile, your office,
or your residence at or near the time of your arrest
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Experience
Of course the official position
of the legal profession is that any lawyer, with sufficient
preparation, is capable of handling nearly any legal
matter.
But any reasonable person is
certainly within his rights to believe that experience handling
particular types of cases is something to look for in a
lawyer.
The practice of criminal defense
in New York City is a completely different world from the practice of
civil (lawsuit) cases.
One way experience can be
important is that experience can teach the lawyer how to evaluate a case
with respect to likely offers from the Government to resolve it. As in any type of
negotiation, the ability to know when the opponent is at his "bottom
line" is critical to the negotiation.
If your criminal defense lawyer
does not have the experience to be able to judge what the likely "bottom
line" from the District Attorney's Office is likely to be, then he will
not be able to advise you with sufficient precision about what choices to
make as the case progresses.
For example, a civil lawyer
with no experience in criminal court in New York City might well think
that a plea to the charge and a $50 fine was a great deal for his first
arrest theft of services client who jumped the turnstile in the subway
without paying. Upon reviewing the potential punishment this civil
lawyer sees that his client could have received up to one year in jail
for this offense. The client doesn't know any better so he is
convinced by his lawyer that it is a great deal. He even might
thank his lawyer for "saving" him from jail. A criminal lawyer
experienced in New York City, however, would know that this was a
horrifically bad deal that needlessly gave the client a criminal
conviction. A criminal lawyer experienced in New York City would
know that most first arrest theft of service cases are resolved with
non-criminal offenses or ACDs.
Civil lawyers inexperienced
in criminal cases in new york city also are unused to the "atmosphere"
of criminal court. Most civil lawyers rarely go to court and when
they do it is often in the "civilized" world of civil court.
Practicing in criminal court, however, is often an extremely
contentious, unforgiving, and high pressured experience. Civil
lawyers will often talk aggressively about going to court and
going to trial. The plain reality is that, compared with the
average criminal defense lawyer, civil lawyers are virtually never in
court doing anything of substance. A criminal defense lawyer with
an active practice is in court nearly every single day and will do
numerous trials and hearings in court each year.
Experience alone, of course, is not enough. There are
lawyers who are quite experienced at repeating the same mistakes over
and over again. The passage of time, without self-analysis and an
attempt to learn from experience, does not increase any lawyer's skills.
As the potential client you will have to judge from your impression of
the lawyer during the interview whether the lawyer is likely to be
self-critical enough to learn and become better from his experiences.
Aggressive self-importance and arrogance are usually pretty good
indicators that a person is not likely ever to do anything different
from the last time he did it. (Why do anything different when you
are perfect?)
Nevertheless, all other
things being equal, significant criminal defense experience is an
excellent place to start and something you definitely want in all of the
lawyers you interview.
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Local Knowledge
An intimate understanding
of the courthouse, its staff, and the way the system operates at even the
smallest of levels is something that is quite valuable in an attorney.
In theory the laws are the same all over New York State. And yet
the actual practice of law varies extraordinarily from courthouse to
courthouse. Each courthouse has its own inexplicable "feel" to it.
Each courthouse draws on different communities. Manhattan, for
example, tends to be more formal than Queens. Many of the
differences will be invisible to the non-lawyer. But it is worth
the effort to find someone with local knowledge.
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Membership in the
National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers
The National Association of
Criminal Defense Lawyers or NACDL is a national organization of lawyers
who share a common interest in criminal defense. The NACDL counts
in its membership many of the best and brightest criminal defense
lawyers in the nation.
Like any other organization,
it simply requires an interest and the money to pay the dues (although
prosecutors are prohibited from becoming members). Nevertheless,
it is not a lawyer referral service. Therefore, it is not an
organization that people are likely to join because of a sense that
there is something in it for them other than being part of an
organization of criminal defense lawyers.
Membership in the NACDL is a
qualification that at least indicates that the lawyer you are
interviewing really identifies himself as a criminal defense lawyer and
is seriously interested in being a criminal defense lawyer.
Ask your candidate lawyers
whether or not they are members of the NACDL. If so, then the odds
are higher that you have found a lawyer who has committed his
professional career to criminal defense at a high level.
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