Arming Yourself With Information for Criminal Attorneys
You have been charged with a crime and you need a lawyer to defend you. As you go about searching for criminal attorneys to meet with, you need to be armed with the questions you plan to ask and the paperwork that you need to show them.
Write down all of your questions ahead of time. Meeting with various criminal attorneys is not the time to be impromptu with your questions. Strategic planning is essential because it helps you to get closer to making the right decision for yourself.
When you bring your list of questions with you, you do not have to worry about forgetting anything that you wanted to ask. Make sure that you bring some paper and a pen so that you can write down the answers you receive and anything else of relevance that you find out from the lawyer you talk with. There is no point in asking the questions if you forget the answers you are given!
The criminal attorneys you consult with will benefit from you having all of the necessary documents on hand when you come to their offices for a chat. Any and all paperwork that you have been given from the court that lays out the charges that have been brought against you is relevant, as is any documents that show when your next court appearance is.
Bring your bail papers with you to the offices of the criminal attorneys that you decide to interview. If you have a copy of your police report, make sure that you have it with you to show them. If the police gave you any other type of paperwork, such as an inventory report that resulted from a search they did, it would be helpful to be able to produce that.
The criminal attorneys would appreciate it very much if you would compile a list of names of the people who have a connection to the case that you are embroiled in. This would include any witnesses, as well as the victims and the co-defendants. Generally speaking, lawyers will choose not to represent a person if they or the office they work for have represented another individual who is involved in the case. This is known as a conflict of interest. They will let you know at the time of your meetings if a problem exists due to a conflict of interest.
When you sit down to talk with a criminal defense lawyer, allow the legal professionals to begin the questions and to get the dialogue started. The lawyer needs to clearly understand in his own mind what the charges filed against you are all about. He also has to understand what evidence the authorities have against you. Once he has learned enough from you, he can determine if your case is a good fit for him, and vice versa.
