How Can A Defense Attorney Help Clients Facing Sex Crimes Charges
If you are facing sex crimes charges in Rockville or elsewhere in Maryland, there are many things an experienced Rockville sex crimes lawyer can do to help your situation. It is important to seek legal help as quickly as possible.
Evaluating Evidence
The first thing a sex crimes lawyer can do for a client is see whether or not the government can actually prove the case itself. For example, if the client really did not commit the act then there are defenses that need to be brought to light about alibis or about consent, there may be motive on the part of the complaining party to fabricate the charges. That would be extremely important to make the court aware of.
Additionally, when sex crimes cases are prosecuted by the state attorney’s office one of the other things that they’re most often trying to include in their prosecution is some kind of DNA evidence. DNA evidence is important to any state because it allows the government to put somebody at a particular location at a particular time. But DNA has its own errors and its own issues and can be challenged in terms of its collection, in terms of its storage and in terms of its analysis. A defense attorney that is well versed in DNA evaluation and how it is processed is also going to be extremely helpful to any criminal defendant in assisting with challenging the actual prosecution of this kind of a case.
Negotiating with the Prosecution
Beyond the evaluation of evidence, a defense attorney is also very helpful in those situations where somebody is likely to be convicted of the criminal charges. In these situations, negotiations with the state need to begin. In that negotiation, not only do we want to make sure that our clients are facing minimal to no jail time for the offenses that are being brought against them, but we also take into consideration the consequences of sex offender registry. If we can negotiate a plea bargain in which somebody will not be required to be placed on a sex offender registry, it is a huge victory in any case where somebody is likely to be convicted on a sex related crime.
Attorney-Client Relationships in Sex Crimes Cases
The value of trust is extremely important in sex crimes cases, probably more-so than in any other case. There are several reasons for this.
Gathering the Facts
First an attorney who is tasked with representing you in a case like this always going to need to know a great deal about your personal life, your own sexual history, your relationship with the complaining party, and whether it was sexual in nature or not. It’s important for you to have enough faith in your attorney in a relationship with your attorney where you feel comfortable sharing that information. It will be extremely important in allowing the attorney to formulate a proper defense on your behalf.
Trusting Your Attorney
Additionally, it’s important to be in a relationship of trust with your attorney because these cases can take a great deal of time to resolve. Occasionally these cases can take upwards of a year to come to complete resolution particularly because the volume of evidence in these types of cases can be so high with DNA, expert witnesses, mental health evaluations and because these cases can take such a long time to resolve and the stakes are so high. Knowing that your attorney is working towards resolution or working in your best interests even if you’re not speaking with that attorney every single day is extremely important.
The process is so long and can be so tedious at times that you may not always feel like there is some major activity. In fact, a great deal of preparation goes into each individual case. So that level of trust needs to be there when you are working with an attorney on a sex crimes case.