If you are reading this you have been charged with an offense and looking for an attorney. Here is a variable neither you nor I have control over. These cases were not triable. A good search in the first caseand the second client was caught at the scene with the stolen property. What prompted this post was the conversation at a coffee house this morning with the prosecutor in the first case.
This morning I had a sad conversation with a prosecutor whom I like and respect. The client is going to jail for a few months (selling a small amount of weed), and will be on either work release or college release. During the summer, the client will work. When school begins, the client will have 10 days left to serve because, although the client will have earned release credits, they are not awarded until the end of the month. I wanted to modify the agreement (the sentence has not been imposed yet) to reduce the time by the 10 days. The prosecutor said, the client can be released for school so why do it. I said i did not want the school to note it on his school record since they have to agree to allow him to attend (they do it all the time). It would also be easier to start school at the beginning of the semester from home. The prosecutor’s response was too bad, let it be on his school record. I commented the client would like to keep it out of there, and the prosecutor said that the prosecutor was tired of being accused of ruining people’s lives. I told the prosecutor that I did not think that, nor was I implying it, and that the client did not think that when the request was made to me. The client is not receiving a PBJ so this will not be expunged, so maybe there is no additional harm. The problem was the cold stark reality that once you have screwed up your life, you may find little sympathy.
The contrast to this was recently I had another college student who was involved in a Theft. Inexcusable and inexplicable. Caught red-handed. The prosecutor in that case was also dumbfounded by what the client did. The agreement was for a PBJ (can be expunged in 3 years, unless Good Cause for an earlier expungement). Without me asking or even thinking about it while we were waiting for the Judge, the prosecutor walked over to me and said, if the client stays clean for the next year, the prosecutor would agree to an early expungement so he can get a job because he is graduating college this year. A kind and gracious act that was not even on anybody’s radar screen, and would not have been on mine until the probation period was over.