Riverside Criminal Defense Lawyer

As with other crimes, the prosecution must prove your guilt beyond a reasonable doubt when you are charged with a sex crime. What must be proven depends on the particular sex crime at issue. Certain crimes require a judge to impose mandatory lifetime sex offender registration. These crimes include sexual battery, rape, aiding and abetting a rape, pimping or pandering a minor, child procurement, aggravated sexual assault of a child under 14, contributing to the delinquency of a minor with lewd or lascivious conduct, lewd or lascivious acts with a minor, showing minors obscene materials, arranging a meeting with a minor for lewd purposes, continuous sexual abuse of a minor, child pornography, child molestation, and more.

Although there is a significant stigma attached to having a sex crime on one's record, there are potential defenses available. In some cases, a San Bernardino or Riverside criminal attorney will investigate and find that the prosecution's evidence is weak on one or more elements. In other cases, there may be a defense such as consent, when the victim is old enough and mentally capable of providing valid consent. In further cases, there may be a violation of constitutional rights before or during an arrest that can result in a successful motion to suppress evidence.

Under section 667.5(c), violent felonies include crimes such as murder, voluntary manslaughter, mayhem, rape, kidnapping, robbery, arson, carjacking, assault intending to perpetrate a particular felony, burglary of the first degree, and attempted murder. By law, these particular crimes are sentenced harshly. The enhancement for a violent felony depends on which felony is being charged. With the violent felonies listed above and some others, the court will add on and impose consecutively a three-year term for each prior separate prison term served by the defendant. There are certain nuances to this law, and there may be procedural or substantive defenses available, so it is very important to consult a San Bernardino or Riverside criminal defense lawyer about your particular situation.

White collar crimes are usually illegal, nonviolent acts that involve a violation of trust, concealment, or deceit. These crimes are usually perpetrated for financial gain. As with violent crimes, however, the prosecutor must prove beyond a reasonable doubt each element of the charge. When proving embezzlement, for instance, the prosecution will need to show that the defendant was entrusted with someone else's property and either took or misused the property.

There may be defenses available depending on the crime being charged and the factual circumstances. For example, there may be a violation of constitutional rights, such as the right to avoid self-incrimination or the right to be free from illegal searches and seizures. In other cases, the prosecution may not be able to show a crucial element beyond a reasonable doubt.

There are three situations in which you can be charged with a felony DUI in California. First, if you have three or more prior DUI or wet reckless convictions during a 10-year lookback period, you can be charged with felony DUI. If you have at least one prior felony DUI conviction, you can be charged with felony DUI even if there are no aggravating factors, and you would be charged with misdemeanor DUI if it were a first offense. If your drunk or drugged driving caused somebody else’s injuries or death, you can be charged with felony DUI.

Felony DUI charges are extremely serious and can result in a minimum sentence of 16 months in prison, among other penalties. The sentence is likely to be more than the minimum if you caused an injury to someone else. However, there may be defenses available, including constitutional or procedural defenses, so it is important to consult an experienced attorney.

Drug crimes are punished harshly, especially if significant amounts of drugs are involved. Often, if you possess more of a controlled substance than an ordinary person would personally ingest, it may be assumed that you were possessing narcotics for sale. The packaging of the controlled substance can be used to establish possession for sale; for example, baggies and balloon packaging are often associated with drug trafficking. Even if you are caught with a lot of packaging material, but the drugs were not yet packaged, you could be charged with possessing for sale.

The prosecutor always bears the burden of showing your guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a high standard. In some cases, a criminal attorney in Riverside or San Bernardino County can defeat a charge by simply raising a reasonable doubt. In other cases, it is possible to challenge the way that the police obtained the evidence. When the police recover drugs through an illegal search and seizure, we can seek to get evidence of the drugs suppressed, which may demolish the prosecution's case. There are also affirmative defenses that may be available, such as entrapment.

If you are charged with a crime in Riverside or San Bernardino County, you should call experienced criminal lawyer Gregory H. Comings. He represents defendants in areas such as Riverside, Palm Springs, Palm Desert, Temecula, Moreno Valley, Indio, Fontana, Highland, Redlands, Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, San Bernardino, and Victorville. Call us at (951) 686-3457 or use our online form to set up an appointment to discuss your needs.