Criminal Defense

The National Employment Law Project estimates that more than 65 million Americans hold a criminal record of some sort, including convictions for misdemeanors and felonies. Most people know that a conviction, no matter what it is for or when the offense occurred, can follow you around for the rest of your life. However, did...

When Tyson Timbs of Indiana was convicted of selling a small amount of heroin in order to support his opioid addiction, he was sentenced to a year of home detention and five years of probation. The court could also have fined him up to $10,000, but chose not to. But Indiana law allows private...

You worked hard throughout your parenting to create a place of trust and understanding. You wanted your child to be able to turn to you if they were in trouble. And then, one day, they do. When they call you from college to tell you that they were charged with a minor in possession...

The National Academies of Science released a comprehensive report in 2003 that examined the state of the science in lie detection. After reviewing nearly a century of scientific data and reports and visiting polygraph units run by government agencies, the NAS committee found that polygraphs were prone to both false positives and false negatives....

How safe are we in America? How about in Colorado? Reports on the crime rates were just released by the FBI and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Colorado saw increases in both violent crimes and property offenses, the nationwide rates actually dropped, on average. The crime rate is of crucial importance in criminal...

The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution contains the Double Jeopardy clause, which reads, “nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” The Double Jeopardy clause is meant, in part, to keep prosecutors from getting “two bites at the apple.” In other...

When colleges or universities discover an alleged rule violation that could also be considered a crime, they typically have a choice in all but the most serious types of offenses. They can refer the case out to local police and process the case as a violation of school rules, or they can handle the...

In March, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty announced the creation of a conviction integrity unit in the county which will review criminal cases for signs that defendants are actually innocent. Since then, his office and local criminal defense lawyers have been working to create review criteria and an application process. The unit will...

Across the country, cash bail systems have been under attack as being essentially debtor’s prisons. Cash bail means that many people will be kept behind bars before trial simply because they can’t afford to pay. That can be devastating, often causing job loss, loss of housing and massive disruption in a person’s life even...

According to the National Registry of Exonerations, at least 139 people were exonerated in 2017. These people had been convicted of criminal offenses and were then proven to be innocent of those offenses. Shockingly, 84 of the 139 wrongful convictions were the result of official misconduct. In 66 cases, no actual crime had been...