For over twenty years, Shawn Mills has seen that the average defendant does not get an attorney who explains both the law and the case to them. They are often told to plead "guilty" without fanfare. We believe in client education and not client dictation.
702 Forest Avenue, Suite A, Pacific Grove, California, 93950
montereydefender@hotmail.com
831-372-3000
831-521-Six-Two-Six-Five
Developing a Defense Strategy
You work closely together with your criminal defense attorney to develop a defense strategy. Your defense strategy will typically emerge as you work with your criminal defense attorney educating him about the facts of your case, the names of witness and how they may help or hurt your case. This information is then compared with the prosecution’s evidence. This is an ongoing process that is developed as information becomes available to your attorney.
The process is never the same in any two cases, simply because the facts and evidence is never the same in any two cases. Your attorney may start with a tentative theory of your defense. This tentative theory will influence the questions and topics first addressed by your defense attorney. The client’s answers will serve to guide the defense attorney into other areas of inquiry. The defendant’s responses to the attorney’s questions often shape the defense strategy.
Your defense attorney will never collaborate with you to make up a false story. No good criminal defense attorney will ever lie to the Court, or assist another person to do this either. Defendants usually benefit from telling the defense attorney the truth, as they see it. It is well known that multiple versions of the truth can coexist in the defense of criminal charges. This explains how the police can tell a story that is so far from what the criminal defendant perceives as the truth.
The police may state that a defendant struck another person and the defendant is charged with a serious assault. In reality, the “truth” is that the defendant was only protecting him or herself from being attacked and was acting in self-defense. A reasonable person could find that the truth also lies somewhere in between these two versions of the truth. If the defendant was not truthful with the defense attorney and insisted on saying that he or she did not strike the “victim” then the defense attorney would never have the information necessary to decide that a “self-defense” defense was both truthful and available. The fact that a story may be told in a variety of ways does not prevent each version from being accurate.
Shawn C. Mills, Attorney at Law #189896
MONTEREY CRIMINAL DEFENSE SERVICES
702 Forest Avenue, Suite A
Pacific Grove, CA 93950
(831) 372-3000 or
(831) 521-Six-Two-Six-Five