Saratoga County Criminal Defense Lawyer Blog

If you want to be a criminal, but can't bring yourself to do actual harm, there's a simple solution. Just ignore correspondence from New York's Department of Motor Vehicles.

Ignore DMV, and any number of normal, everyday activities can get you arrested.

One of our clients was just driving to work. His wife (who usually took care of the bills) had accidentally let their car insurance lapse. DMV immediately suspended the car's registration. When our client drove the car, he was committing a misdemeanor - a crime - by driving a car with a suspended registration.

Ultimately, we were able to get the charge reduced to mere operation of an unregistered vehicle, a traffic violation. But not before the client had called his wife and shouted "You've made me a criminal!"

Driving with a suspended license is another easy way to commit a crime. And you can get your license suspended with little or no effort, as we'll go into below the fold.

Continue reading "How to Be a Criminal Without Really Trying: New York's Scofflaw Provisions" »

Know Your Rights:

Most people living in our country are familiar with Miranda warnings, as they are called, in that they are frequently recited on television police shows. The warnings stem from a well known United States Supreme Court case Miranda v. Arizona. From that seminal case, and those that grew out of it, came the requirement that once an individual is taken into custody and is therefore "under arrest" they must be advised by the arresting officer of certain rights that they have. Among these rights is the right to remain silent and the right to have an attorney appointed to represent the individual if the person is unable to afford an attorney on his or her own.

The right to remain silent is an important right with which each of us is protected as we go about our daily business in society. For example, an officer approaching an individual in the street is not allowed to detain a person for questioning without having a sound legal basis. Actually, the analysis is far more complicated then this, however, suffice it to be said that if a police officer is to question an individual on the street, or after a traffic stop, or in some other setting, the person being questioned is not required to answer those questions, essentially "remaining silent".

Most importantly, one's right to remain silent is not dependent upon being advised of that right by a police officer. Often times police officers are seeking information and hoping that an individual will give up their right to remain silent. Instead of reminding the person of their right to invoke silence, the investigating officer will usually just go right into the questions that he seeks to have answers for. This is most likely to occur in a "non-custodial" setting, where for instance an individual is approached on the street or after a traffic stop.

Continue reading "Know Your Rights if Arrested in New York (Part I)" »