Legal Question in Criminal Law in Georgia

Re: Legal Question

The judge will issue a bench warrant for your failure to appear. The warrant will transfer to Colorado and the next time you are pulled over, you will likely be arrested. Or, when you try to renew your license, you may be arrested or denied a license.

You need to hire an attorney to appear and enter a plea in abstention. (a guilty plea in your absence). I have an associate that you can contact for that purpose. His name is Kendall Carter and you can reach him at 404.962.4475.

Best of luck,

David H. Glass

Re: Legal Question

If you don't appear, they'll likely issue an FTA (Failure to Appear) arrest warrant. It's not an extraditable warrant, meaning you wouldn't be arrested here and sent back to a Georgia chain gang. But it would be available to the police and courts should you be ticketed in Colorado on a subsequent charge, and count against you.

You should contact the Georgia court (and probably a Georgia lawyer), and ask what you can do. There is likely a plea by mail arrangement that would allow you to do what that says, enter your plea through a letter to the court. In that letter you would explain the circumstances, and why you think you should be offered a lesser plea, or are not guilty. If you were actually in possession of alcohol (this is pitifully easy for a prosecutor to prove, by the way: in Colorado this basically means you were in arm's length of a drop of the stuff), you might suggest that you plead guilty to the MIP charge and ask that the other charge be dismissed in exchange. If this was your first MIP, ask for diversion, if it's available in Georgia, and that you do your alcohol education class in Colorado. Make sure you send the letter well before the arraignment date.The DA there would then communicate back a plea offer, which you would sign or reject. If you reject it, you're back to your original dilemma.

This is all better handled by a lawyer, who probably has lunch and attends the dog fights with the DA who will handle your case. But it's your call.

Good luck, and don't ever drink underage again in Georgia. After you're 21 (or 14, or whatever the legal drinking age is there), it's probably some kind of requirement.