Legal Question in Criminal Law in Maryland

Re: falesly accused of assault... what can i do?

From reading this story, something tells me this is

only going to get more serious between the various

parties. Now that the matter has moved into the arena

of criminal court due to charges and counter-charges,

there is no such thing as "can't afford a lawyer." Get

one, and do it today. Make sure the attorney has a lot

of experience in criminal law matters at the level of

Maryland District Court. And remember that you get

what you pay for, especially in legal services.

You must first vigorously defend the criminal charges,

which involve at least calling the various parties

present as witnesses. It is possible that the criminal

cases will be tried together since they arose from the

same incident. But that is not clear.

As for suing the ex-girlfriend over the charges,

what you are speaking of is malicious prosecution.

That is a civil action which first requires that the

initial legal case brought against you, be resolved

in your favor. And that means a favorable result in the

criminal case against you. So it is too soon to be

thinking seriously about that, although it is available

as a civil remedy down the road.

Go to friends, relatives, whatever. But be sure

that you have legal representation in this criminal

case. A guilty finding will follow you for a long

time and can result in other consequences such as

fine or jail, regardless of how foolish you thought

the charges were.

And how did this simple matter of your ex-girlfriend

coming over to get her stuff--something that goes on

every day--wind up in this donneybrook? Something

tells me that something else is going on here. A judge

who is tired of hearing about it (like the Judge

Joe Brown types on TV and they do exist in real

courtrooms) might just convict everybody. Don't take

any chances with this.