Legal Question in Criminal Law in Michigan

? about two cases of marijuana possession.. daughter was 18 now 19

#1: 10/05 posses of marij. Daughter went thru system, did sm amt of jail time(4 days) was in rehab, been clean over 5 mos. and case is over. #2: 09/05 posses of marij on school property(yes this one was written up 1st but #1 was tried & handled quicker #2 just hit court system 06/06). Pros atty sugg HYTA. Her ct apptd atty agreed saying that if she goes through prob & stays clean felony will be dropped. 1st mtg with PO: not nice guy..looks at her juve file & says 3/6 months of jail..for what? He wants to talk to me. Can she change her plea of guilty(9/8/06) to not guilty & go for a trial before sentencing on 10/26? She thought guilty with HYTA would get her case dropped due to her clean screens. Her court appt atty thinks school mishandled her pers property.I questioned co sher why #2 took so long..he stated he hadn't turned in the paperwork and would when he returned from deer hunting11/05. She has been randomly tested since June(bond requirements) and is clean everytime. Can a cranky PO put her through hell? Isn't this double jeopardy? Why weren't the 2 cases combined & tried? She also wants to enlist(marines) & can't because of this case.Is her atty not wanting to go to trial because of the time involved? HELP!


Asked on 9/12/06, 10:06 pm

2 Answers from Attorneys

Re: ? about two cases of marijuana possession.. daughter was 18 now 19

Have you ever heard the old saying "You get what you pay for?" I heard that EVERY DAY about court appointed attorneys.

If you want to help your daughter, I recommend hiring an experienced and aggressive attorney to represent her and try to withdraw her guilty plea. It will be the judge's decision whether to permit that.

You can phone us at 18005766035.

Chuck Kronzek

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Answered on 9/13/06, 10:02 am
Neil O'Brien Eaton County Special Assistant Prosecuting Attorney

Re: ? about two cases of marijuana possession.. daughter was 18 now 19

I'm not soliciting your business like the first replying attorney did.

Whether a judge allows your daughter to withdraw her plea in case #2 will happen in his discretion, since it is not an automatic right, even before sentencing. One factor weighing against the plea being withdrawn is that it's really due to her not liking the terms of the sentence being recommended to the judge -- i.e., jail time. (That's usually frowned upon as a good reason to allow a plea withdrawl.)

HYTA can include jail time in the sentence terms.

About the only issue I can see your daughter's new attorney arguing re: case #2 is "pre-indictment delay" -- i.e., that the delay in charging her resulted in an unfair prejudice. When this happens, the charge can be dismissed. Usually, that happens when the charging delay results in critical evidence being lost that would have supported a defense (witnesses, physical evidence, etc.), but that's probably not going to fly here. Your real beef is that she didn't get a chance to package the two cases together. But ... she knew about "Case #2" before Case #1, was resolved, right? Why didn't she tell her attorney on Case #1 about another charge possibly coming down the pike, when Case #1 could have been put on hold waiting for Case #2, or a deal could have been struck where Case #2 would be dropped in return for a plan on Case #1? Here, she might have been as much a cause for her own "prejudice" as blaming the police for a delay in issuing a complaint/warrant.

In drug cases, delays are common if the prosecutor is waiting for a lab report re: testing the evidence. Unlike TV shows (CSI, etc.) lab analysis does not happen in the first 20 minutes of a case ... there may be a backlog for months waiting for other cases' evidence to be processed first.

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Answered on 9/13/06, 2:58 pm


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