Legal Question in Criminal Law in Montana

trial location

if you are an attourney and you feel your client will not get a fair jury trial in a certain court,what is the process for getting the trial moved to a differant county, district or whatever?


Asked on 1/16/02, 1:37 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

Mark Sullivan Mark R. Sullivan - Attorney at Law

Re: trial location

Move for substitution of the district judge if that is where the client or the attorney thinks the problem is. There is a statutory procedure for doing this, but it must be done within a certain (fairly short) time. To get it moved to a different county or district, a motion for change of venue would be the best avenue. You must prove you cannot get a fair trial in the current venue and that is not always an easy thing to do, but not an impossible thing to do. Each case is different and it may be possible to select a jury that has not heard of the case or the client and thereby, presumably, the client would get a fair trial. If that occurs, then the case would not be moved. Hope that answers your question. Happy to discuss it further if you need more information. You can e-mail me directly if you would like.

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Answered on 1/18/02, 5:49 pm


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