Legal Question in Criminal Law in Texas

My fiance accepted a plea bargain on a charge that had no evidence against him but he took it out of fear on getting 20 years for burglary of hab. Even though he was allowed in the premises.and did not.take anything when he was a maintenance man for apartments.They originally gave him deferred.adjudication for 3 years but they extended it 2 more years due to.failure of being able to make all his payments. When we were unable to pay all our fines and it was up to 1400 dollars..they wanted to stick him in a 6 month isf program to pay the fines even though he had passed all his drug testS and had completed it all except for the payments. They put an mtr on him which he had ran from for almost 2 years and then he finally was arrested in that warrant. He spent over 5 months of straight dead time in order to come to the terms of what he needed to do..which was isf for 6 months or the judge said he would have to do the whole 10 year sentence at tdc even though that meant him missing out on the birth of his first son. He successfully completed it all and then was released back to 10 years community supervision..which he had unfortunately failed a drug test and then when he had to see his probation officer again the next week..she refused to accept his reschedule for the next day..due to our jeep not being able to start and the office was in San marcos..we were in the process of being transferred bc we were up all the way in houston. They filed for mtag once again and picked him up two months after filing which his probation office never even sent any notice of the court date or the fact that they were revoking his probation. He is now waiting in a different county and has no court date still. He's been in there since October 7th. What are our options? We now have a 2nd child on the way due in april..and he has the same judge he has had since 2012 who is not at all willing to work with us and since we have a new probation officer bc the one we had thI'd whOle time finally retired right after he got out..this new probation officer is extremely rude and is not willing to work with us either..is there any step we can take to try to make to help the outcome where he doesn't get a full 10 years?


Asked on 11/01/19, 10:42 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Wes Ball Wes Ball Law

Most of this depends on the Judge you have and the quality of your legal representation. It is always preferable to retain a Board Certified Criminal Law Specialist. I have to say, reading your lengthy explanation, that there is quite a bit of excuse making for what appear to be poor decisions. To say he accepted a plea bargain when there was no evidence against him is the first excuse. In most cases, when you plead guilty to a felony, you swear under oath that you committed the crime. I would never tell a client to commit perjury and sign a false statement to get a plea bargain. The phrase, "he had unfortunately failed a drug test" likely presents the wrong attitude when dealing with probation officers. He is not supposed to "unfortunately fail a drug test." You also say that when they filed a motion to revoke his probation, "he ran from for almost 2 years." There are very few judges that will excuse these types of probation violations and most would revoke him. Saying the Judge is not at all willing to work with us ignores the fact that the biggest part of probation is showing up and not running for two years. I think the Judge would say your fiance wasn't willing to work with him. Depending on the jurisdiction, probation revocations can be subject to plea negotiations between your fiance's lawyer and the prosecutor. This is when the experience and skill level of the lawyer pays for itself. It sounds to me like your fiance needs to try and negotiate a revocation plea that gets him close to a plea where his back time is enough for him to be parole eligible and cut his losses.

Read more
Answered on 11/04/19, 1:16 pm


Related Questions & Answers

More Criminal Law questions and answers in Texas