Legal Question in Criminal Law in Virginia

If I was taken into custody without my rights being read to me, can my assault on a family member charge be thrown out?


Asked on 9/19/09, 5:39 pm

2 Answers from Attorneys

Michael Hendrickson Law Office Michael E. Hendrickson

No, not at all. The way this works is, if after your arrest you were not read your Miranda rights, and then interrogated by cops regarding the crime alleged, any information which you may have given the officers during this particular interrogation cannot be used by the prosecutors to convict you.

However, the prosecutors can still use any and all other relevant evidence that they may have(or will get) regarding the crime to later prosecute and convict you of it.

Consequently, failure to give Miranda rights to an arrestee is rarely a substantive basis for having a criminal charge dismissed before trial.(Many people simply don't understand this basic rule of criminal procedure arising out of the law of arrest and naively believe that a criminal case is automatically dismissable if the one arrested was not given his Miranda warnings.)

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Answered on 9/24/09, 8:22 pm
sheryl shane sheryl shane, attorney at law

The miranda rights are triggered by certain events. Unless triggered, the police need not read them to the accused. There are many ways to beat a charge for assault and battery. You ought to hire an attorney to handle the case. Attorneys should be familiar with constitutional law and how to proceed with criminal procedure.

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Answered on 9/27/09, 10:32 am


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