Criminal Law >> Iowa Criminal Process
People are asking for free legal advice or asking what will happen in their criminal cases on websites like Avvo and Justia.
A lot of the answers I see on these sites are curt, rude, or flat-out unhelpful. Who wants to be told to “call an attorney” with no further help when they’re already on a website asking for input from attorneys? Worse yet, who wants to be told to “just Google it” when the internet is rife with nonsense answers from strangers with no more legal background than you have yourself?
Free legal advice like this isn’t just useless, it’s insulting. Before you even call an attorney, you should know not to talk to the police and you should know how to invoke your Miranda right to remain silent and right to an attorney.
If the police have asked to talk to you about a crime or if you’ve been arrested or charged with a crime in Iowa, you may find yourself overwhelmed. The obvious thing to do is to call an Iowa criminal defense attorney, but before you make that call, there are plenty of things you can and should do to to help yourself. If you’re looking for free legal advice, here are a few quick things to remember.
Don’t talk to the police
No, not even just to explain that you were innocent.
That officer might be a good person and really want the best for you. That doesn’t matter. You aren’t going to help yourself by talking to the police before you talk to an attorney.
Police can lie to you during interrogations. They can claim to have evidence that they don’t have. They can tell you that your friends said you did something even if they’ve never met your friends.
If you’re flustered and say something that isn’t the whole truth or that could be misunderstood during interrogation but then try to clear it up later, your statements during interrogation can be used to impeach you in court and make you look like a liar.
Do not ever, ever confess to a crime that you didn’t commit and assume that you can just clear things up later.
DNA exoneration has proven that lots of people confess to crimes they didn’t commit so that they can get out of police custody and go home to their families. People sometimes feel pressured into confessing to things that they didn’t do so that they can go home.
Free legal advice: don’t do this.
Invoke your rights
Did the police read you your Miranda rights? You know, you have the right to remain silent, you have the right to an attorney, that whole bit? If they didn’t, there might be grounds for throwing out the answers to any questions they asked you, but most likely, if you were arrested, you were read your rights.
Just staying silent doesn’t count as invoking your right to remain silent. Yes, seriously. If you want to invoke your right to remain silent, you have to say “I want to remain silent” — and then you absolutely need to remain silent.
Courts have held that you have to “unambiguously” assert your right to remain silent and your right to an attorney. “Unambiguously” means there can’t be more than one interpretation of what you’re saying.
Check out this case where a defendant said “just give me a lawyer, dawg,” and the police pretended that the guy wasn’t obviously asking for an attorney — and the court upheld it!
Free legal advice: just say “I want to remain silent” and “I want an attorney.” Police questioning should stop until you’ve gotten to speak to your attorney once you’ve invoked these rights.
Do tell your lawyer what the state knows
Your lawyer doesn’t need you to tell them everything all the time. In fact, there are times when the less you explicitly tell your lawyer, the more creative they’ll be in imagining paths to reasonable doubt.
What you do need to tell your lawyer is what the state knows and what the state could find out. If you tell your attorney that you have an alibi when you really don’t, they won’t be much help when the state proves you lied.
You also need to not lie to your attorney or to the court. You also need to know that lying to the court is a crime. That crime is called “perjury” and it is a class D felony in Iowa.
Your lawyer is an officer of the court. If your attorney knows that you’ve lied under oath, they have to take “remedial measures” that could include withdrawing from your case or making it apparent to the court that you lied. Don’t lie.
Criminal defense lawyers Katie Sears and John Sears in Des Moines IA and surrounding areas.
We can help you figure out what to do about your criminal charges in Des Moines, Polk County, Ankeny, Ames, Johnston, West Des Moines, Waukee, Saylorville, Bondurant, Altoona, Clive, Grimes, Pleasant Hill, Story County, Boone County, Marshall County, Dallas County, Jasper County, Madison County, Warren County, Marion County, Wapello County, Davis County, Ottumwa, Bloomfield, Iowa City, Council Bluffs, and the rest of Iowa.
This blog post is for informational purposes only and should not be relied on as legal advice. Consult with a licensed attorney in your jurisdiction.
