Criminal Defense Lawyer Blog
The Maryland criminal justice system is relatively friendly to first time offenders compared to other states. This may be a hard concept to swallow, especially for someone who has spent months fighting in the district and circuit courts to clear their name. But our state provides number of ways for a person charged with a crime to eventually be able to move forward with their life. The expungement system is easy to understand, cheap, and quick in comparison to other similar systems. Typically within three months of filing a qualified expungement application, the charge at issue will be taken off the public case search, and court and police records will be destroyed. There is also no limit on how many qualified cases a person can expunge, which is hardly the case in other states, and there are numerous outcomes that allow a defendant to expunge his or her case. Some common outcomes are a not guilty verdict, nolle pros., STET, or a probation before judgment. Probation before judgment, which allows a defendant to plead guilty without receiving a permanent conviction, is often afforded to first time offenders. A PBJ is eligible for expungement three years from the date it was accepted. A case that is marked as STET also may be expunged after waiting three years, but not guilty verdicts and cases where the state announces a nolle pros. are immediately eligible.
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New Law Would Shield Criminal Convictions From Public View
Baltimore still has a long way to go, but it appears the city is heading in the right direction when it comes to fighting crime. City officials including the mayor and police commissioner recently kicked off 2015 with a press conference announcing a decline in Baltimore’s overall crime rate. The decline from 2013 to 2014 includes both violent offenses and property crimes such as murder, robbery, and burglary. The number of murders and non-fatal shootings both decreased roughly ten percent. There were 235 murders and 402 shootings in 2013, while there were 211 and 371 respectively this past year. The murder total is the second lowest in decades, with only 2011 seeing a lower number in recent history with 196. The 80’s and 90’s consistently saw homicide numbers in the 300’s, while the beginning of this century mostly saw numbers in the high 200’s.
A few months ago we posted an article about a criminal defense attorney who was arrested for smuggling various illegal drugs into the Baltimore County Detention Center. The police investigative reports and charging documents described a multi month conspiracy between the attorney, her son, secretary, and her current and former clients to introduce the contraband into the jail for sale and use by other inmates. Security at the Towson facility is more relaxed for attorneys who present their clearance cards upon entry, as it is not standard for the guards to thoroughly frisk lawyers. Part of the reason for this is that most visits at the jail are non-contact visits, where the attorney still must speak to the inmate through a glass wall. Contact visits typically have to be arranged ahead of time. But unlike the standard visitation area, the attorney visitation area has slits under the glass partitions so that legal documents may be passed back and forth. Though in the case of this former attorney, it wasn’t just legal documents that were being passed through the slits.
The 2013 legislative session officially came to an end last month, but 265 bills still awaited Governor O’Malley’s signature before they could make the transformation to state laws. The bills covered dozens of different fields of law including health care, environmental law, consumer regulations, education, and of course criminal law. The most notable bills that crossed the governor’s desk happened to be right up our alley in the field of criminal law, so naturally those are the bills we will discuss. The blog has followed the progress of state marijuana reformation for the past year, and it seems for there is now a small amount of closure on the topic. The signing of the medical marijuana bill closed the debate until next year’s session about how far Maryland was willing to move toward legalization. And to some up what this bill actually means for the state residents, it’s safe to say the law is a lot of bark and a little bite.
The synthetic marijuana controversy is back in the news again in Maryland. Clashes between vendors and members of the community where the fake drug is being sold continue to butt heads, and Frederick is at the center of this latest dispute. A cigar store that also sells beer and wine on Market Street in downtown Frederick has seen sales of synthetic marijuana boom in the last few months. Commonly known as spice, which was the one of the product’s original names, synthetic marijuana is actually a blend of natural herbs that is sprayed with a chemical compound. The chemical is not one specific compound, but rather one of many that is designed to mimic the effects of THC. Many of these chemicals have been made illegal by the federal government, including the original spice and K2 compounds, but manufacturers have created new chemicals to skirt the federal regulations. The synthetic drug now lines the shelves of various tobacco shops and liquor stores in Maryland, and the product is flying off the shelves. While storeowners and smokers are thrilled about the product’s availability, members of the community are voicing their displeasure with spice sales.