Case examples should not be taken as guarantees; each case is different and prior results are not a guarantee of future success.

The post Case Result: 3 Probation Violations and 2 New Cases Resolve For No Jail Time appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

Case examples should not be taken as guarantees; each case is different and prior results are not a guarantee of future success.

The post Case Result: Loitering With the Intent to Commit Prostitution Case Dismissed appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

Case examples should not be taken as guarantees; each case is different and prior results are not a guarantee of future success.

The post Case Result: Battery and Criminal Threat Case Dismissed appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

The post Case Result: Assault with a Deadly Weapon and Child Abuse Case Dismissed appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

The post Case Result: Misdemeanor Hit and Run Dismissed appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

The post Case Result: 2 of 3 Felonies Reduced to Misdemeanors Following Preliminary Examination appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

The post Case Result: Misdemeanor Marijuana Sales and Transportation Case Dismissed appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

The post Case Result: Not Guilty – Hung Jury appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

According to the Public Defender’s website:

“The Alameda County Superior Court has posted a new proposed rule that would change the way jurors are selected for misdemeanor cases. You can read it here.

Currently, the rule provides that Alameda County civil and misdemeanor juries are drawn from four locations with potential jurors called to serve in the courthouse that is closest to them geographically. The new rule eliminates these subpanels, and would create county-wide juries for misdemeanor cases, similar to felony jury trials.

All potential jurors would be drawn from one list without respect to the distance between the courthouse and the juror’s residence. This means that a citizen from the outskirts of Fremont or Pleasanton could be called to serve on a misdemeanor petty theft jury trial in Oakland and vice versa.

This will create a heavy burden on the residents of Alameda County that already find it difficult to serve on juries, and it will exacerbate the poor representation of low income people of color on juries. In short, it will be terrible for our clients, our practice and all the residents of Alameda County.

The courts are accepting public comment on the proposed change until May 3, 2018, with the proposed change taking effect July 1..

Please take the time to send an email to the Court using the form on the Public Defender’s website, here. It will take less than a minute and may help prevent this terrible rule from taking effect.

Additional written comments can be submitted to any of the following:

• pcomments@alameda.courts.ca.gov
• Superior Court of California, County of Alameda, Attn: Jasmine Polar, 1225 Fallon Street, Room 209, Oakland, CA 94612
• Fax: (510) 891-6276″

Please make your voice heard.  People don’t like jury duty to start with, and traveling to Fremont from Oakland or vice versa to hear a petty theft case will not make them any more enthusiastic about it; quite the opposite.

I suspect the court is doing this to try and make the laws within the county enforced more uniformly.  Fremont tends to be more conservative and hand out harsher penalties than Oakland does.  I think the remedy there is with the judges and district attorneys, not with juries.  Make the offers to settle cases uniform across the county.

Anyhow, Alameda County is huge, the commutes are dreadful now, and asking people from Oakland to commute 2-3 hours a day to serve on a jury in Fremont is just another reason for people to consider leaving the Bay Area.

The post Alameda County Public Defender: Oppose The Court’s Plan to Make Jury Service More Difficult and Juries Less Diverse appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.

“Nearly forty years ago, during an earlier incarnation, the present Governor of this state declared in his State of the State Address that it was necessary for the Legislature to reform the bail system, which he said constituted an unfair “tax on poor people in California. Thousands and thousands of people languish in the jails of this state even though they have been convicted of no crime. Their only crime is that they cannot make the bail that our present law requires.” Proposing that California move closer to the federal system, the Governor urged that we find “a way that more people who have not been found guilty and who can meet the proper standards can be put on a bail system that is as just and as fair as we can make it.” (Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr., State of the State Address, Jan. 16, 1979.) The Legislature did not respond.”

In this case, Mr. Humphrey was held on $650,000 bail in San Francisco, an amount he could never pay. He filed a a writ of habeas corpus, challenging his pre-trial detention as unconstitutional under the 14th amendment.  He argued, just as the governor did 40 yers ago, that setting bail in an amount one can never pay is effectively a pretrial detention order for poor people.  The court agreed, ordering Mr. Humphrey was entitled to a new bail hearing “at which the court inquires into and determines his ability to pay, considers nonmonetary alternatives to money bail, and, if it determines petitioner is unable to afford the amount of bail the court finds necessary, follows the procedures and makes the findings necessary for a valid order of detention.”

The full decision is available to read here: http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/A152056.PDF

The post In re Humphrey – Court’s Ruling Changes Approach to Bail in California appeared first on Law Offices of Jesse M. Adams || Oakland, California Criminal Defense Lawyer.