Should the Defense Attorney Discuss Discovery with His or Her Client?
Interviewer: So what’s happening when you start to receive discovery items from the prosecutor? Do you sit with the client and go over everything? Do you elicit feedback from the client?
Attorney Leckerman Reviews All Discovery Items with His Clients
Kevin: I always discuss discovery with my clients. It’s very important to let clients review the police reports, video, and anything else in the case that they may be able to comment on. Plus, I always want my clients to be able to understand everything about their cases and be able to ask me any questions that they have concerning potential defenses.
Once I get the discovery, it will take me many hours to comb through the information, find discrepancies, and develop strategies. I will make a copy of it and send it out to the clients and then schedule a time to discuss the issues that I’ve found in the case.
Attorney Leckerman Finds That His Clients Are Very Proactive about Creating a Successful Defensive Strategy
Interviewer: How often are the clients’ feedback and their reactions to the discovery helpful for you in creating defenses? Do you find additional tactics from their input as opposed to reading the information without any feedback from them?
Kevin: Most of my clients are very concerned about their cases, so they are extremely proactive about doing whatever they can to help out. That includes reading through the police reports and compiling lists of discrepancies that they noted. We can then go over those discrepancies and flesh out any potential defenses that I see. So, I believe it is very important to get feedback from clients concerning their perspectives about the discovery.
Clients Should Be Actively Involved in Defending a DWI Charge
Interviewer: So they’re actively involved and you found that getting them actively involved helps the case?
Kevin: Yes. I think that it can always help and it never hurts the case. Sometimes the information given to me may be somewhat superfluous, but that’s rare. For the most part, the people I represent have insightful comments on what occurred. This gives us an opportunity to talk about how we’re going to attack the case in relation to their concerns. Or their questions simply dispel any confusion that they have about the situation.
It Is Natural to Feel Helpless or Powerless During an Ongoing DWI Case
Interviewer: Do you see that helps people to get involved in the case? Do you see that is just gives them a better outcome because now they’re actively involved in creating the defense? Do you notice any changes in their outlook?
Kevin: Yes, I think that’s a great question. In order for a person to fell less helpless in this situation, I think it does help that person to become more active in the case. I don’t just ask a person to be more active just to give them busy work so they can feel a little bit more useful.
I think that not only can their input help me in establishing all of the necessary defenses, it also helps them through the process of understanding where they stand concerning their case and how the process is going to proceed. As I mentioned, creating a road map or game plan for the case lets the client understand the approach that we’re both going to take to win the case.
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