Criminal Defense

Our overall goal at Fahle Law Firm is to serve the client’s best interests, in whatever form that may take. We believe that a solid defense is a collaborative effort between the client and the attorney. John Fahle believes that every case should be prepared as if it is going to trial. That way, even if the client directs us to explore plea negotiations (a step we will only take at the explicit request of the client) we will be better prepared on the case, and more familiar than the prosecutor with the facts and the law applicable to the case. This lets us approach plea bargain negotiations from a position of strength, rather than begging the prosecutor for favors. 

That preparation includes an intimate familiarity with the case law and statutory law applicable to the case, as well as with the facts as perceived by the prosecutor and demanded by us in discovery. Should the prosecutor fail to present us with full discovery, we are not shy about taking it to Court to demand the information you are entitled to, including information in the possession of the DA that may help your case.

But we do not stop there, because that is generally only one side of the story. We then conduct our own aggressive investigation into the facts of the case, talking to every witness that will talk to us, including prosecution witnesses and arresting or investigating police officers or detectives; visiting the scene of the alleged offense to make observations that the police may have missed or failed to put in their report, like the presence of cameras that may contain proof of your innocence, or things that might have obscured a witness’s view; and, when necessary, consulting with relevant and knowledgeable experts in their fields, like chemists, forensic pathologists, former police officers familiar with standards and best practices in policing, etc., as appropriate for each case. 

We also keep you up with all relevant developments, so that you can make the best decisions about how to proceed in your case from an informed perspective. We believe that the decision of whether to go to trial or to take a plea bargain is entirely up to the client, and as part of our contract, we will honor whatever decision you make, even if we disagree with it. If you want a trial, you get a trial. If you want us to negotiate a reasonable plea, we will do so, subject to your approval of any deal we may reach. But we will also use our decades of legal experience to give our best opinion on the merits of taking a plea versus going to trial in your particular case. We won’t just tell you we think you should go to trial, or we think you should take a plea bargain; we’ll tell you why. Should you decide we will go to trial, you have an absolute constitutional right not to take the stand and testify. But you also have an absolute constitutional right TO testify, if you decide to do so. Again, this decision is yours and yours alone to make, but we will give you the full benefit of our outstanding training and long experience to help you make that decision, with explanations in English, not Legalese, of why we hold that opinion. But in the end, YOU call the shots. 

President Abraham Lincoln once said that  a lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client. John Fahle once said that a client whose lawyer won’t listen to the client has a fool for a lawyer.