{"id":1472,"date":"2012-03-17T22:03:28","date_gmt":"2012-03-17T22:03:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/just-shut-up-ask-speak-attorney\/"},"modified":"2020-10-30T20:48:29","modified_gmt":"2020-10-30T20:48:29","slug":"just-shut-up-ask-speak-attorney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/just-shut-up-ask-speak-attorney\/","title":{"rendered":"Just shut up and ask to speak with an attorney"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\"\"<\/a>It has been more apparent in my practice now that many people think it\u2019s a smart idea to talk to cops instead of invoking your right to remain silent and asking to speak to an attorney.\u00a0 Here\u2019s the bottom line, more often than not, talking to a cop will not help your case and will only make it worse.<\/p>\n

I know many of us feel that we MUST talk to cops to explain the situation.\u00a0 We\u2019re afraid of authority figures and many of us are afraid that if we don\u2019t speak, the cops will take us in and make life harder on us.\u00a0 Or, maybe some of us feel that we are just really clever and can talk ourselves out of any situation.\u00a0 Yes, maybe they will put you in jail for the night or make you bail out instead of releasing you with a signed cite.\u00a0 Possible.\u00a0 But if you still give them more information, you\u2019re just making your situation worse.\u00a0 Now, instead of a night in jail, you\u2019re looking at a few years in prison.\u00a0 Sometimes cops don\u2019t have enough for an arrest and will try to get more information out of you.\u00a0 If you give them that information, you\u2019re giving them more reasons to arrest you.\u00a0 Just shut up.<\/p>\n

Another misconception is that the police will charge you with a more serious crime.\u00a0 Wrong.\u00a0 The police write the report and forwards it to the prosecutor.\u00a0 The District Attorney is the one who ultimately makes the decision about whether or not to press charges.<\/p>\n

Here is something that most people have heard from TV shows:<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have the right to remain silent. Anything you say or do can and will be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you?\u201d<\/p>\n

Next they will typically say something along the lines of<\/p>\n

\u201cNow knowing these rights, do you still wish to speak to me?\u201d<\/p>\n

Most of my clients say \u201cYes\u201d<\/p>\n

Please say \u201cno!\u201d and say that you wish to remain silent and wish to speak with an attorney.<\/p>\n

Here is the problem: most people don\u2019t think that what they are saying can hurt them.\u00a0 It can.\u00a0 The warning even tells you \u201cAnything you say \u2026can and\u00a0will<\/strong><\/em> be held against you in court\u2026\u201d\u00a0 (Emphasis added).\u00a0 They just told you they will use it against you, so why are you giving them more ammunition?<\/p>\n

What to do<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Say you wish you remain silent and ask to speak to an attorney.\u00a0 Saying those \u201cmagic words\u201d doesn\u2019t get you out of trouble, but it oftentimes prevents the situation from getting worse.\u00a0 The cops might not honor it and keep badgering you (They are not suppose to after you invoke your right to remain silent and ask for an attorney).\u00a0 So it may not work 100% the time, but it works most of the time.<\/li>\n
  2. Be respectful.\u00a0 Understand that they are doing their job but you are also exercising your rights.\u00a0 I am doing mine by raising awareness to your constitutional rights.\u00a0 We all have a job to do, mine is to protect your constitutional rights.<\/li>\n
  3. Shut up and call and attorney, preferably a criminal defense attorney. \u00a0If you are in an emergency situation at 3am, you can\u2019t get a hold of anyone, and you have a second cousin who is a probate attorney, call them!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n

     <\/p>\n

    If you or someone you know has been arrested, have them contact the Law Offices of Lisa Wong<\/a> at 858-609-9664<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    It has been more apparent in my practice now that many people think it\u2019s a smart idea to talk to cops instead of invoking your right to remain silent and asking to speak to an attorney.\u00a0 Here\u2019s the bottom line, more often than not, talking to a cop will not help your case and will…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-california-criminal-law-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1472"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1472\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5596,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1472\/revisions\/5596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.markagallagher.com\/socaldefenselawyers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}