Charged With Drug Crime in Pennsylvania?

Pittsburgh Criminal Defense Lawyer

Video Transcript:

Frank Walker: 

The judge should treat you differently simply because they know, if given the opportunities in the right situation, you could live a conviction-free lifestyle.

Rob Rosenthal: 

If you're charged with a drug crime in Pennsylvania, do you know what your rights are and how you can get help? Well, we're gonna find out right now, 'cause we're gonna ask that question and a bunch more on this episode of Ask The Lawyer. Hi again, everybody. I'm Rob Rosenthal with askthelawyers.com, and my guest is Pennsylvania attorney, Frank Walker. I want to remind you right at the front, if you want to ask Frank questions about your situation, it's easy to do. You can either go to askthelawyers.com, click the button at the top of the page that says, "Ask A Lawyer." Or you can call the phone number you'll see on the screen during our conversation. Frank, good to see you, as always. Thank you for making some time to help us out.

Frank Walker: 

Good to see you, also. Thanks for having me, Rob.

Rob Rosenthal: 

We're talking about drug crimes, tell me a little bit about your experience. Have you had much experience helping people who have been charged with drug crimes?

Frank Walker: 

I have. At the state and federal level, in Pennsylvania and in Northern West Virginia. I've handled the civil possession crimes, to possession, what they call trafficking crimes, where they see someone as a drug user and a drug deliver or drug seller. A seller of narcotics. I've handled all types of crime at the state and federal level, so, we have a lot of experience in our wheelhouse here.

Rob Rosenthal: 

So, let's talk about some of these crimes are state crimes, some are federal. What's the difference? What makes the difference?

Frank Walker: 

Very good question. At the state level, you're dealing with a little bit lesser penalties. Whereas the federal level, you're typically dealing with larger doses or larger weights of narcotics. We're dealing with kilograms, multiple pounds, and crossing state lines, or any of the combination of the above. There's also a situation, where as in state court, it's a multiple offender. Let's say you have two prior offenses for possession with intent to deliver. Meaning, you possessed a narcotic with the intent to sell it or deliver to another person. On your third one, typically federal courts will adopt it. Meaning, they will take that case from the state and prosecute you in the federal courts. Which means you have two prior drug felonies, this is your third one. You're now what they call a career offender, which you are facing sometimes 30 to life or maybe even mandatory sentence of life in prison. So you definitely wanna contact a criminal defense attorney to help you out and advise you of your rights in that situation.

Rob Rosenthal: 

That'll certainly get your attention, I'm imagining.

Frank Walker: 

Oh yes, yeah, it definitely will get your attention. Not only your attention, it will get the attention of your family members and your friends, and here's why, because you're so accustomed to the numbers in state court. Never in your life would you think that in state court, you will end up with the sentence that includes numbers, I mean, letters instead of numbers. Whereas in federal court, you may be dealing with letters which are life, and you don't want that spelled out on your sentencing order. So you wanna make sure you contact a criminal defense attorney to make sure you understand your rights.

Rob Rosenthal: 

So you mentioned how previous drug crimes could affect your... What happens... What about just their previous record in general, does that have bearing on the charges?

Frank Walker: 

It does. I mean, just recently, I had a case dealing with some of the protesters in Pennsylvania and they protested, exercising their first amendment right, no issues there, but some of it got out of hand and they were similarly sentenced or charged with a similar crime. Each person had the exact same crime, but they had different backgrounds, and because they had different backgrounds, the guidelines were different. One person may have been facing probation, whereas the next person would have been facing four years. Same thing in drug crimes. If you have different backgrounds, let's say you have different backgrounds for convictions. Maybe petty larceny, it may even be shoplifting charges, disorderly conduct, but the little things add up and over time, your criminal history will present you in a different position you would be, had you do not have anything on your record. If you have a clean record, that's the best way to be presented for a judge at sentencing, but if you have a lot of things on your record. It can add up very, very quickly and it will change or adjust your prior record score.

Rob Rosenthal: 

And so the first thing I'm gonna do is call someone like you Frank, but how can you help me, what can you do for people in those kind of situations?

Frank Walker: 

A lot of times, some of those prior records, that prior record is stale, which means let's say the crimes happened 10 or 15 years ago, and you can exclude them for the calculation in your prior records score. Thereby instead of having five prior convictions, maybe now only two of them qualify as a prior conviction. So you can make arguments to the court that these things shouldn't count as a prior record score. Therefore, I shouldn't be increased as high as they would be when you include those other three, so you definitely wanna contact your criminal defense attorney, 'cause they can look at some of those things and make an argument to the judge that some of those crimes shouldn't be included in the calculation of your prior record score.

Rob Rosenthal: 

And what else? What are some of the other things that a good defense attorney will help me with?

Frank Walker: 

Well, when you're looking at a sentencing, you wanna argue to the judge, not only are they stale, but that your life has changed since those crimes. For example, let's say something happened in 1995, you were 21 years old, you're fresh out of college, you're young and dumb, as they are. As I was, and you make bad decisions, well now, you are 40 years old and now you've made a bad decision, but now, things are a little bit different. It's at a different level. And in the past, however many years, 20 years, it's been. Now you've shown some changes in your life, you have a family, more things to lose. This was still a bad decision, it was still a mistake. However, you've demonstrated to the court you could have stayed out of trouble and you did stay out of trouble and live a conviction-free lifestyle for that time frame in between your prior conviction and your present conviction. As such, the judge should treat you differently simply because they know, if given the opportunities, in the right situation, you could live a conviction-free lifestyle. So that's why it's important to contact the criminal defense attorney, 'cause you may not be thinking about that, and the court maybe want to hear more about that situation in your life. Excuse me.

Rob Rosenthal: 

So Frank, with a lot of states legalising marijuana use, and there seems to be a change of philosophy towards that, obviously, not on the federal level as of yet. Are you seeing any of that show up in courts as far as sentencing and that sort of thing?

Frank Walker: 

I've seen it in sentencing, but moreso I'm seeing it in the pre-sentence, like when someone is charged with the crime, they're typically on bail or on bond. They call it pre-trial release. Now, if you have a medical marijuana card or you are using marijuana for a therapeutic purpose, then you may continue to use that if you can prove to the court that is necessary for your treatment. Now, if you don't have that excuse or that reason, that rationale, that prescription or that card, then the court will treat you like everyone else and exclude that as a unlawful and a illegal narcotic that you're not able to take while on pre-trial release. A couple of those, meaning that you have a dirty urine screen because of the marijuana, and you don't have the prescription card and you're not permitted to use it, and you didn't seek approval from the court, now you're presenting for the court and you're showing the court that, "Hey, I can't even follow the rules leading up to my sentencing." Now, that's gonna be a problem. The government's going to highlight that. So, I'm seeing a change in that, and I'm also seeing a change in how the court is treating it at sentencing. Whereas they're treating it differently than heroin, cocaine, they're treating... They're not saying, "Oh, it's just weed," but they understand there is a different level of narcotic when you're dealing with marijuana versus heroin or cocaine or some other hard narcotic.

Rob Rosenthal: 

Makes a lot of sense. Thank you so much for answering our questions, Frank. As always, very helpful.

Frank Walker: 

Not a problem. Thanks for having me, Rob, I appreciate it.

Rob Rosenthal: 

That's gonna do it for this episode of Ask The Lawyer. My guest has been Pennsylvania attorney, Frank Walker. I remind you, again, if you wanna ask questions of your own to Frank, what you do is go to askthelawyers.com, click the button at the top of the page that says, "Ask A Lawyer." and it'll walk you right through the very simple process, right there. Thanks for watching, I'm Rob Rosenthal with Ask The Lawyers.

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