Criminal Defense and Government Investigations
“If thy offences were upon record, would it not shame thee in so fair a troop to read a lecture of them?”
– William Shakespeare
Richard II, Act 4, Scene 1
With a wealth of trial and appellate experience in state and federal courts, Potomac Legal performs a wide variety of services for our clients:
- Internal investigations, conducted in response to reports or suspicions of employee wrongdoing and/or in connection with inquiries by government agencies
- Governmental investigations, including representation in the face of a search warrant or a grand jury or administrative subpoena, and how to comply with the government’s investigation while protecting the interests of the corporations, its officers, directors and employees
- Criminal defense, for clients facing charges in state and federal court, including securities offenses, antitrust violations, fraud, OSHA violations, environmental crimes, embezzlement and bribery charges, bankruptcy offenses, RICO violations, health care offenses such as Medicare/Medicaid fraud, tax evasion, traffic matters and other crimes
- Compliance programs, in which we help clients structure processes to detect and prevent criminal activity within the organization, minimizing potential liability should any such activity occur.
DUI & DWI
All traffic code violations are in fact criminal violations. Please review the Drugs & Other Crimes section if you have not done so already because the same rules apply. Do not make any statement of any type (it will be used against you) and be polite and cooperative. It may be a good idea to decline any "field sobriety tests" such as heel-to-toe/walk and turn, 1-leg stand, butchered alphabets ( D-T ), horizontal gaze nystagmus (HGN), preliminary breath test (PBT), among others.
Do I take the breath test or not?
The 'roadside' or PBT cannot be used against you in a formal sense and you are within your rights to refuse the same. However, the stationary breath test machine typically located at the police station can be determinative in terms of guilt or innocence.
BEWARE of the administrative MVA penalties in the event of a refusal of this test. On the other hand, if one were potentially able to accept the MVA sanction, a refusal may increase the likelihood of an acquittal or reduced charge at the time of the court trial.