By: Kyler Ovard and Greg Smith The Utah Criminal Justice System can seem to be very unforgiving. Individuals who are involved in the system may think that if they get charged for a crime they should take responsibility and plead guilty. In Utah, many people are raised with strong religious values, and some of them …
Some of my favorite childhood and adolescence memories involve hunting expeditions with my kin. I also look forward to making new memories every October in the mountains of northeastern Utah. Unfortunately, some Utah hunters lose the privilege to hunt because of unwise decisions, and even honest mistakes. The Utah Code allows for the suspension of …
The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States protects people only from unreasonable searches and seizures, not all ones. In the Chimel case (1969), the Supreme Court reasoned that police officers should be allowed to search an area in which a person is arrested. After all, police had to be able to protect …
I often get asked this question: In Utah, am I committing the crime of criminal mischief, or even domestic violence, for simply breaking my own stuff? Here is my answer: That depends – your stuff may also belong to your spouse, too, and if that is the case, we need to consider many more things. …
We’ve been involved in literally thousands of cases, and trust us when we say that many people end up in jail not because of what they did, but because of what they didn’t do. Namely, they didn’t take care of their court appointments and/or their obligations to the court, so they end up in jail. …
There are times when the system works exactly how our Founding Fathers envisioned it to work. We had a client, let’s call him Henry. Henry was in a lot of trouble because he had not reported to the Utah Courts for going on 3 years, even though he was supposed to have been doing just …
Utah Code § 77-18-1 Allows for Probation To Be Revoked Read More »
It is very easy to commit a crime while you’re driving. Why? Because many things are crimes that you may not even think to be crimes. When you think of a moving violation, you typically tend to think about a law such as careless driving. So, let’s break that down a bit. This law is …
Moving Violations; It is very easy to commit a crime while you’re driving Read More »
In early February 2011, a Utah man was sentenced in federal court for possessing a handgun that was found to have been stolen from Nevada. The man was sentenced to 100 months in prison with a warning from the judge that a future felony conviction “will result in a more severe sentence.” The prosecution asked …
Federal Sentencing Guidelines and Habitual Offenders Read More »
The right to representation by a competent criminal defense attorney is a fundamental principle of our criminal justice system. When a prosecutor, with the full weight of government resources at his or her disposal, chooses to file criminal charges against an individual, the defendant has the right and the need to even the odds with …
Three Utah men are facing multiple charges in the wake of their arrests for a rash of RV and motor home break-ins. The men are accused of entering RVs and motor homes and stealing electronics and other items, including televisions, speaker systems and DVDs, according to the Standard-Examiner. The men face charges of burglary of …
RV Break-Ins Lead to Utah Property Crimes Charges Read More »