Gordon Fenderson is an attorney in Jacksonville, Florida specializing in personal injury accident claims and DUI defense. After receiving a B.S. degree in Political Science from Appalachian State University, Fenderson went on to earn his J.D. from Florida Coastal School of Law. He is currently the owner of the Fenderson Law Firm, and a member of the Florida Bar, Jacksonville Bar Association, Middle District of Florida, and Florida Justice Association. In this article, he explains the best steps to take to find a qualified attorney to handle your DUI case.
After being arrested for driving under the influence, a person is going to need to find a lawyer to represent himself or herself in the case. With so many lawyers out there, it is important that people find the attorney who is best suited to handle his specific needs and issues, which can vary greatly depending on the case.
So, when a person goes and talks with lawyers about his or her DUI case, he needs to look at a few important things:
Comfort Level
The first of these things to look for is comfort—how comfortable can you be with this attorney? Anyone who is arrested for driving under the influence needs to make sure that he finds a qualified attorney who they feel safe with and can talk to with ease. This is going to be important in the case, since you will need to describe to the attorney exactly what happened.
Specialty
In addition to finding someone you are comfortable communicating with, those who have been arrested for allegedly driving under the influence need to find a lawyer who specializes in taking on DUI cases specifically. You can—and should—ask the attorney how many DUI cases he has handled, and whether or not he takes on DUI cases specifically as a part of his practice, as opposed to someone who specializes just in criminal defense alone.
I say this because, while someone may be the best criminal defense attorney in the world, that does not mean he or she is the best fit to take on your DUI case. This person may have worked on all kinds of murder trials—or robbery trials and theft trials—but just because he or she works on those cases does not mean that this attorney necessarily has handled very many DUI cases. So, for the best chance of a quality defense, clients need to make sure that they have found a lawyer who has plenty of experience handling DUI cases specifically—and that DUIs are this lawyer’s specialty—as opposed to someone who primarily works as a criminal defense attorney. Finding an attorney who specializes in your area of need is a good way to ensure that you will have the best likelihood of success in your case.
Case-Specific Issues
Even among attorneys who specialize in DUI cases, you should still be sure to ask whether they have experience handling your specific issues. Your case may not be the same as every other DUI case that comes along, and the issues that are present in your situation may be very different than the issues that are present in someone else’s. It is because of this that you need a lawyer who can spot those individual issues as soon as you tell him or her the story of what happened and led to your arrest.
Many people do not realize this, but DUI cases are just like every other crime—the State has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you did in fact commit the alleged crime in order to convict you. So, what that means for you as a client, is that it helps immensely to be able to hire an attorney who specializes in DUI cases and knows the intricacies of the legal system well. Someone who can put the pieces of your case together in an effective fashion and spot any irregularities that may be cause for your case to be thrown out of the court. So, hiring a qualified lawyer with experience in the field is always preferable, since he may be the only person around who can spot those issues right away and give you the best chances of a successful defense in your DUI case.
