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DUI Charges Dismissed in Howard County.

DUI Attorney David Wooten won a DUI trial in Howard County, despite his client’s .13 blood alcohol level. The client ( a 21 year old petty Officer 3rd classin the Navy ) was elated because attorney Wooten even convinced the prosecutor to dismiss his speeding ticket prior to starting the trial… which was the only charge that he would have been convicted of in the end. The client’s two superiors, observing the trial in disbelief, walked out of court and sternly warned the jubilant petty officer.” Don’t let it go to your head”.

Drugs Charges Dismissed.

Maryland Criminal Defense attorney David Moyse convinced a Howard County prosecutor to completely dismiss drug charges against his client. The client was driving a car in which heroin was found in the passenger compartment. Both the driver and passenger were arrested and charged. However, Mr Moyse convinced the prosecutor to dismiss all charges against his client. Had the client been convicted, he would have faced certain loss of immigration status and possible deportation.

Theft Case Dismissed.

In January 2014, Maryland criminal attorney David obtained a complete dismissal of all charges in multiple count conspiracy theft case in Montgomery County. Moyse’s client mistakenly helped a friend sell stolen goods at a pawn shop in Silver Spring. Following a strongly contested trial in District Court, the State elected not to proceed on appeal, dismissing all charges.

Silver Spring man sentenced to eight years in prison for Wheaton robberies.

Link To Article

St. John Barned-Smith,
Posted: 12/12/2013 2:32 PM

Who was Joseph R. Urrutia — a dangerous career criminal or a man overcoming an addiction-filled past?

Defense attorneys and prosecutors wrangled over that question Thursday, before a Montgomery County Circuit Court judge sentenced Urrutia to eight years in prison on armed robbery charges.

In January, police arrested Urrutia, 48, of Benson Terrace, and charged him with robbing a Wheaton convenience store and a Capital One bank a few hundred feet apart on Georgia Avenue.

According to prosecutors, Urrutia was a “major career criminal,” with 35 arrests and 25 past convictions. Urrutia stormed into a local business wearing a balaclava — a mask covering most of his head and face — and sunglasses and holding a gun, then assaulted a 62-year-old shopkeeper, according to Assistant State’s Attorney Eric J. Nee.

Soon after, Urrutia robbed the Capital One bank branch, court records show.

Police arrested Urrutia the same day in a barbershop nearby. He was covered in red ink from exploded dye packs that were in bags of money from the bank, police records show.

“He has to prove to the parole board that he’s not a threat to society,” Nee said, asking that Urrutia receive a 16-year sentence.

Urrutia’s attorney, Andrew V. Jezic, said Urrutia’s actions stemmed from a childhood made brutal by abusive parents and from the trauma of watching his twin brother shot to death in front of him.

Despite the dozens of arrests his client had incurred, Jezic said for the most part, Urrutia had been a non-violent offender with convictions for disorderly conduct and loitering.

“He is not the monster the list of charges makes him out to be,” Jezic said.

He said Urrutia had tried to use his time in jail productively by attending therapy and addiction-treatment programs, working as a food preparer, and trying to obtain his GED.

Urrutia, Jezic said, turned his life around after marrying his wife, Nilda, in 2007.

“This is not someone who deep in their soul wants to live an assaultive … life,” he said.

In court, Nilda Urrutia said she married Urrutia — who she had known in her youth — while recuperating in Washington, D.C., after being flown from Iraq in 2003.

He had cared for her and supported her through the many surgeries she had to treat her war wounds, she said.

“He’s been my rock,” she said.

He started to turn his life around, she said, but descended into the grips of addiction to Oxycontin he had been prescribed for back pain.

“Things in the house started disappearing,” she told Mason, at times breaking down as she recalled how he sold her jewelry to fund his drug habit.

“What he did was so stupid and idiotic. I’m so sorry for what he did,” she said.

Joseph Urrutia, who pleaded guilty to two counts of armed robbery in July, said he committed the robberies in part because he hadn’t believed he was smart enough to get a normal job. It wasn’t until marrying Nilda, he said, that he finally began to believe in himself.

In apologizing for the robberies and everyone who has been affect, he said, “I know I impacted their lives.”

As he imposed the sentence, Mason noted Urrutia’s past and the trauma it had caused. “I can’t ignore the crimes you committed,” he said.

Urrutia likely would be eligible for parole in four years, Mason said, calling the sentence a “last opportunity.”

“If you don’t come to grips with your addiction, if you don’t get the help you need … if you come back before the courts … you may spend the rest of your life in jail,” he said.

sjbsmith@gazette.net

Jury Tells National Restaurant Chain To Accept Responsibility for their Food .

Montgomery County Injury Attorney Jonathan Carroll recently went to trial against a national restaurant chain when his client swallowed glass that was discovered in the client’s food. The restaurant’s attorney tried every excuse :”it’s the distributor’s fault” , ” you can’t prove the glass came from us”, and ” the customer wasn’t even hurt by the glass”. The jury rejected each of these excuses and found in favor of our client, the customer.

Legendary Maryland judge praises the ninth edition of Jezic’s criminal procedure book, Maryland Law of Confessions.

Thursday, March 25, 2013

A legendary judge on the Court Of Special Appeals commented about Jezic’s criminal law book: ” The leading academic authority on confessions law in Maryland is Jezic, Molony, Nolan and Woodward, Maryland Law of Confessions.”

This quote appeared on page-32 of the scholarly opinion by judge Charles E. Moylan, Jr. In re Daryl P., which was released for publication by the Annapolis appellate court.

Mr. Jezic is again a featured speaker at largest criminal law seminar in Maryland.

Saturday, March 30, 2013

Mr Jezic was a featured speaker for the fourth year in a row, and the sixth time in eight years, at the largest criminal law seminar in Maryland, the Alan Goldstein seminar in Upper Marlboro.

He spoke with the Honorable Jerome Spencer, Circuit Court Judge from Charles County, to over 100 lawyers about Maryland criminal procedure.

Jezic argues cutting-edge MRI brain science in Montgomery County murder trial.

Debate on brain scans as lie detectors highlighted in Maryland murder trial

By Michael Laris,

Gary Smith says he didn’t kill his roommate. Montgomery County prosecutors say otherwise.

Can brain scans show whether he’s lying?

Smith is about to go on trial in the 2006 shooting death of fellow Army Ranger Michael McQueen. He has long said that McQueen committed suicide, but now he says he has cutting-edge science to back that up.

While technicians watched his brain during an MRI, Smith answered a series of questions, including: “Did you kill Michael McQueen?”

It may sound like science fiction. But some of the nation’s leading neuroscientists, who are using the same technology to study Alzheimer’s disease and memory, say it also can show — at least in the low-stakes environment of a laboratory — when someone is being deceptive.

Many experts doubt whether the technology is ready for the real world, and judges have kept it out of the courtroom.

Over three days, Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Eric M. Johnson allowed pretrial testimony about what he called the “absolutely fascinating” issues involved, from the minutiae of brain analysis to the nature of truth and lies. But he decided jurors can’t see Smith’s MRI testing.

“There have been some discoveries that deception may be able to be detected,” Johnson said, but he added that there’s no consensus that the results can be trusted. “These are brilliant people, and they don’t agree.”

Still, researchers and legal experts say they can envision a time when such brain scans are used as lie detectors. Standard polygraphs are generally not admitted in trials because some consider them deeply flawed. During his police interrogation, Smith said he would submit himself to a polygraph, but Johnson said such results would not be allowed as evidence.

Smith’s attorney, Andrew V. Jezic, argued in court that the MRI test should be allowed, and neuroscientists sparred over the credibility and usefulness in a jury trial.

Prosecutors hate the idea, saying that replacing living, breathing suspects with a stack of colorful brain images would upend the legal system. “The jury’s the decider of credibility,” said John Maloney, Montgomery deputy state’s attorney, who argued that Smith’s brain scans are worthless.

But Smith, who is facing his second murder trial in the case after an appeals court threw out an earlier conviction, says it’s an important tool to back up his account. “After fighting for everybody else’s freedom . . . to be put in prison for a crime I did not commit was extremely frustrating,” Smith said. “It may not be perfect, but it’s definitely something reliable and should be considered.”

Smith and McQueen, who had served together in Afghanistan and shared a Gaithersburg apartment, hung out the night of Sept. 25, 2006, drinking beer and smoking marijuana, court papers say. They went to a VFW and played pool. Just before 1 a.m., Smith called 911. “Oh my God, help me,” he sobbed, telling the dispatcher that he had found McQueen dead. “I dropped him off at the house, and I came back, and he had a big hole in his head.”

When officers arrived, they found Smith, with blood on his hand, face and clothes, vomiting outside the apartment, court papers say. McQueen’s body was in a metal chair in front of a flickering television. They didn’t find a gun.

In evidence that is key to the prosecution’s case, Smith would later give detectives three accounts of what happened, court papers say.

The first time, Smith said he’d been out and returned to find McQueen dead with no gun in the house. Pointing to possible suspects, he said McQueen had argued with some Hispanic men in the past. In version two, Smith returned to find McQueen dead with a gun in his hand. In version three, Smith was in the apartment and McQueen shot himself.

Smith said McQueen used Smith’s gun, and he panicked. He removed the bullets and tossed them and the gun in a nearby lake.

Outside of crimes caught on video or solved with DNA, few pieces of evidence offer clear proof of guilt. Eyewitnesses can make mistakes, and problems have been found in hair and fiber analysis and arson investigations. Maryland judges tell jurors to use their common sense and life experiences to decide whether witnesses are being truthful.

Frank Haist, assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Diego, analyzed Smith’s brain scans. He was hired as a consultant in Smith’s case for No Lie MRI, a firm commercializing the technology. In his own research, Haist has used brain MRIs to study how people of different ages and races and those with autism process faces.

If Smith chooses to testify at trial, Haist said, “he would be asked and the jury would like to know: ‘Did he shoot Michael McQueen?’ Obviously, his answer would be no.” Jurors would see whether Smith was sweating or not, Haist said. They would see whether he appeared nervous. And they would make judgments.