Opening the Door to Extraneous Bad Acts in Opening Statement Fort Worth Criminal Defense Attorney’s Cautionary Post As a Fort Worth criminal defense attorney, I am constantly up against some of the best prosecutors in Texas. This means my colleagues and I must tread carefully in cases involving “extraneous offense evidence.” As a general rule, crimes or past bad acts of the accused cannot be offered by the prosecution besides the crime a person is on trial for. Over the years, this protection has been eroded by appellate courts and the Texas Legislature’s changes to procedural laws. Aside from the many exceptions that practically swallow the rule, a criminal defense attorney can create a situation that this, otherwise inadmissible, evidence
Read more →Juvenile Sex Crimes Recidivism Prior to the late 1970s, a juvenile sex offender was not viewed as a threat to public safety with many experts believing that sexual offenses by young boys was simply part of adolescence. However, during the early 1980s, researchers found in interviews with adult sexual offenders that they began offending during adolescence, leading legislators to focus more attention on youth who commit sexual crimes. Adult Sex Offender Treatments Because there was little data on how to treat youthful offenders, interventions were often the same as those used on adults. It was not considered that juvenile offenses may differ from that of adults or that there may even be differences between youth who commit sexual offenses and
Read more →Information on Post Conviction Supervision for Cyber Crimes If an individual has been convicted of a cyber crime, the government may place restrictions on their use of computers and the internet in general. The amount and severity of restrictions placed on an individual are dependent on a variety of factors decided on a case-by-case basis. A Court May Need to Articulate Its Position for it To Be Valid It is generally not sufficient for a court to simply ban an individual from having access to a computer or to the internet. Courts have consistently held blanket bans or bans lasting for a long period of time serve to deprive a person of his or her liberty beyond a necessary scope.
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