How Much Will a Quality Criminal Defense Law Firm Cost?

Many times potential clients, or their loved ones, find themselves in the unenviable position of having to hire a criminal defense firm on short notice. How much will it cost? Can't everything be addressed at one or two court appearances? All good questions. Watch San Diego criminal defense lawyer David P. Shapiro explain why hiring a quality, locally experienced, criminal defense firm is well worth the investment in the future of our clients. Office Address: Law Office of David P. Shapiro 3500 5th Avenue Suite 304 San Diego, CA 92103 619-295-3555 https://www.davidpshapirolaw.com/ In this video, I want to talk to you about some questions that we receive a lot of times from current, even potential clients, more often than not potential clients' families, when we're discussing the case evaluation process and whether or not our firm is a good fit with this potential client, whether they're a good fit with us, whether we're a good fit with them. And a lot of times, the parents of a client or the potential client themselves will say, "Well, wait a minute, why is it going to take all these court appearances? Why is it going to take all this money to be able to represent our son, to be able to represent our daughter, to be able to represent her husband?" So on and so forth. And what we've realized over the years is that there's this misconception out there that good results happen like that, right? But more often than not on cases whether you're dealing with a misdemeanor DUI or whether you're dealing with a child sexual assault, whether you're dealing with homicide, whatever the case may be, there is a significant amount of work that's done behind the scenes. So there may only be three or four court appearances, but there's constant work being done on that case. Or let me rephrase, there should be constant work being done on that case, whether it's reviewing discovery, reviewing reports, meeting with investigators, consulting with experts, spending time with your client to understand their side of the story, to understand what would we have seen if we were there. All those types of things to make sure you're represented the right way. A lot of firms will say, "Oh okay, assault case, all right, $7,500." Okay, but they know nothing. They know nothing about the potential client. They don't even know if they want to represent that client, I guess they do if they pay the fee. But we don't operate that way. We need to make sure it's a good fit for us, it's a good fit for the client, and then we have a general idea during that case evaluation process, whether or not this is a case that may be able to resolve early on, may not, whether there's some collateral consequence, maybe there's an immigration consequence, maybe there's a professional licensing consequence. All of those factors that we're thinking outside of criminal court that could affect how this case needs to be handled, and in order to handle it the right way would require a certain fee to ensure that we're not the law firm, which we never will be, that we're just chasing cases left and right and just signing up cases for whatever the client can pay. You don't want that as a law firm representing you. If ever the time not to "be shopping" for a law firm or for anything in life, is not to do it when you're dealing with a criminal defense case or a criminal defense charge or criminal defense accusations, right? We've had them made in 2019, grocery bags that say, "Shop for groceries, not criminal defense law firms." And there's nothing wrong with doing your research on a couple of different firms, but what you don't want to do is you don't want to just call 15 firms or send 15 firms the same contact form and just start shopping around because what you're doing is you're not appreciating the differences between the firm, and that's really, really important. Whether you hire my firm or anybody else's, it's really, really important to understand you want a firm who's been there, who's done that, who's got the reputation with judges, prosecutors, fellow defense attorneys, and the community to back that up. And a firm that understands the amount of work that it'll take to do things the right way, to represent you and your loved one the right way, and sometimes that does come with a fee that may be higher than you may want to pay, then you may think it should be, but there are so many things that if done the right way by the right firm will prove and yield dividends in the end. So I hope this video is helpful in your assessment of law firms as you're interviewing them throughout the process, if you're facing criminal charges in San Diego or elsewhere. If you have any questions about your case, feel free to give my firm a call (619) 295-3555.