Drug Offense

Tarrant County Drug Offense Attorneys

Drug charges can range from possession of a marijuana cigarette to delivery or possession with intent to deliver of a significant quantity of cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin or other narcotics. Beyond the immediate concerns of jail or prison time, a drug conviction can have serious collateral effects on your life that come from a permanent criminal record.

If you have been charged with a drug offense, you should seek a lawyer's help as soon as possible to assess the strength of the state's case against you. The strength of that case depends not only on whether you were in possession of the drugs but also on whether the police followed proper procedures to discover and seize those drugs.

What is drug possession?

The legal definition of possession is whether a person has actual care, custody, or management of an item. If the drugs were found in your house, the prosecutor could claim you were in possession of the drugs even though you were not at home at the time the drugs were discovered. If the drugs were found in a car and there were other people in the car with you, the prosecutor would have to prove affirmative links between you and the drugs. The weaker those links, the more bargaining leverage your defense lawyer has.

Did the police follow proper procedures?

The police need proper reasons to stop and search a person's car for drugs. Police also need a properly executed warrant to search someone's home. If the search and seizure violated your constitutional rights, your attorney can ask the court to review the actions of police. If the judge agrees that the search and seizure were illegal, the evidence will be excluded.

Outcomes in a Drug Offense Case

No lawyer can promise a result in any criminal case. However, with prompt action and guidance from your lawyer the consequences can be minimized. Sometimes it is possible to have charges dropped without conviction and the possibility of having one's record cleared with an expunction.

Cases involving large quantities of drugs are often handled in federal court where sentences can be particularly harsh under what are referred to as the federal sentencing guidelines. To obtain the best possible outcome, you should have a lawyer's help as soon as possible.

Free consultation: If you have been charged with a drug offense in Texas, contact a board-certified criminal defense attorney at Ball & Hase in Arlington. In an emergency, call 817.860.5000. We answer calls 24 hours a day.