Author Archives: Eric Benavides

I have seen some sad patterns in my years of being a defense attorney, both for “victims” and for “defendants”, and all of the problems and drama could be avoided.  It goes back to what they tell you when you are young, “Be careful who you hang out with”, “You are no better than those you surround yourself with”, “Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”.I have seen some sad patterns in my years of being a defense attorney, both for “victims” and for “defendants”, and all of the problems and drama could be avoided.  It goes back to what they tell you when you are young, “Be careful who you hang out with”, “You are no better than those you surround yourself with”, “Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”.

I have a couple of stories of clients I have had that are true victims of the people they associate with.  One recent client is a young female who had never been in trouble in her entire life.  She started seeing the wrong person and the drama culminated with her boyfriend beating her in a park.  He punched her in face, leaving her with a black eye.  A witness saw everything and called the police.  When the police showed up he was arrested.  But when they went through her car, they found marijuana and arrested her for that (which wasn’t hers).  Then to make it worse, they found counterfeit bills (which she didn’t know were fake).  So now this young girl who had never been in trouble before was looking at a misdemeanor and a felony charge (both have been dismissed, but that’s besides the point).

When I first talked to her I told her she needed to make better choices and surround herself with better people.  She assured me she would.  But not 2 weeks pass by until I get another call from her that she picked up another felony because she was in a car that was stolen (again nothing she knew about).  So now instead of living with a clean record, this young girl was facing 2 felonies and a misdemeanor that could have been avoided by avoiding the wrong crowd.

Another client I helped in the past was accused of beating his girlfriend.  He was charged with a felony because he was accused of choking her.  We were eventually able to prove it was all a lie with recorded phone calls and letters that the “victim” sent to my client in jail.  I told him he needed to stay away from her, and he assured me he would never talk to that crazy girl again.

Fast forward 3 months and I get another call from the jail.  He is in there again, for the same thing, accused by the same girl.  Again, we eventually get the case dismissed again by using proof from a surveillance camera at the bar they were at, and getting letters from the bartenders who witnesses her hit him, not the other way around.  This time he told me how stupid he was, and how he should of listened to me, and how he was completely done with her.  Fast forward 6 more months, and yup, you guessed it, felony charge number 3.  Same accusation, same girl.  This time unfortunately there were no witnesses, and even though we probably would have won the case, he was tired of sitting in jail after 3 months and took an offer of time served on a misdemeanor conviction against my recommendation.

Almost every person who gets charged with a crime is in that position because of a bad decision, and that’s understandable as everybody makes mistakes.  But when the same thing happens over and over and over, there is nobody to blame but the person in the mirror.