Pleading Guilty to a DWI Charge: Can You Expect to Receive “Mercy” from the Court?

Interviewer: And is there a mercy of the court that people can throw themselves upon, or is that simply a legend?

Michael: That’s a wonderful question; however, the background with DWI cases are that everyone is running scared, the police, the District Attorney’s office, the judges, the probation department, which means they are reluctant to show mercy.

If, for example, a judge on a second DWI conviction wants to show mercy and says, well, I’m not going to give you jail certainly, I’m not even going to give you probation because probation would mean you can’t drive for 3 years according to the conditions of probation. So I’m just going to give you a conditional discharge and I’ll let you drive if the Department of Motor Vehicles finds you’re eligible.

Judges Can Face Consequences for Showing Leniency to a Repeat Offender

With this example, let’s say you’ve had a prior conviction two or three years before? Well, now the judge is sticking his or her neck out. What if, god forbid, you drive within months of the sentence and hurt somebody, get in a serious accident and you’re DWI?

The fear is that the newspapers will pick it up, the media will pick it up and investigate and say, why did this judge just give this person a slap on the wrist? And the judge will get adverse publicity. These are elected officials, and their careers will be ruined.

District Attorneys Also Face Consequences for Offering Leniency to Repeat Offenders

The same example applies with the District Attorney’s office. You may feel you have the best case for mercy in the world in terms of your background and lifestyle and lack of a prior record and responsible job position. But let’s say they show you mercy and the mercy comes back to haunt them in the form of a repeat offense where someone is injured. Then the District Attorney’s office neck is on the line. The same applies with the Department of Probation. Their neck is on the line as to letting you drive.

Attorney Kramer Has Developed Good Relationships with the Judges and DA’s in Westchester County

So everyone is running scared, and it’s very, very difficult to get them to risk irreparably hurting their careers. But through relationships developed between myself and the judges and the District Attorneys under certain circumstances, they might be willing. They have been willing to stick their neck out. And fortunately, none of my clients has bit the hand that fed them, so to speak, and made them look bad. But there’s always that possibility.

What Are the Advantages of Building Good Relationships with the Local Judges, District Attorneys and Court Personnel?

Interviewer: Because you’ve been in the court systems here for so long, I would imagine you know the judges, prosecutors, probation office and the staff very well. What does this do for you as an attorney practicing in this area? It’s not going to get people out of charges, but you just mentioned one of the positive things it can do for someone is it might help promote more leniency than they’d otherwise receive. Are there any other benefits that these good relationships afford your clients?

New York’s DWI Laws Have Incorporated Areas of Discretion

Michael: Well, I believe I have a statement on my website that knowing the law is good, but knowing the court personnel is better. There are areas of discretion in DWI law, and discretion in terms of the District Attorney’s office as to what position they take, and discretion that the judges can have, and the discretion with regards to how a probation officer treats a particular case.

Common sense tells us it is probably going to be exercised more in favor of an attorney that has built up a relationship over the years with these individuals assuming it is a relationship based upon honesty and straightforwardness.

Relationships Built with Honesty and Straightforwardness Are Better Working Relationships

There are many attorneys out there who just ask for the world all the time. District Attorneys are always saying to me that the thing they like about me is I do not always ask for the impossible so that they can’t distinguish which clients of mine really deserve something and which do not.

You’re being totally reasonable and straightforward with the District Attorney, and if I go to bat for a client, they know there must be a really worthwhile reason to go to bat for them, and they should listen, rather than an attorney who is always asking for the same thing, and therefore they just turn their head and say, here he goes again.

Are There Adverse Consequences to Not Accepting a Plea Bargain?

Interviewer: In a DWI case, if someone wants to take it to trial, will the court judge sentence them more harshly because they have taken up their time and effort and gone through a trial versus pleading out?

Knowing What May be a Consequence of Going to Trial Is an Advantage Offered Only by an Experienced Area Attorney

Michael: Yes, that’s the unwritten law. There are judges – and if you practice in Westchester County, we all know them – that will punish you more for putting them through the time and effort and their court personnel through the time and effort of going to trial.

And by practicing in Westchester County and knowing which judges are involved, that’s one of the considerations and one of the benefits, my clients might have as opposed to an attorney who comes from an outlying jurisdiction just to handle one or two DWIs in Westchester.

Informed Decisions Are the Result of Weighing Both Advantages and Disadvantages

So I know the judges and I know which ones are going to be a problem in that regard and which ones are not. And when a motorist makes a decision whether to go trial, we sit down and we take all of these things into consideration, and it’s an informed decision weighing all of these advantages and disadvantages and coming up with the best decision for them.