Philadelphia Criminal Defense Blog

Zak Goldstein 9/21/26 Zak Goldstein 9/21/26

PA Superior Court: No Reasonable Expectation of Privacy in Bag Left in the Open Bed of a Pickup Truck Where Defendant Had No Connection to the Truck

Zak T. Goldstein, Esquire - Criminal Defense Attorney in Philadelphia

The Pennsylvania Superior Court has decided Commonwealth v. Serrano, 2026 PA Super 205 (Pa. Super. Sept. 18, 2026), holding that the trial court erred in suppressing a gun that police found in a bag in the open bed of a parked pickup truck. The Commonwealth produced evidence that the defendant’s only connection to the truck was that he stood next to it, and he did not present any evidence to the contrary. The Court concluded that he did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the truck and that he abandoned the bag when he left it there and ran. It did not decide whether the open bed of a pickup truck should receive the same protection as the inside of a vehicle in a case where a defendant actually establishes a connection to the truck.

What happened in Commonwealth v. Serrano?

On August 26, 2024, two uniformed Philadelphia police officers received a call from another officer who had seen the defendant near Reese and Somerset Streets with a black fanny pack. The officers ran a warrant search and found an active arrest warrant. When they arrived, they saw the defendant crouching behind a parked pickup truck. One officer asked to speak with him, and he ran. Police arrested him after a brief chase. He did not have keys to the truck.

Meanwhile, the second officer looked around the truck and saw a black satchel on the floor of the open truck bed. He reached in, took the bag to the police car, searched it, and found a gun. The officer did not have a search warrant. The officers testified that the defendant was not holding the bag when they arrived.

The Commonwealth charged the defendant with three firearms/VUFA offenses, and he moved to suppress. The suppression court granted the motion under the Pennsylvania Constitution. It reasoned that society would treat the bed of a pickup truck as part of the vehicle, with the same expectation of privacy as the interior. It also found that the Commonwealth did not meet its initial burden of showing that the defendant lacked a privacy interest in the truck. In the court’s view, the only evidence on that point was the absence of keys, and the defendant could have been spending time outside his home in his neighborhood. The Commonwealth appealed.

The Superior Court’s Ruling

The Superior Court reversed. Under Commonwealth v. Enimpah, 106 A.3d 695 (Pa. 2014), the Commonwealth bears the initial burden of producing evidence that the defendant lacked a reasonable expectation of privacy in the place searched. The defendant then bears the burden of persuasion. The Court found that the suppression court did not consider the totality of the circumstances and wrongly treated the question as one of ownership. A person who does not own a vehicle may still have a reasonable expectation of privacy in it if he lawfully possesses or controls it. Commonwealth v. Anderson, 340 A.3d 297 (Pa. 2025).

Here, the Court found that the Commonwealth showed more than missing keys. The officers did not see anyone in the truck, no one claimed it, no one saw the defendant operate it, and his only apparent connection to it was that he stood near it. He did not introduce any evidence linking himself to the truck. The Court relied on Commonwealth v. Millner, 888 A.2d 680 (Pa. 2005), in which the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held that a defendant who stood beside a parked car and tossed items into it did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the car. In the cases the defense cited, the police saw the defendant inside the vehicle. The Court did criticize the Commonwealth, noting “with displeasure” that it never ran the truck’s registration and that running the registration could have made things a lot easier for everyone.

The Court then turned to the bag. A defendant cannot maintain a reasonable expectation of privacy in property he has abandoned. Leaving property in a place open to the public is not enough. The evidence must also show that the person tried to dissociate himself from it. The Court found that showing here because the defendant walked away from the truck and the bag when the police approached, ran, and did nothing to suggest that he intended to come back for it.

Because the defendant did not have a privacy interest in the truck, the Court declined to decide whether an open truck bed is protected like the rest of the vehicle. In a footnote, it said that the defendant might have prevailed on that argument, but that the question requires analysis because the Fourth Amendment does not protect what a person knowingly exposes to the public.

The Takeaway

Serrano is a reminder that the defendant carries the ultimate burden on the expectation of privacy. When police find a gun or drugs in a car that is not registered to the client, and the client was not inside it, the defense should be prepared to present evidence connecting him to it. Without it, the Commonwealth can meet its burden by showing that the police did not find any link between the defendant and the place they searched. It is also a reminder that people who run and throw contraband are usually worse off for a motion to suppress than people who remain calm and do not run away.

The decision also leaves room for future litigation. The Court left open whether the police need a warrant to take property from an open truck bed when the defendant has a connection to the truck. And abandonment only helps the Commonwealth when the police acted lawfully. Here, the police had an arrest warrant. Where the police unlawfully seize someone and he discards property in response, the forced abandonment doctrine requires suppression, as the Superior Court held two days earlier in Commonwealth v. Thomas, 2026 PA Super 202. This defendant may have lost either way. If the police found the warrant, they likely could have searched him incident to arrest, and if the gun was on him, they would have found it. But running away will usually not improve your case.

Facing Criminal Charges or Appealing a Criminal Case in Pennsylvania? We Can Help.

Criminal Defense Lawyer Zak T. Goldstein, Esquire

If you are facing criminal charges or under investigation by the police, we can help. We have successfully defended thousands of clients against criminal charges in courts throughout Pennsylvania and New Jersey. We have successfully obtained full acquittals and dismissals in cases involving charges such as Conspiracy, Aggravated Assault, Rape, Violations of the Uniform Firearms Act, and First-Degree Murder. We have also won criminal appeals and PCRAs in state and federal court, including the successful direct appeal of a first-degree murder conviction and the exoneration of a client who spent 33 years in prison for a murder he did not commit. Our award-winning Philadelphia criminal defense lawyers offer a free criminal defense strategy session to any potential client. Call 267-225-2545 to speak with an experienced and understanding defense attorney today.

Zak Goldstein 9/19/26 Zak Goldstein 9/19/26

PA Superior Court: No Mere Encounter Where Officer Pointed Gun At Suspect (Obviously)

Zak Goldstein Defense Lawyer — Criminal Defense Lawyer Zak T. Goldstein, Esquire

The Pennsylvania Superior Court has decided Commonwealth v. Thomas, 2026 PA Super 202 (Pa. Super. Sept. 16, 2026), holding that a Philadelphia police officer seized the defendant when he approached him with his gun drawn. The officer claimed that he only asked for identification, but he did not turn on his body camera until after the chase ended, and the suppression court did not believe him. Because a reasonable person would not feel free to walk away from an officer holding a gun, the Superior Court affirmed the order suppressing the firearm that the defendant discarded before he ran.

**What happened in Commonwealth v. Thomas?**

On May 16, 2024, an officer setting up narcotics surveillance saw the defendant walk by with a rectangular bulge near his hip that, according to the officer, moved like an unholstered gun. He put out a radio call that the man might have a gun. A second officer, who was alone, out of uniform, and driving an unmarked car, responded to the 3900 block of North Smedley Street. He testified that the defendant picked up the pace, so he got out to try to engage him in a mere encounter and ask for identification. According to the officer, the defendant bladed his body away, dipped down behind a parked car, and ran. Police caught him after a chase, and the officer recovered a gun from the wheel well of the parked car.

As is typical, the officer’s body camera video did not have any sound for the first minute. When the defendant began to stand back up from behind the parked car, the officer had his gun in his right hand, pointed chest-high across the car towards him. The officer testified that the gun was initially pointed up and that he lowered it when the defendant ran.

The suppression court first denied the motion, finding a mere encounter that turned into a stop supported by reasonable suspicion when the defendant dipped behind the car. The defense moved for reconsideration, and the court amended its findings. It found that the officer approached with his gun out and that, without audio, it could not know what he actually said. The court cited a Philadelphia police directive that requires officers to activate their cameras before conducting any pedestrian investigation, found that the officer deliberately failed to do so, and did not credit his testimony about what he said. It granted the motion, and the Commonwealth appealed to the Superior Court.

The Superior Court’s Ruling

The Superior Court first considered sua sponte whether the suppression court had jurisdiction to reverse itself more than 30 days after its original order. It did because a pre-trial suppression order is interlocutory and the 30-day limit in 42 Pa.C.S. § 5505 does not apply. Commonwealth v. James, 69 A.3d 180 (Pa. 2013). The Court did not endorse the procedure because Rule 581(J) makes the denial of a suppression motion final absent previously unavailable evidence, but the Commonwealth did not preserve that challenge.

On the merits, police may generally use abandoned property as evidence, but not where unlawful police action coerced the abandonment. Commonwealth v. Lewis, 343 A.3d 1016 (Pa. 2025). On appeal, the Commonwealth argued only that the interaction was a mere encounter and did not claim that the officer had reasonable suspicion. The question therefore became whether a reasonable person in the defendant’s position would have felt free to leave.

The Court held that he would not. An officer may approach someone in public and ask for identification without any suspicion, but the display of a weapon is one of the recognized factors that turns an encounter into a seizure. The video supported the finding that the officer activated his camera only after he had approached, chased, and apprehended the defendant, and the suppression court did not commit a clear and manifest error by discrediting him on that basis. The officer’s testimony that his gun was initially pointed up supported the conclusion that he pointed it towards the defendant before the defendant dipped down.

The Commonwealth argued that the defendant never saw the gun because he had turned away and was wearing a hood. The Court disagreed. The video does not show the defendant during the first six seconds after the officer got out of the car, and the Court found it reasonable to infer that he bladed away because he saw the gun. The Commonwealth also argued that the officer reasonably held his gun at his side for his safety. The Court responded that the question is whether a reasonable person would feel free to ignore the officer, not whether the officer acted reasonably for his safety. The Court affirmed. Judge Sullivan noted a dissent.

The Takeaway

Thomas is a helpful case for anyone charged with possessing a gun or drugs that the police recovered after a chase. Under Pennsylvania’s forced abandonment doctrine, if the police unlawfully seize someone and he throws something away in response, the Commonwealth cannot use it. Where an officer does not follow the body camera directive, defense counsel should ask the court to consider that failure in deciding whether to believe him.

Facing Criminal Charges or Appealing a Criminal Case in Pennsylvania? We Can Help.

Zak Goldstein 9/10/26 Zak Goldstein 9/10/26

Philadelphia Bench Warrants: How to Get a Bench Warrant Lifted

Bench warrants don't go away on their own. Our Philadelphia criminal defense lawyers can help get a bench warrant lifted.

Bench Warrants in Philadelphia, PA

A bench warrant is a judge’s order for your arrest because you missed court. It does not expire, and ignoring it does not make it go away. In Philadelphia, there are two ways to resolve one: turn yourself in and have a hearing, or have a lawyer ask the court and the District Attorney’s Office to lift the warrant without you appearing. For older cases and for clients who live out of state, we can often get the warrant lifted, and sometimes the whole case withdrawn, without the client ever returning to Philadelphia. Call or text 267-225-2545 for a free warrant check.

A bench warrant is a serious problem. The judge can revoke your bail, keep the money you posted, hold you in contempt, and send you to jail for missing court. Our Philadelphia bench warrant lawyers can help you get the warrant lifted, whether that means arranging a surrender and representing you at the hearing or asking the court to lift the warrant without you appearing at all. This page explains how bench warrants work in Pennsylvania. Every case is different, so call us for advice on yours.

What will happen if I don’t go to court?

Zak T. Goldstein, Esq. - Criminal Defense Lawyer for Lifting a Bench Warrant in PA

If you are a defendant and miss your court date without telling the court, the judge will almost certainly issue a bench warrant. When the police eventually arrest you on the warrant, the judge could also hold you in contempt and revoke your bail. The same could be true for a witness in a case. The Commonwealth does not always seek to arrest its witnesses when the witnesses fail to appear, but in some cases, the Commonwealth could obtain a material witness warrant for you if you were subpoenaed for court to testify as a witness and failed to appear.

What is a bench warrant?

A bench warrant is an order issued by the judge directing any law enforcement officers with whom you come into contact to arrest you. If the police stop you for anything, even a traffic stop, and run your name, they will see the warrant and arrest you. An open warrant can also show up on an employment background check, and customs officers can detain you when you re-enter the United States, even decades later.

Are there any other punishments for missing court?

Goldstein Mehta LLC Bench Warrant Lawyers — Philadelphia Bench Warrant Lawyer

Sooner or later, the police will arrest you or you will decide to turn yourself in. When you go before a judge to have the warrant lifted, there are other potential punishments that the judge could impose. The judge could hold you in contempt and sentence you to a fine or up to six months in jail. The judge could also revoke your bail as a flight risk or raise it so that you have to pay more to get out. If the court forfeits your bail, you could owe the city or county a large amount of money. In most counties in Pennsylvania, the defendant or the surety actually pays 10% of the bail amount. This means that if bail is set at $100,000, then the defendant would have to pay $10,000 in order to be released. If a judge finds that the defendant willfully missed court, then the defendant could be required to post the other $90,000.

How can I get a bench warrant lifted?

There are two ways to get a bench warrant lifted. You can turn yourself in and have a hearing, or a lawyer can ask the court to lift the warrant without you appearing. Which option is realistic depends on the court, the charges, and how long the warrant has been open. We cover the second option below. If you turn yourself in, Pennsylvania Rule of Criminal Procedure 150 says the court cannot hold you longer than 72 hours without a bench warrant hearing before a judge or commissioner. If the 72 hours runs out on a weekend or holiday, the court must hold the hearing by the close of the next business day. The judge who conducts the bench warrant hearing will lift the bench warrant and determine whether to reinstate and release you on the same bail, revoke bail, or raise the bail. Additionally, the prosecution may move for contempt, in which case you would have a contempt hearing.

In Philadelphia, you turn yourself in at a courtroom in the Criminal Justice Center. You must arrive early in the morning. The court will usually see you that day, and many of our clients go home the same day. Judges almost always treat you better if you come in voluntarily with a lawyer than if the police bring you in. If the police arrest you on the warrant instead, they will take you to the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility, and you will wait there until the bench warrant judge sees you by video from the prison.

Can a lawyer get my bench warrant lifted without me turning myself in?

Often, yes. Since the pandemic, Philadelphia courts have allowed defense lawyers to ask the court to lift a bench warrant without requiring the defendant to surrender first. The process usually works like this. We pull your docket and confirm the warrant. We contact the assigned assistant district attorney, explain why you missed court, and show what has happened in your life since. If the District Attorney’s Office agrees, the judge can lift the warrant based on the filings and give you a new court date without you setting foot in the Criminal Justice Center. If the judge denies the request, you would still have to turn yourself in and have a hearing, but you would do it with counsel and a plan.

This works best in Municipal Court cases (misdemeanors and preliminary hearings) and in older cases. In Court of Common Pleas cases, the request goes to the judge assigned to your case rather than the bench warrant judge, and judges differ in how they handle it. For serious felony charges, the court will usually insist that you appear. Counties outside Philadelphia handle this differently, and many now allow a lawyer to file a motion to lift the warrant instead of requiring a surrender.

What is a judge-only bench warrant?

A judge-only bench warrant means that when you get arrested on the warrant or turn yourself in, your bench warrant hearing will be held before the judge that originally issued the warrant. In Philadelphia, if you receive a normal bench warrant, then the warrant will be addressed by whichever judge happens to be assigned to bench warrant court on the day that you have your hearing. If you receive a judge-only warrant, then you will have the warrant addressed by the judge who issued it.

How long can they hold me on a bench warrant?

Pennsylvania Rule of Criminal Procedure 150 provides that the court cannot hold you on a bench warrant for more than 72 hours without a hearing, or past the close of the next business day if the 72 hours runs out on a weekend or holiday. Once the warrant is lifted, you could still be held if the judge raises or revokes your bail. This is true both for criminal defendants and material witnesses. If the police arrest you in a different county from the one that issued the warrant, it can take longer. The jail in the arresting county must notify the issuing county, and the 72-hour limit in Rule 150 applies to detention in the county that issued the warrant.

What happens after the bench warrant is lifted?

Once the bench warrant is lifted, the judge will schedule the case for the next hearing. If you missed your preliminary hearing, then the judge would schedule the case for the preliminary hearing. If you missed your trial date, then the case would be scheduled for trial. It is relatively rare, but in some cases, the court may conduct a hearing or trial in your absence if the court finds that you willfully failed to appear. So it is possible, though unlikely, that a judge already found you guilty in absentia. If that happened, the court could require you to serve the sentence. You may still be able to appeal, but the clock runs from the sentencing, and a defendant who stays a fugitive past the appeal deadline can forfeit the right to appeal. The sooner you come forward, the more options you have.

How can I find out if I have a bench warrant?

If you missed court as a defendant, you almost certainly have a bench warrant. We can check for you in minutes. Call or text 267-225-2545 for a free warrant check. If you are facing criminal charges and have a bench warrant, we are happy to look it up for you and discuss representation in the case and getting the warrant lifted. You can also check the public court dockets by searching for your name at https://ujsportal.pacourts.us/DocketSheets/CP.aspx. If you have a bench warrant, it will typically be indicated on the docket.

What if my bench warrant is years old?

An old bench warrant is still an active warrant. Bench warrants in Pennsylvania do not expire, and the court will not clear one just because time passed. We regularly hear from people who learn about a ten- or twenty-year-old warrant when they apply for a job, renew a license, or come back through customs at the airport.

The age of the warrant cuts both ways. The police can still arrest you on it. But if the case was minor, you have stayed out of trouble, and you can show the prosecutor what you have done with your life since, the age of the case becomes your best argument. Witnesses move, officers retire, and evidence disappears, so the District Attorney’s Office often has little interest in trying a decades-old misdemeanor.

In these cases we put together a mitigation package for the assigned prosecutor: a letter explaining what happened and why you missed court, proof of employment, letters from family, employers, or people in your community, treatment records where they help, and your clean record since the case. Based on that package, the District Attorney’s Office will often agree to have the warrant lifted administratively so that nobody has to arrest you. In some cases, the prosecutor agrees to withdraw the charges altogether, as happened in the K.E. case below. If the Commonwealth withdraws the charges, you can then petition to have the arrest record expunged.

I live out of state or in another country. Do I have to come back to Philadelphia?

Not always. Many of our bench warrant clients live in other states or overseas, and in less serious cases we are often able to resolve the warrant without the client traveling to Philadelphia. We handle the entire process by phone, email, and video. You send us the documents for the mitigation package, we deal with the District Attorney’s Office and the court, and you hear the result from us.

If the court lifts the warrant, one of two things happens. Either the court schedules the case for its next hearing, and we then work out whether you need to appear in person or whether the case can be resolved without you, or the Commonwealth withdraws the case. If the court does require you to appear, we schedule the date in advance so that you know exactly what to expect and can usually be in and out of the courthouse the same day.

Ignoring the warrant because you live far away is a mistake. The warrant follows you. It can appear on background checks, customs officers can detain you when you re-enter the United States, and if the police stop you in another state, they can hold you while Pennsylvania decides whether to bring you back. For a minor case Pennsylvania may decline to extradite, but you could still spend days in a local jail while that gets sorted out. Dealing with the warrant on your schedule, with a lawyer, is always better than dealing with it on theirs.

Case Study: Twenty-Year-Old Bench Warrant Lifted and Charges Dismissed Without Returning to Philadelphia

In Commonwealth v. K.E., Attorney Zak Goldstein represented a client who learned that he had a twenty-year-old bench warrant for knowing and intentional possession of a controlled substance. Police had arrested K.E. about twenty years earlier in two misdemeanor drug cases in different counties at around the same time. Although K.E. resolved one of the drug charges through participation in a treatment program, K.E. did not realize that he still had an outstanding warrant when he left the program.

K.E. moved out of state, rebuilt his life, and eventually obtained a job as a professional which required a great deal of travel for work. Over the years, customs officers detained K.E. for up to 24 hours when he re-entered the country after business trips, but nobody ever arrested him or told him he had a warrant and pending charges. Police had even stopped him for traffic tickets without telling him about the warrant. When returning from a recent trip, K.E. learned that he had a bench warrant from the old drug case and immediately contacted Attorney Goldstein.

Attorney Goldstein put together a mitigation packet for the District Attorney's Office showing that K.E. completed drug treatment at the time, had remained clean for twenty years, and had gone on to have a successful career in another state. After receiving the packet, the District Attorney's Office agreed to lift the bench warrant and dismiss the charges without requiring K.E. to return to Philadelphia.

Why should I retain a Philadelphia Criminal Defense Lawyer for help with my bench warrant?

Our Philadelphia criminal defense lawyers have represented thousands of clients in criminal cases and have resolved bench warrants for clients in Philadelphia, across the country, and overseas. Each case is different, and we never guarantee results, but you will almost always do better if you retain counsel and come forward on your own terms than if the police pick you up. In many cases, the judge reinstates our client’s bail and releases the client the same day. We offer a free criminal defense strategy session to any potential client. Call or text 267-225-2545 to discuss your case today.

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Zak Goldstein 9/4/26 Zak Goldstein 9/4/26

PA Superior Court: Trial Counsel Ineffective for Failing to Move to Suppress Parole Violation Admission Obtained Without Miranda Warnings

Criminal Defense Attorney Zak Goldstein — Criminal Defense Attorney Zak T. Goldstein, Esquire

The Pennsylvania Superior Court has decided Commonwealth v. Ames, 2026 PA Super 179 (Pa. Super. Aug. 10, 2026), holding that a parole agent conducted a custodial interrogation when he took a parolee into custody in handcuffs and shackles, read him the complainant’s allegations of new crimes, and presented him with a form on which he could admit that he had violated his parole by committing that conduct. The agent never gave Miranda warnings, so the signed admission should have been suppressed, and trial counsel had no reasonable basis for letting the Commonwealth use it at a trial where the whole defense was that the complainant had made the allegations up. The Court reversed the denial of the defendant’s PCRA petition and remanded for a new trial.

**What Happened in Commonwealth v. Ames?**

In 2016, the defendant pleaded no contest to simple assault and terroristic threats for assaulting his wife, L.A. While he was on parole for that case, L.A. alleged that he strangled her, beat her, threatened to kill her, and sexually assaulted her on two occasions in late 2018. In March 2019, she reported the incidents to his parole agent. The agent passed the allegations to the local police, and when the police did not file charges right away, he ordered the defendant to report to the parole office. When the defendant arrived, the agent handcuffed and shackled him, took him to an interview room, read him the notice of charges describing L.A.’s allegations in detail, and gave him the choice of a hearing on the violation or a signed waiver admitting it. The defendant signed the form admitting that he had violated parole by engaging in assaultive behavior and violating a no-contact order. The agent never gave Miranda warnings.

The Commonwealth charged the defendant with strangulation, aggravated assault, sexual assault, and related offenses. At trial, it introduced the signed admission and the agent’s testimony about the meeting. The defense argued that L.A. had fabricated the allegations to get the defendant in trouble with parole, and it called two medical experts, including L.A.’s treating physician, who testified that L.A. told her that storage containers had fallen on her. The jury convicted the defendant of everything, and the court sentenced him to forty and a half to eighty years in prison. The Superior Court affirmed on direct appeal. The defendant then filed a PCRA petition arguing that trial counsel should have moved to suppress the admission. The PCRA court denied relief, and he appealed.

The Superior Court’s Ruling

The Commonwealth conceded that the defendant was in custody, so the only question was whether the agent interrogated him. In Commonwealth v. Cooley, 118 A.3d 370 (Pa. 2015), the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held that a parole agent who handcuffs a parolee and questions him about new crimes must give Miranda warnings, because at that point the agent’s conduct is the functional equivalent of a police officer’s. The Commonwealth argued that Cooley did not apply because the agent never asked the defendant any questions and the meeting was a routine part of the parole process.

The Superior Court rejected both arguments. The agent did not bring the defendant in for routine administrative questions. He brought him in to find out whether he had committed the crimes L.A. described, laid out those allegations, told him he believed the defendant had violated parole by engaging in assaultive behavior, and then handed him a form on which he could admit it. That was an interrogation. Miranda protection is not limited to answers to questions; the agent’s words and actions were reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating response, and the defendant did not volunteer anything. A motion to suppress would have had merit.

Trial counsel had no reasonable basis for failing to file it. Her strategy was to show that L.A. was lying, and the signed admission told the jury that L.A. was telling the truth. No competent counsel would allow a confession to the charged conduct into evidence while arguing that the complainant invented the allegations. On prejudice, the Court noted that the defendant’s admissions alone were enough to convict him of several charges, and that the medical evidence was contested. Two defense experts testified that L.A.’s injuries did not match her account, and the Commonwealth did not call any expert to rebut the treating physician. Given that conflict, the confession likely had a substantial impact on the verdict. The Court reversed and remanded for a new trial.

Does a parole agent have to give you Miranda warnings?

Sometimes. Cooley held that a parole agent who questions a handcuffed parolee about new crimes must give Miranda warnings. Ames extends that rule to the situation where the agent does not actually ask anything but simply presents the parolee with an admission form. Anyone on parole or probation who is called in over new allegations should not sign anything admitting to criminal conduct without talking to a lawyer first because the Commonwealth could use the signed form as a confession in the criminal case. And where an agent has already obtained an admission from a client in custody without warnings, defense counsel should move to suppress it. Under Ames, the failure to file that motion can support a successful ineffectiveness claim and lead to a new trial.

Facing Criminal Charges or Appealing a Criminal Case in Pennsylvania? We Can Help.

Zak Goldstein Criminal Defense Lawyer — Goldstein Mehta LLC Criminal Defense