So You Got Arrested
The Texas justice system can be messy- we talk to the key players to uncover what really happens. Hosted by BRCK Criminal Defense Attorneys, this podcast dives into real stories and hard truths from inside the Texas criminal courts.
We explore what happens after an arrest, how charges are fought, and what it's like to face the court system in places like San Antonio, South Texas, Austin and the Texas Hill Country.
Whether you’ve been arrested, have a loved one in jail, or just want to understand the criminal defense process in Texas, this show gives you raw, unfiltered insight from criminal lawyers, legal experts, and those directly impacted by the system.
So You Got Arrested
Going to Court in the Hill Country
Navigating the Texas justice system, especially in the scenic Hill Country, can be tricky. In this episode of "So You Got Arrested," host Stephen Barrera and guest Jacob Lindberg, both criminal defense attorneys, discuss the key differences between practicing law in a large metropolitan area like San Antonio versus the smaller, more personal communities of the Hill Country.
Jacob shares his experiences as a former prosecutor and now a criminal defense attorney in places like Boerne, Kerrville, Fredericksburg, and Bandera. They cover everything from the importance of personal presentation in a close-knit community to the strict enforcement of bond conditions and the consequences of missing a court date.
Learn why an attorney's relationship with local judges and prosecutors matters, the difference between surety and cash bonds, and how a seemingly minor mistake like a missed court notice can lead to a new felony charge. Whether you're facing charges or simply curious, this episode provides essential insights to help you understand your rights and make the smart moves that could change everything.
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The Texas justice system is messy, so let's break it down. You're listening to so you got arrested the podcast that tells you what really happens after an arrest hosted by brick criminal defense attorneys. We talked to the people who've lived it, worked in it and been shaped by it. Whether you're facing charges or just want to understand your rights, your options and the smart moves that could change everything, we've got your back.
Speaker 2:So, Jacob, I'm a little bit jealous of you. It's not because of the hair or the fact that you're, you know, younger than me and in better shape, but you get to practice in some of the most beautiful areas in this part of the state, Absolutely, yeah, A lot of your practice takes you out to places like Bernie, uh, Carville, Bandera, Fredericksburg, uh people, uh places that people go, uh you know to to get away on little trips. You get to go out there as part of your practice.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, and people travel across the country just to come to see the Hill country and the wineries. And Fredericksburg, and Bernie of course, is kind of this up and coming, especially after the little league baseball. I know you were watching some of that, joe, part of our firm, you know, being such a small but nice community, it does, it draws people and so I really am privileged to do that and the drives are wonderful. I know you've made that drive to Bandera at least a couple times Every time I drive out there.
Speaker 2:I wish I lived in that area. Now you started out your practice over at the Bexar County DA's office.
Speaker 3:That's right, yeah, so I started out being a prosecutor and learning it from that perspective right. So I was at the Bexar County DA's office for a while, specifically in the family violence division and the juvenile division. The family violence division really was what I liked right, Prosecuting those kinds of crimes. You're a fan of family violence, Prosecuting those kinds of crimes, standing up for the victims of the family violence you know that was great. And juvenile is also good because you get a opportunity to stand up for those juveniles, help them as a prosecutor.
Speaker 2:You have a lot more hand in control of it, sure, and a lot of times in that juvenile court, I mean, you know you're really focusing on rehabilitation and trying to make sure that that juvenile has a second chance and can still have everything that they wanted in life.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right, and I wanted to be a criminal defense attorney my entire practicing career through law school, all of those things and so being able to do it through that rehabilitative perspective really was beneficial. Seeing it as a prosecutor and obviously being able to facilitate that now representing juveniles in the Hill Country.
Speaker 2:Well, and now you know you've kind of made this transition from being a prosecutor in a large metropolitan area like San Antonio to practicing out in the Hill Country community. Is there a difference?
Speaker 3:Yeah, generally, yes, absolutely, and so what you get with that is some of the things that come with being a smaller community, smaller county, smaller town. The main thing is going to be how you present yourself. I think that's the most important thing. One, of course, physically, you know what you look like as far as your appearance, how you dress, how you present yourself. I think that's the most important thing. One, of course, physically, you know what you look like as far as your appearance, how you dress, how you carry yourself.
Speaker 2:So you're going to do better in court out there than I would.
Speaker 3:You hold your own, you hold your own. Come on. So the boots especially, that's what carries the day for you, and so, but second and very importantly, is how you carry yourself with the people you interact with. There's different things that come into place, whether it's a pretrial officer or drug tests that come up during the pretrial period. So how you present yourself during those opportunities really is what they are is super important.
Speaker 2:Well, and you know, I started my practice in a small community and the thing that always struck me there, you know, versus practice in a place like San Antonio, is there is a likelihood that the prosecutor may know you, or the bailiff may know you or your family, or even the judge, and so it can it. It does come into play a little bit in these smaller communities. Or even if you're in a jury trial, uh, the, the people that are showing up for jury duty may know you, or they may know the police officers who are going to testify, they may know the victim. I mean, you know those, those variables are very different than in a place like San Antonio.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. It's almost easy, and slip through the cracks isn't the right word. But in Bexar County it's almost easy to just kind of get in and get out. It's almost easy to just kind of get in and get out If you have a good attorney, like someone like Scott Simpson, who comes in and you really don't have to talk to the judge or do much of anything. He'll get your case reset when it needs it. Or if there's a plea, you guys are in front of the judge together, which of course you have to present while they are, but otherwise you're kind of in and out. There's less of a interaction throughout the entire process. Pre-trial being as busy as they are, they're not going to have as much hand in controlling what you do in those bond conditions in Bexar County as they would in the smaller communities like the Hill Country where they are.
Speaker 2:Let's kind of touch on that a little bit. So you mentioned bond conditions. You know bond conditions come about when you're arrested and you're allowed to be released and you're out on that bond. The magistrate gets to say, okay, while you're out on this bond you're going to have to follow these conditions. Now, in your experience, are those bond conditions that get set out in maybe a place like Kendall County, where Bernie is, or Kerr County, where Kerrville is, or Gillespie County, where Fredericksburg is? Are those any different than something that you might find in Bexrett County?
Speaker 3:Not necessarily different. In fact, most of them are going to be similar, which is DWIs are going to have, of course, no alcohol, no drugs which will come on anything but DWI specifically. Normally there's interlock with things like that. The family violence offenses will have a no contact, or at least a no harmful or injurious contact, and so those conditions are similar. The main difference is how they're supervised. So, being a smaller county, there's less criminal cases. When you are assigned a pretrial officer, which you would be those officers will call you almost immediately and you will work with them, and people sometimes get frustrated. They say, okay, well, I haven't even been found guilty. Why am I answering to this person on these conditions when I'm not guilty, While that might be the case? You were released from the jail, you've got these conditions and they're going to expect you to follow them. So pretrial will be working directly with that person to make sure they're being followed.
Speaker 2:Well, and in a smaller community like that, I imagine that it's a little more likely that that pretrial officer may do what's called a home visit, where they're actually showing up to your home to see hey, do you have? You know you're not allowed to own or possess a firearm. Are there any firearms here? Or, you know, let me see if you have alcohol in your refrigerator, things like that.
Speaker 3:It's something almost completely unheard of in Bexar County you think of San Antonio, how big it is, and that's what I mean by you can almost slip through the cracks is there's no way they're doing home visits and pretrial. With the amount of understaffing that there is and the amount of people there are in the system, it's just not possible. But in the Hill Country, absolutely, you can almost always expect a home visit, whether it be during probation or pretrial.
Speaker 2:Well, and the other thing that I found, you know having practice in a small town, is that there are only so many bars to go to and you know convenience stores to get your alcohol. And I've had cases where I have somebody out on bond and you know they'd show up at a bar thinking well, nobody's going to find out, or in their pretrial officer, you know, happens to see them. I've even had situations in these small counties where somebody goes to like a friend's wedding and they're getting wasted at the friend's wedding and then their pretrial officer just happens to be there, you know, because they're somebody's distant cousin, right? So that that's a little more likely in a smaller community than it's going to be in a place like San Antonio.
Speaker 3:Definitely, Definitely and again. Another important part of all of those things is going to be the drug testing. Okay, so the drug testing during pretrial is they're going to test you, I mean, whether it's in court, after court, before court, whatever it is.
Speaker 2:Those tests are going to be had and the court's going to want to hear about it. And when we say pretrial, we're meaning you're not on probation. This is just a condition for you to be out while your case is pending.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right, and so when that condition is in place, they're going to expect you to be clean and you have to be or you could see yourself back in custody, which is obviously new bonds, new issues and something to address with the court.
Speaker 2:And when those pre-trial violations come up, I mean, are they enforced maybe a little more harshly in smaller communities than they are, like they would be in San Antonio, or what's your experience with that?
Speaker 3:As far as the way they're enforced, because there is a closer eye on it, it's definitely caught more, and so it's caught far more often than it would be in Bexar County. But they also can be reasonable when enforcing it. They understand maybe they didn't fully understand their conditions. They needed that reminder. Hey, I will take you back into custody if you continue to fail your conditions. Or, yeah, if it's a person that simply is not complying with their conditions, they're going to be in custody and they're not going to get a bond.
Speaker 2:Now let me kind of talk to you about a scenario that pops up all the time. So you have these communities like Kerr County, gillespie County, kendall County, and they're all along the I-10 corridor, and so a lot of times what you see are people that aren't residents of that county necessarily, they're just traveling through, they're driving in from California. Whatever the case may be, they get arrested and they get a bond condition saying you are not allowed to leave Kendall County while your case is pending. Now, if that comes up, is there anything you can do about that?
Speaker 3:Absolutely as the attorney, we file a motion immediately, and that's a perfectly reasonable one, right?
Speaker 3:Especially if you're in custody, hoping to leave, to go home.
Speaker 3:A lot of times we get people from El Paso, driving from El Paso to San Antonio or even Houston, coming through I-10, they get stopped in Bernie or Kerrville, whatever it might be, and so, yeah, that's absolutely something that happens, which kind of brings up another point, which is in Fredericksburg, the wineries, right, I mean, the idea there is that they don't necessarily love people coming in, going to the wineries, getting drunk and then going on the roads potentially hurting their citizens, right.
Speaker 3:So it's something that's frowned upon in any county in the state of Texas, but of course there it's looked at a little differently with the wineries because of that, and so it's certainly something that exactly right kind of just as you're passing through, they want to keep their community members safe, they want to make sure you're not an issue, and so, going back even to the pretrial conditions, we really need to look at that as probation practice. It doesn't necessarily mean every case or every person goes on probation, but if there's the opportunity for that and it's the better opportunity compared to jail or prison or whatever it might be, you need to treat that pretrial condition as okay. This is an opportunity for me to pass my drug tests. Work well with the pretrial officer, not be an issue with them.
Speaker 2:It's almost like an audition.
Speaker 3:Exactly and that way we can tell the judge judge they were completely perfect on their pretrial during the nine months to a year that it took to handle the case. They're perfectly eligible and going to be successful on this because, other than the situation where we go to Fredericksburg, we get drunk at the wineries and then we don't listen to anyone, we don't come to court, we don't listen, you know, do anything and you know they're not going to want to give us a good outcome at all.
Speaker 2:Well, and I would imagine that you know, in these smaller communities where maybe the judge has maybe a smaller caseload, they might be a little more likely to remember. If you frequently violate those pretrial conditions and then you're in front of them, you know where the judge is trying to decide what to do with you at the end of your case.
Speaker 3:Of course, right, and so if the pretrial officer is having to bring you up to the judge every single time and maybe the judge is deciding your punishment on the situation, they're not going to be as lenient. I mean, they know you and again, these smaller counties. The reason that they may know you is they have court less. They have court less often uh, maybe four or five times a month in some counties and so because of that, it's the same people every single time. If you come in and you're wearing shorts or you're disheveled and you look hung over or something, and you know really the when I say present yourself well, it's more of a church clothes regular thing. It doesn't have to be super fancy, jeans are fine, but you don't want to look bad. That's when people notice. You don't want to not carry yourself well at all, because that's when people notice. You know it's easy to just dress fairly well, anything is fine and just kind of get by, rather than being an issue wearing shorts, looking bad and those kinds of things.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and that kind of raises a question of. On this podcast we've talked about how you should present or what you can expect at your initial appearance, like in San Antonio. Is it any different for an initial appearance, say, in one of the Hill Country communities?
Speaker 3:It can be, yeah, and so that first setting is always going to be the arraignment setting, right, and I know there was an episode on arraignment on the podcast.
Speaker 2:It's just the initial court appearance where the judge is trying to figure out do you have a lawyer, Do you need a lawyer? And that's about the extent of it.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right, and so sometimes people will go in confirm those things. If they have an attorney, we'll either do the arraignment or just waive it, right. But then your first pretrial ends up coming up. And so the biggest difference during these settings is that in Bexar County, again, your attorney can go to the coordinator, maybe move the court case and that's it, you're done for the day. You don't do anything, whereas in our courts you have to come up to the judge. You come with me, we go to the judge, we tell the judge hey, judge, we're here, we've got another setting a month from now on this docket. Today we talked about this, that or the other thing and this is what we're going to do at that setting. And so you know, when we go up to the judge again, you can't look disheveled, you have to be put together, presenting yourself well, and of course the prosecutor is up there also, so they will remember you if you're not presented well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's right. Like in a place like San Antonio, your attorney can, you know, just go up to the coordinator and say, hey, can I move this out? You know 30 days, 60 days, whatever it is, and handle it that way, yep. But in these smaller communities like the Hill Country, or even you know where I started my practice down South Texas, wilson County, carnes you're actually taking your client up in front of the judge. That's right To get that reset form signed. So the judge is seeing your client in front of them just to get the case reset.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and so it's. You know something, the other thing to expect on your first court date is because of that it does take some time. Normally with me it wouldn't. I'm pretty efficient in making sure we're kind of in and out. I know people have jobs, all these things that are kind of on hold when you have to come to court and so, being cognizant of that, I do try to be as fast as possible. And for the ones that are going to take a long time, we have the discussion of why, if we're taking a plea deal, paperwork takes a long time, and so we you know the things that take longer will have to take longer. Otherwise we're in and out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, plan on devoting your entire day to that court appearance, but we're coming up on the break, but when we come back we'll have more with Jacob Lindberg. This is so you.
Speaker 4:Got Arrested. The attorneys of Brick Criminal Defense have helped over 5,000 clients move on with their lives. When an arrest or accusation turns your life upside down, we have the knowledge, experience and integrity to get your life back on track. Traditional legal ethics, modern legal tactics the best defense possible to get you through the criminal justice system. Search Brick Criminal Defense to see our reviews and find out why so many of our clients have trusted us to fight for them. Brick Criminal Defense helping our clients move on with their lives.
Speaker 2:So we're back on, so you Got Arrested. We're talking about what it's like if you get charged with an offense in the hill country, specifically you know, bernie, which is kendall county, curville, which is cur county, fredericksburg, which is gillespie county, and bandera and bandera county. As the clients are attending court, are there any differences in in terms of what court might be like for them every time they go versus somebody who may have court in a larger area like San Antonio?
Speaker 3:Not necessarily outside of the things that we've talked about. It's going to be, we're going to go in. In fact, most of the time the client and I will have a conversation of. This is what we're doing today. We're trying to get to this point or that point or whatever it is, and you know the courts do move quickly, also in that if it's someone that needs a jury trial, because that's what's required, we can get one pretty soon. The dockets, you know they only have a jury trial setting normally at least once a month, maybe twice, and that's because, again, with less citizens in the county, they can't pull a jury pool every single day like Bexar County. It's just not going to work. There's not enough people, and so because of that, it's normally one a month. But they are pretty efficient. We're able to get things tried when they need to be, and so it's kind of similar in that respect.
Speaker 2:And you know, one thing I have noticed in the courts out in the Hill Country is some of them have courts at different times and so I know like in South Texas you know, court always starts at nine. But I know I've practiced in Kendall County where you may have like a court appearance at 1.30. And that's what time you're supposed to be there. I know in Bandera sometimes they have court at 8.30. I mean, can you kind of talk about that a little bit?
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:And so the main ones you hear about are the 9 am, of course that's most dockets in any felony case, except for Kendall County, will be 9 am. As far as the 198th, the 216th, that's going to be Kerr, gillespie and Bandera counties, those are always going to be 9 am. As far as the felonies go, however, the misdemeanors those could be at the 1.30. And really the reason for that is that's the court working with us. They know attorneys might be coming in from Bexar County to handle cases in the Hill Country and they want good attorneys to come out there, and so places like Kendall County, kerr County, glasgow County will work with us in doing afternoon settings for misdemeanors, felonies, whatever it might be. And so really, yeah, that's a good opportunity for us to go at a later time. I mean again, it's one of those things where the person is going to have to take off at work ahead of time, kind of take that full afternoon. Unless you're able to get back to work around three or four, you're going to want to take the whole afternoon.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you know, one of the things that stands out to me in some of these, uh, Hill country courts is like, for example, in Kendall County, uh, you're going to have, let's say, you're charged with a misdemeanor DWI and during that misdemeanor DWI arrest they find, you know, a bag of cocaine and now you got a felony for possession of a controlled substance. The interesting thing about like Kendall County is you're going to have the same judge for both cases, right?
Speaker 3:That's right, and so it's the 451st, whether it's a felony or a misdemeanor. It can be a little different compared to other counties, but yes, so the county court judge is going to be the sitting district court judge also. It's a blessing in disguise because in reality, again, as long as you're presenting yourself correctly, it's really is a benefit, because again she sees that you're coming on your misdemeanor setting, but you're also coming on your felony setting, you're not an issue with pretrial, you're doing everything correctly and there really is no issues. And again it can be a complete blessing in kind of putting a face to the name. That's really an opportunity that you don't have in Bexar County because of how big it is, and so if she's able to say OK, I know this person, as far as I've heard the name a hundred times is every time they came to court and here they are getting a good outcome, I'm absolutely going to sign off on this kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Now you know, with that kind of increased attention that can also be a negative thing. Absolutely If you're late to court or you don't show up, or whatever the case may be, that could cause problems.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and so those problems are far more magnified in that situation and the judge knows your name now and it goes the opposite direction where it's harmful to us. In that situation, unfortunately, we see it come up where you know. We were talking about the arraignment setting and, let's say, the person. They get noticed through the mail most of the time and so when you get arrested, make sure you're giving them your permanent address or the address you actually are living.
Speaker 2:And let me tell you a scenario that comes up in these small communities, because I've had this come up In these smaller communities. You may have somebody who has their home address but that's not where they get mail. It goes to like a PO box location and so sometimes you'll get a client who says well, should I put my physical address or should I put my mailing address? You always want to give them the mailing address because they're mailing you something with your notice record.
Speaker 3:That's right. And so, for example, if you hadn't hired us or an attorney yet, um, and you have your arraignment setting, which is to make sure that you get an attorney and you get that in the mail, but you don't get it, you miss it because you put the wrong address or whatever it is. And so maybe you had a let's say, for example, we've had a client where it was a state jail felony. Okay, that person's not looking at prison time, where a third degree felony would the state jail.
Speaker 2:felony is like the lowest level felony we have in the state of Texas.
Speaker 3:That's right. And so the person is looking at maximum of two years state jail rather than the two to 10 years prison on a third degree felony that step above and so that would be on a possession of a controlled substance, for example, like a personal use amount. That's right. And so that person now has a state jail felony, but they missed court because maybe they missed that mailing or they live in a different place and they didn't go to court. And in the Hill Country whereas it's a little different from Bexar County, but in the Hill Country, they're going to file that failure to appear. And failure to appear is a brand new felony offense. So long as it's a felony case originally, it can actually be charged differently. If it's a misdemeanor, it's going to be a Class A misdemeanor. That is the underlying offense.
Speaker 2:So to be clear, not showing up for court. If you're accused of a felony and you're going to court on a felony charge, not appearing for court is in and of itself a new felony charge.
Speaker 3:A brand new criminal case. That's a third-degree felony. So to make our state jail felony situation worse, which is the lowest level of felony, now we have a third degree felony, the step above, for just not showing up to court, and if it's a confusion, of course that's why you have an attorney to hopefully iron that out with the prosecutors. But maybe you think, okay, well, I don't have an attorney yet, I'm not going to go, whatever it might be. Well, then now you have a way worse situation. And then the next step after that, mr Burr I know you're very familiar with, is you're. If that happens, you fail to appear as a brand new criminal case and they filed it at large. Have we talked about at large?
Speaker 2:filings. No, no, you can explain it to the audience.
Speaker 3:Okay, and so an at large filing just means you haven't been arrested, you're completely at large and technically a fugitive. And so with that brand new case they put a brand new bond and a brand new warrant. In our communities of the Hill Country that's a cash bond, and a cash bond is everything up front. So if it's $20,000, you have to pay $20,000 cash.
Speaker 2:If it's $50,000, it's $50,000 cash on top of your previous bond, and so, so that's different from like a surety bond, where maybe your bail set at $20,000 and a bail bondsman says give me $2,000 and I'll get you out. That's exactly right set at, you know 20,000 and a bell bondsman says you know, give me $2,000 and I'll get you out.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right. Cash bond you're paying the entire amount in order to get out, entire amount in order to get out, and it is no one really not many people have 20 to $50,000 just lying around and that's all because you didn't show up to court, whereas if you had the attorney or at least made sure you went to court again, presenting yourself correctly is the most important step you can have in this County, these counties, and so, yes, that's going to be so fundamental to the success of your case.
Speaker 2:Well, and the reason you know it's important is like you were talking about that state jail felony situation. You get stopped and you have a little personal use amount of cocaine. If you don't have any prior felonies, technically under the law they can't give you time for that. You can't be incarcerated for it. The only thing you get is probation. But if you pick up that third degree felony, all bets are off. Now you're open to whatever may happen.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. It makes our job much harder because in a situation where you have the state jail felony maybe you have no criminal history you're eligible for potentially pretrial diversion, completely expunging your record, clearing it and erasing the fact that you then got arrested, whereas now, with this third degree felony, it gives them essentially another bargaining trip right. Another thing to hold against you it's leverage. It's leverage.
Speaker 2:It's leverage that they're using against the defendant.
Speaker 3:And so even in a situation where, as I know in Bexar County, oftentimes what we would do is maybe plea to the underlying charge, the state jail felony, and dismiss or take into consideration that failure to appear, but in that situation it's still there. I mean, you're usually dealing with a deferred or a straight conviction probation on the state jail, and so now it's much harder to completely clear your record, which is really important and often what people want the most in their criminal cases.
Speaker 2:And that's always the goal is to get through the case. You know, a lot of times people make a poor decision one day, for whatever reason. They're having a bad day, but the goal for the case is always to kind of get you back to that place where you were before you made that bad decision. Because, you know, the thing that I found in my 20 years of doing this is almost all the people that I represent they're not bad people, they're just people who made a bad decision one day, for whatever reason. And you know, what you don't want is that bad decision to follow them around for the rest of their lives, absolutely Affecting their ability to maintain employment. If they're going through a custody issue, be able to see their kids or what have you, yeah, and so now, this is not to scare people. If you're in a situation where you have a court date and you end up in the hospital or your loved one is in the hospital for something serious, I mean, that's something you could take care of.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, and that's again we're having an attorney communication presenting yourself. Well is what's important, because think of that deference that maybe the judge, who knows that you've appeared every time, knows that you're working with pretrial and a pretrial officer that knows that you've been working hard. So, for example, you passed a drug test the week before court and then you called us the morning of saying, hey, I've been in a car accident or my wife is in the hospital, I can't make it to court. Well, that deference that you did because you passed the drug test, you built up goodwill, that's right. And so now we can tell the judge, hey, he's been in every court setting. Or she, women get arrested as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's a theme here on the pod.
Speaker 3:And so we're able to kind of use that to say all right, you know, there's no need for a warrant in this situation or, of course, a failure to appear.
Speaker 2:Let's just go ahead and pass the setting. Know that in some of these smaller counties and I've talked about this like in Wilson and Carnes and Atascosa counties, it you know, you may be asked to do a drug test on the day that you're trying to get probation, you're pleading for probation or what have you Do? They have something similar to that up in the Hill Country area.
Speaker 3:I think it's one of the most important things you can do, in that having a clean drug test means sometimes it means probation or prison, sometimes it means maybe not going to safe P what is safe P A certain in custody drug rehabilitation program but you're in jail, I mean, and it's a six to seven month program depending on the halfway house afterwards.
Speaker 2:So people hear this term safety, substance abuse, felony punishment facility and you go to a prison for six months to get rehab as a part of probation. So this is not you're getting sentenced to prison. You're going to prison to do rehab and then when you get out, you still have your probation to do.
Speaker 3:That's exactly right, and so of course it's ideally reserved for the offenses where it has to do with that kind of thing. But if you have an offense where maybe intoxication isn't directly involved, well, if they feel you have a substance abuse issue or the judge feels that during a pre-sentence investigation, they could absolutely order it.
Speaker 3:And showing up to court dirty with drugs, could you know, in a judge's mind could mean that you have a drug abuse issue Absolutely and so, and failing drug tests with pretrial, all of these things again presenting yourself, and so presenting yourself with a clean drug test every single time, can potentially save yourself from seven months in custody in a rehabilitation program. You may not need away from your family, and the ability to do the probation, and so being able to pass a drug test at all times is the most important as far as the Hill Country goes, and really the smaller communities is what it sounds like- yeah, no, and that can be a huge difference.
Speaker 2:I mean, I referenced it, you know, a couple of podcasts ago, but I've had cases where the prosecutor basically said, look, I'll get rid of this case if your guy can pass a drug test, if he really is the saint that you told me that he is, and this is all a misunderstanding. And then the client's like, no, I'm not going to pass a drug test and you don't get the dismissal.
Speaker 3:And maybe it's not even a UA but a hair follicle. That's a popular one as well, where it goes back maybe three months of use, whereas maybe when you get arrested and you get bonded out and you are on the outside, I would say you would try your best to stop any substance use. Then I understand, of course people drink. It's very normalized in our society. So that kind of thing here and there, of course. But you but again, you want to make sure you're passing hair follicles and UAs in every situation.
Speaker 2:So just keep in mind when you're going out to Fredericksburg to do that wine tour, try not to get a room in the area or take a friend or who can drive. You have a designated driver because they do take those things seriously out there. But if you do find yourself in trouble, give us a call at Brick Criminal Defense at 210-874-5080. We have a lot of experience handling cases out in the Hill Country. We'd be happy to help. This is so you Got Arrested with Brick Criminal Defense. Jacob Lindberg, steve Barrera. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to. So you Got Arrested. If you found this podcast helpful, share it with someone who needs to hear it. For more legal insights and real talk from the front lines of the Texas justice system, follow us and subscribe. And remember Brick Criminal Defense has your back. For more information, visit us at brckdefensecom.