A first-degree murder conviction in Maryland carries life without parole. A first-degree assault conviction carries up to 25 years. An armed robbery conviction is at least 5 years on the front end, and the sentencing range goes up from there. These are the kinds of cases where the difference between a good defense and a routine defense isn’t measured in fines and probation. It’s measured in decades.
If you or someone in your family has been charged with a violent felony in Charles, Calvert, St. Mary’s, or Prince George’s County, this is not a case to handle alone or with a lawyer who treats it like ordinary criminal work.
I spent nine years as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Charles County. I prosecuted homicides, shootings, armed robberies, and serious assaults. I tried more than 60 jury trials. I know how the state builds these cases because I built them, and I know where the cracks are because I had to work around them. Call (301) 818-0389 for a free consultation.
Charges We Defend
We represent clients charged with the full range of violent felonies in Maryland:
- First-degree and second-degree murder
- Attempted murder
- Voluntary and involuntary manslaughter
- Vehicular manslaughter
- First-degree and second-degree assault
- Armed robbery and robbery
- Carjacking and armed carjacking
- Kidnapping and false imprisonment
- Child abuse
- Use of a firearm in a violent crime
Many of these charges carry mandatory minimums. The judge cannot suspend below the floor. That changes the entire shape of plea negotiations and trial strategy, and it’s the first thing we look at when we read the charging document.
What’s Actually Different About These Cases
Most criminal cases turn on one or two pieces of evidence. Violent felony cases turn on twenty. Police reports, body camera footage, surveillance video from neighboring properties, cell phone records and tower data, autopsy reports, ballistics, DNA, fingerprint analysis, eyewitness statements, social media activity, prior statements by the defendant, prior statements by the witnesses, and the timeline that ties it all together.
Each one of those pieces is a place where the state’s case can break down. We don’t wait until trial to find out where. Every violent crime defense we take begins with a full independent investigation — reviewing the discovery, interviewing witnesses where appropriate, retaining expert witnesses where the science requires it, and visiting the scene when the geography matters.
The state has investigators, the State Police lab, the medical examiner, and the full resources of the county. The defense has to know how to push back on every one of those.
Defenses That Actually Win Violent Crime Cases
The defense in a violent crime case depends entirely on the facts. No two cases are alike, and we don’t apply templates to serious charges. That said, the strongest defenses in Maryland violent crime cases tend to fall into four categories.
Self-defense and defense of others
Maryland law allows the use of force — including deadly force — to protect yourself or someone else from imminent serious bodily harm. The force used has to be proportionate to the threat, and you cannot have been the initial aggressor.
The state will argue you weren’t really in fear, or that the force was disproportionate, or that you had a duty to retreat. In a self-defense case, the work is showing the jury what you actually saw and felt in the seconds before the act — the threat as it appeared to you, not as the prosecutor reconstructs it months later in a fluorescent-lit courtroom.
Lack of intent
Most violent felonies require the state to prove a specific mental state. First-degree murder requires premeditation and deliberation. First-degree assault requires intent to cause serious physical injury. Robbery requires intent to permanently deprive.
Intent is also the element prosecutors most often overcharge. Walking a jury through what the actual evidence shows about the defendant’s state of mind — and what it doesn’t — is the difference between a first-degree murder verdict and a manslaughter verdict. Or between a conviction and an acquittal.
Misidentification
Eyewitness identification is one of the least reliable forms of evidence in the criminal justice system. Cross-racial identification errors are well-documented. Suggestive police lineup procedures are common. Memory degrades fast and reconstructs itself even faster.
When the state’s case rests on someone saying they saw you, every detail of how that identification was made matters. The lighting. The distance. The duration. The interval before the witness was first asked to identify someone. The procedure used. We attack each one.
Constitutional violations
If the police searched your home without a warrant or probable cause, if they questioned you after you asked for a lawyer, if they obtained a confession through promises or threats — any evidence that flowed from the violation can be suppressed.
Suppression in a violent crime case can change everything. A homicide case without the murder weapon is a different case. A confession that gets thrown out is a different case. We file suppression motions when the facts support them, and we don’t file boilerplate motions that have no chance of being granted.
What a Conviction Actually Means
A violent felony conviction in Maryland is a life-changing event in ways most people don’t fully see until they’re inside it. The prison sentence is the front end. Behind it: a permanent record that follows you on every background check, loss of the right to vote while incarcerated, lifetime federal firearms prohibition, immigration consequences for non-citizens, loss of professional licenses, restrictions on housing, restrictions on employment.
For a client facing first-degree murder, life without parole is on the table. That’s the highest stakes the criminal justice system has. We treat every case at that level with the preparation and the seriousness it requires — and we treat the cases below that level with the same standard, because the gap between a 25-year sentence and a 12-year sentence is also somebody’s life.
What This Firm Brings to a Violent Felony Case
Most of what makes a violent felony defense work happens before trial. The investigation. The motions practice. The expert consultations. The negotiation strategy that comes from knowing how the state actually values each weakness in its case.
I tried these cases as a prosecutor. I know what makes a State’s Attorney’s Office lean hard on a charge and what makes them quietly look for a way out. I know which judges are receptive to which arguments. I know how the local prosecutors think about plea offers in homicide cases versus assault cases versus robbery cases.
Kathryn served as a Deputy District Public Defender in Charles County before joining the firm. Between us, we have been on both sides of every kind of violent felony case the state files in Southern Maryland. That’s the experience we bring to your file.
We also limit our caseload. A homicide case takes hundreds of hours of preparation if it’s done right. A firm that takes thirty homicide cases at a time isn’t preparing any of them properly. We don’t run that kind of practice.
Talk to Us Before You Talk to Anyone Else
The single most important thing you can do if you’ve been charged with a violent felony in Maryland is get a defense lawyer involved before you say anything to police, before you talk to family members on a recorded jail line, and before the state finishes building its case. Every hour matters.
Call (301) 818-0389. We answer the phone. The consultation is free.
