How Lawyers Help With Tickets In Mesquite Municipal Court
Lawyers can play a key role in the defense of your case in Mesquite Municipal Court. This page is dedicated to helping those who have been issued a ticket in Mesquite, Texas by the Mesquite police department understand their legal options. If you would like to discuss your particular case with an experienced legal professional after reading this page, feel free to contact our Mesquite ticket attorneys at 214-321-4105.
Types Of Cases Mesquite Ticket Lawyers Defend
Mesquite ticket lawyers defend a variety of violations that can be issued by the Mesquite Police Department. Some examples of types of citations that can be issued and defended by our Mesquite ticket lawyers is as follows:
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Assault Tickets In Mesquite: If the assault is charged as a class “c” misdemeanor, then it will be filed in Mesquite Municipal Court. These types of assaults are considered offensive contacts. That means that no bodily injury occurred during the contact, but it was offensive enough for a charge to be filed. For example, spitting on a person may be considered an offensive contact. What you need to be concerned with is how these cases are reported to DPS through an arrest or fingerprints that are taken at the court after a charge has been filed. Our experienced team of lawyers has seen state agencies use this information to fire employees over assault family violence tickets in the past.
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Public Intoxication Tickets In Mesquite: Public intoxication tickets are a commonly filed charged in Mesquite Municipal Court when a person is alleged to have been intoxicated in public and appears to be a danger to themselves or to another. In this situation, the charge will be filed and the person is usually arrested. When this occurs it is important to protect your record so that the arrest records associated with the case are destroyed afterward. Our Mesquite ticket lawyers can help you both protect your record and expunge the records related to the arrest.
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Drug Paraphernalia Tickets In Mesquite: Drug paraphernalia tickets can become very complex. This is especially true when an arrest occurs. The issue is related to how a drug paraphernalia is reported on a person’s record. There is no distinction between a charge for paraphernalia related to marijuana and meth or heroine. An employer doing a background search on a criminal record will only see that an arrest occurred for drug paraphernalia, leading them to think the worst. This is why it is important for a Mesquite ticket lawyer to defend the charge of drug paraphernalia to ensure it does not become a conviction.
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Traffic Tickets In Mesquite: Traffic ticket defense in Mesquite is becoming an important part of what our Mesquite ticket lawyers do on a daily basis. With every traffic ticket having the ability to suspend a person’s driving privileges, it is crucial to keep a clean driving record. Our Mesquite ticket lawyers can evaluate your case to determine possible legal strategies to help assist you in the protection of your driving privileges. If for any reason, your license is suspended due to traffic ticket convictions in Mesquite, Texas our lawyers can assist you in applying for an occupational driver license to keep you driving legally.
Entering The Correct Plea For Your Mesquite Ticket
The first step that must be done when defending a ticket in Mesquite is to enter an appearance on the case. Every ticket has an appearance date listed on it. The appearance date requires a defendant to contact the court on or before a certain date to avoid having the case go past due. If a case goes past due, then it can also go into warrant. Past due tickets can also cause a hold to be placed on a person’s driver license. Normally what lawyers will do to meet this requirement is send a letter of representation to the court prior to the appearance date passing. This letter satisfies the requirement of contacting the court. Thereafter, the court will then schedule a formal pretrial hearing where the attorney can go to court on the client’s behalf to evaluate the case.
What If Your Ticket Is Past The Appearance Date?
If your case has gone past the appearance date listed on the ticket, then it could possibly go into warrant status. This means that you could be arrested for the violation and brought before a judge to resolve the case. Mesquite Municipal Court also places an OMNI hold on the license of defendants whose cases have gone past the appearance date. This means that the person will not be able to renew their driver license until the case is resolved.
The absolute worst mistake a person can make when a case is past due is to simply pay off the old tickets. Paying off old tickets in Mesquite will also cause a conviction to be reported to the permanent record of that individual. This means that a person could essentially pay off a ticket to get their license back, only to get a letter from DPS afterward saying their license is suspended due to the ticket they just paid off. Our Mesquite ticket lawyers have seen this scenario play out hundreds of times, especially during income tax season.
How To Remove The License Hold And Warrant Properly In Mesquite
There are very specific steps that must be taken once a case goes into warrant in Mesquite, Texas and a hold has been placed on the license of the defendant. Those steps are as follows:
- The attorney must post an appearance bond with Mesquite Municipal Court removing the warrant.
- The attorney must then file a Motion To Accept the OMNI fee. This fee can range between $10 and $30 depending on when the ticket was issued and the OMNI hold was placed on the license.
- The attorney will also send a letter of representation to Mesquite Municipal Court along with the appearance bond entering a plea of “not guilty” and requesting the first available pretrial date.
This is one of the only ways to remove a hold on a driver license and remove a warrant without causing a conviction on a defendant’s record in the process.
Attending Hearings After A Driver License Hold And Warrant Have Been Removed
If an attorney is hired for your Mesquite tickets, then you will normally not have to attend any hearings unless your case is set for trial. In most cases, setting a case for trial is not necessary to protect a client’s record. There are exceptions depending on the license status. For example, commercial drivers will regularly have to set their cases for trial in Mesquite Municipal Court to have a chance of fighting to protect their records. However, if you are a regular class “c” driver license holder, the real benefit of hiring a lawyer for a ticket is the fact that you do not have to do anything other than keep in contact with your lawyer and assist them with any documentation requested by the lawyer that would help assist them in the defense of your case.
Hire A Lawyer For Mesquite Tickets
There are many benefits to hiring a lawyer for tickets in Mesquite. The main benefit is having an advocate on your side that is there to fight to protect your record from being harmed. In the world we live in, criminal and traffic records are being used more than ever to make decisions about a person. For example, a theft conviction can cause a person to lose employment opportunities. Assault family violence cases can impact immigration status. Speeding tickets can cause driver license suspensions. This is why why highly suggest you hire a lawyer to assist you with your tickets in Mesquite. If you would like to discuss your case with our Mesquite ticket attorneys, feel free to call us today at 214-321-4105.