A DWI Can Change Your Life

A DWI in NJ can carry a number of penalties including fines, fees, and surcharges, license suspension, jail time, ignition interlock devices, and community service.

The clients whom I defend on charges of DWI in NJ are a cross-section of all New Jersey residents. I defend lawyers, physicians, stock brokers, accountants, executives, truck drivers, bus drivers, masons, carpenters, plumbers, civil servants, friends and family of police officers and firemen, business owners, fathers, mothers grandfathers, grandmothers, college students, et al. My clients are the fabric of society; they are our friends, family, colleagues and neighbors.

Ideally people would plan to avoid driving after drinking alcohol. How then, do socially responsible and productive people find themselves arrested and charged with a DWI in NJ? Well, part of the answer is that alcohol is deeply rooted in the larger society and culture. Alcohol and cars are everywhere in New Jersey, and trains and other transportation are—proportionately—hardly to be found. In New Jersey a baby typically has traveled in a car many times before first walking with shoes on his feet. For most New Jerseyans a car is as much a part of themselves as their shoes. Alcohol is always present or easily available in every social context, and many New Jerseyans drive everywhere, e.g., to work, visit, shop, etc. The same State government that—rightly—asserts the public interest in road safety and law enforcement also licenses and taxes the numerous taverns, restaurants, liquor stores, etc. located along highways and accessible only by driving.

My clients charged with a DWI in NJ are generally fine, upstanding people who find themselves facing prosecution after—by lifetime habit and often with no more thought than putting on shoes—starting their car.

I explain to every client that New Jersey law defines their rights as well as their alleged offense, and that they can be proud of committing their time and money to defending themselves. Defending their rights and challenging the State’s evidence and allegations is the ultimate pro-social and civic minded response to a charge of anti-social conduct.

Police, prosecutors, judges and defense attorneys are all too human. Government and society function through the actions of agents and officials.

Thanks to the commitment and civic virtue of my clients the police are better and more professional because they know that their investigations, reports and evidence will be scrutinized and challenged. Prosecutors have an incentive to take the extra time and effort to prepare and ethically bring the State’s case when they face an aggressive and committed defense attorney. Judges in municipal court know that they face reversal by a higher court if their rulings at trial are not substantially fair and legally correct.

In the American constitutional and legal system, the individual is the foundation on which the system is built. My clients and I safeguard your rights whenever we fight for their due process in court.