When you need to find a defense attorney, you are already in trouble, already in a panic. It just isn't a good time to make such a momentous decision but there is no way around it. Fortunately for us, my husband was not arrested the day the ICE agents invaded our home to serve a search warrant so we could both work on finding the attorney.
An Internet search would have made it much easier because we may have been able to find something out there that gave us an idea about whether the attorney was any good. As it was, we had a phone book and no Internet. I remembered seeing a defense attorney on TV and I knew I would recognize his name if I saw it. I wandered through the yellow pages until I could remember his name. That is who we called.
He made time to see us briefly over lunch the same day. He introduced himself and asked my husband if he was thinking of suicide. I was relieved to hear him ask that first--it indicated that the attorney thought first about the person sitting across from him instead of the crime.
Since then, our attorney has answered all my questions. When I talk about possible defenses, he listens. He also does me the courtesy of giving it to me straight. He never condescends by pretending that I've come up with the magic formula that will result in our lives going back to what they were.
I hope we never have to find out in court exactly how good our decision was, though.
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