Criminal defense attorney Glenn Obedin discusses Federal law and defending people accused of Federal crimes…
Well it’s similar to state criminal work except that it’s done on a federal level. Many of the crimes involved are the same or similar to state crimes, but many times the federal work involves a larger group or organization, which is why people think of federal crime as organized crime. And that is true.
Usually federal investigations are very long, very detailed and they involve a lot of defendants. So your typical state case involves one or two defendants. Your typical federal case can involve ten to twenty co-defendants involved in organized crime activity.
Typical federal crimes involve illegal interstate transport, mail fraud, organized crime involving any type of gang activity, kidnapping, certain homicides, bank robberies, and then there are also crimes that you wouldn’t think of as federal crimes that in fact do fall under federal jurisdiction.
If you commit a crime in New York State and you possess or use or threaten to use a hand gun, that automatically becomes a federal crime because no hand guns are manufactured within New York State. Therefore any crime involving a gun, a hand gun, automatically is a federal crime because it had to have gotten into New York State illegally.
Also any narcotics crime, although most people think of those as local crimes, they’re not. Any narcotics crime can be a federal crime and is under federal jurisdiction.
People commonly think that when you are arrested, you know the police make an arrest locally, it goes to local precinct, you call an attorney, you contact the precinct, you tell them don’t speak to my client, that’s the end of the story and now you’re not concerned your son, your daughter or your husband, your wife, is protected. Not so in federal.
First of all, you can be arrested, picked up off the street by a federal agent, they don’t have to notify anyone. And secondly, even if they notify family or family sees the arrest happening, an attorney calling and saying, “I represent so-and-so, don’t speak with him” has absolutely no weight in federal court.
So it’s a good lesson for anyone if they find themselves in the unfortunate position of being picked up by federal agents, they have to say, “I don’t want to speak with you.” If they don’t say that, federal agents can ignore phone calls from attorneys and continue to speak with an individual. So it’s a very good rule of thumb if you’re picked up by federal agents, politely decline to speak with them and wait for your opportunity in court to speak with your attorney.
Defense lawyer Glenn Obedin can be reached by calling the Law Office of Naiburg, Obedin and Weissman at (631) 979-7777.