Forgery
Forgery Is A Serious Crime That Requires An Experienced Defense
Forgery is the label generally used for a host of white collar felony charges that may involve defrauding another for profit. This can be done through creating counterfeit checks, altering important documents, credit card fraud or reproducing a signature on a check. This is also a crime that can easily be escalated to federal felony charges, depending on the documents involved.
Have you found yourself charged with forgery, and no one will believe that you are innocent? Call Philip Averbuck for the best counsel and advice that the area’s most experienced criminal defense attorney can give.
Tools Of The Prosecution
Should you ever be charged with forgery, the first thing you should do is to hire the best criminal defense attorney that you can find. This is not a charge that anyone would recommend that you defend yourself against. The crime itself has so many nuances under the law that it can be confusing and difficult to mount a reasonable defense against. To be successful, you will need the experience that a successful defense attorney can bring to the table.
The main tool available for the prosecuting attorney in cases like this is the handwriting expert. You see it all the time on those daytime court shows: man claims he does not owe a debt regardless of the promissory note brought into evidence, because he claims that the signature is not his. The handwriting expert is brought in, and proves to the satisfaction of the judge that it is indeed his signature. Still think you can defend yourself against that?
Launching The Best Defense
During trial, depending on the nature of the charges, two defenses exist: lack of intent and lack of capacity. The first rests on the individual charged. If your defense attorney can prove that you honestly believed that you were in the right signing another’s name to a check drawn on their account, you cannot be found guilty. The second involves the document in question. If your defense attorney can prove that the document created lacked the capacity to defraud anyone out of benefits, property or money, you cannot be found guilty of the crime.
The need for an experienced defense attorney is especially important in the state of Florida. There, if you are found guilty of engaging in the creation of false documentation that profited you in some manner, you could be facing up to five years in prison, with fines around $5000. The laws there are stricter than many other states, because even writing a bad check for an amount over $150 in Florida can be treated as the same as forgery and counterfeiting.