Best Federal lawyer Michael Leonard on filing a renewed bond motion in federal court cases. As discussed in prior posts, a federal criminal defendant can utilize a variety of arguments in attempting to win his/her bond motion. Sometimes the efforts made by defense counsel fail and the District Court orders that the defendant be detained pending trial. The question often arises from defendants who are detained, “can we file another bond motion?” The answer is always yes – in so far as there is no prohibition against subsequently filing another bond motion, or even theoretically yet another one after that one. However, practically, unless defense counsel can bring something new to the table by way of another bond motion, there is no reason to expect that the Court will grant such a motion. In addition, the Court may question the competence or motives of defense counsel if the Judge does not see a basis for revisiting the issue. However, there are circumstances where something has in fact changed from the time of the initial bond/detention hearing. This post identifies just some of the situations that strongly merit filing another bond motion, including but not limited to: 1) the place of detention is not or cannot provide for the detainee’s serious medical needs; 2) the place of detention is not or cannot provide for the detainee’s mental health needs; 3) the defendant is now able to offer the Court a new and different third-party custodian; 4) the defendant is now able to post property to secure his release; 5) the defendant is now able to post funds to secure his release; 6) the defendant’s other pending case in State court has now been resolved favorably; 7) the defendant is able to show that, because of a change in the law, or because of a recent Supreme Court or Circuit decision, there is a likelihood that the Indictment will be the subject of a motion to dismiss in whole or part; 8) because of a change in the law, including a change to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, the Defendant has served most of his/her sentence or is at risk of serving more than the ultimate sentence that will likely be imposed; or 9) any other factual or legal argument that allows defense counsel to argue in good faith that there has been a change in circumstances – something new that was not already presented to the Court and/or was not considered by the Court – that merits revisiting the earlier bond/detention determination. In sum, federal criminal defense lawyers need to be creative in pursuing relief from detention on behalf of their clients. That is something a defendant can always expect from Leonard Trial Lawyers
Michael Leonard
Leonard Trial Lawyers
October 23, 2023