If you have been charged with a drink driving/DUI offence, one of the first questions you’ll need to ask yourself is whether you should hire a lawyer to represent you in court.
Many people will simply look at the costs of hiring a drink driving/DUI lawyer and decide that they’ll take a chance and represent themselves. However before you make a decision to appear in court unrepresented, it is important that you understand that there are many benefits of hiring an experienced lawyer to appear in court with you and that you may actually save money by hiring a lawyer.
We Will Get You The Best Outcome
If you are convicted of a drink driving/DUI offence in Queensland, you will receive a mandatory licence disqualification of anywhere from 1 month to an absolute disqualification. Additionally, you will receive a fine or worse (including a potential jail sentence).
Nowadays, holding a driver’s licence is essential for most people. We need our licences to go to work, drop off children to school and to visit friends and family. Therefore wouldn’t you want to make sure that you receive the shortest disqualification possible so that you can start driving sooner?
At Harper Finch Lawyers, we know how to get our clients the best outcome possible. We have represented hundreds of drink drivers and we know what needs to be said and done to make sure our clients receive outstanding results.
We Know Your Options
If you are charged with drink driving/DUI, do you know all the options available? For example, you may be eligible for a work licence which could be the key to saving your job. Alternatively, do you even know if you’ve been charged with the correct offence? We see people being charged with the wrong drink driving/DUI offence all the time and we have saved our clients from a worse-than-necessary penalty on countless occasions.
Being charged and convicted of a drink driving/DUI offence can have a devastating impact on drivers and their families. Make sure that you know all your options so that you protect your legal rights.
We Know the Judges and Magistrates
Each Judge and Magistrate is human, just like you and me. They all have their own unique approaches to drink driving/DUI offences and this means that they will have their own opinion about what sort of penalty should be imposed.
Since we regularly appear in courts throughout Queensland, we know almost all of the Judges and Magistrate that might hear your case. Our experience means that we can present your case to the Judge or Magistrate in the best way to ensure that your case is given the appropriate attention. If however you represent yourself, you are walking in blind without having any idea about what the Judge or Magistrate will say or do with your case.
Judges and Magistrates also appreciate it when a person is represented by a lawyer and they often refer to this when they give their reasons for sentencing a person. First, it shows that the driver is taking the court process seriously as they have gone to the expense of arranging legal representation. Second, the Judges and Magistrates know that your lawyer will present your case properly and professionally which is important in a courtroom.
We Can Save You Time
People today are busier than ever and trying to juggle all of our commitments can seem like a neverending struggle. The last thing that people want is to have to waste their precious time sitting in a courthouse all day.
Most self-represented defendants have no idea just how much time will be wasted when going to court. The situation is even worse when if they need to appear in court more than once (for example, when making an application for a work licence which usually requires two or more court appearances).
If you have a lawyer representing you, you will automatically receive priority over everyone else in the court. This means that you will be in and out of court early in the morning while the others might still be sitting in court well after lunchtime. We have no doubt that you have more important things to do than to sit in a courtroom all day.
In addition, in some situations your lawyer can even appear in court on your behalf without you needing to turn up to court. This means that you can have your case handled by expert drink driving/DUI lawyers without the inconvenience of spending countless hours and days waiting in court. For many people, even just the extra time that they can spend at work is worth their lawyer’s fees.
Summary
If you have been charged with a drink driving/DUI offence in Queensland, it is simply not worth taking a gamble by representing yourself. The benefits of having an expert lawyer representing you will far outweigh the potential costs involved – you will save time and will also receive a better outcome if you hire a lawyer.
Contact Harper Finch Lawyers now for an obligation-free chat about your drink driving/DUI charge.