Massachusetts Criminal Lawyer Blog
ED, age 17 from a bedroom community north of Boston, graduated with honors from High School in May 2019 and was due to go off to college in August. On Monday, May 27, 2019, he was with some friends. They all decided to get some weed and get high. One of the boys got weed and they all proceeded to smoke. ED’s last good memory was smoking the weed. His next good memory was waking up in an ambulance being brought to the hospital.
According to a police report the police responded to an accident scene as the result of several 911 calls. Upon arrival at the scene and speaking with witnesses it was determined that ED had run out into the street directly in the path of an oncoming car and was struck by the car. The driver of the car – herself in shock at what had happened – remained at the scene. According to police reports ED, after the collision, entered a motor vehicle and barricaded himself in the vehicle. The police ordered ED out of the car but he refused. After some tugging and pulling ED was removed from the car and forced to the ground. He resisted the police and scratched at the police and actually bit one of the police. Back up offices arrived at the scene and ED was subsequently cuffed and placed into an ambulance. According to one police officer’s report ED was in an “excited delirium state”; his heart was racing, he was sweating profusely, and when he spoke he made no sense.
The police charged ED with two counts of assault and battery on a police officer, one count of malicious destruction to property, disorderly conduct, and interfering with a police officer.
ED and his parents were summonsed to appear in Lowell Juvenile Court on July 16, 2019 for an arraignment. ED was due to go off to college out of state by mid-August. ED’s parents sought out Attorney Robert Lewin from North Andover. ED and his parents met with Attorney Lewin for a free initial consultation that took 2 hours. At the end of the conference ED’s parents immediately retained Attorney Lewin.
Having a juvenile record could have caused ED’s acceptance into college to be rescinded by the college. It became very important to avoid having this case show up on ED’s record. Attorney Lewin immediately contacted the police department and spoke with the Juvenile Police Prosecutor. Attorney Lewin also contacted the District Attorney’s Office and spoke with the Assistant District Attorney assigned to the Lowell Juvenile Session. Attorney Lewin also spoke with the head of the Juvenile Diversion Program.
On July 16, 2019 ED, his parents, and Attorney Lewin all appeared in Lowell Juvenile Court. The DA agreed NOT to arraign ED that date. The arraignment was continued to August 9 to see if the Juvenile Diversion Program would accept ED. On July 30, 2019 ED, his parents, and Attorney Lewin all met with the Juvenile Diversion coordinator and the Juvenile police prosecutor at the Police Station. A juvenile diversion program agreement was worked out between the DA’s Office and ED and ED’s case was officially diverted out of the Juvenile Court system.
As a result of this disposition NO juvenile court record will be created. A juvenile court record gets created when the juvenile is arraigned. Because ED’s case was diverted without ED ever being arraigned NO record was created. On August 15, 2019 ED left for college.
ED and his parents were very grateful to Attorney Lewin for getting this result and for keeping ED’s record clean.