When people are looking for a federal criminal lawyer, criminal justice lawyer, or any other type of lawyer for that matter, one of the first and most important questions that they have is how much is it going to cost?
Especially if you have already dealt with a lawyer of any kind in the past, you know that it can get to be incredibly expensive, and so you need to be really careful with this.
Generally, the better a lawyer’s reputation and the more experience they have, the more they are going to charge per hour. They can get away with this because people are willing to pay more if they know that they have a better chance of winning the case, especially if it is a very significant case.
If you need to get a federal criminal lawyer but are not sure of what you will pay, expect to pay between one hundred to two hundred dollars per hour. It really will all depend on the complexity of your case, and whether or not it will be going to trial. If it is just a simple case where you go to court once or twice, you may get away with only paying a couple thousand, if that.
However, if the case ends up going to trial, you have to figure in all the times your federal criminal lawyer is going to court for you, all the extra paperwork that they are having to do and so on, and you may spend anywhere upwards of five, six thousand dollars.
Legal Aid
Now for people who simply cannot afford to pay for a federal criminal lawyer on their own, there is always the option of applying for legal aid. This is funding from the government for people who are unable to afford a lawyer.
You will need to get the application form, and provide them with the requested personal information. This includes the basics such as your name and address, but as well proof of income, and proof of how much you are spending in bills each month.
You will be notified as to whether or not you were accepted in the coming weeks, as long as you have gotten everything you need into them, and after this they will send you a list of the different federal criminal lawyer options in your general area that you may want to contact to see if they have the time available to take you on.