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Constitutional Defenses in Fairfax Gun Cases 

Although individuals who choose to carry guns are allowed to do so, there are still regulations in place that gun owners must abide by. These regulations are put in place for the safety of the gun owners, and for the general public. When individuals violate these rules, there can be serious legal consequences.

Gun charges range in severity, but can majorly impact someone’s life. However, there are certain approaches you can take to defend yourself against gun charges. Constitutional defenses in Virginia gun cases can work well, especially if you hire an experienced Fairfax gun attorney to craft your defense.

 Second Amendment and Gun Charges

The Second Amendment does not work as one of the constitutional defenses in Virginia gun cases and it does not give a person the right to violate the law. The amendment also does not apply to some of the situations that people may think that it applies to.

The Second Amendment grants an individual the right to bear arms but does not mean people can bear arms without any regulations. An individual has the right to bear arms until they give that right up. It is like when an individual is convicted of a felony, they have the right to vote until they give that up by violating the law.

A person does not automatically just have the right to a gun. The person has the right to follow the processes correctly as long as they have not violated the law in order to be able to legally and correctly bear arms, but they do not have the ability to have unbridled access to guns. That is not something that the Constitution guarantees and the Second Amendment grants.

Constitutional Issues and Their Impact on a Case

Common issues that come up in a gun charge case are part of statutory arguments. Also, there are usually search and seizure issues to examine. Constitutional issues can impact the case, especially if these issues involve improper search or seizure, the technical arguments that have to deal with the way the officer came across the evidence, what the officers observed, and what the officers are allowed to testify to.

The prosecution’s argument helps the case and often can make the difference between winning the case and losing a case. It will only help somebody’s case if constitutional rights have been found to be violated. It is going to help some of these cases.

Building a Constitutional Defense

When building constitutional defenses in Fairfax gun cases, an attorney is going to be crucial for any kind of gun or firearms use, because the defense is going to be very technically-based. It is rare that a defense will be the more obvious defense like in other cases where it is enough for people to say that they did not

Possessing is going to be a legal term of art that is going to be broken down by whether the person had it in their hands or on their person, whether it was constructive possession, and whether it was something that can be imputed to the person based on the location nearby and the ability to access it with the knowledge of the item. That is something that an attorney can defend against.

All these kinds of legal constructs – what is a gun, is the person in possession of it, did they brandish it, what does brandishing mean – are legal terms that are in the Virginia gun law statutes, are very specific, and have their own case law behind it. An attorney is going to help an individual be able to parse out what arguments to use and what definitions apply to make a more compelling argument for the person.

Qualities to Look For in a Lawyer

An important thing to look for in a criminal defense attorney and in a criminal defense attorney’s law firm when choosing a lawyer for this type of case is somebody who is zealous, knows their stuff, and has good statutory interpretation skills. That not something that every lawyer has. There are lawyers who make great arguments, but cannot read a statute, apply the statute correctly, and get into technical arguments necessary for this type of case.

An individual needs somebody who has experience preparing constitutional defenses in Virginia gun cases. If the defendant works with a less experienced lawyer, they might not have as strong of a chance as they would have with somebody making arguments that need to be made. A person cannot afford to miss out on these arguments or have them argued incorrectly.

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