Intro: Welcome to the Lady Lawyer League podcast. They are a league of lady lawyers in an all-female law firm in Omaha, Nebraska, called Hightower Reff Law. On this podcast, you’ll hear stories of what it’s like to be a lady lawyer and an entrepreneur. Now it’s time to talk about the law, share real-life stories about representing clients and discuss the current events of the week. It’s the Lady Lawyer League podcast with Susan Reff and Tracy Hightower-Henne.
Susan: On today’s podcast, we are going to talk about what happens if you are arrested for a crime and you’re sitting in jail. What you should do, what you shouldn’t do, what the process looks like from the point of view of the criminal defense team at Hightower Reff Law. So again, we have Erin Wetzel here today.
Erin: Hello.
Susan: Hi, Erin. And quick question, have you ever been arrested?
Erin: I have not; have you?
Susan: No, I have never been arrested.
Erin: But I’ve been at the jail on the inside a lot.
Susan: You used to work at the jail?
Erin: Yeah.
Susan: Erin worked at the jail before she became a lawyer, and … But you weren’t like in a booking area or anything like that? Or did you see that?
Erin: I saw it. So the area that I walked through to get where I worked in the jail went like right by the booking area. And when I first, when I interviewed, I think they gave me a tour of the full jail. So I saw it. And then we actually see that in some of our body cam videos that we see when somebody is getting arrested.
Susan: Oh yes. Yeah, the cops will usually keep it on until the person’s considered completely booked into the jail, I think, right?
Erin: So they, if we start from being in the car under arrest, yeah, they take the person to the jail and they drive through the little secure area.
Susan: And they’re in the garage underneath the jail.
Erin: Yeah, it’s a secure garage so that when they’re taking the person out, they can’t run anywhere. Yeah. And they keep the body cam footage on the whole time they take them into the jail and then the cop is filling out. The cop who did the arrest is filling out their paperwork while an employee of the jail starts the booking process, which is fingerprints, getting identifying information. The cop will ask, they actually do a lot more than you would think, like you just think fingerprint, photo, information, done. They actually, they have a bunch of questions they have to go through to make sure that the person doesn’t need additional help. So medical questions to make sure they don’t have a medical need, mental health questions, substance abuse questions. They have to basically screen somebody for all these issues to make sure that they don’t need to see somebody else and they’re not going to be a danger to themselves or others when they are released into the general population.
Susan: So, and also from a legal standpoint, a lot of things are kind of happening too. So we’ll cover all of that as we dive deeper into what happens once you’re arrested at the jail. Dun dun dun. We need, we need like the d’attente content. What, the law and order, right? Yes. Are they ending that show?
Erin: Now they’re bringing it back.
Susan: Oh, it ended already.
Erin: It ended like a decade ago. The original, yeah. Law and Order: SVU has been going on the whole time, been off and they’ve done a couple of other spinoffs. And in the time there have been, I think there’s been some other spinoffs that have also ended.
Susan: Have they all use that same music? Yeah.
Erin: So they start with a data dump.
Susan: I thought it was like slamming of the slammer, the gavel it only hit. Is it the gavel?
Erin: I did not know that.
Susan: Side note, I’ve never seen a judge use a gavel. Have you?
Erin: Have I?
Susan: Now, only in auctions, not a judge.
Erin: Or like mock trials.
Susan: I don’t even think I’ve seen it in a mock trial.
Erin: Oh, you’re right, I think it’s a myth. Some of them have it up on their bench.
Susan: I feel like it’s like a tchotchke, though.
Erin: It’s not like it’s always, it’s like a memento type thing, like somebody gave it to them. Like, Congratulations, this is a cool gift for a judge.
Susan: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Erin: You’re right, I don’t think I ever have seen that, only on TV.
Susan: Yes, only on TV. And maybe like the People’s Court or on TV. So during, let’s talk a little bit more about this booking, too, because yeah, when we’ve seen it, the other thing I’ve seen them do is they make the person take out all their, all their jewelry.
Erin: Yeah. They inventory the property. Yeah.
Susan: And the people get all mad if they have to take out strange piercings.
Erin: I, this is really gross. I had a client that was arrested on a DUI and she was quite drunk. And when they’re asking her all these questions, she says, “I have a tampon and do I need to take it out?” And they’re like, “No, no, no, no.” I couldn’t see because the cop turned to the side, but she took it out. And then you hear the booking person who is also a man go, “That was gross. You don’t have to take out your tampon.”
Susan: Yeah. So they will put your earrings, your rings, your watch into these cute little plastic baggies.
Erin: Which, there’s like two reasons for that right? One, they don’t want the inmates to have all of that stuff inside that could be either stolen by other inmates, used as a weapon or anything like that. And also they inventory everything because they don’t want inmates accusing them of stealing something, right?
Susan: And then they take your keys, your wallet, your phone and then your clothes.
Erin: They count cash. If you have cash in your wallet they count it so that they can’t be accused of stealing that. Yep.
Susan: And they put them all in these plastic evidence bags basically kind of, or property bags, I think they call them. Right. And then you get a jumpsuit.
Erin: And sandals.
Susan: And some cute sandals.
Erin: You don’t get your shoes. No, because you could use your shoelace to hurt yourself.
Susan: They have those one tennis shoes with the velcro straps.
Erin: You have to pay. That’s from the commissary. You have to pay for those. So the sandals, the they’re like rubbery sandals or shoes, the shower shoes. That’s the standard that you get. You get socks, underwear, you don’t even get your own underwear. The jumpsuit and the sandals. If you want the velcro shoes, you have to pay for those yourself. Oh, it’s an item that you can order in the commissary and then you get a very basic toiletry kit. Toothbrush, toothpaste, a shampoo/body wash together type thing. You do get soap, you get a little bar of soap. And if you want anything more or nicer than that, also commissary.
Susan: There’s a name for those shoes, those white shoes. I can’t think of it. Anyway, we’ll come up with that later. Yeah, it’s like a, it’s like a two-word name I have.
Erin: So what a lot of people do with the soap is they will carve things, like they’ll be artistic. Sure. So I actually have a turtle made out of the jail soap at my house. I took some. It’s called contraband. If you have anything that, you’re not supposed to modify anything that they give you that you can have from its original purpose, it’s called contraband and they can write you up for it or they can just take it. So they had in the programs office there, which was the office that I worked under. They had just this large pot of contraband items that had been taken, and I was allowed to take a couple as mementos when I left.
Susan: And you chose that soap turtle.
Erin: I can’t remember if I chose that or somebody gave it. I also had items that were given to me by inmates, like I was given a rose once made out of toilet paper, and they said that they use candy to like color so that they can make handmade cards and send to people. So I have cards that were written to me. I had this rose that was made out of toilet paper and colored. So like the stem was colored. They even put like little toilet paper thorns in there. I still have that.
Susan: So if you’re ever arrested, here’s some things you can do while you’re waiting to meet with your lawyer or go to court, because that’s what’s going to happen next. Right, right. So if you get arrested, potentially. Depending on where you’re arrested and what for, what you’re arrested for, potentially there could be a bond just automatically put on you and you could bond out right away if that’s the case, right?
Erin: Like a domestic violence type charge in Douglas County usually has a standard bond of $5,000, but that’s per charge. So if you have two counts, they make you post $10,000.
Susan: So if you are given a bond right away, that means that if you post it or someone posts it for you, you can get out right away, right? If you do not have a bond on you or it’s too high, you’re going to be sitting for a while. And in Douglas County, they now have a courtroom in the jail that people who are in jail go to to get arraigned and potentially have a bond set on them, depending if they don’t already have a bond, right?
Erin: And they typically do it twice a day. Yeah, morning and afternoon session. And so depending on when you get arrested and booked into the jail, that’s when they decide. So if you get arrested at 8:00 in the morning, you’re not going to go to that 9:00 session because that’s, they’re going to still be booking you, but you’ll probably go to that afternoon session.
Susan: The problem is they only have so many slots, and I don’t know what number they’ve come up with. Let’s say they have 30 misdemeanor slots. If those 30 are full, it doesn’t matter what time you got arrested, you’re going to sit until there’s a slot open.
Erin: So, and it used to be that if you go as a viewer to the jail, which you can’t right now because of COVID. But prior to COVID times, you could go to the front door of the jail, walk in and say, I’m here to watch court. You walk down this little hall and there’s a little viewing room that’s separate from this jail courtroom. And in that jail courtroom, there’s several rows of benches. And so they used to fill those up totally with people, and then they would have a second room in the hall because I’ve been on the other side of this hall, which, if you’re an attorney, goes to the jail, you’re in this part of the hall also. It goes, there’s a bunch of doors from this courtroom and then there’s like a conference room and they would have other inmates out in there. So usually what they would do is they would have like all the males in the courtroom and then the females in there and there’s a video feed so they can see what the judge is saying as they’re doing the rights advisory to everybody. And then they just call them up one by one. Yep, and they’ve got a handful of people there. They always have somebody from pretrial services. So if you are arrested for a more serious misdemeanor or a felony, somebody from pretrial services usually comes and talks to you, and they have this scoring system for the judge. And in the scoring system, they determine, you know, they take information like, “How long have you lived in Nebraska? What’s your work history? What’s your substance abuse history?” Basically trying to tell the judge if they think you’re a flight risk, because if they think you’re a flight risk, you’re going to get a higher bond, right? Or is this person not a flight risk? And we’re going to release them either on their own or for a low bond. And if we do release them, are we going to make them follow any specific conditions like pretrial release or the 24/7 program? So there’s somebody from there who reads this report to the judge. You have a prosecutor there who reads the details of the charges to the judge and then you have a public defender that is there for you, just for that hearing, unless you qualify to have the public defender’s office appointed to you, who represents your interests at the hearing to say,
“Oh, judge, you know, this person is not a flight risk because of X, Y, Z,” right?
Susan: And we’ve talked about, I think, the arraignment on prior podcasts, but that’s really basically what’s happening. You’re being, you’re arraigned on your charge and then the bond can be set if you didn’t have one or it can be raised or lowered from what that schedule bond was, right? And if you don’t bond out, you know, after your arraignment, then you’re just sitting in jail until your case gets resolved.
Erin: Right? So after the arraignment date, they set a pretrial date for a misdemeanor or preliminary hearing for a felony, and then if you can’t bond out, you’re just sitting around waiting for that hearing.
Susan: And one thing that I think jails are really an unknown for people who’ve never been in one as a visitor, an employee, a professional, or arrested, like you don’t have any idea. I’d never been in a jail before I was an attorney. You know? Right. And, but I had done visits with clients, and now we go to the courtroom and blah blah blah at the jail. Well, not now because of COVID.
Erin: But yeah, we do it by WebEx. They still have everybody in that same courtroom. But instead of the judge and the attorneys being in that courtroom, we are at the courthouse in a courtroom with a big screen and then it’s like a Zoom call.
Susan: It’s very, very interesting. But attorneys can go visit clients at the jail. They have to make our clients available to us to visit us,
Erin: Which doesn’t mean that the client won’t agree to see you. I have, this is very rare. Most clients always want to see their attorneys. But I had one client that I’m thinking of in particular. That was pretty difficult, and he kept refusing to visit with me.
Susan: And in Douglas County, we used to have face-to-face visits with our clients. We would get a little small conference room and we could show them their file and they could look at the police report with us and we would take notes and we could show them pictures. You can even show them videos if you set that up ahead of time with the jail and things like that. And now we only get to have video calls with our clients. And do you think that is going to stay after COVID?
Erin: No. So you can technically do a face-to-face visit right now. You have to set it up in advance. And it’s only supposed to be if you have physical documents that you need them to see, but you have to wear the N95 mask and all of that.
Susan: Ok? So it’s, so now we’re talking to them on a handheld phone through a video screen, and it’s pretty hard to communicate with them.
Erin: But I feel like because they can usually hear background noise. It’s the phones that the general public used to use, which is unfortunate for the general public now because now their only option is to set up this account online to do these video visits online. But they have to pay for them. Yeah, which is insane, like they have to pay for phone calls. And there’s a lot of issues with these private companies that are hired to provide these services.
Susan: Overcharging insane amounts. Yeah. The other thing is we can talk on the phone from jail to attorney. It’s not ideal, but a client can call us, call our law firm from the jail and talk to us on the phone for free.
Erin: We get our number registered with them and it’s a free call for them. But it’s also limited. So after like 15 minutes it times out and then the client has to call back.
Susan: Yeah, and usually they are only given certain times of the day that they’re allowed to be on the phone, and everyone wants to make their phone calls at that time.
Erin: Well, now because of COVID, so generally before they, so the jail has these lockdown periods where they do counts and it’s like three times a day, like right around the shift changes. And so during those time periods, they have to be in their housing units. And so there’s two different types of housing units there. There’s one where they have their open housing units and it’s just basically like bunk beds and there’s no rooms. Those are, there’s only a handful of those and the others, there’s a room. Each person has their own room and there’s two beds to a room.
Susan: And so those doors to cell, well, it’s a small room. It’s a small room.
Erin: The door locks. So during counts, these doors are locked and the, you know, they have to go through and check each person and make sure everybody’s where they’re supposed to be.
Susan: Erin Wetzel, here. Yep. Susan Reff, here.
Erin: Yep, yeah. And then the rest of the day, they could be out milling around the common areas of the housing unit, which some of them have like a little rec area attached to it and some of the cells don’t. So they have specified rec times where they have to go to a separate rec area. But the ones that have them attached, you could go out there any time. There’s like a basketball hoop and then they can ask for a basketball, volleyball, soccer ball. Yeah, you know, so nice. And so they have like the little phone banks in the middle of the housing unit. So there’s like four or five of them.
Susan: And so there’s a lot of privacy, right? Yes.
Erin: Yeah. You’re talking to your attorney when you’re standing right next to the person next to you who might be trying to listen to what you’re saying about your case. So yeah, we do not like to talk to our clients about their cases over the phone like that.
Susan: Yeah, I don’t like to talk about specifics. I mean, I don’t mind, you know, passing court dates or talking about bond information, right? Or saying, like, I’m going to come and visit you on Friday. So hold tight or whatever. Yeah, but and the other thing that they, all jail phone calls are recorded, they say that the attorney phone calls are not listened to, but …
Erin: We can’t guarantee it.
Susan: We don’t know that. And then there was that one jail that got in trouble because they were. Was it Hall County somewhere? It was somewhere in Nebraska that they were recording the inmate calls with their attorneys and the county attorney’s office was listening to them?
Erin: Yeah, which is a huge no-no.
Susan: Yeah. So the other word of advice is if you’re in jail and you’re calling your family, your friends, and there’s that little recorded voice at the beginning that says this call is being recorded, guess what? It’s not only being recorded, there are people at the county attorney’s office whose sole job it is to listen to people’s calls. And depending on how many staff they have, and if they think that you’re going to be talking about your case, they’re going to listen.
Erin: Oh yeah, especially like domestic violence related cases, because they assume that the person arrested is going to call the victim and try to persuade them to not pursue the charges or not cooperate in the investigation. I have been sitting in county attorney’s offices where they go, “Oh, your client called so-and-so? Let me pull it up,” and they just pull it up on their computer and play it for me. And I’m like, “Oh crap, there’s my client telling this person to not pursue this.” And then they add other charges.
Susan: Yes, so it’s not like when you’re calling your credit card company and they’re like, this call may be recorded for quality assurance and you’re like, “Oh, yeah, whatever.” They’re really recording these and listen. Yes.
Erin: So do not talk about your case on your on the phone, anybody, and also do not talk about your case to anybody in there. Nobody is your friend in there. Nobody. Do not talk about it, period.
Susan: And this is where definitely family law and criminal law overlap because people always want to spill their guts about their case to somebody else. Yes, and then somebody else is like, “Oh, well, you think that’s bad?” And then they tell their story, and then the person comes back to the lawyer and they’re like, “Well, my friend told me in their case, they only got, you know, one day in jail or whatever.” Yes.
Erin: It’s the same jailhouse lawyers telling everybody, “Well, you should do this,” and they say, “Well, I want to do this,” and I say, “Well, that’s not a thing. We can’t do that.”
Susan: “I want to file a motion to depress.”
Erin: Yes, I had that. I had that told me, that’s not an emotion.
Susan: It’s a motion to suppress or dismiss, which isn’t even a thing, you know, no law.
Erin: Or this person or they call and they say, “I want house arrest,” and I’m like, “OK, that’s not, while we’re pending this case, that’s not a thing.” Well, I heard I’m like, that person had to have been sentenced. That’s the thing after your sentence, and I …
Susan: “Just get an ankle monitor.” No. Yeah. “Can I just, I mean, can I get house arrest until my murder trial?” No.
Erin: Yeah, apparently Florida lets you do that. Yeah, yeah. But Nebraska does not. No. Well, start. Bay County does the alcohol monitors on pretrial release.
Susan: Yeah, the scram or well, it yeah, so expensive. It is.
Erin: And then, you know, yeah, I was in, I was in court once and it’s, you want your client to have it. And even though this client had hired me and I was not court appointed, I said to the judge, you know, he can’t afford this bracelet, but I didn’t want to go to jail. Obviously, it’s a DUI and I said he can’t afford this. You know, he basically spent all this money on paying me. And so the judge says, I’m going to put you on this, even though he had not been on it for several months. I’m going to put you on this, but you know, I’ll have the county pay for it and I’m like, Well, I’m happy for my client, but I’m annoyed as a Sarpy County taxpayer that I’m paying for this.
Susan: Yeah, yeah. So those bracelets are fairly new. And just to kind of go slightly off topic, they they’re mostly used for a person who’s pending charges, right? But you can also voluntarily submit to one, I suppose, for purposes to show you’re sober and maybe a custody case or whatever. But I was reading when they first came out, I was kind of like, well, how do these things work? And they have these like little spiny things that, like, actually go in your skin, to detect alcohol, and they don’t pierce your skin to the point where you’re going to be bleeding or anything. But someone was trying to beat the Scram bracelet. And they put lunchmeat between the needles and their skin, like pieces of lamb. It was ham. Gross. And it, I think it stayed on there for a while, like they cut it like to the size of the bracelet or whatever, but then it started to like cause the bracelet to malfunction.
Erin: The oils in the meat.
Susan: And the meat starts to decompose on your leg. I don’t know. Yeah, it was, it was really interesting.
Erin: The only other time that you hear about the ankle monitors pretrial is for juvenile cases.
Susan: And that’s a GPS, right? Not an alcohol monitoring.
Erin: It’s a GPS tracking device to make sure that that juvenile is where they’re supposed to be. Yeah, but they don’t, typically not in Nebraska. I’ve heard some other cases in other states where they say this felon was released and they were on GPS tracking like on parole or something like that. And yeah, and then he was tracked down to this other crime, where we don’t we don’t have that here.
Susan: Yeah, the GPS is the juvenile court cases and the alcohol monitor.
Erin: Yeah, I mean, they’re expensive.
Susan: Yeah, it’s like three or four hundred dollars a month, I think. Yeah. So. If you’re in jail, you still have access to your attorney. You’re still going to be, oh and if you do go to court, they’re going to transport you right to the courthouse to come to court after that first hearing? Yeah. Or if there’s some sort of video capability for like a non-substantive hearing, that may happen, but you do have the right to be present for the majority of your court hearings if substantive things are going to happen.
Erin: Well, and sometimes at that very first hearing, if it’s just like a smaller misdemeanor, they might offer you a plea deal without you having an attorney with you at that first hearing. So if it’s like a trespassing or something, and let’s say you get arrested on a Friday and you go in for court on Monday, you’ve been there for three days. By that point in time, they might say, “Hey, if you plead guilty to this trespassing, I’ll agree to time served for,” and you get released that day.
Susan: I truly believe that some of the best plea deals happen when people are in jail without a lawyer for their first hearing. I mean, because that prosecutor says if this person pleads not guilty, they probably aren’t going to make their bond. They’re going to sit in here and we’re just going to come back again in six weeks. So I might as well try to get him out now with a reasonable deal.
Erin: Well, I’ve had some on family law cases where I’m representing the victim of a domestic violence type charge on a protection order or whatever, and they say, “Well, he assaulted me and I got this protection, or he also got arrested” and I say OK. So I look up the charges and they do that. You give them like three days and she’s sending you pictures of these, it’s bad and it’s bad. And you’re like, you gave that person three days without even consulting her. That’s ridiculous. So it goes both ways.
Susan: It does. But like I said, I think some of the best deals happen when someone’s sitting in jail. It’s their first court appearance and it’s like that carrot is dangled in front of them, pleading, pleading, get out. And people, usually people who’ve never been in jail before, they’re like, “Get me the heck out of here.”
Erin: Or sometimes people who’ve been there a lot. They’re like, “Oh, of course I’m doing this.”
Susan: That sounds better than 30 days, right? So word to the wise, just don’t get arrested, right?
Erin: If you do respond, they have you sign a little form that advises you of all the conditions of the bond. So there’s a group of standard conditions and so that says reside at this arrest and it’s whatever arrest or address, I can’t.
Susan: Arrest, address.
Erin: Reside at this address, and it’s usually the address that you have on your driver’s license. So you might want to correct that if it’s not the correct address, right? Not that they really check that that much. You can’t go more than it’s like 10 miles outside of Douglas County, right? Which they also really don’t verify super often. You can’t. You’re not supposed to. Does it say you can’t drink substances?
Susan: I don’t think that’s a standard clause.
Erin: I’m trying to think of what all the standard clauses are. And then you might …
Susan: Have you promise to appear at court.
Erin: Yeah, promise to appear. And so it’ll have your hearing date on there.
Susan: I think violating, no violating laws.
Erin: Yeah, no violating laws. And then they can add some stuff in there. So if it’s a crime with an identified victim, they may add a no-contact order with that victim. So like an assault charge, they might say no contact with that victim, right? Which means if you contact them, they can violate your bond and haul you back into jail and then you forfeit the amount that you posted, potentially. Or they can add a separate charge of tampering with the witness, right? You can also be ordered to do these two different programs in Douglas County. There’s the 24/7 program, which is usually used for people with substance abuse issues, DUIs, drug possession charges where you have to check in with them in person at this program twice a day and do drug tests or do breathalyzers right. And if you miss, they can sanction you by sending you to jail for a couple of days, or they can violate your bond and issue a warrant for you. And then pretrial release is a little more lax. You just have like a number that you call each day to check in. You put like your Social Security number and then periodically, I think it tells you you have to come in to do a drug test.
Susan: Yeah, it’s it’s not the worst thing in the world to get pretrial release.
Erin: No, it’s pretty easy. And I’ve had some clients that that is given to them as a condition of bond, but not explained to them when they leave. So they don’t know. And then the pretrial release program just reaches out to me and says, “Hey, did your client know they’re supposed to be checking in with us? If you get them to start checking in regularly, I won’t tell the prosecutor,” yeah, and then I reach out to them. They’re like, “Oh, I didn’t know.” And then they start calling in, and that’s fine.
Susan: And if you commit another crime when you’re out on bond on any of these, the prosecuting attorney will likely set a bond review hearing and they will ask for a higher bond. And you’ll be back in jail and not good.
Erin: And probably get a higher bond on your second charge since you allegedly committed the crime while you were out on bond for the first one, right? But the most important thing is that you look at that form that you get that you sign when you get released to see what your court date is, because then if you miss your next court date, they will issue a warrant and potentially add a charge of failure to appear and forfeit any cash you did post.
Susan: Yes, that becomes property of the state, right, county or whomever.
Erin: Which sometimes we can get reinstated, but not always. So don’t count on that.
Susan: Yeah. So we covered a lot of stuff about what happens if you’re in jail sitting on a case, a criminal case. So. And all of this is subject to change, according to the jail rules, like what COVID showed us.
Erin: Yeah, it’s much different. Yeah. Now what happens in the jail versus what happened three years ago?
Susan: And your lawyer really doesn’t have any control over what happens in the jail. They have no control, so you’re at their mercy or whim or whatever.
Erin: Whatever you want to call it.
Susan: We’re calling it. So don’t get arrested. You don’t have to worry about it.
Erin: It’s my takeaway. But if you do get arrested, call us and we will help.
Susan: Yes. Call us. All right. Thanks, everyone.
Outro: Thank you for listening to the Lady Lawyer League. Be sure to like and subscribe anywhere you get your podcasts. If you would like to learn more about our firm, visit us at hrlawomaha.com. We’ll see you next week.
