When New Jersey residents are charged with crimes, they might be concerned that if they are convicted, that criminal record will be around for years to haunt them. It might seem far-fetched, but in some instances, however, this might not apply because a charge is simply forgotten about. That doesn’t mean, however, that such charges will go away forever.
For one Morristown man, a charge from more than a quarter-century ago that was never resolved will now have to be dealt with. The man, now 64, was charged with drunk driving back in November 1987. For reasons that have not yet been made clear, the man never showed up for the hearing on the charge in municipal court. Somewhere along the line, officials forgot about the charge, or at least stopped looking for the man to bring him to court.
Recently, however, the man was stopped again on an unrelated offense. Officers at the scene performed a background check and discovered the 1987 charge and how it had never made its way to court. As a result, the man had his municipal court hearing rescheduled — to June of this year. At an initial hearing, the man pleaded not guilty to the charges. At the time, officials say his blood alcohol level was measured at 0.17 percent; this was back in the days when the legal limit in our state was 0.10 percent.
Regardless of the time between your initial arrest and your court hearing, it can be beneficial to have an experienced defense attorney on your side.
Source: Mount Olive Chronicle, “After 27 years, drunk driving charge heard,” Phil Garber, March 28, 2014
