San Antonio Juvenile Defense Attorney

Your child is not the first good kid to end up in this position, and an arrest is not a verdict. What happens over the next few weeks matters more than what happened on the night in question, because early decisions determine whether this becomes a paragraph in a file or a permanent obstacle to college admission, financial aid, military enlistment, and a first real job.

Texas handles these cases outside the adult criminal courts, and that distinction shapes everything about how a successful defense works.

Conduct committed between the ages of 10 and 16 falls under the Juvenile Justice Code, which is civil rather than criminal. Instead of finding someone guilty of a crime, a court finds delinquent conduct. Instead of a sentence, the court will order a disposition. Despite the use of different wording, the stated purpose is rehabilitation, and that often opens doors that do not exist in adult criminal court.

Parents routinely get two points wrong, and both are important to understand. A 17-year-old is considered an adult in Texas criminal court, with no juvenile protections at all. Even though the goal is rehabilitation, the consequences can be significant: a disposition can range from a warning at the low end to commitment with the Texas Juvenile Justice Department at the high end (sending the youth to a state residential facility), with a determinate sentence reaching decades into the 17-year-old's future for the most serious offenses.

Getting ahead of the DA's case is the first step. The window when a prosecutor is still deciding what to do is when our defense does the most good. This means that it's imperative that you contact us immediately so we get to work right away.

Schools run their own process, on their own timeline, and it does not wait for the court.

Once a district learns about an arrest, it can change your child's placement or start expulsion proceedings, even when the alleged conduct happened nowhere near campus. Those hearings have their own rules and their own deadlines, and the outcome can affect graduations, athletics, and transcripts regardless of what the juvenile court eventually decides. We represent students in those school hearings alongside the criminal case, because winning one and losing the other still costs your child a year.

Everything moves faster at the beginning than families expect.

If your child is detained, the detention hearing comes almost immediately: by law, no later than the second working day after being taken into custody, or the first working day when the detention started over a weekend. You are entitled to notice, and you should be in that room. The judge decides whether your child goes home to you or stays at the Juvenile Detention Center while the case proceeds, and this early hearing is also our first chance to present mitigation and exculpatory evidence to the prosecutor before anyone commits to a position.

Bexar County hears these cases in three juvenile district courts, the 289th, 386th, and 436th, at the Juvenile Justice Center. From detention, a case moves through pretrial conferences where discovery is resolved and defense motions are argued, including motions to dismiss for insufficient evidence and motions to suppress. If the case does not resolve, it reaches an adjudication hearing, which functions like the guilt phase of a trial. Your child has the right to a jury there, and a jury verdict must be unanimous. When a court does find delinquent conduct, a separate disposition hearing decides what happens, and we present evaluations and mitigation at that stage.

Class C citations, including truancy and most traffic matters, go to the City of San Antonio's juvenile municipal court instead. Note that a child under 17 must appear there with a parent or guardian, even when an attorney is involved, and a 16-year-old who skips the setting can have a warrant issued.

A juvenile record is not automatically private, and it does not always vanish at 18.

Some records are restricted automatically under the Family Code. Others require a petition to seal, and the timing depends on the offense, your child's age, and how the case ended. Parents often assume this happens automatically and find out otherwise when their child applies for a job, a professional license, or military enlistment. We tell you at the outset which category applies and handle the sealing when your child becomes eligible. More on expunction and record sealing.