Only Attorneys Can Represent You
Did you know that only an attorney can legally represent you in traffic court? Your parent, spouse, or friend aren’t allowed to. You certainly can speak for yourself, but if you want help in front of the judge, you need to hire an attorney.
Video Transcription
Hello, my name is Andrew Flusche. I’m a Virginia traffic attorney. Today I wanted to talk to you about something very simple, that some people don’t understand about court. If you’re not an attorney, you’re not allowed to talk for somebody else in court. That’s the way the laws work in the United States; that in order to speak for someone else, you have to be an attorney.
If you have a traffic case and you want to be able to present something about your case or about you or your driving record, you either need to be able to explain everything to the judge yourself– which you are certainly allowed to do, you can talk for yourself–or you need to hire an attorney to come with you to court, or go for your to court.
I see people quite often come into traffic court with a spouse or a parent or a friend trying to speak on their behalf, and unfortunately, unless that person is a licensed attorney who is licensed to practice in Virginia, they can’t speak for you. That’s just an unfortunate way the laws work. In order to speak on someone’s behalf in court like that you have to be a licensed attorney.
It’s really intended to protect consumers, so you make sure that if you have someone coming to court, if you paid them, that you’re getting someone who knows what they’re doing. That’s really the whole goal of licensure for attorneys. But unfortunately it does have the kind of unintended consequence of surprising people sometimes.
The best rule of thumb is that if you need someone to speak on your behalf, or for you in court, you need to consult with an attorney and hire them to come with you to court. Sometimes we can even take care of the case without you even being there. We can present the argument that you would like to present and explain to the judge what you would like them to hear about your case. If you have a case around Fredericksburg, Stafford, or Spotsylvania, I’d be happy to talk to you about it and see if it’s a case that I could help you with.