In many Virginia federal criminal cases where the police have not already conducted a search of your home or business, they will do so at the time that they arrest you. There is a provision under the Fourth Amendment case law suggesting that a search incident to a lawful arrest does not require an active and valid search warrant. If they believe, for example, that they have enough probable cause to place you under arrest for a certain offense, they will in many cases attempt to do that when you are at your home or business or any other place they desire to search. That enables them to bypass the warrant requirement in many cases. Once your case has begun, the government is still not done with their investigation by any stretch. Virginia and federal law enforcement officials will not talk to you or people close to you for fear of tipping you, your friends, or your family off as to the nature and even existence of that investigation.
To learn more about law enforcement tactics in post-arrest investigations, contact a Virginia federal criminal defense lawyer. Call today.
Evidence Virginia Law Enforcement Officials Look For
What they are looking for and who they are talking to depends on the nature of the case against you. If the case involves drugs, Virginia and federal investigators are going to be looking for drugs. They are going to be looking for any kind of paraphernalia that supports either the possession of or distribution of drugs. They will be looking on your computer for “owe sheets” or any kind of client list you might be storing electronically. They might talk to people who know you well or people who have bought from you or sold to you before. Again, the different types of federal criminal cases often dictates what type of evidence investigators search for. The answer depends upon the nature of the case and what kind of evidence the government still feels the need to acquire.
However, Virginia and federal investigators cannot as a matter of law just take things like your computer or cellphone once you have been arrested. But if they have a search warrant in order to acquire those items, then it is very likely that the investigators will take those things as evidence.
While You Are in Court
While your case is in court, Virginia and federal investigators are not as actively investigating you as they were prior to the commencement of court proceedings. That said, the investigation never ends. Once they get to the point where court proceedings have begun, the government should feel they have enough evidence against you to convict you. If they do not, then they should not be bringing these charges in the first place. That is not to say they are not going to continue to investigate, because as with many things, investigations tend to be fluid in nature and circumstances can change. New witnesses whom they did not know about before and whom they might need to talk to might reveal themselves through subsequent investigation.
Again, because of the severity of Virginia federal criminal charges, both state and federal investigators are unlikely to just drop their investigations once someone’s case proceeds to court. They are always building their case and will work throughout someone’s case in order to procure as much evidence as they can. For help in your case, call a Virginia federal criminal attorney today.
