If you have been arrested and your property has been seized by the police as evidence, you may be wondering if you can challenge the use of that evidence in court.  Any evidence used against you has to be obtained lawfully, and you can try to have some evidence suppressed at trial if you think it has been obtained unlawfully.  However, this does not apply to all evidence. 

In order to get a suppression hearing, you must establish that you have “standing,” which means that you had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the item seized or the place searched.  Merely owning the item in question is not the same thing as standing.

The issue of standing can be difficult for defendants, as your New Hampshire criminal defense attorney will try to distance you from the evidence seized.  However, that might conflict with the fact that your attorney needs to establish sufficient standing to get a suppression hearing.  Some prosecutors will challenge standing in order to force the defendant to testify at the suppression hearing that he did possess the item in question, which can then be used to impeach the defendant he testifies on his own behalf at trial.

An experienced New Hampshire criminal defense attorney might try using other witnesses to establish standing.  For example, if the arresting officer testified that he saw the incriminating item in the possession of the defendant, that might establish standing without the defendant having to testify.  Similarly, other witnesses such as a friend can be called to testify to the defendant’s interest in the property that was searched.

If you have questions about how standing might affect your case, contact experienced New Hampshire criminal defense attorney Sven Wiberg today for a free initial consultation.