Los Angeles, CA Attorneys, Lawyers and Law Firms

Blair Berk and Leonard Levine, defense lawyers in Los Angeles, are arguing for the release of their client, Darren Sharper, who used to play in the National Football League.

Sharper has submitted a not guilty plea to sexually assaulting two women in Los Angeles.

However, Sharper remains on indefinite custody with no bail after prosecutors pointed out that he also has an arrest warrant issued by authorities in Louisiana.

Sharper's lawyers are insisting on his release because no case has been filed yet pertaining to the Louisiana arrest warrant.

The jury returned a guilty verdict against Rudy Kurniawan, a star wine collector, for faking vintage wines, which he apparently just manufactured from his home.

Kurniawan was convicted for fraud and is looking at a massive 40-year sentence.

Kurniawan was once known as among the top five collectors of wine in the world.

Prosecutors accused Kurniawan of earning millions from selling and auctioning fake vintage wines.

Found in the home that Kurniawan shared with his mother were unlabeled bottles and labels of Burgundy and Bordeaux wines.

Suspicions against Kurniawan started during an auction in 2008 wherein he offered to sell Domaine Ponsot wines.

But it wasn't until a 2012 wine auction in London that Kurniawan was arrested.

Los Angeles criminal lawyer Jerome Mooney, defending for Kurniawan, said his client was not trying to defraud people. Instead, all he wanted was to belong.

A jury rejected a negligence lawsuit brought by Katherine Jackson, the mother of Michael Jackson, against AEG Live LLC, the This is It concerts promoter of the King of Pop.

Katherine Jackson's lawyers claimed that the promoter erred when it failed to verify if Dr. Conrad Murray was qualified when it hired him as the singer's doctor.

AEG denied the allegation but said that Murray was hired by Michael Jackson himself.

Murray is already serving a jail sentence for the death of the popstar.

Los Angeles lawyer Marvin S. Putnam, AEG's lead defense counsel, said the jury made the right decision.

The Jackson lawyers had pointed out that the promoter was only after its own profits thus it did not bother to make sure that Murray was a qualified physician.

Putnam and his defence team claimed Murray's hiring was the singer's choice and that if their client had known about what Murray and Jackson were up to they would not have gone on with the series of concerts.

Robert Lee Phillips was convicted of killing his two stepdaughters in a 2006 birthday celebration for one of the victims.

Jurors found the 66-year-old South Los Angeles man guilty of murder in the first degree for the shooting death of Sabrina Taylor, 30, and murder in the second degree for the death of Charlotte Johnson, 33.

Phillips was also found guilty of attempting to kill two other people during the incident.

The jury had agreed with the Prosecutors that it was clear that Phillips had the intentions of committing the murders to pay the two women for their acts towards him all those years.

This was countered by Louis Sepe, the defense attorney from Los Angeles, who questioned what was his client's motive when he never even lived with the victims.

The incident stemmed from an argument that they were having over the kind of music that was played at the party.

Phillips is looking at a life sentence with no chance of parole.

Brian Patrick O'Callaghan is facing murder charges after it has been alleged that he had beaten his adopted son which resulted to the 3-year-old's death.

O'Callaghan is a former marine and a war veteran who now works for the NSA.

The suspicion against O'Callaghan started when police were called to the hospital where the boy was confined.

The boy was suffering from brain hemorrhage and fractures in the skull, injuries consistent with beating.

O'Callaghan had told police investigators that his wife had gone out of town thus he had been caring for the boy.

While under his care, O'Callaghan said the child had hit his shoulder in the shower after falling backwards. The next day, when he went to check on the boy who was napping, he said he noticed mucus coming out of the boy's nose and when he picked him up, the boy started vomiting so he brought him to the hospital.

Steven McCool, a defense lawyer in Washington representing O'Callaghan, is insisting on his client's innocence.

He said the allegations have no basis and that O'Callaghan is disputing that the child suffered several injuries in the head.

A plea deal agreement has Broderick Kenyo Smith admitting to manslaughter instead of capital murder in the death of Arlando Maurice Pritchett in 2012.

The plea agreement will have Smith serving just a year in jail for a split sentence of 10 years.

His jail stay will be followed with probation for three years.

Should Smith violate his probation, he could be made to serve the rest of his 10-year sentence.

According to the police, Pritchett had an argument with a cab driver prior to his shooting while Smith admitted that he had been driving a cab during the time of the incident.

Birmingham defense attorney Charles Salvagio said Smith had shot Pritchett because the latter had robbed him.

The murder charge filed against Freddie Earl Patton,53, for the shooting death of his girlfriend's father, Kenneth Millar, 81, has been dismissed upon the request of the Deputy District Attorney.

An order for Patton's release from jail has been signed, however, he may not be off the hook yet as the DA's office has stated that the case will be turned over to the grand jury in Jefferson County.

The prosecution moved for the dismissal after arguing with the defense who wanted to further question the detective about the autopsy report.

Birmingham criminal attorney John Lentine said that a manslaughter charge should have been filed instead of murder because the shooting was an accident.

If Patton gets indicted, he will have to go back to jail.

William S. Kern, a Baltimore Police instructor, was handed a 60-day jail stay, for shooting Raymond Gray, a police recruit, while they were doing exercises.

Kern, who has been in service for 19 years, told the court during his trial that he had brought a live gun to the exercises and he had accidentally used it instead of the training weapon.

Gray was hit in the head and was blinded in one eye when Kern fired his gun through the window to show the recruits the danger of lingering near the door, the window or the hallway.

Kern said that he brought his gun to the training for the safety of the recruits because the facility where they were having their exercises is not secure.

Baltimore defense attorney Shaun F. Owens had argued for Kern's release saying that his client's eventual dismissal from the service would already be enough of a punishment.

Kern is on a 60-day suspension while the Baltimore Police conducts an investigation within its ranks.

Gray's family, who expressed dissatisfaction with the sentence, has also filed a civil lawsuit in relation to the incident and is being represented by Baltimore litigator A. Dwight Pettit.

Ken Anderson, the former District Attorney of Williamson County, was meted with a 10-day jail term after the judge accepted his no-contest plea for the charge of contempt of court.

The charge steamed from the wrongful conviction of Michael Morton who was found guilty for the murder of his wife in 1986 and was sentenced to life imprisonment.

However, in 2011, Morton's conviction was overturned using DNA as proof that he did not kill his wife.

In the light of that development, Anderson, who had prosecuted Morton's case, was scrutinized and was determined to have erred when he withheld evidence which would have been beneficial for Morton's defense.

Aside from the short jail stay, Anderson will also have to give up his license as a lawyer and as part of the plea bargain, he will also be disbarred for five years.

Austin attorney Eric Nichols, however, pointed out that there will be no conviction for Anderson on any criminal charge.

Morton, for his part, said he is more than happy with the result because all he wanted was for Anderson not to practice law anymore to prevent what happened to him from happening to anyone else again.

Anderson was also fined and made to do community service.