L and L Law Group, PLLC defends clients facing criminal charges in Dallas County, Texas across the full Penal Code spectrum. Cases proceed in the Frank Crowley Courts Building at 133 N. Riverfront Boulevard, Dallas, and are prosecuted by the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office; a defendant is first booked and magistrated at the Lew Sterrett Justice Center on Commerce Street. Free 24/7 consultation with founding partners: (972) 370-5060.
Charge categories handled in Dallas County
The Dallas County District Attorney’s Office prosecutes the full Texas charge spectrum filed from Dallas County arrests. Each major category has its own defense framework, statutory analysis, and procedural workflow:
- DWI (Tex. Penal Code § 49.04) — Class B (BAC < 0.15) or Class A (BAC ≥ 0.15) first offense; second-offense Class A; felony DWI on third or DWI-with-child enhancement. ALR hearing required within 15 days under Tex. Transp. Code § 524.031.
- Drug possession (Tex. Health & Safety Code § 481) — Penalty Group classification drives punishment range. Possession with intent to distribute under § 481.112 elevates one class.
- Assault and family violence (Tex. Penal Code § 22.01) — Class A misdemeanor; Class A family-violence assault adds a federal firearms ban under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9). Continuous family violence under § 25.11 is a third-degree felony.
- Theft (Tex. Penal Code § 31.03) — aggregated under § 31.09, value tiers from Class C (under $100) to first-degree felony ($300,000+).
- Weapons offenses (Tex. Penal Code Ch. 46) — UCW under § 46.02, felon-in-possession under federal § 922(g)(1), prohibited weapons under § 46.05.
- Sex offenses (Tex. Penal Code Ch. 21-22) — sexual assault is a second-degree felony; aggravated sexual assault is a first-degree; both trigger Tex. Code Crim. Proc. ch. 62 registration.
The Dallas County criminal court infrastructure
Dallas County criminal cases are filed and tried at the Frank Crowley Courts Building, 133 N. Riverfront Boulevard, Dallas, TX 75207, on the west edge of downtown. The felony docket is spread across seventeen district courts — seven formally titled Criminal District Court No. 1 through No. 7, plus ten numbered district courts (the 194th, 195th, 203rd, 204th, 265th, 282nd, 283rd, 291st, 292nd, and 363rd). Class A and Class B misdemeanors, from a first-offense DWI to a simple assault, are heard in the eleven County Criminal Courts (No. 1 through No. 11) — the label Dallas County uses in place of “county courts at law.” Before bond is posted, a defendant is held at the Lew Sterrett Justice Center, 111 W. Commerce Street, the jail the Dallas County Sheriff runs a few blocks from the courthouse; the Sheriff also serves the county’s capias warrants.
Every state prosecution in the county runs through the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office, a unified Criminal District Attorney that carries both the felony and the misdemeanor docket; there is no separate county attorney splitting the load. Inside the office, felony cases route to a felony-trial division and misdemeanors to a misdemeanor-trial division, each with its own intake screening, plea-evaluation thresholds, and trial tempo. Knowing which division holds a file, and how that division tends to weigh a given fact pattern, is part of what local practice buys.
Dallas County also runs an unusually deep bench of problem-solving courts, and for the right defendant they can matter more than anything that happens at trial. The DIVERT program is a felony drug-diversion court; there are dedicated Felony and Misdemeanor DWI Courts, a Veterans Treatment Court, a felony domestic-violence court, and mental-health dockets for both felony and misdemeanor cases. A defendant who completes one of these tracks can often avoid a conviction or a prison term entirely. We screen every Dallas County matter for eligibility early, because admission usually has to be raised before the case is set for a plea, and the window can close quickly.
Scale is part of what defines criminal practice here. Dallas County is the second-most-populous county in Texas, home to more than 2.6 million people across Dallas, Irving, Garland, Grand Prairie, Mesquite, Carrollton, Richardson, and the southern suburbs, and its courts carry one of the heaviest criminal dockets in the state. Cases range from Class C citations to capital felonies, and a meaningful share of the most serious matters — large-scale fraud, drug conspiracies, firearms trafficking — are taken federally and prosecuted across town in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Dallas Division. We handle both the state docket at Frank Crowley and federal matters in the Northern District.
The defense workflow for a Dallas County case
Once you retain the firm, the case proceeds on a defined workflow:
- Bond and pretrial release. If you are in custody, we file an emergency bond motion under Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 17.15 in the trial court. We coordinate with the bondsman or pursue a PR bond where eligible. We respond to any pending capias warrant.
- Discovery demand. Within 14 days of arraignment, we file the Michael Morton Act discovery demand under Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 39.14. We obtain the offense report, body-cam video, in-car video, lab reports, dispatch tape, and prior-call records.
- Investigation and motion practice. We review the discovery for Fourth Amendment suppression issues, chain-of-custody breaks, Brady-and-Giglio disclosure issues, and procedural defects. We draft motions to suppress, motions in limine, and motions to dismiss as the record supports.
- Plea negotiation. We engage the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office on plea options — pretrial diversion (where the county runs such a program), deferred adjudication, charge reduction, or favorable sentencing. Negotiation tempo varies by county and division.
- Trial preparation or disposition. If the case resolves by plea, we document the plea agreement and represent you at the plea hearing. If the case proceeds to trial, we prepare voir dire, opening statement, cross-examination outlines, defense case-in-chief, and closing argument.
- Post-disposition relief. If the case ends favorably, we calendar the expunction or non-disclosure petition. If a sentence is imposed, we file notice of appeal within 30 days under Tex. R. App. P. 26.2(a) where appellate review is appropriate.
Engagement and fee structure
The firm operates on a flat-fee structure for criminal-defense engagements. At the free initial consultation (30-45 minutes, conducted by one of the founding partners), we assess the case posture, identify the time-sensitive deadlines, and quote a flat fee in writing if we are the right firm for the matter. The flat fee covers the entire defense through final disposition or trial in chief on the underlying charge.
We do not bill criminal-defense matters hourly because the State controls the case pace and hourly billing creates the wrong incentives. Appeals, post-conviction relief, and unrelated ancillary matters are scoped separately.
Free Dallas County consultation
Direct to attorney 24/7. Flat-fee representation, scoped in writing at the consult.
Call (972) 370-5060What a Dallas County criminal-defense attorney actually does
Hiring defense counsel in a Dallas County case is not a clerical errand; it means handing someone strategic judgment over charges, plea posture, pretrial motions, evidence challenges, and — where it comes to that — trial. A Dallas County criminal-defense attorney typically begins by reviewing the offense report, body-worn camera and dashcam recordings, Dallas PD or Sheriff's intake records, and the laboratory analysis for any tested substances. Where stops or searches are at issue, counsel examines the precise basis for the encounter (traffic infraction, community caretaker function, anonymous tip corroboration, consent) and the chain of evidence justifying each escalation. In Dallas cases that record usually comes from the Dallas Police Department or a suburban department, the Sheriff’s intake at Lew Sterrett, and the Texas DPS crime laboratory, and we read each source against the others for gaps.
Motion practice in Dallas County courts
Effective defense in Dallas County turns substantially on motion practice. Common motions include: motion to suppress (Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 38.23 and Fourth Amendment), motion in limine on identifying-witness or prior-conviction evidence, motion to disclose confidential informant identity, motion to compel additional discovery (under Michael Morton Act, Article 39.14), motion for change of venue if pretrial publicity is significant, and motion to dismiss for speedy-trial violation under Article 32A.02. Each motion is evaluated against the specific factual record and the judge's customary disposition. Counsel familiar with the Dallas courts will know, for example, which judges entertain extensive evidentiary suppression hearings versus which prefer to defer issues to trial. In Dallas County those suppression fights play out under Article 38.23 in the same district court or County Criminal Court that will try the case, so the judge who rules on the motion is the judge who later hears the evidence.
Sentencing, probation, and post-disposition relief
Most cases in Dallas County resolve by plea. The defense attorney's value at that stage shifts from trial-readiness to sentencing advocacy: PSR-review and objection preparation, identification of mitigating factors specific to the defendant (employment history with AT&T HQ, Texas Instruments or other major area employers, family responsibilities, treatment commitments, restitution efforts), and negotiation with the prosecutor for charge concessions, deferred adjudication, or community-supervision conditions calibrated to actual rehabilitation needs rather than maximalist control. After judgment, counsel handles probation-condition modifications under Article 42A.701, early termination motions, expunction or non-disclosure petitions when available, and (in qualifying cases) writ-of-habeas-corpus litigation for fundamental defects in the conviction. Where the facts fit, that sentencing advocacy includes arguing for admission into one of Dallas County’s problem-solving courts — DIVERT, the DWI courts, Veterans Treatment Court, or a mental-health docket — in place of a straight sentence.
L and L Law Group represents clients across Dallas County in felony and misdemeanor matters, with substantial caseload concentration in DWI, drug, assault, theft, sex-offense, and weapons cases. Our practice runs through the Dallas district courts — all seventeen, including Criminal District Court No. 1 through No. 7 — and the eleven County Criminal Courts, every one of them under the roof of the Frank Crowley Courts Building.
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