As criminal lawyers, we see first hand how bad drugs are and how drug offences destroy peoples lives. We have noticed the increased media around drugs at music festivals and witnessed many cases where people have made the wrong decisions and paid the price by losing their lives or being sentenced with a criminal conviction that will impact the rest of their lives.
Watch and learn from Sam McKensey, Senior Criminal Law lawyer at Aubrey Brown Lawyers, on what you, your friends or your children should do if you have made a bad call and been caught with drugs at a music festival.
Understanding your rights and how the process works can have a huge impact on the outcome.
What to do if you have made a bad life decision and been caught with drugs by police at a music festival.
Firstly, we don’t condone the use of drugs, but the reality is people make bad life choices. If you happen to find yourself in that circumstance, it’s important that you understand what your rights are and what the best way to approach it to make sure that the situation doesn’t get worse.
Be Polite.
The first thing to remember if you, your friends, or your children are ever approached by the police anywhere, be polite. Manners and respect are important in all aspects of life.
Give name and address to police and seek proper legal advice. Stay silent.
The second thing to remember is if the police ask for it, give your name and address, but you aren’t required to say anything else. It’s really important that you get proper legal advice before speaking to the police. It may be that you end up with a supply offence inadvertently when it would have remained as a simple possession charge had you remained silent.
Don’t consent to search but cooperate with police directions.
The third thing to remember is if the police reasonably suspect you’ve got drugs on you, they’re entitled to search you, which will be a pat-down search. If they want to conduct a strip search, it’s important that you don’t consent to the search, but you make it clear you will cooperate with police directions. Not consenting to the search preserves your legal rights, helps us protect you if your matter ends up in court.
In summary, we all know that drugs are bad. We see them ruin lives every single day. But it’s important if you are in that situation and you’ve made a bad decision that either you, your friends, your children understand your rights so that one bad decision doesn’t then go on to impact you for the rest of your life.
If you need any further assistance on this topic please call us on 02 4350 3333 or contact us here.
