Family and Friends Forum

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If you switch and he is getting legal aid the new one wont be able to work for you until he is charged unless you pay for it yourself. My OH is in the same situation. Specialist Solicitors dont take legal aid as it maxes out at 25K - and they charge a lot more than that! Most people end up pleading guilty due to the expense. Good luck.

If you can afford it I would have a specialist solicitor, we got one for our family member and although it's still on going he has put our minds at rest. He was going to stay with the Duty solicitor but when I read up about her I didn't think she would do her best for him,also when he did contact her it took ages for her to email back which can be stressful.

Just to add do not use one that wants money up front, we contacted one which was pre charge only and they wanted 9k before anything was done!

We have paid for a more specialist solicitor for any engagement pre charge to try and work on relaxing conditions but hasn't been successful yet! They will move him to be a legal aid client post charge so only paying for in between bit but it's cost enough!

I'm also North Yorkshire and wondering what to do for the best. I have some savings to use for a private solicitor but seen stories of some people paying tens of thousands!

We decided to switch from the duty solicitor to a private one and am so relieved we did. He takes our calls at any time, our son can message him whenever and he gets replies the same day (almost always anyhow!). We have agreed a fixed fee upto charge and we know the costs that will occur after if it goes to Crown. PM me if you want to x

We got a specialist one for grandson after the first duty one being pretty good but when he was asked to attend for a second Interview it was a different Duty solicitor who had no idea about his situation and even after the interview said he had had no idea that he had been under 18 at the time! The time between the two interviews, over a year we heard nothing from them. Once we heard it was going to court we got our own specialist solicitor, the difference was like chalk & cheese. They came to the house to see my grandson a couple of times and were available by phone they said they thought they might be able to stop it going to court, they did say that if we had contacted them sooner they could have done more and maybe got him a caution.They gave no guarantees but of course we wanted them to try especially as grandsons mental state was so bad he had tried to take his own life. When they didn't manage to get it stopped we had to pay again for them to attend court with him. Did it make a difference to the outcome we will never know but the solicitor did argued against some of the restrictions they were suggesting, I am sure their care and compassion towards my grandson stopped him from attempting suicide again and able to face going to go to court and that was worth every penny. It was extremely expensive I used all my pension savings so it has altered what we thought we would be able to do a bit in retirement but to have my grandson still here was worth it. It does appear reading others stories that many youngsters are having the same outcome as grandson did even with a Duty solicitor but he and us needed the extra help.