Criminal Defense

We Have the Resources, so YOU Have the Resources!

Alexander Toia & Company subscribes to numerous commercial databases specifically designed for Private Investigators, Law Enforcement, Research Professionals, Attorneys, Paralegals, and Insurance Companies. We also maintain a vast network of outside legal service and resource contractors that assist with particularly difficult assignments anywhere in the nation and beyond its borders.

Criminal Defense Investigations
Case Investigation Work-ups
Crime Scene Photography & Video
DNA Lab Testing
Domestic Violence
Juvenile Cases
Timeline Creation

ATC is judicious in the cases we accept. They primarily depend on the circumstances and nature of the crime, and especially on the cooperation of the defendant. Alex has attended seminars where world-renowned pathologist, Dr. Henry Lee, attorneys F. Lee Bailey and James Cooney, and criminal investigation expert, Brandon A. Perron, have taught. In Mr. Perron’s Comprehensive Guide for the Criminal Defense Investigator – Uncovering Reasonable Doubt: the Component Method, he quotes an often used phrase by F. Lee Bailey, “A good investigator is generally more valuable to a defendant’s case than a good lawyer.”

It is important to know that the defendant and his legal counsel trust and rely on their investigator, providing the discretion and budget to fully investigate the case. Without that ability to draw a total picture of the circumstances surrounding the arrest, the investigator is ineffective. Without that support, the entire case could be jeopardized. ATC declines cases where we are unable to do what is necessary to protect the defendant’s rights. We accept cases where we feel the defendant has been unjustly accused. The deciding factors lie in the defendant’s attitude and version of events..

SAMPLE CASE:

A criminal defense attorney client requested an investigation into a fight his 15 year old client had with another 15 year old boy. The boys attended the same high school, but did not know one another very well. The circumstances surrounding the fight were described by the victim in a complaint his father filed against our client three days after the altercation. It charged him with aggravated assault because the victim received a broken nose, fractured eye socket, and damaged retina. It was also stated that our client was a high school football player that used his size and reputation to pick on and bully other students. After reviewing discovery, the police report, and prosecutors’ interviews with father and son, we needed to know what the police investigation found. We learned directly from the arresting officer himself that no official investigation had been done. His superiors confirmed it, and admitted the Detective Bureau “had dropped the ball.” In contacts with the prosecutor’s office and its lead investigator, we learned no one had conducted an investigation or interviewed any of the fifteen other children that had witnessed the fight.

In meeting with our client, he was found to be too small, thin, and reserved to act aggressively with anyone, especially someone almost twice his size, as the “victim” was. He had played one year on the freshman football team and found it too physically demanding. He was soft spoken, intelligent, and was nowhere near the profile the victim and his father gave the police and prosecutors staff.

Of the fifteen kids in the vicinity at the time of the fight, twelve had direct information, but only nine were willing to talk. Eight provided written statements. Five were our client’s friends and four were friends of the other boy. Everyone said the difference in size between the two boys was remarkable. The victim was almost twice as large in height and weight. Moreover, he has a very bad temper and demeanor. They said our client had never been seen in a fight before, nor was he aggressive in behavior. He is very well mannered, and was only standing up for a 7 year old boy the victim was physically pushing around and calling names.

There was a birthday party at one of our client’s friend’s house in a nice section of town that bordered on a working class neighborhood. Our client was celebrating his friend’s birthday with several family members. The mother left to pick up pizza, and the kids remained at the house. Their ages ranged from 7-18. It was between 7:30 and 8 p.m. on a Friday night. The kids went outside to the front lawn at the same time another group of boys came walking down the street. They had cut over from the working class neighborhood where the victim lived. They had not been invited to the party, but had not come to crash it.

The victim was known as a bully and was using his size to intimidate the seven year old. Our client told him to knock it off, the kid was only seven. The victim then focused his attention on our client and antagonized him, prodding him to fight. Our client told him this was not worth fighting over, just leave the child alone. But the “victim” pushed it until there was no way out. He quickly moved in and threw a punch connecting with our client’s face, snapping his head back. The client came back with a roundhouse right from his right to left catching his “assailant” across his face, causing a tear of skin and slight nose bleed. That was it, a two-punch fight. The blood stopped it.

Our client went into his friend’s house to get towels and ice for the victim. The victim said he was “cool.” They shook hands; the fight was over. Both kids were no worse than when they started, other than a slight bleed under the nose. The victim hung around with his buddies for about 20 minutes to half an hour before he called his father to come pick him up. Everyone with him, as well as those from the party, said he was fine. No injuries, no complaints; he was walking around, hanging out, joking with his friends.

When his father arrived, kids on both sides heard the old man yelling and screaming at his son, slapping him on the head for “fighting again.” Here is the timeline:

The fight occurred at eight o’clock and lasted two punches.
The “aggressor,” our client, went inside to get his “opponent,” the victim, ice, and towels to clean up the scratch of blood.
The victim and his friends continued to hang out on the street, joking and fooling around until 8:30
The victim was picked up by his father, who was seen cursing and hitting him around 8:30.
It was a two minute drive to the victim’s house. Being generous, they arrive home at 9:00.
A friend saw the victim upon his return and reported he was fine.

The victim went to the Emergency Room the next day, Saturday, and admission records show he arrived at 1:04 p.m., 16-17 hours after a fight that allegedly produced severe, life-altering injuries. The father and his victim son arrived at police headquarters the following Monday. Interviews only of the father and son were conducted. No one from our client’s family had any idea what had occurred because the authorities only had the victim’s version of what happened.

Our very basic, elementary investigation, which the police and prosecutor’s office neglected to do, brought the truth to light. In court, with the benefit of the nine conforming truthful statements, the client received reduced charges were dismissed after five months probation. It was a major victory for our client and his lawyer, but should never have reached that stage in the first place.

It is obvious by now that the father is the prime suspect for the kid’s injuries. Alex Toia’s theory is that the father severely beat his and then threatened him to lie about it, blaming our client. In addition, as a result of these alleged injuries committed by our client, the father and son filed police reports and sued our client’s parents for injuries.

It was our suggestion to find out who these people are that would file a false police report and commit fraud for damages we did not produce. The parents were in full support and funded a new investigation. We wanted to know:

Who this father was?
Did he have he have a history of aggression or abuse?
What was in his background?
Does he have a violent past?
Has he ever harmed his children?

The results were not surprising. The father of the victim was a tyrant. At six feet, five inches tall, 255 pounds, he was an intimidator and controller. He yelled and threatened his two boys since they were born. He verbally and physically abused his wife, all five feet, 110 pounds of her. On several occasions, she stood between her husband and sons to prevent him from grabbing them. She has taken her children to her mother’s home for their protection. She had been knocked down by him in front of her children to the point where she called DYFS (NJ Division of Youth & Family Services). When two investigators arrived, her husband charged her with abuse of the children. But interviewing family members individually brought out the truth of what occurred. The boys reluctantly admitted their father struck them many times and also hit their mother. The father lost his temper and became abusive with the investigators. And DYFS concluded the mother’s call had been legitimate and made arrangements for her protection.

Eventually, the mother separated from her husband, but did not tell him where she went. In setting out to look for her, he threatened everyone in her family. It was not until the woman’s sons grew to 13, 14, and 15, years old that she became the focus of their discontent. He oldest, the victim of this case, began to physically push her around, slamming her petite frame into walls, tripping her, and pulling her hair. He stole credit cards, walked out of the house at all hours of the night, and was incorrigible at school. He was forced to join an afterschool program for children that could not conform to daily requirements, and was eventually expelled. The mother got to the point where she dropped her children at her husband’s house to tell him they had become him, and she could not longer allow them in her home where she could be further physically harmed. It was on the night of this separation from her children that the incident with our client occurred.

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