Appearing in court can feel like you are back in high school, everyone looking at you, scrutinizing your every move and word, and judging your appearance and behavior. Unlike in high school, where a misstep might make you a temporary laughingstock, one wrong move in the courtroom can leave you with a potentially devastating outcome. 

When you are in court, the judge, the opposing attorney or prosecutor, and the jury are all judging your appearance and examining your behavior to determine your credibility. Here are a few tips to help you be at your best when you have a criminal court hearing:

In casual conversation, robbery, theft, and burglary may seem synonymous, but in the criminal justice system, they are not. Robbery, theft, and burglary are three different charges that have very different consequences. 

Most people know these crimes all involve taking property that belongs to someone else, but there are various behaviors that constitute each offense. If you face robbery, theft, or burglary charges, it is important to understand the differences.

Like marriage, marijuana, sales tax, and countless other issues, each state has the ability to make its own laws concerning firearms. In Illinois, you are required to have a firearm owner’s identification (FOID) card, which legally states to police and others that you are allowed to own a firearm and ammunition. If you are caught by law enforcement with a firearm and do not have a FOID card or your card has been suspended or revoked, it can result in serious consequences. 

The Illinois State Police is the governing body that issues and controls all Illinois FOID cards and they maintain the right to suspend or revoke your card at any time based on criminal charges or convictions you might face.

Each year, the Illinois Department of Corrections releases an annual report which details programs in place at correctional facilities in the state and statistics about the prison population. In 2017, there were 43,075 inmates that were serving sentences in 25 correctional centers throughout the state. The majority of inmates--29.2 percent--were convicted of Class X felonies or the most serious felony classification for crimes other than murder.

Assault or Battery

Inmates: 3,976

If you have been convicted of a crime, you may have either served a jail sentence and then been subject to probation, or you could have been sentenced to probation in lieu of jail. Either way, probation is taken seriously in Illinois and there are consequences for violators. Probation usually requires those who are convicted of a crime to follow a certain set of rules, which can be different for everyone, based on the crime they were convicted of. Violating a condition of your probation can lead to unwanted consequences.

Common Terms and Conditions for Probation

Though the terms of probation differ from person to person, there are a few conditions that are usually present in most probations. These conditions include: