Factual Innocence Declared – San Francisco Case 15019614

On July 7, 2016 Ryan Friedman successfully petitioned the court to seal and destroy the arrest records of a client who was falsely charged with domestic violence. Case began when client was arrested outside his San Francisco apartment. Earlier that evening, the alleged victim fabricated a story to the police where she stated that her boyfriend (client) had assaulted her and threatened to kill her new boyfriend, a San Francisco County police officer.

Mr. Friedman and his investigator, Craig Speck, conducted a months long investigation into the alleged victim’s claims, and interviewed numerous witnesses connected to the alleged victim (co-workers, former roommates, ex-boyfriends, etc.). The District Attorney dismissed the case on the first day of trial, when Mr. Friedman’s defense team produced substantial evidence that the alleged victim was a serial liar and that she had fabricated false evidence against client.

Thanks to the hard work of the Friedman Law Firm’s defense team, this “victim” was prosecuted by the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office for four counts of felony perjury as they related to the wrongful prosecution of client (See People v. Chandler, 2016 San Francisco County Superior Court).

This was a huge win for the Friedman Law Firm team, which not only reminded the government that sometimes truly innocent people end up being prosecuted for crimes they did not commit, but also that the claims from an alleged victim deserve careful scrutiny as the law requires that the accused person is presumed to be innocent.