Georgia Criminal Solicitation Lawyers

Crimes that are predicated on half-hearted attempts to conduct another crime are known as inchoate crimes. They are attempt, conspiracy, and solicitation. A criminal conspiracy occurs when two or more people agree to commit a crime. It is considered an attempt when a person makes a significant step toward committing a crime but is unsuccessful.

What Does Georgia Criminal Solicitation Entail?

In Georgia, asking someone else to commit a crime is solicitation. The person asking wants the person to commit the crime on their behalf.

Someone must be asked, urged, hired, ordered, or encouraged to commit a crime like murder or prostitution. The crime of solicitation occurs the moment the solicitation is transmitted to another person; neither party must carry out an act to promote the crime.

The victim of the solicitation need not even consent to the crime to be committed. To be charged with solicitation, a person must have consciously asked another person to commit the offense (with the specific intent that the other person actually committed the crime).

What Behavior Qualifies as Solicitation in Georgia?

Criminal solicitation occurs when:

• Requesting/Commanding
• Importuning
• Attempting to influence another individual to commit a crime on the solicitor’s behalf.

If the Person I’m Accused of Soliciting Didn’t Commit a Crime, May I Still Be Charged?

You are guilty of solicitation if you genuinely asked the person to do something illegal on your behalf. Suppose the individual being solicited did not end up taking any action to make the crime happen. In that case, the state does not view this as a defense against criminal solicitation or as a strategy to escape facing criminal charges.

Criminal Conspiracy: What Is It?

The term “conspiracy” refers to a broad category of crimes in which several persons work together to commit a crime. The federal legal system contains specific anti-conspiracy provisions. Anti-conspiracy legislation is also found in state statutes. Even though the crime planned and committed is a misdemeanor, criminal conspiracy is still a felony.

Allegations of conspiracy have been present in an increasing number of white-collar criminal convictions in recent years. A person or business generally engages in conduct that constitutes a crime, an attempt at committing a crime, or the solicitation of someone to commit a crime, or agrees to assist another person or business in planning, committing, or attempting to solicit a crime, with the intent of facilitating or promoting its commission.

What Benefits Are There to Punishing Someone for Criminal Conspiracy?

The prosecution has numerous clear benefits from filing a conspiracy case. In most cases, prosecutors can file charges before the underlying crime is committed when a conspiracy is discovered early enough. Additionally, prosecutors could be able to charge multiple people at once and provide proof against the group.

Trial judges frequently have more sympathy for the prosecution due to the difficulty in gathering evidence in criminal conspiracy cases because most of the agreements must be inferred from the scant evidence.

What Constitutes Evidence of Criminal Conspiracy?

An agreement and an act by one of the participants furthering the conspiracy are the two essential factors in proving a conspiracy. Establishing an agreement is crucial in charging a defendant with a conspiracy. The understanding that gives rise to a conspiracy need not be spoken, written, or even explicit; it can frequently be deduced from the facts of the particular instance. There is an agreement if the parties meet and agree to collaborate on a project.

The majority of criminal conspiracy laws additionally demand that at least one party must have carried out an overt act to facilitate the plot.

What Two Forms of Criminal Conspiracy Exist?

Whether government prosecutors attempt to depict the conspiracy as a “hub-and-spoke conspiracy” or a “chain conspiracy” is a procedural matter of crucial consequence to the parties accused of conspiring.

Many collude with one person in a hub-and-spoke conspiracy but not with other defendants. A defendant’s acts being described as a member of a hub-and-spoke conspiracy benefits them because it indicates that the conspiracies are distinct from one another.

Multiple individuals act as links in a long criminal chain in a chain conspiracy. Even if some of the other participants in the chain were strangers to the defendants, they are all nevertheless held accountable for their activities in chain conspiracies.

Why Do Some States Punish at a Higher Level Than Others?

Depending on the age of the solicitor and the solicited, the age of the crime, whether it is a felony or misdemeanor, and the specifics of the crime, there can be varying degrees of solicitation. When the offense under discussion is prostitution or statutory rape, the age of the participants is important.

Although this will undoubtedly vary from state to state, certain states may structure their solicitation in the manner shown below:

• First Degree: A person above eighteen intentionally solicits a juvenile, age sixteen or younger, to commit a serious crime. Among these serious offenses are rape and murder.
• Second Degree: Someone intentionally encourages another adult to commit a serious crime. Among these serious offenses are rape and murder.
• Third Degree: A person above eighteen actively seeks out a juvenile, aged sixteen or younger, to commit a minor offense.
• Fourth Degree: In the fourth degree, a person solicits another adult to commit a minor offense.
• Fifth Degree: Someone intentionally asks someone else to commit a misdemeanor.

Are There Any Solicitation Defenses?

There is a renunciation defense for solicitation under the Model Penal Code. The crime of solicitation has been effectively absolved by the solicitor if they have totally and freely given up their criminal intent and have either convinced the person they have solicited to refrain from committing the crime or have prevented him in some other way. He has given up his evil intent.

This defense may be allowed by some courts. Additionally, unless the solicitor has made preparations with the solicited in furtherance of the crime, the solicitation does not constitute an effort to perform the sought crime.

A person cannot be charged with both the solicitation of a crime and the actual crime since solicitation is a non-merger crime. Which offense is more serious must be decided by the prosecutor. If the prosecution chooses to pursue a crime that is more difficult to establish because they lack experience, this may work to the defendant’s advantage.

Certain defenses might be offered depending on the details of a person’s solicitation case. Inchoate criminal defenses, however, frequently include the following:

• Legally impossible
• Mistake of law
• No desire to solicit someone to disobey the law.

In Georgia, What is the Penalty for Criminal Solicitation?

Criminal solicitation in Georgia is punishable by any of two different laws. The punishment for the felony that a person asks the other person to commit determines the sentence that person will receive.

The sentence is one to five years in jail if the felony that the solicitor is asking the other person to commit is punishable by death or life in prison. The sentence for solicitation is one to three years in prison for all other offenses.

Do I Need an Attorney to Represent Me?

If you cannot defend yourself in court against a criminal solicitation allegation effectively, Georgia may sentence you to prison. Make urgent contact with a criminal attorney in Georgia if you are charged with solicitation.