My son was present in a school locker room when there was some physical confrontation between some other boys. When my son and i met with the school police officer she said he was being treated as a suspect and wanted him to sign a waiver of his rights. I told her he was a witness not a participant and i wasn't comfortable with him signing the waiver and we may need an attorney since a statement from a boy who doesn't like my son implicated him as involved in assault. I wouldn't let my son be questioned without representation, but two days later the Vice principal at the school questioned my son with the police officer present. The police officer asked him a question directly about the case. They did not try to contact me until after they questioned him. They called to inform me that they were issuing a citation to my son for disorderly conduct. They didnt tell me they had questioned him, I found out from my son. The VP confirmed that the police officer was present during th questioning. Is it a violation of his fifth ammendment right if the investigating police officer was present after we chose to exercise our right to remain silent?

Have you browsed through the information in LawInfo's Free Legal Resource Center to learn more about your issue yet? See: http://www.lawinfo.com/consumer.html. You can certainly try to speak to a lawyer to determine what legal options may be available. In the meantime, you may be able to learn more on your own. Search the "Free Legal Resources" tab, or browse the Consumer Resources. Good luck.

yes that is in dirrect violation of your rights, get a lawyer, not a public deffender.

Public defenders are lawyers. They passed the same bar that private attorneys pass, but work for an agency instead of private firms.

how much do you currently know about montana public deffenders, and whats going on in the montana system. before you deffend something try knowing about it

Regardless, the answer is STILL the same. Public defenders are licensed attorneys who passed the same bar exam as all other attorneys in the state. The political issues you're implicating in MT don't change that.

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While pointers can be helpful, ultimately the number one lesson in any legal action is: don't take legal advice from books, family, friends, co-workers, police officers, grocery clerks, web sites, or people on legal message boards. The only person who can give YOU legal advice is YOUR attorney.

http://www.aardvarc.org

Aardvarc is correct. Regardless, public defenders are attorneys by definition.