What happens after an arrest in Coventry? First, a custody suite and an interview, and the one piece of advice that applies to everyone: ask for a solicitor before you say anything. Police station advice is free regardless of income, and a criminal solicitor who hears the disclosure before the interview can tell you whether to answer questions, stay silent or give a written statement. Second, if charged, a hearing at Coventry Magistrates' Court on Little Park Street, where minor cases are finished and serious ones are sent on. Third, for the serious ones, a trial or sentence at Coventry Crown Court, which sits in the Combined Court Centre on Much Park Street, a few minutes' walk from the magistrates.
Criminal law solicitors in Coventry handle the whole sequence. They challenge the evidence and the way it was obtained, argue bail, negotiate with the Crown Prosecution Service over charges, instruct a barrister for a Crown Court trial and prepare the mitigation that shapes a sentence. Many also deal with motoring law, which in a city ringed by the M6, M69, A45 and A46 and threaded by a famously tight ring road is a large part of the work: drink and drug driving, speeding and totting-up bans, driving while disqualified.
The caseload reflects the population. Drug supply, violence and public order around the student bars, county lines, domestic abuse, burglary, fraud, and offences involving young people, which the youth court handles separately. A smaller number of firms take on serious fraud, regulatory prosecutions and professional disciplinary cases.
Legal aid is means-tested in the magistrates' court and may involve contributions in the Crown Court; most Coventry criminal firms hold a legal aid contract. Those paying privately should expect a fixed fee for a motoring case and a staged estimate for anything more.
Criminal defence firms serving Coventry are listed below, verified firms first. See our guides to criminal law, criminal law solicitors and getting legal help for free, or the page for criminal solicitors in Birmingham.
