Our attorneys have been Air Force sexual assault attorneys for more than 35 years of collective experience. We each started our careers in the Air Force as JAGs where we dominated as the top ranked attorneys in the offices we were in.
Now, after years as civilian attorneys for Air Force sexual assault cases, we are recognized as the best of the best. It’s the judges, the co-counsel, the opposing counsel, and now as national news contributors.
Who’s the Best Air Force Attorney
The question that comes up more often in Google searches for people looking for an attorney is “who is the best attorney.” We are confident in our belief that we are the best Air Force attorneys because of the combination of our record in court, the number of cases and clients we have helped over the years, our knowledge of the law, our professional relationships with judges and prosecutors, and our ability to connect with Air Force juries.
We are willing and able to defend the quality of our representation under any metric you can think of. If you want to talk about past success rates, we will first warn you that every cases is unique and that past success is not a promise of future victory, but that by our calculations, there is no military attorney with a better sexual assault success rate. If you want to talk about the opinions others have of us, look no further than our ratings online, our reputation within the legal community, and our publicity in national news. If you want to talk about tenacity, ask us to tell you about any of our cases and the amount of effort we personally place on our shoulders and not hand off to the military counsel (something we can compare to the practice of other civilian attorneys). We win in every metric – hands down.
The skill and dominance of a court-martial attorney is really best understood by how the attorney functions in court. The best court-martial attorneys, and especially the best sexual assault court-martial attorneys, have a tremendous number of examples they can give from their past cases. The following is an example of our unique ability to earn a result that inexperienced and ineffective military and civilian lawyers would not have earned.
Air Force Court-Martial Success
Our firm’s founder, Andrew Cherkasky recently defended an Air Force officer on trial for a variety of financial crimes and unprofessional sexual relationships. The case was handled terribly by prosecutors and investigators from the beginning, and we knew it. Time after time, Andy tried to talk sense into the inexperienced Lt Col-Staff Judge Advocate. She was entirely resistant to any reasonable requests. As time wore on and the tone became increasingly hostile, it was time to go over her head and address the issues with her boss and the military judge.
Andy started with the higher level Staff Judge Advocate, a former military judge that Andy had been in front of a number of times. Their working relationship helped with the credibility of our request for a reasonable outcome in the case – it was a great starting position.
Next, Andy went to the military judge. He highlighted real and significant issues in the way in which the case was being handled by the prosecution. Documents, notices, digital evidence, and so much more, were all in disarray. That Lt Col-Staff Judge Advocate had essentially thrown her junior prosecutor under the bus by giving her a complex case without the training or supervision she needed. Andy zeroed in on this and won motion after motion in front of the military judge.
Andy had been in front of this military judge multiple times in Air Force courts-martial and has built a solid foundation of trustworthiness. The relationship with the military judge and the history of experience in Air Force courts-martial was a tremendous value in this case when we raised complaints about the prosecution.
The Lt Col-Staff Judge Advocate was removed from the case. The military judge placed heavy requirements on the prosecution to remedy their misdeeds. A Major that Andy has known for many years was placed on the case as the acting Staff Judge Advocate. That positive history resulted in meaningful and fair negotiations. In the end, this was a case that was appropriate for a negotiated deal that allowed the client to retire. And that is exactly what happened, thanks, in no small part, to the tremendous experience and credibility this law firm has in an Air Force Court-Martial.
Something else was noticed by the military judge that was intended to be private. After the judge had issued a series of rulings clearly finding multiple errors in how the junior prosecutor had handled the case, Andy talked to that prosecutor privately. She was emotionally upset by her failures. Andy didn’t say a lot to her, and it wasn’t intended for any reason other than to make her better in the future. He told her that if she pays attention to the lessons being taught in that moment, she will be a better attorney as a result, and that she will help bring justice to cases in the future whether she is a prosecutor or defense counsel. The judge learned what Andy said because that junior prosecutor told one person, who told another, who told the judge. You better believe that military judge’s opinion of our firm, and likely the opinion he will share with other judges in the future, is a positive reflection of the candor and ethics of our firm, and THAT WILL HAVE a very positive result for our future clients.
We Help Airmen in Need
The most common question for a criminal defense lawyer is: “how do you sleep at night.” It’s simple. We help people that need help, and in doing so we make our system of justice work at its best. Whether our client is guilty or innocent, whether they are as bad as the prosecutor says, or maybe even worse, we advance our society and the interests of that individual client, by making sure the Government is held to account for their accusations and their prosecution. We bring a positive attitude to the process of justice, and we are confident that our exceptional results are because of our exceptional attitude.
