We handle the full spectrum of federal and state criminal defense — from first appearance through trial, appeal, and post-conviction. Every case receives the same level of attention, preparation, and commitment.
Federal prosecutions are among the most serious legal matters a person can face. Federal prosecutors work alongside the FBI, DEA, and other agencies with vast investigative resources — and they come to trial prepared. We match that preparation with deep courtroom experience forged over decades of federal practice. As members of the Criminal Justice Act Panel in both the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York, we represent clients at every stage of federal proceedings: from grand jury investigations through arraignment, pre-trial motions, trial, sentencing, and appeal.
Our SDNY trial victories are a testament to what thorough preparation and genuine commitment to a client can achieve in the most demanding federal courthouse in the country.
A verdict is not always the final word. When the system fails — through prosecutorial misconduct, ineffective assistance of counsel, newly discovered evidence, or constitutional violations — we fight to correct it. We pursue every available avenue of post-conviction relief: direct appeals, habeas corpus petitions, motions based on new evidence, and sentence modification requests.
Wrongful conviction work is some of the most meaningful we do. For clients who have already lost their freedom, the stakes could not be higher — and we approach these cases with the same intensity we bring to trial.
Federal drug charges — from simple possession to large-scale trafficking conspiracies — carry severe mandatory minimum sentences that can dramatically affect every aspect of a person's life. We scrutinize every element of the government's case: the lawfulness of the search and seizure, the integrity of the chain of custody, the reliability of confidential informants, and the sufficiency of the evidence connecting our client to the alleged conduct.
In cases involving drug conspiracies, the government often sweeps in individuals who had only peripheral involvement. We work to distinguish our client's actual conduct from the acts of others in the alleged conspiracy.
Large-scale federal racketeering and RICO cases are among the most complex and high-stakes in criminal defense. They typically involve voluminous discovery, multiple co-defendants, and a government narrative designed to implicate everyone in the alleged enterprise. We have experience navigating this complexity — untangling the government's theory, challenging conspiracy allegations, and presenting a clear, compelling case for our client's individual conduct.
In these cases, case management and discovery organization are as important as courtroom advocacy. Our background in legal technology gives us a genuine advantage in managing and analyzing large-scale discovery.
Federal white collar prosecutions — wire fraud, bank fraud, securities fraud, money laundering, tax offenses — demand a defense built on forensic precision. The government's case is built on documents. So is ours. We comb through financial records, communications, and transaction data to challenge the government's narrative, expose weaknesses in their evidence, and tell our client's story clearly and completely.
Many white collar cases are resolved before trial through effective pre-indictment advocacy. We engage early, aggressively, and strategically to protect our clients at every stage.
We believe in the right to protest, organize, and dissent. When people exercising those rights face criminal charges — from protest-related arrests to targeted prosecutions of activists and organizers — we stand with them. Abi Hassen's scholarship and practice at the intersection of criminal law and political philosophy informs an approach to civil liberties defense that is both rigorous and deeply principled.
We also represent clients in cases that intersect with issues of race, inequality, and systemic bias in the criminal justice system — bringing both legal skill and genuine understanding of the broader context to every case.
Assault, weapons charges, murder, attempted murder, and serious felonies carry severe consequences and demand an immediate, thorough defense. We build our case from day one — investigating the facts, challenging the evidence, and scrutinizing how law enforcement conducted their investigation. When witnesses, forensics, or constitutional violations are at issue, we dig deep.
Violent crime charges can move quickly. Early intervention can make a significant difference in how a case unfolds. We encourage clients to contact us as soon as possible after an arrest or investigation begins.
Our commitment to clients does not end at sentencing. Compassionate release — a reduction in sentence under 18 U.S.C. § 3582 — is available to people facing changed circumstances that were not anticipated at the time of sentencing. We have won significant sentence reductions across a wide range of cases, including for clients serving time for violent offenses such as murder, and for clients whose primary struggles were with mental health rather than physical illness or age. Courts have discretion, and we use every tool available to put our client's full humanity before the judge.
Compassionate release is often misunderstood as being limited to the elderly or terminally ill. It is not. If you or a loved one is incarcerated and circumstances have changed — in ways the original sentencing could not have foreseen — it is worth having a conversation about whether a motion makes sense.
The Southern District of New York is widely considered one of the most prestigious and demanding federal courts in the country. The government's trial win rate there is exceptionally high. Winning a jury trial in the SDNY as lead counsel is rare. Winning two is almost unheard of.
Those two victories represent something more important than a statistic. They represent the difference between freedom and imprisonment for two real people. That is what we fight for in every case we take.