Mr. Beach’s client was a porch pirate. There was no question that he had stolen a package from someone’s porch. The problem was that the prosecutor filed a ‘mail theft’ charge so that if convicted, Mr. Beach’s client was looking at 26 months of prison. At trial, Mr. Beach had his client testify to exactly what he had done – without denying anything. Then Mr. Beach argued that what his client had done was Theft in the Second Degree (a misdemeanor) and not the mail theft charge. The result proved that Mr. Beach was right. Mr. Beach’s client was found guilty of the misdemeanor theft that he actually did commit and not guilty of the 26 month prison mail theft charge!