Mr. Beach’s client was accused of Strangulation and Harassment. The Strangulation charge carried up to five years of prison and the Harassment carried an additional possible six months of incarceration. This case was eligible for the Washington County Deferred Sentencing program which would have resulted in the case being dismissed with no jail time if Mr. Beach’s client agreed to do classes (and other work). Mr. Beach and his client turned down the Deferred Sentencing program option and set the case for trial. Naturally, this decision involved a bit of risk. At trial, Mr. Beach stressed to the jury that this was a ‘he said, she said’ case where she alleged that he had strangled her. However, there were no marks on her neck, no redness, no bruising, here eyes did not show any signs of being blood shot (a very common sign of being strangled called petechiae). After hearing everything, the jury returned a Verdict of Not Guilty! One thing about this trial is that it set a new record for Mr. Beach. Previously, the fastest jury deliberation Mr. Beach had experienced in a trial was 15 minutes (that was also a Not Guilty verdict). This case took less than 10 minutes of deliberation for the jury to reach a unanimous Not Guilty decision!