What is the law on Criminal Damage to Property in Merriam Municipal Court?
The City of Merriam operates on a set of rules and laws. Those rules and laws are gathered up and organized and make up the city code. As you can imagine, writing, debating and passing into law every single rule or law is cumbersome, costly and time consuming. Most cities do not author every single law governing the people within their city limits, they adopt prewritten sets of laws. The Uniform Code for Kansas Municipalities is one of the codes that are available for cities in Kansas to adopt into law and the law that Merriam has adopted to criminalize certain conduct in the city of Merriam. Here is the cite ordinance prohibiting Criminal Damage to Property in the City of Merriam. Any Criminal Damage to Property case in Merriam Municipal Court will be adjudged with this law.
Sec. 6.6. Criminal Damage to Property.
(a) Criminal damage to property is by means other than by fire or explosive:
Knowingly damaging, destroying, defacing or substantially impairing the use of any property in which another has an interest without the consent of such other person; or
Damaging, destroying, defacing or substantially impairing the use of any property with intent to injure or defraud an insurer or lienholder.
(b) Criminal damage to property is a Class B violation if the property damaged is of the value of less than $1,000 or is of the value of $1,000 or more and is damaged to the extent of less than $1,000.
(c) In determining the amount of damage to property, damages may include the cost of repair or replacement of the property that was damaged, the reasonable cost of the loss of production, crops and livestock, reasonable labor costs of any kind, reasonable material costs of any kind and any reasonable costs that are attributed to equipment that is used to abate or repair the damage to the property. (K.S.A. 21-5813)
Possible Punishment
*Class B Violations are punishable by up to 180 days in the Johnson County Jail, however, most Class B Violations are eligible for probation
You've been charged with Criminal Damage to Property in Merriam Municipal Court, Now what?
You're already on the right path, you are researching the law. Anytime you are charged with violating the law, reading the law is a good place to start. The problem with the law is it doesn't take into account many different fact scenarios, it hardly ever answers the question, "I did this...did I break the law?" Nevertheless, reading the law is a good place to start gathering information. After you have digested what you can from the text of the law it's time to do more research. Don't try to reinvent the wheel, build on the research of others. Here is a commonly asked questions when charged with Criminal Damage to Property written by an experienced criminal defense lawyer. After you've read the law, extrapolated what info you can out of the commonly asked questions guide, you need to talk to a lawyer. Focusing your search on a lawyer with experience in Merriam Municipal Court is vital. Knowing the law is important, but equally as important is knowing the processes of the Merriam Municipal Court, the people and personalities associated with the Merriam Municipal Court. Having a lawyer with experience in the Merriam Municipal Court is vital to getting a successful outcome.