Posted by Amanda on 11/04/07

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I am on probation for a class C felony: stealing more than
$500 but less than $25000. My first time around with the
judge he issued a more harsh punishment than what the DA
wanted. Since that case started I have had a daughter. She
was born right before the judge issued his sentencing. To
be quite honest with you, the judge issued me to serve 20
days of shock time to be served on 10 weekends. I have
four young children at home so serving the weekends was
more like a break for me than a punishment.
Since my daughter was born I have been have dreams on a
regular basis of horrible things that my stepfather used
to do to me. When you add that on the the severe case of
post-partum depression that I have been going thru I was
emotionally torn up. So I did something stupid. Something
that seemed like it was helping me get rid of some of the
stress in my life. I shoplifted. I was only caught with
$400 worth of merchandise on me but like a dumb*ss I told
the officer that I had stolen more. I was detained in the
store office while the officer searched my car and found a
total of $2000 worth of stuff.
So now, I have broken probation and I am afraid of what is
going to happen. I have a serious psychological problem
that I want to get taken care of before they send me to
prison. I tried contacting my PO but she was out of town
for a week when this all happened. The county where I got
caught is charging me with shoplifting in the amount of
$2000. I talked to a lawyer and said he wasn't sure that
they could do that since I had taken stuff from several
stores and they wouldn't be able to pinpoint which store
anything was from. I would really like to hire him but I
don't have the $4000 to do that. He gave me a lot of legal
advise and even suggested that I get a public defender. He
said that the public defender in my county was really good
and could do just as good of a job as any lawyer.
I am very suicidal right now just thinking that if I talk
to my PO when she gets back she'll have me arrested on the
spot and I won't be able to hug my kids goodbye. He said
the only advantage a lawyer had over the PD was that you
had to wait for a PD to be assigned to you and that I
might end up waiting in the county jail for 2 or 3 months
to get one. Whereas a lawyer would more than likely be
able to get me out on an OR bond right away.
I read somewhere of an insanity plea called
an 'irresistable impulse' where you know you are doing
something wrong, you know the difference between right and
wrong, you just can't stop yourself. Which is I think
where the best defense is for me. I didn't have a chance
to talk to the lawyer about it though. I still need to
come up with the $1500 for him to take just the probation
violation case. He did tell me that there was a very slim
chance that my PO would not report this but that was more
or less wishful thinking. I was just wondering if I talked
to my PO (who seems pretty decent) and told her everything
that is going on with me: the suicide thoughts, the past
molestation, the past rape, and the repeated dreams making
my depression worse; if she would allow me to get help
before reporting this to the judge. What are my chances of
this happening? I'm not being unrealistic and hoping she
won't report it. I'm preparing myself to go to prison. I
just think that I need to get help first b/c just sending
me away is not going to take care of the problem. Does any
of this make sense? Please let me know what my best
options are. Thanks!

Re: Breaking probation, 11/04/07, by --.

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