John David Forsyth

I hired John Forsyth to help me get my husband out of jail after he was arrested on a fugitive warrant when, unbeknownst to us, charges were filed against him in another state. It took us 9 very stressful days to get him out, and I don’t know what I would have done without John Forsyth. At every tu...rn, John gave practical, sound information and advice that empowered me to make decisions about next steps… pros and cons, implications of various decisions, etc. He cut through the quagmire of legal jargon and procedure to help me understand what was going on and what I needed to do. John was compassionate but did not sugarcoat the situation, give false hope, or do a lot of handholding… BUT he fought hard inside and outside the courtroom, kept me informed at every turn, and leveraged all of his experience, expertise, and resources to essentially get the best win possible. Because of John, we emerged from an extremely difficult 3+ year fight with many scars, but with hope for our future.

From the moment I had my first conversation with John, my family and I had significant stress put to ease, knowing that someone professional and realistic was now helping with my situation. John has shown personality traits that I find incredibly well-suited to the field of criminal defense, exhibiti...ng confidence and straightforward communications that leave nothing ambiguous. He was referred to me by a highly prestigious staff member at the university I attend, and was gracious in considering my financial situation and other contextual factors. In addition to strictly working with me on my legal charges, John has offered a valuable support role in dealing with repercussions from my university and the DMV with regard to my situation. After consulting with a couple of university-supplied attorneys, I was not at all feeling optimistic about my case. As soon as I spoke with John, I was able to understand the potential situations I was faced with and begin planning my next moves, which was absolutely invaluable. From simple court cases to felony trials, I am confident that John's experience, expertise, and fierceness are very competitive in the Bay Area, and I would absolutely recommend speaking with him about any legal matters one may face.

My family lives in Arizona and I had searched numerous attorneys online trying to find the right fit for my son. My son has mental retardation and is on the borderline with his disability. However, according to the state of Arizona, you pretty much have to be drooling and extremely disabled to not ...be convicted of a sex crime. My son at the time was 30 years old. He cannot drive and is not able to work because of his brain damage. He's smart in some areas and very immature in others. He's approximately a 10-14 year old by child standards. He does not understand innuendos or more than a 2-step process. He has trouble understanding many situations and can't remember a lot. One day my son was on the internet and he was in a porn chatroom. I know, he should not have been there and I did not know he was there. He found the site and was watching everyone talk back and forth. He never interacted with anyone but saw the posts they were putting out on the site. One of the posts said that they just had to go to this website and look at it to see how good it was. My son did not know that there was even such a thing as child pornography and he wanted to see what everyone was talking about. He went to go look at the site but saw that it had to be down loaded. He looked at it and thought it was weird and didn't understand. In Arizona, the state police, FBI and local official can bait and trap people to go to those sites. They do not know who is looking at them or who understands the content. The Swat team, FBI and police came to my home one morning and arrested my son on 2 counts of child pornography. I found John online and saw that he had helped many other families who had someone with mental retardation. I met with John and he let me know that in the state of Arizona this was a worst case scenario. Arizona has a 17 year minimum for 1 download of child pornography. I was devastated because I knew my son had never met anyone or tried to do anything weird with anyone. He didn't even know that there was such a thing as child pornography but this is what happens when someone like my son who does not belong on the internet and starts browsing. I have since removed his computer from my home and found other ways to fill his time and interests. It took 1 year and John stuck by us all the way till the end. My son saw a defense doctor, prosecution doctor and then a court doctor who all of them found him incompetent. This process took 1 year. John called me one evening just before Christmas and told us we could take my son home! We all cried for an hour. John was always available, kind and very strong fighting for my son in the courtroom. If I could give John more than 5 stars, I would. My son could have spent 34 years in prison but instead he came home.