Criminal Defense

Very few cases turn on a moment in a courtroom. They turn on what the state can prove, whether it obtained that proof lawfully, and whether anyone makes the prosecutor look hard at both before a plea is on the table.

That's also why the stages are genuinely different problems. Before charges are filed, no one has committed to anything, and the question is whether a case gets built at all. Once charges exist, the work moves to testing the evidence — how the stop happened, how a search was conducted, whether the testing was reliable, whether the whole account traces back to one person with a reason to give it.

If what you want is the sequence itself — booking, bail, arraignment, pretrial, trial, and how long each part takes — we wrote that out in full.

How a case is charged often matters as much as what happened. The classification drives the exposure you face, whether the offense counts as a strike, what it does to immigration status and a professional license, and whether it can ever be cleaned off a record.

Between misdemeanor and felony sits a large group of California offenses called wobblers, which a prosecutor may charge either way and a court may later reduce under Penal Code § 17 (opens in new window). A great many of the charges on this page are wobblers, and that's the clearest reason early defense matters — the classification is still a decision someone is making. Both are worth understanding before you choose a lawyer: misdemeanor versus felony in California, and what a wobbler actually is.

Boyadzhyan Legal Shield is based in Encino on Ventura Boulevard and defends criminal cases throughout the San Fernando Valley and greater Los Angeles — Encino, Sherman Oaks, Tarzana, Van Nuys, Woodland Hills, Studio City, Northridge, and the surrounding communities.

If you were arrested in the Valley, your case is very likely to be prosecuted at the Van Nuys Courthouse, which handles criminal matters for much of the San Fernando Valley. We appear in Van Nuys and the surrounding Los Angeles County courts regularly, which means knowing its prosecutors, its calendar, and how cases like yours are actually resolved there.

Working from a single Encino office keeps the firm close to the courts, the clients, and the communities it serves. Whether your case sits in the Valley or elsewhere in Los Angeles County, you work directly with the attorney handling it — not a rotating cast — and you get counsel who knows the terrain your case will travel.

Founding attorney Knarik Boyadzhyan is a former Deputy Public Defender who represented clients facing criminal charges at every stage. Before serving as a Deputy Public Defender, Knarik worked as a paralegal in the U.S. Department of Justice's Violent and Organized Crime Section.

That experience shapes how we approach every case: we start from what the prosecution must prove and where that proof is vulnerable, rather than reacting to the charge in front of us. We keep the defense practical and honest — we will tell you what we see, explain your realistic options, and never sell you an outcome we cannot promise. No lawyer can guarantee a result, and you should be wary of any who does.

We also keep it personal. This is a focused Encino practice, not a high-volume mill, so the attorney you speak with is the attorney handling your case. Initial consultations are free and confidential, with no obligation to hire the firm. The goal from the first conversation is simple: protect your rights and pursue the best result the facts will allow.