Katie Kauffman won a not-guilty verdict this week for a client charged with vehicular assault, a Class B felony that carries a maximum punishment of 10 years in prison and a $25,000 fine.

Kauffman’s client, who has no criminal history, likely would have received a much shorter sentence had he been convicted but a conviction would have cost him his job as a commercial driver.

While the Clark County Superior Court jury acquitted Kauffman’s client, they returned a guilty verdict for a co-defendant whom Kauffman argued was the one at fault even though he escaped unscathed from the 2018 traffic accident.

Kauffman was assisted at trial by attorney Gregger Highberg. The trial lasted four days. Jurors deliberated approximately three hours before reaching the verdicts on Feb. 13.

The charges stemmed from a Sept. 14, 2018, accident on Interstate 205. Kauffman’s client testified he was driving home from work in his 2003 Acura RSX. When he entered the northbound on-ramp to I-205 from westbound Padden Parkway there was a large red truck – a Dodge Ram 3500 -- following too close.

As he told Washington State Patrol officers who investigated the accident, he told jurors he tapped his brakes twice to try and signal to the truck driver to back off. Witnesses testified that not only did the truck driver not back off, he tried going around the Acura to pass it on the shoulder of the one-lane on-ramp.

Kauffman’s client said he felt as though he was being forced off the road. He lost control of his Acura. His sedan flew through the wooded median onto I-205, where it was hit by a northbound motorcyclist.

Prosecutors dismissed a potential “third strike” case this month that attorney Neil Anderson had been preparing to take to trial.

A Clark County deputy prosecutor acknowledged at a Jan. 2 pre-trial hearing that she did not have enough evidence to prove her case beyond a reasonable doubt. She dismissed a charge of second-degree kidnapping domestic violence, a felony.

Had Anderson’s client been convicted, he would have faced a mandatory sentence of life in prison under the state’s “three strikes and you’re out” law for serious, violent crimes.

Anderson’s client was arrested by Vancouver police officers on Nov. 1 and booked into the Clark County Jail, where he remained – unable to afford to post bail – for two months until his case was dismissed.

Attorney Zeed Meyer won a not-guilty verdict on Jan. 22 in Clark County District Court for a client accused of assaulting his estranged father.

Meyer’s client called 911 on July 18 to report that his father had punched him in the face and broke his nose. Three officers from the Vancouver Police Department responded and determined the client was the aggressor after questioning the client, his father and his father’s long-term girlfriend.

The client was arrested for assault in the fourth degree, domestic violence. The gross misdemeanor carries a penalty of up to one year in jail.

Attorney Marina Spencer won a trial this week for a client accused of domestic violence assault.

A jury deliberated approximately 25 minutes before delivering the not-guilty verdict Nov. 6 in Clark County District Court.

Assault in the fourth degree, a gross misdemeanor, is punishable by up to one year in jail.

In May, the alleged victim called 911 and said she’d been assaulted by her boyfriend. She told responding deputies from the Clark County Sheriff’s Office that she and our client got into an argument over a marijuana grinder.