A criminal appeal is not a do-over of your trial - it's a legal argument that specific errors occurred that require reversal or a new trial. Most defendants don't know whether their case has real appellate grounds. This screener walks through the 5 most successful appeal categories to identify whether your case has viable issues worth pursuing.
An appellate attorney reviews your trial transcript and identifies all viable appeal grounds. The analysis costs nothing. Missing the appeal deadline permanently waives your right to relief.
Criminal appeals succeed on 5 main grounds. Brady violations - where prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence - are among the most powerful because they represent a fundamental violation of fair trial rights. Ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC) claims under Strickland v. Washington are the most frequently raised post-conviction ground, requiring proof that the attorney's performance was deficient and that the deficiency prejudiced the outcome. Newly discovered evidence (especially DNA) produces exonerations. Improper evidence admission where the trial court wrongly allowed prejudicial evidence over objection creates reversible error. And sentencing errors - particularly in federal cases where guidelines are miscalculated - can reduce sentences without overturning convictions entirely.
An appellate attorney reads the full trial transcript looking for errors the defendant never noticed - juror misconduct issues buried in voir dire records, improper hearsay admitted without objection, prosecutorial arguments that crossed constitutional lines. Many successful appeal issues are invisible to defendants who were focused on the verdict rather than the legal process. If your underlying case also involved a plea deal, the plea deal analyzer and Miranda rights checker may identify issues that affect the validity of the plea itself.
A direct appeal challenges the conviction in the standard appellate process immediately after sentencing. It must be filed within strict deadlines - typically 30 days in state court and 14 days in federal court. Direct appeals are based on the trial record only - no new evidence is considered. A habeas corpus petition (28 U.S.C. § 2254 for state convictions, § 2255 for federal) is a post-conviction proceeding that can raise new evidence, IAC claims against trial counsel, and constitutional violations. Habeas corpus has its own strict filing deadlines - typically 1 year from the date the conviction becomes final. Missing the habeas deadline permanently forecloses federal review in most cases.
Even if a trial error occurred, appellate courts will not reverse a conviction if the error was "harmless" - meaning it did not affect the outcome. The prosecution must prove harmless error beyond a reasonable doubt for constitutional errors. For non-constitutional trial errors, the less demanding standard is whether the error likely affected the verdict. This is why the strength of the remaining evidence matters enormously in appeal analysis. A strong IAC claim combined with weak prosecution evidence produces a much better appeal outcome than the same IAC claim where overwhelming independent evidence of guilt exists.
State court direct appeals typically take 1 to 3 years from filing to decision. Federal direct appeals take 1 to 2 years. Federal habeas corpus proceedings routinely take 3 to 7 years through all levels. Capital cases can span decades. During the appeal, the defendant typically remains incarcerated unless a stay of sentence is granted - which courts rarely do except in capital cases. The length of the appeal process means early action on a strong case is always better than waiting - and why missing deadlines is so catastrophic.