# Criminal Defense Answering Service & AI Intake Source: https://insertchat.com/industries/criminal-defense-law > Answer late-night arrest calls from worried families, take jail and charge details, and alert your on-call attorney. An AI receptionist for criminal defense firms answers arrest and charge calls around the clock, using your practice areas, fees, and office hours. InsertChat’s assistant takes the jail, booking, charge, and court details from the caller or a family member, books consultations, flags anyone in custody for your on-call attorney, and keeps every legal question for a lawyer. ## Turn a mother’s 2 a.m. call into the first alert your attorney sees Example workflow: Phone call. Illustrative scenario. Answers depend on your sources; actions depend on your connected tools and permissions. This is not a customer testimonial or measured result. A mother calls at 2:10 a.m. on a Sunday. Your office opens Monday at 8. > My son was arrested tonight for DUI and he’s at the county jail. How do I get him out, and can you help him? ## Explain what your firm does Confirm that you take DUI cases in that county and share how consultations and fees work, from the details you publish. ## Take the custody details Record her son’s full name and date of birth, the jail, the booking number if she has it, the charge as she understands it, and any bail amount or court date. ## Alert your on-call attorney The call is marked urgent, an email alert goes to the teammates you chose, and she gets a text confirming that an attorney will call her back. ## Your team sets the boundaries How to post bail, what her son should say, and how the case might go are questions for your attorney. The assistant says so plainly and promises only a callback. ## What it handles for criminal defense firms Handled by your assistant: - Intake for DUI, drug, theft, assault, domestic violence, and white-collar charges - Consultation bookings for people out on bail or not yet charged - Your fee structure and payment plans, exactly as you publish them - Expungement and record-sealing inquiries, with eligibility left to an attorney - Office hours, courthouses you cover, and directions Sent straight to your team: - Someone in custody right now - An arraignment or court date in the next few days - Police asking the caller to come in for questioning - A warrant the caller knows about - Existing clients with a new arrest or a probation violation ## What it asks and what it needs to know Details it collects: - Caller’s name, relationship, and callback number - Full name and date of birth of the person charged - Jail or facility, and booking number if known - Charges as the caller understands them - Bail amount and next court date, if set - County where the arrest happened - Names of alleged victims or co-defendants, for your conflict check What to add to its knowledge: - Charges you defend and courts you appear in - Fee structure, retainers, and payment plans - What families should have ready, such as the booking number - How your firm handles calls about someone in custody - Expungement and record-sealing services - Your instruction not to discuss the facts of the case by phone ## Can an AI receptionist answer criminal defense calls after hours? Yes, and arrest calls are where it earns its keep. It answers every call at night and on weekends, takes the custody, charge, and court details, and marks anyone held in jail as urgent so an email alert reaches your team. Consultations for people who are already released can go straight onto your calendar. ## Will it tell callers what to say to the police? No. What to say to police, whether to take a plea, and how bail works in a specific case are questions for a lawyer, so list them as topics that always need a person. You can also have the assistant ask callers to save the details of what happened for the consultation, which keeps the intake to the facts your attorney needs first. ## How much does an AI receptionist for a criminal defense firm cost? InsertChat Pro costs $98 a month, about $3.27 a day, and includes one number, monthly credits, three AI assistants, and three seats. Calls round up to whole minutes against those credits, so a busy Saturday night uses more than a quiet Tuesday. Firms that want more people in the shared inbox can move to Growth, Scale, or Enterprise for more seats. ## Can it put a caller straight through to the on-call attorney? No. Live transfer during a call isn’t available. The assistant marks the call urgent, your team gets an email alert, and the caller receives a text or email confirming the callback request. Choose which teammates receive alerts, by role or by name, so the first person to see a 2 a.m. arrest is the one who can act on it. ## What happens when a client misses court or is picked up on a warrant? The assistant treats it as urgent. It records the client’s name, the court, the case number if known, and where the client is now, marks the conversation for your team, and tells the caller an attorney will call back. It doesn’t tell the caller what to do next; that stays with your attorney. ## Can families text the firm instead of calling? Yes, where your number supports SMS. Families can text your InsertChat number, answer your intake questions by text, and get the same urgent handling as a call. Texts, calls, and website chats land in one shared inbox, so the attorney on call reads the whole story in one place. ## Can it answer only outside office hours? Yes. Set your weekly hours and time zone, and the assistant answers evenings and weekends. During the day, calls ring your office, and the assistant can still step in after 5 to 60 seconds if nobody picks up, or when a call lands in a staff voicemail. ## Related features - [After-hours answering](https://insertchat.com/product/after-hours) - [AI receptionist](https://insertchat.com/product/phone) - [Shared inbox](https://insertchat.com/product/inbox) ## Broader industry - [Professional services](https://insertchat.com/industries/professional-services): Give every new inquiry a clear next step.