My son was arrested for having (not attempting to use) a fake ID. The incident happened in a small, rural town. We retained an attorney who recommended we go see the local police chief to ask that the charges be dismissed. The police chief agreed to drop the charges and keep the $650 bond for the fine (which of course, in retrospect doesn't make sense because there shouldn't have been a fine if the charges were dismissed).
We were told we didn't have to go before the judge because the charges were dismissed. However, we recently found out that instead of a dismissal, my son now has a felony conviction on his record. Also, the code written on the ticket was for falsifying documents in order to obtain something official like a passport, not having a fake driver's license. We have retained still another attorney to have my son's record expunged, but I would like to know if there are any other options, such as appealing the wrongful charge. Our attorney seems to think the expungment would be the most quick way but I want to know if there are any other options.

1. police chief does not even have the authority to "drop" the charges once they are filed.

2. a fake drivers license is and can be a serious charge, depending on how the state statue is written. A Drivers license is something official like a passport, ( passport is merely a legal ID) as is a Drivers license.

Explungement is still a conviction and can be viewed by police and national security background searches, what you need to do is appeal, based on the police chief lying to you.

If this is the same lawyer that told you to "go talk to police cheif"?? Why did he not go talk to police chief ?) I would go talk to a different attorney