A friend and I were stupid and stole around $400 worth of stuff in total from a store a few days ago. We were caught, searched, then arrested by a cop. The store has surveillance video of us in action by the way. Anyway, I have fingerprinting soon and a court date in a couple months. Since I'm young, a criminal record would be devastating as I want to go to university next year to become a teacher, and I have my class grad trip in July 2016 and we are going somewhere tropical. I feel horrible for what I did, and I can't sleep. I do not want to plead guilty because that means I will get a criminal/youth record, but I want to take responsibility for my actions somehow. I need diversion or some sort of thing along that track so my life isn't ruined for years and I don't get a record! How do I go about this? Lawyer or not? This is also my first offence and I was very respectful to the people who caught me and the cop. P.S: I live in Alberta.

I would suggest most definitely hiring a lawyer !

I'm with Tickle... you are going to have to hire a lawyer... but what you get is going to be determined by the court... not what you want. The lawyer while very expensive...will get you a better deal than you will on your own.