Criminal Defense Attorneys in Dallas, Texas

(214) 468-8100

Bruce Anton graduated from Southern Methodist University’s Dedman School of Law in 1979 where he was the Champion of the prestigious Russell Baker Moot Court Competition as well as the Associate Editor of the Journal of Air Law and Commerce. Following graduation, Mr. Anton worked as a briefing attorney for Dallas County District Courts.

In 1980, Mr. Anton went into private practice in Dallas, Texas. Over the next twenty- two years Mr. Anton successfully represented clients in a multitude of state and federal criminal trials. He was also admitted to practice in the Fifth, Tenth, and Eleventh Circuit Courts as well as the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 2002 Mr. Anton joined Udashen Anton. Mr. Anton has the experience and knowledge to handle Federal cases involving embezzlement, RICO violations, federal firearms offenses, drug conspiracies, counterfeiting, child pornography, identity theft, mortgage and bank fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, Medicare-Medicaid fraud, healthcare fraud, tax fraud, computer crimes, etc.

At the state level, Mr. Anton handles a wide variety of cases such as assault, drug offenses, conspiracy, embezzlement, credit card abuse, identity theft, sexual assault, robbery, weapon offenses, burglary, injury to a child, kidnapping, child sex abuse, shaken baby cases, and murder, including death penalty litigation.

In addition to handling cases at the trial level, Mr. Anton regularly handles state and federal appeals and post-conviction proceedings. He is a board member of the Innocence Project of Texas. As a board member his responsibilities include investigating and reviewing shaken baby claims. Mr. Anton also and handles state and federal post-conviction investigations into prisoner's claims of actual innocence. He also assists clients, if eligible, in cleaning their criminal record through filing an expunction and/or a petition for nondisclosure.

Mr. Anton is Board Certified in Criminal Law. In addition, he was a Fellow in both the Dallas Bar and the Texas Bar Foundations, has been listed on D Magazine's list of Best Lawyers in Dallas in 2011, and has been a Texas Super Lawyer (published by Thomson Reuters) since 2003.

Honors and Awards

  • Texas Board of Legal Specialization, Criminal Law, 1986
  • Texas Board of Legal Specialization, Criminal Appellate Law, 2011
  • Texas Super Lawyers, Thomson Reuters, 2003-2017
  • Best Lawyers in Dallas, D Magazine, 2011, 2015-2017

Associations

  • Bar Association of the Fifth Federal Circuit, Member
  • CJA Representative, Northern District of Texas, 1998-2000
  • Dallas Bar Association, Member
  • Dallas Bar Foundation, Fellow, 1988-2002
  • Dallas Civil Liberties Union, Legal Director, 1995-2003
  • Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, Member
  • Innocence Project of Texas, Board Member, 2010
  • National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Member
  • State Bar of Texas, Member
  • Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, Member
  • Texas Mock Trial Committee, Chair, 1994-1996

Past Employment

  • Dallas County District Courts, Briefing Attorney, 1979 - 1980
  • Bruce Anton, Lawyer, 1979

Results

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a more than decade-old drug conviction, saving their client from deportation.

  • Brett Ordiway and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a conviction for tampering with evidence, persuading the court of appeals that the evidence at trial showed only a lesser offense.

  • Brett Ordiway and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a guilty plea to unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon, persuading Texas’s highest criminal court that their client’s guilty plea was involuntary because the police made material misrepresentations in offense reports.

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a guilty plea to possessing, manufacturing, transporting, or repairing a prohibited weapon, persuading the trial court that their client’s previous attorney provided ineffective assistance and, as result, that the client’s guilty plea was involuntary.

  • Brett Ordiway and Bruce Anton persuaded Texas’s Sixth Court of Appeals that their client’s direct-appeal attorney provided ineffective assistance, winning their client a new appeal.

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a conviction for possession of fraudulent identifying information and nine-year prison sentence, persuading Texas’s highest criminal court that their client’s guilty plea was involuntary and his right to due process was violated.

  • Brett Ordiway and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a conviction for criminally negligent homicide and the rendering of a judgment of acquittal in a case in which the state prosecuted a grieving parent for tragically forgetting his child in a car on a summer day.

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a 16-year-old guilty plea to tampering with a governmental record on the basis that, at the time of the plea, the client was not aware of possible defenses to the charge. 

  • Gary Udashen and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a Dallas County conviction for burglary of a habitation after presenting evidence that the defendant was in another city at the time the burglary occurred.
  • Gary Udashen and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a Dallas County conviction for failure to register as a sex offender after presenting evidence that the defendant was not required to register.

  • Bruce Anton won the reversal of a guilty plea for indecency with a child, persuading the trial court that his client’s plea was involuntary and his right to due process was violated.

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a 15-year-old guilty plea to possessing marijuana that threatened their client with deportation. Bruce and Brett persuaded the court that their client’s plea was involuntary because he did not understand its immigration consequences.

  • Bruce Anton and Brett Ordiway won the reversal of a conviction for forgery of a financial instrument, persuading the trial court that their client’s guilty plea was involuntary, and his right to due process was violated.

  • Bruce Anton and Madison McWithey won a not guilty verdict for a young man charged with murder in Denton County on the basis of self-defense. 

  • Brett Ordiway and Bruce Anton won the reversal of a conviction for failing to register as a sex offender, persuading Texas’s highest criminal court that their client was innocent.