What will happen at court appearance?

My boyfriend received a summons to appear in court for possession of an illegal weapon. I need to know, when he appears in court, will the sentence only be based on the ticket for the illegal weapon possession or will the judge look at the circumstances surrounding why he got the ticket and maybe priors?

[mgbcarter]

Unfortunately for him this is not like a traffic ticket where you either did it or you didn't. In this type of situation the judge will undoubtedly want to know the circumstances surrounding it and if he is found guilty he would almost certainly look at his priors in dertimining sentence.

The court appearance was this morning. The DA didn't have a copy of the police report and said he needed it "for his own review" and that his next court appearance and possible sentence would only be based on the ticket, not the mitigating cirumstances. Why if that's the case does he need a copy of the police report? He was not arrested for this, just ticketed. Not to mention he didn't know the knife was illegal when he purchased it. Can the store that sold it and not disclosed that it was illegal, be held responsible?