by Anthony W. Accurso
Technology companies and prosecutors are working together to assert the right of the companies to protect their intellectual property in ways that deny criminal defendants their right to challenge the reliability of forensic evidence in criminal proceedings. This assertion of intellectual property rights is done in ...
The All-Seeing Fourth Branch of Government
by John W. Whitehead and Nisha Whitehead
It is just when people are all engaged in snooping on themselves and one another that they become anesthetized to the whole process. As information itself becomes the largest business in the world, data banks know more ...
by Matt Clarke
The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts held that the prosecution in a first-degree murder (extreme atrocity or cruelty) trial failed to disclose material, exculpatory evidence that a key witness had changed her testimony to include visceral depictions of the victim’s dying last words and the defendant’s reaction, ...
by Dale Chappell
The fear that a police officer would be held personally responsible, should he be sued because of his actions in the line of duty, is nothing short of irrational and unfounded, a May 2021 article in reason.com concluded. This fear is what has driven the U.S. Supreme ...
by Anthony Accurso
The Supreme Court of Wyoming held that police lacked exigent circumstances required to justify warrantless entry to a suspect’s apartment where the suspect was fleeing arrest for a traffic offense.
Campbell County Sheriff’s Deputy Ryan Kellison attempted to pull over an SUV that he noticed had no ...
by Douglas Ankney
A unanimous Supreme Court of the United States (“SCOTUS”) held that § 2(a) of the Fair Sentencing Act modified the statutory penalties for only subparagraphs (A) and (B) of 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1), i.e., the mandatory-minimum provisions, not for subparagraph (C).
Tarahrick Terry pleaded guilty in 2008 ...
by Doug Ankney
The Supreme Court of the United States (“SCOTUS”) held that for purposes of 18 U.S.C. § 1030(a)(2), the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 (“CFAA”), an individual “exceeds authorized access” when he accesses a computer with authorization but then obtains information located in particular areas of ...
by Anthony Accurso
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Virginia committed a procedural error where it applied a leadership role enhancement without performing the proper analysis.
Wayne Thomas Burnley was arrested one night in April 2015 ...
by Dale Chappell
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit held that a district court is authorized to correct an erroneous career offender enhancement when a defendant qualifies for relief under the First Step Act, joining other circuits which have held the same.
The appeal came after Wallace ...
by David M. Reutter
THe Supreme Court of Hawaii held where defendant was precluded from discretionary relief from deportation as result of her plea of no contest to an aggravated felony charge, counsel was ineffective for advising her that it was “almost certain” that she would be deported when in ...
by David M. Reutter
The developmentally immature decision-making decisions of child defendants makes them “likely to be systematically pleading guilty to crimes that they did not commit in predictable circumstances,” concluded a study by Rebecca K. Helm from England’s University of Exeter Law School. To protect children from such an ...
by Dale Chappell
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina must recalculate the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines (“USSG”) sentencing range in a case where the district court claimed that it would still impose the same sentence, ...
by Dale Chappell
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held that a witness’ edited statement from a prior trial, saying that she feared going back to jail if she didn’t say what she thought the judge wanted her to say which tainted the first trial, violated the ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
JusticeText is new software designed specifically for defense attorneys and public defenders who are being overwhelmed by the amount of audio and video evidence they have to review when defending clients.
Devshi Mehrotra was nearing the end of her studies in computer science at the University ...
by Dale Chappell
In a rare case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit granted habeas corpus relief to a state prisoner after finding that the State’s evidence was lacking and the state court was “not just wrong, but unreasonable, in holding otherwise.”
In 2001, two individuals rushed ...
by Dale Chappell
Finding that the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada applied the incorrect standard in denying a state prisoner’s request to stay his federal habeas petition while he returned to state court to exhaust his state post-conviction remedies, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
The Supreme Court of Wisconsin held that an officer who retained a motorist’s driver’s license without any reasonable suspicion of criminal activity—for the purpose of delaying until a drug dog arrived—effectuated an unlawful seizure.
Just after midnight on the evening of November 12, 2017, Sheboygan Police ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit held that a search warrant authorizing seizure of “any item identified as being involved in crime” lacked sufficient particularity to be valid under the Fourth Amendment.
After a driver fired shots at a pedestrian during a verbal ...
How death of basketball star helped
launch unjust war on drugs
by Jayson Hawkins
On June 19, 1986, Len Bias died of cardiac arrhythmia caused by a cocaine overdose. Bias was a basketball superstar at the University of Maryland and had been drafted second overall by the Boston Celtics only ...
by Doug Ankney
The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts (“SJC”) announced the framework for deciding whether a defendant’s due process rights were violated where the defendant’s pretrial detention has been prolonged due to the COVID-19 pandemic, revisiting Commonwealth v. Lougee, 147 N.E.3d 464 (Mass. 2020) (as of June 2020, ...
by Matt Clarke
The Supreme Court of North Dakota reversed the denial of a motion for postconviction relief challenging a conviction for attempted knowing murder after holding it was a non-cognizable offense.
Lorenzo Pemberton was staying at a woman’s home. During an argument, she called 911. He knocked the phone ...
by Doug Ankney
The Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, Division Three ruled that § 1170.95(e) permits a vacated felony-murder conviction to be redesignated as more than one underlying felony for purposes of resentencing. (Note: All statutory references are to the California Penal Code.)
In 1987, Donald Alexander Watson, Timothy ...
by Chuck Sharman
On August 23, 2021, in a decision that immediately enfranchised some 55,000 North Carolinians, a state court ruled that felons released from prison on supervision may not be barred from voting.
The 2-1 decision by the judges of Fifth Superior Court—with judges Lisa Bell and Keith Gregory ...
by Dale Chappell
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that a prosecutor’s closing comments about the State’s own witness were so harmful to the defendant that it affirmed the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois’s grant of habeas corpus relief in a murder ...
by Douglas Ankney
In a case of first impression, the Supreme Court of Arizona held that trial courts have broad discretion to vicariously disqualify a prosecutor’s office based on an appearance of impropriety.
In 2010, Darren Irving Goldin was charged with murder, and the Attorney General sought the death penalty. ...
by Matt Clarke
The Supreme Court of Mississippi held that a defendant’s trial counsel was ineffective for failing to timely object to the introduction of a video recording of her client’s confession, which showed police officers making threats and promises to the defendant in order to elicit the confession.
A ...
by Dale Chappell
In a case where a defendant admitted to selling drugs that previously led to an overdose-death but was only convicted of selling drugs that did not result in a death, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia held in a published sentencing decision ...
by Douglas Ankney
The Supreme Court of Indiana affirmed the holding of the Grant Superior Court, which found that forfeiture of Tyson Timbs’ Land Rover was grossly disproportionate to his crime of conviction in violation of the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause.
Timbs had been prescribed opiates and had become ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
Community control over police departments has become a hot topic since the militaristic response of police departments to protests over the killing of George Floyd and other citizens. Part of that militaristic response has involved new surveillance technologies like drones, facial recognition software, and cell-site simulators. ...
by Dale Chappell
In a case where a defendant’s lawyer was present at sentencing but did “absolutely nothing” to help him, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit granted habeas corpus relief to an Indiana state prisoner, ruling that attorney abandonment does not always mean that the attorney ...
by Anthony W. Accurso
Clearview AI, controversial facial recognition software being pitched to law enforcement agencies, bills itself as being “the most accurate facial identification software worldwide,” but first-hand reports from police departments reflect the program’s near uselessness.
Clearview has been trying hard to sell law enforcement agencies on using ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Forensic DNA evidence has been used since the 1980s. Public confidence and familiarity with this method grew in the wake of the O.J. Simpson trial and the popularity of television police procedural shows, but the traditional methods of gathering and analyzing blood and semen samples has given ...
by Douglas Ankney
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit vacated the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida’s order denying compassionate release because the district court failed to demonstrate it had considered the applicable factors under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).
Horace Cook pleaded guilty to ...
Loaded on
Sept. 15, 2021
published in Criminal Legal News
October, 2021, page 44
A settlement was announced on August 10, 2021, between the city of Pleasanton, California, and the family of a mentally ill man who died after a struggle with city cops trying to restrain him in 2018.
Before the incident that left their son dead, John and Rose Bauer made four ...
by Doug Ankney
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”) conspiracy in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1962(d) is not categorically a “crime of violence” under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(3)(A).
Antonio Simmons, Nathaniel Mitchell, and Malek Lassiter (collectively, ...
by Matt Clarke
The Supreme Court of California held that, for charges of gang participation and gang enhancements under California Penal Code, § subdivisions (a)and (b), respectively, which require the State to prove that gang members had previously committed two or more enumerated offenses (predicate offenses), the State may not ...
by Jayson Hawkins
Amidst the chaos of a global pandemic, social protests, and political upheaval, many people felt as if anything that could go wrong in 2020 went wrong. The avalanche of tumultuous headlines tended to bury the positive stories that emerged—such as cops in Newark, N.J., not firing a ...
by Matt Clarke
The Supreme Court of the U.S. reinstated the death sentence of an Alabama man who had been convicted of murder. The Eleventh Circuit had reversed, in part, the conviction based on the incorrect claim that Alabama had established a categorical rule requiring post-conviction habeas corpus applicants claiming ...
A team of researchers at the University of Birmingham’s School of Psychology in the U.K. developed interactive lineup software that allows witnesses to view lineup photographs from different angles. They tested the software to see if it improved eyewitness identification and concluded that it may improve identification accuracy. They also discovered ...
by Jayson Hawkins
The summer of 2020 was a moment marked by extremes—vast populations around the world were quarantined in their homes for months, interrupted by an eruption of millions onto the streets to protest the killing of George Floyd by police. Law enforcement’s reaction to the demonstrations varied considerably ...
by Douglas Ankney
In April 2021, Jonathan Smith, Sr. was freed after serving nearly 21 years in prison for a murder he did not commit. Last year, the Maryland Court of Appeals unanimously reversed the 2001 murder convictions against Smith and his codefendant, David Faulkner, and granted both men Writs ...
Loaded on
Sept. 15, 2021
published in Criminal Legal News
October, 2021, page 50
Arizona: After shooting more people than any other U.S. city or county police department in 2018, the Phoenix Police Department (PhxPD) will now be the subject of a “pattern and practice” (P&P) investigation announced on August 5, 2021, by the federal Department of Justice (DOJ), according to a report by ...
