David A. Hamer (The University of Sydney Law School) has posted Tendency Evidence in Hughes v The Queen: Similarity, Probative Value and Admissibility (Sydney Law Review, Vol. 38, No. 4, pp. 491-503, 2016) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Hughes...
Hamer on Tendency Evidence
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Alabama Senator and Attorney General
Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, as we all know, resigned his Senate seat to take the helm at the U.S. Deparment of Justice. Gov. Robert Bentley promptly appointed Attorney General Luther Strange to the U.S. Senate seat.Now AP reports: MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) -- Longtime district attorney Steve Marshall has been appointed as Alabama attorney general. Gov. Robert Bentley announced the appointment Friday. It came a day after Bentley named former AG Luther Strange to the U.S. Senate seat that Jeff Sessions left to become U.S. attorney general. Bentley in a statement said Marshall is a "well-respected district attorney with impeccable credentials and strong conservative values." Marshall has been a Marshall County district attorney since 2001.
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17 Indicted in Florida Condo Fraud
Miguel Soto, Jr., 46, Miami, Florida; Hector Raul Santana, 38, Miami Lakes, Florida; Miguel Faraldo, 52, Miami, Florida; Barbara E. Zas, 46, Miami, Florida; Maria Rosa Diaz, 45, Miami Springs, Florida; Heberto Elias Gamboa, 31, Miami, Florida; Michael Jose Gonzalez, 31, Miami, Florida; Jenny Nillo, 50, Miami, Florida; Jaime Jesus Sola Avila, 59, Miami, Florida; Jorge Angel Sola, 31, Miami, Florida; Emily Marie Echavarria, 50, Miami, Florida; Eduardo Cruz Toledo, 50, Miami, Florida; Yanet Huet, 44, Miami, […]
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Bishop & Osler on Wrongful Convictions
Jeanne Bishop and Mark William Osler (Office of the Cook County Public Defender and University of St. Thomas - School of Law (Minnesota)) have posted Prosecutors and Victims: Why Wrongful Convictions Matter (105 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 1031...
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Rare Disorder Causes DUI without Drinking
A woman, who requested to be called Sara to maintain confidentiality and protect her legal career, was arrested in 2015 for driving under the influence when she collided with a parked vehicle. It was later determined that she had a blood alcohol content of 0.10 percent. Sara had been arrested for DUI before back when she was an admitted alcoholic. This time, however, was different. Sara, now a recovering alcoholic for nearly ten years, only drank orange juice. Sara drank orange juice and lots of it, sometimes up to a gallon per day. That orange juice, however, might as well have been alcohol for Sara. Sara suffers from auto-brewery syndrome. Yes, that is an actual medical condition albeit an extremely rare one. Auto-brewery syndrome causes a person’s body to produce extremely high levels of yeast in the digestive track. If you know anything about how beer is made, you’ll know that yeast eats the sugar that is extracted from boiling grains and then releases carbon…
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Lesson 2: Lower Court Appointments Matter
Here is the second lesson to be learned from the debacle noted this morning.Supreme Court appointments are critically important, but lower court appointments are important, too.The Supreme Court is one court of nine people. It cannot and does not correct every wrong decision rendered by lower courts. Not even close. The high court takes about 1% of the cases it is asked to take. It takes a higher percentage when the Government is asking, but not all.Bad appointments to lower federal courts can have very long-lasting effects. The Ninth Circuit was expanded during Jimmy Carter's single term. The appointments he made, no doubt strongly influenced by California Senator Alan Cranston, produced the notorious "Ninth Circus" that plagued the Far West for an entire generation.One of those appointees is reported to have said, regarding the Supreme Court and Ninth Circuit decisions, "They can't reverse them all." …
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Tenth Amendment Center: Arizona Committee Passes Bill to Prohibit Warrantless Stingray Spying
Tenth Amendment Center: Arizona Committee Passes Bill to Prohibit Warrantless Stingray Spying by Mike Maharry: PHOENIX, Ariz, (Feb. 10, 2017) – An Arizona bill that would ban the use of “stingrays” to track the location of phones and sweep up … Continue reading →
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Report: Some Massachusetts Bars Served More Drunk Drivers Than Others
Days on which football games are played are often problematic on the roads, specifically for drunk driving hazards. In the Boston-area, fans like to go to Foxboro and drink at the stadium. Many prefer bars in the greater Boston area and drink while watching the game. As part of a continuing effort to curb drunk driving in the Commonwealth, state officials have been compiling what they termed a “place of last drink list.” This means that whenever possible, they want to find out where a person was arrested for drunk driving and put it on the list. This will not only provide the public with this information, but it will also allow alcoholic beverage control personnel to conduct investigations at these bars and find out if there is a problem. According to a recent news article from the Boston Globe, Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar, an establishment just outside of Gillette Stadium where the New England Patriots play, is a prime destination for…
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About that custodial death report database...
Without being asked to do so – not counting the frequent requests for information – the Texas Attorney General’s office spent $150,000 to index and display reports of deaths in law enforcement custody. According to records released in response to this scribe's request, the state paid Neos Consulting Group $157,031 to create the database last June. The site, featuring a searchable index of PDF reports on the deaths of Texans, went live in December, the Houston Chronicle reported. When asked why the office voluntarily set up the database, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Ken Paxton cited “transparency and easier access to the information by the public.”The reports on deaths of people who die while in the custody of Texas law enforcement have been required for years. Before the new database went live, the office posted online a list of reports that were available, but one would need to file an open records request to obtain the report.…
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Lesson 3: Judge-Shopping Must Be Curbed
Here is the third lesson to be learned from the debacle noted this morning.Plaintiffs seeking to enjoin government actions have way too much choice where to file their suits. Further, there is not enough control on conflicting decisions when it comes to injunctions.The WSJ article noted in a previous post this morning reports on the development of the strategy of the opponents:Democratic attorneys general and their aides held a series of conference calls. They agreed to mount separate lawsuits across the country. The goal: try lots of different arguments to block the ban in hopes that one of them would succeed. Minnesota's attorney general, Lori Swanson, joined the Washington lawsuit. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman joined the American Civil Liberties Union's case in federal court in Brooklyn. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey did the same with an ACLU case in Boston.Not only did they throw as much against the wall as they could to see…
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"Trump Signs Orders to Combat Crime, With Little New in Them"
From The New York Times: For example, the first, on combating international criminal cartels, largely consisted of stating opposition to such groups, and directed the government’s Threat Mitigation Working Group — which already existed because President Barack Obama established it...
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Baltimore Sun: Aerial surveillance by Baltimore police has promise, should be studied more, report concludes
Baltimore Sun: Aerial surveillance by Baltimore police has promise, should be studied more, report concludes by Kevin Rector: Footage collected as part of a secret aerial surveillance program in Baltimore last year supplied police with hundreds of potential leads in … Continue reading →
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WI: Probation condition against possession of a computer gives the PO power to search one found
Defendant had arson and sex offender convictions, and a term of probation was no computers without approval. They found computer with live modems at his house, and he denied that the big computer worked, but he had a laptop. “When … Continue reading →
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VA: Jardines not retroactive on state habeas review
Defendnat’s conviction was final ten months before Jardines was decided by SCOTUS. “Therefore, because the controlling legal landscape when Oprisko’s conviction became final did not dictate that use of a drug-sniffing dog within the curtilage of private property was a … Continue reading →
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NY4: Search of cell phone for texts led to SW; not inevitable discovery because SW sought because of illegal search
Defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights in his cell phone text messages were violated by the police searching them without a warrant. The fact they got a warrant later didn’t help them because that was the only reason to search the phone, … Continue reading →
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S.D.Ga.: Def’s evasive movements near and shortly after a shooting call was RS
Defendant’s evasive movements near and shortly after a shooting call that at least partially matched him was reasonable suspicion. “The sum of the information available to the officers when they decided to stop Porter gave them reasonable suspicion that he … Continue reading →
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"Maryland top court: defendants cannot be held before trial if unable to afford bail"
From Jurist: JURIST - Maryland top court: defendants cannot be held before trial if unable to afford bail The Maryland Court of Appeals [official website] adopted a rule [press release] on Tuesday ending the practice of holding criminal defendants in...
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CA10: Officers pulled up next to def walking along road and finally told him to stop; this was a seizure without RS
Defendant was walking down the street at night and a police car pulled up beside him and officers were talking to him as he walked. Finally they told him to stop. This was a seizure for which there was no … Continue reading →
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Former Mass. Priest Faces New Abuse Charges in Maine
The Salem News reports that a former Catholic priest who was at the center of the Boston Archdiocese sex scandal in 2002 is facing new charges of sexual abuse in Maine that date back to the 1980s. On Monday, a grand jury in Maine indicted former priest Ronald Paquin, 74, of Massachusetts on 29 counts of gross sexual misconduct, said Craig Sanford, police chief in Kennebunkport, Maine. Sanford said the criminal acts took place in the late 1980s at seasonal locations in Kennebunkport. The victims, both males, were 11 and 14 when Paquin began abusing them, police said. Continue reading
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No Bail for Paquin
The Eagle Tribune reports that defrocked and formerly jailed ex-priest Ronald Paquin, who was assigned to parishes in Haverhill and Methuen, will be held without bail on a fugitive from justice charge until late next week. Paquin, 74, was arrested on Wednesday in Boston after a grand jury in York County, Maine, handed down an indictment on 29 new sexual abuse and misconduct charges against him. Friday at his arraignment in Roxbury District Court, Paquin was held without bail and waived rendition proceedings. Continue reading
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