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Lee on Police Use of Deadly Force

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Cynthia Lee (George Washington University Law School) has posted Reforming the Law on Police Use of Deadly Force: De-Escalation, Pre-Seizure Conduct, and Imperfect Self-Defense (2018 U.ILL. L. Rev., Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This article seeks to contribute...

Lots of notable marijuana news via Marjuana Moment

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I receive a press release this week spotlighting that Tom Angell, who had been providing a great marijuana newsletter titled Marijuana Moment since the start of this year, decided to transform his work from a daily e-mail into a "full-scale cannabis news portal." That portal is likewise titled Marijuana Moment...<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarijuanaLaw/~4/0OUGNFOmo1M" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>

Sociological Gobbledygook

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"Although some people have urged that this Court should amend the Constitution by interpretation to keep it abreast of modern ideas, I have never believed that lifetime judges in our system have any such legislative power."  -- Justice Hugo Black, concurring in McGautha v. California (1971).Yesterday in the reapportionment case, Chief Justice Roberts expressed a similar sentiment on transcript page 40.[T]he whole point is you're taking these issues away from democracy and you're throwing them into the courts pursuant to, and it may be simply my educational background, but I can only describe as sociological gobbledygook.No, Mr. Chief Justice, it's not your educational background.  I call it "sociobabble," a variation on the "psychobabble" theme, but "sociological gobbledygook" will do nicely. A bit earlier, on page 37, the Chief openly worried about how reapportionment decisions by the Supreme Court would…

"Out-of-state companies making a run for Ohio’s medical marijuana licenses"

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The title of this post is the headline of this notable new Marijuana Business Daily article that might be of special interest to my Ohio-based students and really to anyone thinking about how the laboratories of democracy in the marijuana reform space still have inter-state elements despite the persistence of...<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarijuanaLaw/~4/vZtP1OvpFf8" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>

SCOTUS vacates by 6-3 vote lower federal court injunction which would have blocked planned Alabama execution

The Prior Probation Violation Aggravating Factor

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One of the statutory aggravating factors for felony sentencing is that the defendant has, during the 10-year period prior to the commission of the offense now being sentenced, been found to be in willful violation of probation, post-release supervision, or parole. G.S. 15A-1340.16(d)(12a). It sounds straightforward enough, but it turns out to be a little tricky to apply in practice. The factor hasn’t been around very long. It was added to the law in 2008, and made applicable only to offenses committed on or after December 1, 2008. S.L. 2008-129. That refers to the offense date of the crime now being sentenced, not to the offense date of the earlier crime that eventually resulted in a violation of probation, PRS, or parole. Obviously most crimes sentenced today are covered. The prior findings that can trigger the aggravating factor are a finding of willful violation of probation by a judge or a finding of willful violation of post-release supervision or parole by the…

Via Fox News, Senators Grassley, Durbin, Lee and Whitehouse start a renewed pitch for their Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act

In Memoriam: John Thompson

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Today, with deep sadness and grief, the Innocence Project staff mourns and remembers its friend John Thompson, who died yesterday in New Orleans. He was 55 years old. Thompson was a fighter for justice. In 1985, he was wrongfully convicted of two crimes in New Orleans—the first an armed robbery for which he was sentenced to 49 years in prison. The second case was a murder of a hotel executive; Thompson was found guilty and sentenced to death. For 14 years, Thompson was on death row. Throughout that time, Thompson and his attorney’s appealed the case, but each appeal was denied. Finally, in 1999, just 30 days before his execution date, a private investigator discovered scientific evidence of Thompson’s innocence from the robbery case that had been concealed for 15 years by the Orleans Parish District Attorney’s Office. The new evidence showed that prior to Thompson’s armed robbery trial, the prosecution ordered blood type testing of bloodstains…

Koepke & Robinson on Zombie Predictions and Bail Reform

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John Logan Koepke and David G. Robinson have posted Zombie Predictions and the Future of Bail Reform on SSRN. Here is the abstract: In the last five years, legislatures in all fifty states have made changes to their pretrial justice...

McGrath on Corporate and White-Collar Crime

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Joe McGrath (Sutherland School of Law, University College Dublin) has posted Instrumental and Expressive Governance: Corporate and White-Collar Crime in Contemporary Society on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This paper analyses the evolution and enforcement of corporate and white collar...

I Have Been Accused of Committing Domestic Violence - Now What?

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If you have been accused of committing an act of domestic violence in California, then you need to take that accusation extremely seriously, even if you are innocent. In an effort to cut down on instances of spousal and child abuse the state of California has decided to take all allegations of domestic abuse extremely seriously. For example, did you know that when the police are called in response to an alleged domestic violence incident in California, their guidelines for law enforcement state that they should arrest the dominant aggressor if there is reasonable or probable cause that an act of domestic violence has been committed? This law is in place to protect domestic violence victims and to help defuse dangerous situations, which it does. However, it also leads to a lot of domestic violence arrests—some of which are based on little more than he said/she said. Because the state of California takes accusations of domestic violence so seriously, it is…

Elizabeth NJ Women Arrested for Assault By Auto & Aggravated Assault After DWI Related Accident

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An Elizabeth New Jersey women was charged with both DWI, assault by auto and aggravated assault this past week. The arrest took place after the motorist hit a pedestrian causing serious bodily injury. Whenever injuries are sustained in an alcohol related automobile accident, you can expect an investigation for driving while intoxicated or under the influence of drugs. The ensuing investigation here revealed that the defendant was intoxicated. This also mushroomed into indictable criminal charges for assault by auto based on the fact that extensive leg injuries were caused to the victim. The police ultimately filed an even more serious felony criminal charge, second degree aggravated assault, based on the fact that the serious and/or significant bodily injuries were sustained as the result of reckless conduct of the Elizabeth driver. Assault by auto is a third degree crime when the related accident is the result of DWI/DUI. The penalties for third degree assault by auto include…

Kinports on Illegal Predicate Searches and Tainted Warrants

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Kit Kinports (Penn State Law) has posted Illegal Predicate Searches and Tainted Warrants after Heien and Strieff (Tulane Law Review, Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: A long-standing debate has surrounded the relationship between two features of the Fourth...

Wall Street Journal Praises Judicial Ignorance of Statistical Methods

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From yesterday's Wall Street Journal editorial page covering yesterday's oral arguments in Gill v. Whitford, a case that involved a challenge to alleged gerrymandering:[Chief Justice John Roberts] zeroed in on risks for the credibility of the judiciary if the Supreme Court invalidates a state electoral map on purely political grounds for the first time. His reference to EG is to a political science standard offered by the plaintiffs as a test of when an electoral map is too partisan. . . . Chief Justice: “It is just not, it seems, a palatable answer to say the ruling was based on the fact that EG was greater than 7%. That doesn’t sound like language in the Constitution.” . . . [Plaintiffs' Attorney, Paul] Smith: “If you let this go, if you say this is—we’re not going to have a judicial remedy for this problem, in 2020, you’re going to have a festival of copycat gerrymandering the likes of which this…

"How Ivanka Trump And Donald Trump, Jr., Avoided a Criminal Indictment"

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From WNYC News: Kasowitz, who by then had been the elder Donald Trump’s attorney for a decade, is primarily a civil litigator with little experience in criminal matters. But in 2012, Kasowitz donated $25,000 to the re-election campaign of Manhattan...

"Terrific series of postings looking at empirics of the drug war and mass incarceration"

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That's the view of Doug Berman at Sentencing Law & Policy, who excerpts and links to a series of posts. Further: "Two posts into this series makes it clear that serious folks should spend some serious time looking at this...

Police and Fake Social Media Accounts

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The post Police and Fake Social Media Accounts appeared first on Gregory & Waldo 702-830-7925. It’s all over the news today. The evidence is beginning to indicate that a certain unfriendly foreign entity created fraudulent Facebook accounts for the specific purpose of impacting our most recent presidential election. Although these pages did sport images of real people, the associated names and identities were fake. Why did they do this? For just one reason: to gather “friends” and build relationships with users they hoped would soon become putty in their hands. Having gained the trust of these contacts, they then used it to their own advantage. This underhanded use of social media is more widespread than some would care to believe. Members of law enforcement in our own country have also begun to utilize fake acounts. However, their intention has nothing to do with swinging an election. Instead, they hope to use their Facebook and similar accounts as…

Default Mens Rea Requirements

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Bill notes the introduction of the Mens Rea Reform Act of 2017, S. 1902, by Senators Hatch, Lee, Cruz, Perdue, and Paul.  I agree with Bill and the Senators that congressional attention to mens rea is order.  I also agree that strict liability or a mental state of mere negligence should not be read into any criminal statute.  If Congress wants to create such a crime it must say so expressly.Regrettably, though, this bill goes too far.  The American Law Institute's Model Penal Code gets it right in § 2.02(3).  The comment to that subdivision says:Subsection (3) provides that unless the kind of culpability sufficient to establish a material element of an offense has been prescribed by law, it is established that if a purpose acted purposely, knowingly or recklessly with respect thereto.  This accepts as the basic norm what usually is regarded as the common law position.  More importantly, it represents the most convenient norm for…

Aufsichtsrechtliche Behandlung von Initial Coin Offerings

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Die Eidg. Finanzmarktaufsicht FINMA hat am 29. September 2017 eine Aufsichtsmitteilung betreffend die „Aufsichtsrechtliche Behandlung von Intitial Coin Offerings„ veröffentlicht (siehe auch Medienmitteilung). Gemäss FINMA handelt es sich bei Initial Coin Offerings („ICOs“) um eine digitale Form der öffentlichen Kapitalbeschaffung zu unternehmerischen Zwecken, die ausschliesslich über die Distributed-Ledger- bzw. Blockchain-Technologie erfolgt. Die FINMA hält in ihrer Aufsichtsmitteilung fest, dass weder international noch in der Schweiz spezifische Vorschriften zu ICOs bestehen, dass ICOs aber unter bestehendes Aufsichtsrecht fallen können. Nicht unter geltendes Aufsichtsrecht fallen gemäss FINMA folgende ICO-Modelle: „Das Aufnehmen von Geld für eigene Zwecke ohne Zwischenschaltung einer Plattform oder eines Emissionshauses ist grundsätzlich aufsichtsrechtlich unreguliert, wenn keine…

Better Than Ever: A New Criminal Case Compendium

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As many blog readers know, I’ve been offering my free Criminal Case Compendium since 2008. The Compendium is a collection of U.S. Supreme Court, Fourth Circuit & published N.C. criminal law, procedure and evidence case summaries, arranged by subject. Until now, folks have accessed the Compendium online as a massive 900-page PDF, containing over 3,000 case summaries. That worked okay, but we knew we could do better. And we have. My Criminal Case Compendium has just been re-released in a new format: A dynamic web-based version, designed to help you find the law you need even faster. The robust search feature puts real power behind your keyword search, sorting cases by relevancy. And if you like navigating through a table of contents, that’s still there, only amped up a few notches on the “usability scale.” Best of all? It’s still free. The new Compendium is online here: www.sog.unc.edu/sccc That landing page includes brief instructions and a link…
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