When a defendant is convicted of more than one offense at the same time, the court may consolidate the offenses for judgment. The sentence for that judgment is driven by the “most serious offense” among the consolidated convictions. G.S. 15A-1340.15(b). Today’s post considers some issues related to the determination of which offense in a consolidated […]
Most Serious Offense for Consolidation Purposes
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McCarl on Vagueness
Ryan McCarl has posted Incoherent and Indefensible: An Interdisciplinary Critique of the Supreme Court's Void-for-Vagueness Doctrine (Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly, Vol. 42, No. 1, Fall 2014) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The Supreme Court’s “void-for-vagueness” (or simply “vagueness”) doctrine,...
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Escrow Agent Admits Role in Condo Conversion Scam
Mortgage Fraud Blog. Rashmi Airan-Pace, 42, Miami, Florida, an escrow agent, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire, mail, and bank fraud, for her role in facilitating the inclusion of material misrepresentations in closing documents, including the HUD-1 settlement statements. The Plea Agreement and Information were filed in Tampa and then transferred to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, where Airan-Pace pleaded guilty to other charges. As part of the agreement, Airan-Pace will also forfeit property, including $26,973.81, which represents title insurance premiums she earned. Airan-Pace faces a maximum penalty of 5 years in federal prison. A sentencing date has not yet been set. According to the plea agreement, in 2005, entities controlled by co-conspirators entered into a contract to purchase The Arbors, an apartment complex in Hillsborough County, Florida. The new owners of the property then engaged in a plan to convert the complex from…
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Woman Gets 25 Years in Prison for Loan Scam
Mortgage Fraud Blog. Diane Glatfelter, 48, Billerica, Massachusetts, was sentenced for wire fraud charges in connection with a bogus bank guaranty program. Glatfelter defrauded a real estate businessman who was seeking funding for a development project. Glatfelter promised to secure a $20 million loan, but required him to pay $125,000 in up-front fees. The defendant was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Douglas P. Woodlock to 30 months in prison, three years of supervised release, and ordered to pay $1,575,000 in restitution. In September 2014, Glatfelter was found guilty following a five-day jury trial of four counts of wire fraud. In 2007 and 2008, Glatfelter engaged in a scheme to defraud a young real estate businessman from California who was seeking funding for a development project. Glatfelter promised to secure a $20 million loan for him, but required him to pay $125,000 in up-front fees. The loan never materialized. Glatfelter used the money for various purposes other…
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The Alabama Board of Pardons and Paroles — Getting a Hearing (Part 2)
So you understand the Pardon and Parole Board’s authority to grant parole or pardons. How do we get them to consider your case? The answer depends on whether you (or a loved one) is seeking a pardon or parole. In the case of parole, an incarcerated person will automatically have parole hearings scheduled periodically, depending on the length of their sentence. If the person has completed more than 5 years of their sentence, they can petition the board for a “parole cut,” or an early consideration for parole. The board can grant an early hearing if the person has shown good behavior and a good likelihood of success on parole. It is important to know that you will likely receive less than 30 days notice when a parole hearing is set, so it’s a good idea to prepare ahead of time so that you don’t have to scramble at the last minute. If a person is seeking a pardon, they may apply at any time after their court supervision is…
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Pondering the Ghosts of Christmas Pardons Past, Present and Future
Will Texas Gov. Rick Perry issue one last round of Christmas-time pardons on his way out the door?The future of executive clemency looks bleak.Image from A Christmas Carol, 1951.Usually he'd do it this week. (The sign of a clemency geek: I've been keeping the governor's web page up in a browser tab and periodically refreshing it. At least I'm up to date on the governor's views on the Australian hostage crisis and Chanukah.) Grits notoriously is not a great fan of the Christmas pardon phenomenon, but for the most part, with a few notable exceptions (especially early in his governorship), Perry has restricted routine exercises of clemency to a minimalist, annual pre-Christmas ritual.One also wonders as pardon season approaches about Greg Abbott and what his clemency policy will look like as governor. Rick Perry rejected two thirds of positive recommendations he received from his appointees on the Board of Pardons and Paroles. Will Greg Abbott approve them…
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Revenge porn charged, despite court order staying enforcement
Arizona is one of a number of states that have recently passed what are commonly known as “revenge porn” laws. The laws criminalize the display of nude or sexually explicit photos of a person without that person’s consent. Their aim, generally, is to penalize the posting of, for example, nude photos of a former lover […] The post Revenge porn charged, despite court order staying enforcement appeared first on David Black.
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Sexual assaults on campus targeted by SDSU
A headline tells you that college students are now required to take a course relating to sexual crimes on campus. What would you think? For many of us, our thoughts would probably focus on how women can protect themselves against sexually predatory behavior. And we’re willing to bet that many folks would assume that the […] The post Sexual assaults on campus targeted by SDSU appeared first on .
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Dzhokhar Tsarnaev Appears in Court
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, accused of committing the Boston Marathan bombing, was in court this morning. Reporters in the courtroom are live-tweeting. Almost all say he appeared much more alert, interested and engaged in the proceedings than at his prior... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]
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Haftfortdauer: Reisepass mit Visum für China verschwiegen
Das Oberlandesgericht Hamm hat entschieden, dass die vom Landgericht Essen angeordnete Untersuchungshaft gegen Dr. Thomas Middelhoff andauert und er demnach das Weihnachtsfest in der Justizvollzugsanstalt Essen verbringen muss. Middelhoff wurde mit Urteil vom 14.11.2014 wegen Untreue und Steuerhinterziehung zu einer Gesamtheitsstrafe von drei Jahren verurteilt. Das Urteil ist nicht rechtskräftig, da der Angeklagte gegen das Urteil Revision eingelegt hat. Auf die Beschwerde des Angeklagten gegen den Haftbefehl vom 14.11.2014 und den Haftfortdauerbeschluss des Landgerichts Essen vom 19.11.2014 hat das Oberlandesgericht Hamm – nachdem das Landgericht der Beschwerde nicht abgeholfen hat – diese als unbegründet verworfen. Foto: Braegel (CC BY-SA 3.0) Haftgrund der Fluchtgefahr wegen Höhe der Strafe gegeben Nach Auffassung des Oberlandesgerichts sind die Voraussetzungen für die Fortdauer der Untersuchungshaft erfüllt. Der Angeklagte sei…
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Washington Appeals Court address Right to Remain Silent in recent decision
The Constitution protects us when we make statements under police interrogation without being advised of our rights, or when we decide not to make any statements at all. One of the key rights stated in a Miranda warning is the right to remain silent. This right guarantees that a defendant will not be portrayed in a negative light before a jury simply for choosing not to respond to a question posed by police. But a Washington Court of Appeals recently ruled that a prosecutor is allowed to reference the defendant's post-arrest silence because the reference to the defendant's silence was not made with the intention proving the defendant's guilt. The Recent Case of Washington v. Price In the matter of Washington v. Price, the defendant was pulled over by police after they observed him run a stop sign and hit a curb while turning. During the traffic stop, the officers noticed signs of intoxication and also discovered that he was operating with a suspended license.…
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Stamm Featured in Member in the Spotlight Blog of the National College for DUI Defense
Leonard Stamm has been featured in the "Member in the Spotlight" blog of the National College for DUI Defense. It is reprinted in its entirety below: Member in the Spotlight: Lenny Stamm This week's Member in the Spotlight is Lenny Stamm of Greenbelt, Maryland. Lenny grew up in New Rochelle, New York. For four years he started as a goalie on the high school soccer team. Funny how life takes twists and turns, he was selected for the Program for Inquiry, Involvement and Independent Study (a gifted "school without walls" program) in which they made a visit to the United States Supreme Court barely arriving after it had just recessed only to return years later as the coauthor of some of the nation's most important DWI case briefs: Missouri v. McNeely, Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, Bullcoming v. New Mexico. This gifted kid from New York grew up to become Maryland's most respected DWI/DUI lawyer earning the first annual Fred Bennett Zealous…
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Does Tort Law Empower?
Ori J. Herstein, How Tort Law Empowers, 64 U. Toronto L.J.___ (2014) (forthcoming), available at SSRN. Anthony Sebok Ori Herstein’s How Tort Law Empowers takes on the question of whether and how tort law empowers victims. Herstein presents himself as a friendly critic of civil recourse theory, and offers an amendment that he claims makes the theory both more plausible and less interesting. Like many friendly amendments, it is an offer that must be carefully examined before it is accepted. Herstein begins by noting that one of the most important and interesting contributions by civil recourse theory is the idea that tort law empowers tort victims. This contribution comes from the work of John Goldberg and Ben Zipursky, and has been embraced by others as well, either within tort law or in other parts of private law, such as contract theory (see, for example, the work of Nate Oman and Andrew Gold). Continue reading "Does Tort Law Empower?"
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Herbalife’s Fake Business Opportunity
In a video released this week, Pershing Square (the hedge fund that exposed the Herbalife fraud) contrasts Herbalife’s public statements about the “business opportunity” with the statements made behind closed doors. Herbalife claims to offer “the best business opportunity on the face of the earth.” But the reality is that it is an opportunity in […]
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Look For The (Police) Union Label
Breezing through the news, the manly image of Cleveland Police Patrolman’s Association boss, Det. Jeffrey Follmer, hit the screen. He struck me as comical, the cartoon version of a third-rate city’s tough-guy cop. Just too much of a dumbass not to laugh at. But after some contemplation of this bald beagle, it occurred to me that as buffoonish as he may have seemed, he was likely sitting there with a gun strapped to some part of his body, and Tamir Rice was still dead. There should be no laughing at Follmer. Aside: 12-year-old Tamir Rice was not a “survivor.” His parents, family and loved ones suffered the “profound trauma” of his killing. You may care deeply about the fact of his being shot down by P.O. Timothy Loehmann, but unless you are among that small group of loved ones, you did not suffer trauma. To claim so is not only a lie, but diminishes the loss of those who did. You are not among them no matter…
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Schools Have Rules: When Blind Boys Go Bad
Sometimes boys hit other boys. Girls too, but let’s pretend for the sake of this post that gender isn’t really important, because the boy who hit another student here is 8-year-old Dakota Nafzinger, and he’s just a boy. Whether he hit a boy or a girl isn’t clear. There’s no indication that the hit was a big deal, beyond the fact that it happened. It’s not good that it happened, but then, it’s not the first time that a boy hit a boy either. Except Dakota is blind, and he hit another boy with his cane. That’s the long white thing that blind people use because they can’t see. I add that as a tip from my buddy, The Blind Guy, who informs me that there are still a lot of people out there who can’t figure out why blind people have long white canes. A representative of the North Kansas City School District said that the cane is property of the district that was given to him during enrollment, and…
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Marijuana, the Automobile Exception and the Text Messages
After Dwight Corey Kennedy was charged – in a “seven-count information” – with “possession of methamphetamine while armed with a loaded gun (Health & Safety Code § 11370.1(a), possession of methamphetamine for sale (Health & Safety Code § 11378), two counts of the sale or transportation of marijuana (Health & Safety Code § 11360(a), two counts of possession of marijuana for sale (Health & Safety Code § 11359) and cultivation of marijuana (Health & Safety Code § 11358), he filed a motion to suppress. Kennedy v. Superior Court, 2014 WL 5468967 (California Court ofAppeals 2014).To understand the motion to suppress, it is necessary to understand how the case arose. As the Court of Appeals explains, on August 5, 2011, at around 7:30 p.m., Alameda County Sheriff's Deputy Michael Dalisay saw [Kennedy] drive into the parking lot of a liquor store in San Leandro. There was no one else in the car…
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Day 10: Online Training
For the final day of our holiday promotion, TRACE is offering one company complimentary access to our online training for one year. Our system administrators will set the winner up with a branded platform to train up to 500 employees using our interactive training modules. Available in 14 languages, TRACE Online Training currently includes Anti-Bribery, Avoiding Trafficked Labor and Conflicts of Interest courses. These courses are designed to be engaging and feature interactive scenarios to increase retention rates. ENTER TO WIN *Please note: Winners will be randomly selected from all entries received between 8:00 AM EST and 11:59 More…
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Vicarious Liability for West Virginia Coal Companies in Worksite Injury Cases - Young v. Apogee Coal Company
If you were injured on a worksite, it's likely that more than one business may be legally responsible for the accident. Companies often work together in a wide variety of ventures, under which they share their resources and capabilities in order to both make money. These ventures can create a tangled web for liability purposes, as the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia recently explained. Mr. Young was killed in a tragic accident while working for Apogee Coal Company at the Guyan Mine in Logan County. He was removing a more than 11,000-pound counterweight from a machine when the counterweight fell on top of Young and killed him. Young's wife later sued the company, alleging that it didn't properly train Young in how to remove the counterweight before his supervisor ordered him to complete the task. She also sued Apogee's holding company, Patriot Coal Corporation. Ms. Young argued that Patriot was vicariously liable for…
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"Six Reasons the Death Penalty is Becoming More Expensive"
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