First and foremost, a prosecutor must prove each and every element of their case beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury. Typically, PC 242 battery defenses fall into one of three categories: False Allegations False allegations are common with Battery charges. Often the person making the false allegations does so because they are worried about their own responsibility for the confrontation. Other times, things like jealousy or anger can be enough to motivate a person to make false statements and allegations. Each case is different, and false allegations can often be attacked through conflicting evidence and proper cross examination of the witness. Accident The prosecutor has to prove that the Battery was willful and unlawful. True accidents therefore wouldn’t qualify. However, before asserting an accident defense, it’s important to recognize that the accident has to be reasonable and believable to a jury. Accident is limited as a battery defense also to those actions…
What Are Some Defenses For (PC 242) Battery In Riverside & Orange County?
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Can the Police Follow You?
One question that a lot of clients, and potential clients have is whether or not the officer can observe a traffic violation at one location and then pull you over much later on, let’s say miles down the road. Here is my answer. © marketing for Andrew Flusche, 2015. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us Post tags: Feed enhanced by Better Feed from Ozh The post Can the Police Follow You? appeared first on Andrew Flusche.
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Prayer for relief: Bill to abolish Driver Responsibility surcharge
By popular demand, I give you SB 93 by Rodney Ellis to abolish the "Driver Responsibility" surcharge. Several readers have asked me whether abolition legislation had been filed yet, so there you go. It has been referred to the Transportation Committee, which is chaired by Sen. Robert Nichols. Last session, state Rep. Larry Gonzales filed legislation in the House to get rid of the surcharge, but a quick check finds nothing comparable so far. If a senator who represents you is on that committee (find out who represents you at this link if you don't know), you may want to give their office a call and let them know you support Ellis' bill.Most of the money in the DRP accounts was finally released to trauma centers during the last biennium, I discovered this week, and going forward they can expect about $55 million per year from the surcharge at current (stubbornly, pathetically low) collection rates. The shortest distance between two points would be for the Lege…
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Prosecutorial Misconduct Still a Big, Big Problem: District Attorneys Do Bad Things
We monitor cases of prosecutorial misconduct here in Texas and elsewhere, and in the past we’ve reported on things like: Trusting Prosecutors With Forensic Lab Evidence? Consider Harris County District Attorney: Notices Sent of 100s of Wrongful Convictions Prosecutorial Misconduct in Texas: Continuing Injustice Prosecutorial Misconduct Rules Issued by Texas Supreme Court: Where is Michael Morton’s Prosecutor, Ken Anderson, Now? Prosecutorial Misconduct Allegations Against Four Top Texas District Attorneys: Update Texas Top Prosecutors In Trouble: Dallas DA Craig Watkins, Austin DA Rosemary Lehmberg, Corpus Christi ex DA Anna Jimenez, Williamson County ex DA Ken Anderson – How Big is Prosecutorial Misconduct Problem in Texas? As the media spotlight and legislative focus turns on the bad acts of district attorneys and those prosecuting criminal cases on behalf of the government, there is the optimistic idea that there will be less prosecutorial misconduct…
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One Sonoma CHP Officer Gets Two DUI Drivers on 101
Sonoma County CHP Officer Mike Phennecie arrested two drivers within a matter of hours on Highway 101 on Monday. Shortly before 6 a.m. Officer Phennecie stopped a Honda Civic traveling northbound for speeding, allegedly at 92 mph. The driver of that vehicle, a Petaluma man, displayed signs of intoxication, and was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving. After Officer Phennecie finished writing his police report he got back out on the streets around 1p.m. and as he was driving on Rohnert Park Expressway, he received a CHP dispatch concerning a possible DUI driver. A concerned motorist had called 911 to report a Dodge Sprinter swerving on the highway. Officer Phennecie stopped on the shoulder of Highway 101 to wait for the suspect vehicle. When the Dodge drove by the officer observed it to be swerving in a manner that forced other cars to avoid a collision. At that point the officer stopped the Dodge and arrested the driver, a Cotati man, for driving under the influence.…
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News Scan
New Bill: DNA Testing Misdemeants:: A Vermont lawmaker is introducing a bill that would require individuals convicted of most misdemeanors to submit a DNA sample for the state-wide database. Peter Hirschfeld of VPR News reports that while the state already collects DNA from felons, Sen. Dick Sears believes the state should also collect DNA from misdemeants to help eliminate suspects of future crimes. State prosecutors, police, and other public safety officials are supporting the proposed legislation and believe the bill would improve an already successful database. CA Thieves Targeting Mailboxes for W-2s: Thieves in a Northern California town have been breaking into mailboxes to steal tax documents so they can file fake tax returns and steal the refunds. Ian Schwartz of CBS 13 reports that in Elk Grove, CA, postal service employees are investigating at least 50 cases of mail theft. Several other towns around the area dealing with the same…
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Untold Stories of Syria’s Most Vulnerable Refugees
What happens when a crisis so prolongs that the world tires of it? You get 3.7 million Syrian refugees. You get stories like the one told by this woman living in a refugee camps. She has been in a Lebanese camp for three years with her two sons, one of whom is autistic. She has necessities, but little else; what she dreams of is that her children get an education. “We don’t go to anyone, we don’t visit anyone because dealing with him is so difficult,” the woman told Amnesty International researchers. “People stay away because they are afraid he will hurt their children. This little room is our bedroom, it is our living room, it is our everything. Our financial situation doesn’t allow us to register him in such [specialist] schools… That is why we need to resettle in another country, to get help for our child. This will make it better for him and for us.” Amnesty International wants to give this woman and her family a…
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BGer 4A_414/2014: Besserer Schutz gegen ungerechtfertigte Betreibungen
Das Bundesgericht hat im Urteil 4A_414/2014 einen massgeblichen Entscheid zur Zulässigkeit der Feststellungsklage im Zusammenhang mit ungerechtfertigten Betreibungen gefällt. Mit dem Rechtsvorschlag kann eine ungerechtfertigte Betreibung zwar gestoppt werden. Der Registereintrag kann sich jedoch auf den wirtschaftlichen Ruf einer Person auswirken: Der Kredit kann leiden, was im Rechtsalltag unter anderem im Wohnungsmarkt mit Nachteilen verbunden sein kann.Nach der bisherigen Rechtsprechung des Bundesgerichts war für die negative Feststellungsklage ein erhebliches schutzwürdiges Interesse erforderlich. Ob diese Rechtsprechung auch unter Art. 88 ZPO i.V.m. Art. 59 Abs. 2 lit. a ZPO Gültigkeit behält, wurde von Bundesgericht bisher nicht ausdrücklich entschieden (Erw. 2.3). Diverse Lehrmeinungen aber auch eine Handvoll parlamentarische Vorstösse haben dazu geführt, dass das Bundesgericht zum Schluss kam, dass eine Lockerung der…
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Too Good to Pass Up
I will just let this item from today's Washington Post speak for itself:RICHMOND -- Some snickered and wondered if Del. Joseph D. Morrissey might have had a conflict of interest Wednesday when he voted against a bill to keep "obscene materials" out of the hands of prison inmates.Morrissey (I-Henrico) has been spending his nights in jail since before the start of the current legislative session, on a misdemeanor charge related to his relationship with a 17-year-old receptionist at his law office.The lawmaker, who won reelection literally from his jail cell and has since been charged with four felonies on top of the earlier charge of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, has caused much hand-wringing and consternation in Mr. Jefferson's Capitol.************************Morrissey has a long history of legal skirmishes, starting 20 years ago with a courthouse fistfight.In June, he was charged with multiple felonies for allegedly having sex with the young…
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Prostitution Charges in Las Vegas
Prostitution charges can be embarrassing for the accused, but without adequate legal representation, they can be absolutely destructive. Many people charged with prostitution in Las Vegas decide to go it alone. They think that hiring a defense attorney might bring publicity to their situation or maybe the police left them feeling intimidated and frightened. Some people think they simply can’t afford an attorney. However, going without legal counsel is almost always more expensive in terms of the consequences. People charged with prostitution who don’t have an attorney almost always pay more in fines and spend more time in jail. On top of that, the police don’t always use the most legal tactics when making arrests. If you need help with prostitution charges in Las Vegas, contact the experts at Potter Criminal Defense. They can be reached at (702) 997-1774.
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REVENGE PORN SITES CREATE TENSION BETWEEN FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND CRIMINAL LAW
Indeed, it is a dirty business: websites that expose the most private and intimate moments in a person’s life to destroy their reputation. Like Sherlock Holmes’ […]
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Legislators Prepare For New Session And New DWI Penalties
As state legislatures across the country are preparing to gear up for the start of their new sessions, citizens should prepare for a round of fresh regulations. The legislators in Oklahoma have been on a notable run, proposing bans on talking on cell phones while driving and even banning wearing hoodies in public. Now, word is that that another group of legislators want to ban those convicted of drunk driving from being able to consume alcohol. The legislation, currently known as Senate Bill 30, says that anyone who has been … [Read more...] The post Legislators Prepare For New Session And New DWI Penalties appeared first on Minneapolis DWI Lawyer Douglas T. Kans.
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Article 78 proceedings were commenced in both counties....cont
Under these criteria, and under 510.30 of the CPL, the court can come to only one logical conclusion, namely that the pre-arraignment procedure now existing in Bronx County violates a defendant's right to the granting of reasonable bail; does not conform with the requirements of 510.30 of the CPL; and contradicts the mandate of the Court of Appeals and is therefore an unconstitutional deprivation. If the Court is uninformed in the bail fixing process, reasonable bail cannot be set. The Legislature, in passing section 510.30, set forth standards so that the Court can guide itself in being as objective as possible. The pre-arraignment procedure frustrates these guidelines by cutting off from the Court its main and most significant source of information upon which it must rely if it is to conform to the intent of the Legislature. The People, without conceding that the defendant's arrest rights were violated, state in their brief (page 13, referring to the advantages of…
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Our 2014 closed case stats
I get it, hiring a defense lawyer is a difficult decision. Clients are about to make a choice that may affect the rest of their life, and they want some degree of certainty before picking one of us. Many clients ask what our firm can guarantee if hired. I explain our process and how our team defends cases. You know, the process and hard work that leads to a great result (sometimes). But what clients really mean is they want a guaranteed outcome, which we don’t offer, and would it be unethical if we did. The next question is usually what are the odds of a certain result, and until now, I’ve never had those numbers handy. But for 2014 our firm went through our closed cases (cases that were pled, dismissed, no billed, diverted, rejected etc; basically any case that ended in 2014) and came up with the following stats. These totals don’t include traffic tickets because those are more about revenue generation for local governments than actual criminal law. Closed…
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To Kill An Ending
Alexandra Petri at the WaPo is dreading the Harper Lee sequel.
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Rhode Island Man in Court with Hope of Exoneration of Murder Conviction
In 1982, 22-year-old Doreen C. Picard of Rhode Island was found strangled and beaten. Police said that Raymond Tempest, Jr. was the killer, and in 1992 he was convicted and sentenced to 85 years in prison. Now, more than 20 years since he was sentenced, Tempest is in court, striving to prove his innocence. A story in the Providence Journal says that according to prosecutors, Tempest killed Picard in 1982 after she saw him beating her landlord, Susan M. Laferte, in Laferte's cellar. Medical examiners said that Picard's clutched hands held hair that she'd pulled from someone's head. At Tempest's trial in 1992-it took police 10 years to build a case against him-that hair was said to have belonged to Tempest. That evidence was used to help convict Tempest of a crime for which he has now served nearly 22 years. But Tempest and his lawyers claim that he is innocent and that they have the evidence to prove it. Earlier this week, lawyers from the New England…
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2015.35: Jury Selection Rule: Pull Back the Curtain.
One of my proteges, working on an appeal, noticed how easily the prosecutor convinced a member of the jury panel to change his mind on an important issue with a tongue lashing. He posted about it publicly, admonishing potential jurors to be strong in jury selection and not let a prosecutor “bully them” into changing their opinions. It’s a fair point, but there is a lesson for the defense lawyer as well. Jury selection is not about getting jurors to change their minds. You’re not likely to get them to change their minds in jury selection, and the prosecutor in my protege’s case probably (I wasn’t there) didn’t really get the juror to change his mind. What she did was to get the juror to say different words than he had at first; she might be able to hold the juror to that new position during deliberations, but probably not, so if she didn’t get him to say words that led to a challenge for cause she was wasting her breath. Worse than…
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2015.36: The Unconstitutionality of Section 33.021(c)
Here’s my brief on the unconstitutionality of the balance of Texas’s Online Solicitation of a Minor statute, Texas Penal Code Section 33.021. I have two appeals pending, both in courts that have already upheld the statute in the face of First Amendment challenges: Both the Beaumont and First Courts of Appeals analyzed Section 33.021(c) as statutes regulating conduct rather than speech. This is plainly incorrect: speech that is unprotected because it incites the imminent commission of a crime is still speech. The San Antonio Court of Appeals upheld Section 33.021(c) in the face of a vagueness challenge, holding: The requisite intent arises within the conduct of soliciting the minor, and must exist at the time of the prohibited conduct of solicitation. Id. Indeed, it is the requirement that the defendant must solicit “with the intent that the minor will engage in sexual contact” that operates to make otherwise innocent conduct, i.e., soliciting a minor to…
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Ignition Interlock Violations in Michigan - Test, Rinse and Repeat
Almost all of my blog articles about Michigan driver's license restoration deal with aspects of winning back your license. This article will be about how to avoid certain ignition interlock violations, or at least win a interlock violation hearing. In my role as a driver's license appeal lawyer, I regularly handle ignition interlock violation cases. At least amongst my clients, the overwhelming majority of interlock violations are NOT the result of a person consuming alcohol. While there is a lot to this, the ultimate concern in any interlock violation, from a startup failure, positive breath test, missed rolling retest or a tamper/circumvent is that the person required to use the interlock has, in fact, been drinking. Especially when that's not the case, an interlock violation is just a horrible thing to confront. Although there is no way to just "avoid" certain violations, there are steps you can take to make sure that you can prove you…
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House committees announced: Reviewing the criminal justice chairs
The Texas House announced committee chairs and memberships today.Among the criminal-justice oriented committees, two of three - Corrections and Homeland Security and Public Safety - got new chairmen, with both their former chairs upgraded to more powerful posts. Rep. Jim Murphy now chairs House Corrections and Larry Phillips has Homeland Security and Public Safety. Senior Houston Democrat Harold Dutton chairs the newly created Juvenile Justice and Family Matters Committee. Democrat Abel Herrero out of Corpus Christi retained the Criminal Jurisprudence chair.Criminal Jurisprudence experienced significant continuity amidst a reduction in total seats from nine to seven. Joe Moody out of El Paso is vice chair. Brian Hughes and Matt Schaefer are gone, replaced by David Simpson and Matt Shaheen. Jeff Leach and Terry Canales return to the committee, and all and sundry are joined by Calendars Committee Chair Todd Hunter, which at least may help get some of the committee's…
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