IDAHO STATE POLICE NEWS RELEASE - generated by our News Release ListServer DO NOT REPLY --------------------------------------------------------------------------- IDAHO STATE POLICE NEWS RELEASE District 3 Patrol 700 S. Stratford Dr., Meridian 83642 (208) 846-7550 Fax (208) 846-7520 For Immediate Release: Sunday September 17, 2015 at 2:42 a.m. Please direct questions to the District Office On Wednesday, September 16, 2015, at approximately 8:42 p.m., the Idaho State Police investigated a two-vehicle injury crash, on Interstate 84 near milepost 67, one mile east of the East Boise Port of Entry. Shauna S. Bare, 52, of Pocatello, ID, was driving a 2015 Honda Civic westbound on Interstate 84. Matthew K. Ernestberg, 49, of Middleton, ID, was driving a 2014 Peterbilt semi, pulling a trailer, westbound on Interstate 84. Bare's vehicle rear-ended Ernestberg's vehicle, and Bare's vehicle caught on fire. Bare was transported via ground ambulance to Saint Alphonsus…
Injury crash near the East Boise Port of Entry
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New York DWI Arrest Dismissed on the Merits by Prosecutors: Accused Never Committed VTL 1192.3
In the City of New York there are cabs, livery cars, Uber services, buses and subways. All of these modes of transportation make it a difficult sell to prosecutors that a drunk driving, DWI or DUI arrest was due to an inability of an accused to get home. Not that such a defense would be a viable or strong one, but these facts explain why prosecutors are often unsympathetic to the plight of an individual accused of VTL 1192.2 or VTL 1192.3. Couple this with the fact that drunk driving crimes in New York (or anywhere) can have significant collateral and direct consequences to other drivers and pedestrians, don’t be shocked if the District Attorney does not want to budge on a good offer. Remember, if you are convicted not only can you face a year in jail, the suspension or revocation of your license, a $1,000 fine and the requirement that you install an ignition interlock, but a DWI will remain on your record forever. While I may be a New York DWI attorney and criminal…
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NYLS Hosts A Symposium On Criminalizing The Unconstitutional
A few years ago, I had a chat with the dean of my alma mater, New York Law School, after it announced it was hooking up with a slimy internet outlet selling minicourses in unethical legal marketing by defrocked lawyers. Then Dean Richard Mataser admitted to me that he actually had no clue who his school had gotten in bed with. The problem, he explained, is that NYLS isn’t Harvard Law School, and never would be. That was not exactly an epiphany. So, he went on, it needed some hook to make itself relevant, and it was hanging its future on being the school that embraced the internet. Did I get it? Sure, I told the dean, but if that was where it wanted to focus, it had to, you know, have a clue about the internet. He didn’t. It didn’t. He was going to look into it. And then he retired. As an alumnus, they send me emails from time to time hourly extolling their scholarly efforts, and incoming was one of their major efforts, a make-a-name-for-yourself…
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Five Factors Courts May Consider in Determining Whether a Driver Was Impaired in a New Jersey DWI Case
A common misconception in driving while intoxicated (DWI) cases involves breath testing and blood alcohol content (BAC). New Jersey’s DWI statute states that a person who operates a vehicle with a BAC of 0.08 percent or higher commits a violation, but this is not the only way the state can prove intoxication or impairment. The statute actually defines the offense in two ways: driving with a BAC above a minimum amount, or driving “under the influence” of alcohol or other drugs. Even without any BAC evidence, prosecutors may still be able to prove that a defendant was “under the influence,” intoxicated, or otherwise impaired. The Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court issued a ruling several months ago in State v. Kessler, which identified various methods of presenting evidence of intoxication or impairment. A police officer pulled the defendant over at about 1:22 a.m. He had allegedly observed the defendant swerve from…
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Most People in Prison are Violent Offenders
Kudos to Leon Neyfakh of Slate for calling out GOP contender Carly Fiorina on her claim that most inmates in the United States are locked up for non-violent drug offenses. This frequent quip made by so many so often it has become legend suffers from just one problem - it's dead wrong: Though Fiorina was correct that the United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world--no other country comes close--the rest of her statement was false. In fact, when you look at the roughly 1.5 million people currently doing time in state and federal prisons, only about 300,000 of them are there primarily because of drug offenses, according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics. About half the state prison population--which, at 1.3 million people, represents the lion's share of the country's prisoners--is made up of individuals who are classified as violent offenders. (According to research by Fordham Law School professor John Pfaff, the…
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Chasing justice in Smith County
The Innocence Project of Texas and the national Innocence Project have filed a new habeas corpus writ in Smith County on behalf of Kerry Max Cook. Check out initial news coverage: Texas Monthly: Four Decades, Three Trials, Two Death Sentences, One Exoneree. AlmostDallas News: Why is it so hard to get justice in the small-town courtrooms of East Texas?Dallas News: Years after being freed from death row, East Texas man fights to clear his name
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The Starbucks Cop
For years now, Starbucks has been the office of choice for the ultra-hip tech lawyer who can’t afford a place of his own. But as Philly Police Officer Joe Leighthardt explained on Facebook, police want their own access to the Temple of Frappucino, telling the story of a bro-cop whose needs went, ahem, unfulfilled. I walk into the Starbucks at 13th and Chestnut in full uniform and ask the young blonde liberal behind the counter if I could use their public bathroom for which you need a key code and she states, in a loud voice so all the other customers can hear that the bathroom is for paying customers only. I then ask in a very polite manner if I could please use it. She then states in the same loud manner and a smirk “Are you a paying customer?” It was at this point that I realized what she was doing. As I walked out with my hand up and while she continued loudly to tell me about the bathroom down the street, I was even more astonished…
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"The Meaning of 'Meaningful Appellate Review' in Capital Cases: Lessons from California"
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Feds cracking down on synthetic marijuana
A quick blurb from the Miami Herald about the federal government stepping up their efforts to curb synthetic marijuana. Also known as “spice”, this drug is potentially deadly. What makes it so dangerous is the unknown chemical mixtures that are added, sometimes at random. As there is no purity and no set recipe, “spice” has already been implicated in dozens of hospitalizations and even deaths in Florida. Now the feds may be striking back… Last week, ten men were charged with conspiracy for their roles in manufacturing synthetic marijuana, some of it laced with dangerous or deadly chemicals. Their plan? To distribute the drug throughout New York City. Known as “spice” or K2, this drug is smoked like normal pot. As mentioned above, hospitals nationwide are seeing the results of bad “spice”. There has been a large uptick in emergency room visits because of bad reactions to this…
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[VIDEO] Should You Tell Your Lawyer Everything?
If you think “oh, that doesn’t matter right now,” or “we’ll bring that up later.” We could be in a bind later on where I could have better advised you knowing the full facts about what actually happened. This happens in cases wide ranging nature. Contact me today about your VA traffic or misdemeanor case. Video Transcription Hello, my name is Andrew Flusche, I’m your Virginia defense lawyer. One question that comes up with clients and potential clients is whether or not you should tell your lawyer everything. The answer is yes. As your lawyer I need to know the truth, I need to know what happened, what you said, what you didn’t say, what you didn’t do, in order to properly defend you in court. If you withhold things from me, especially when we’re initially talk about your case. If you think “oh, that doesn’t matter right now,” or “we’ll bring that up later.” We could be in a bind…
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Notable Left/Right morality accounting of the "Truth about Mass Incarceration"
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Lots of new data from BJS on prisoners and from USSC on federal sentencing
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Can You Undo a Divorce Decree in Utah?
While fairly uncommon, it’s not unheard-of for divorced spouses to remarry each other. According to a 2012 study conducted by California State University professor Nancy Kalish, which surveyed 1,001 couples, about 6% went on to retie the knot with each other after ending their marriage. If you and your ex-husband or ex-wife are thinking about getting remarried in Utah, is it possible to undo your divorce as if it never happened? In this article, divorce lawyer Andrew Stewart will explain how Utah’s remarriage laws work. When is the Decree Final? The divorce process can be long and complicated, but in the end, it all comes down to a single document: the divorce decree. State law imposes a bare minimum 90-day waiting period between filing for divorce and obtaining the final decree, though it’s generally possible to waive this delay. Until the judge signs off on the decree, the couple is not officially divorced. However, even after the decree has been signed, it…
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Rushin on The Deaths in Custody Reporting Act and Police Violence
Stephen Rushin (University of Alabama - School of Law) has posted Using the Deaths in Custody Reporting Act to Reduce Police Violence (Boston College Law Review, Vol. 57, 2016, Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Last year, Congress passed...
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GM Deferred Prosecution Agreement and the "New" DOJ Corporate Prosecution Policy
Just days ago, DOJ came down with a new corporate directive (discussed here) describing a shift in investigation policy. The new focus would be on the prosecution of individuals within the entity. It states: "2. Both criminal and civil corporate...
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16 Years of Silence: Enforced Disappearances in Belarus Must Be Investigated
By Viachaslau “Slava” Bortnik, Belarus Country Specialist, Amnesty International USA The legal term may be clunky – “enforced disappearance” – but the human story is simple: People literally disappear, from their loved ones and their community, when state officials (or someone acting with state consent) grab them from the street or from their homes and then deny it, or refuse to say where they are. It is a crime under international law. September 16 marked the 16 anniversary of enforced disappearance of prominent Belarusian opposition politician Viktar Hanchar and his business associate Anatol Krasouski. Both men disappeared the same day of a broadcast on state television in which President Lukashenka ordered the chiefs of his security services to crackdown on “opposition scum.” Hanchar was a Deputy Chairman of the dissolved Belarusian parliament. Shortly before his disappearance, he telephoned his wife to inform her…
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Cognitive Factors in Forensic Science
By Vanessa Meterko, research analyst at the Innocence Project In the spirit of the beginning of a new school year, here’s a quiz for you: count the Fs in the following excerpt. FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTI FIC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS… How many did you count? Many people say three or four, some say five, but rarely do people report the correct answer: six. The reason that so many of us get this simple exercise wrong is not because we’re stupid or lazy; it’s because we’re all experts in reading. That’s according to cognitive neuroscientist Dr. Itiel Dror, who studies expert decision-making at University College London. Dr. Dror explains that over time, we’ve learned that words like “of,” “the,” and “a” are of little importance when it comes to comprehension, so our brains have actually learned to ignore them, allowing us…
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Thirteenth Individual Convicted in Medicare Psychiatric Treatment Fraud
On September 10, a Houston psychiatrist became the thirteenth individual convicted in relation to partial hospitalization program (PHP) services fraudulently billed to Medicare. The psychiatrist was convicted by a federal jury and is scheduled to be sentenced in December. The government has charged numerous individuals with causing Houston’s Riverside General Hospital to submit approximately $158 million in false claims for PHP services. PHP services are outpatient treatments for severe mental illness. The government alleged that the Medicare beneficiaries who received the PHP service at Riverside did not receive the services and, in most cases, were not receiving significant treatment from any psychiatrist. Some of the patients had mental conditions, such as Alzheimer’s, which meant that the purported treatment would not benefit them. The government presented evidence that, instead of receiving treatment, patients were shown movies at Riverside facilities. Evidence…
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The Numerous Ways of Committing Prescription Drug Fraud
Prescription drug abuse has been on the rise in America for years, now. While there are some drugs that are targeted more than others, the sheer volume of prescription drugs that have been illegally obtained is estimated to be in the vein of tens of billions of dollars, every year. Most prescription drug fraud is done to fuel a drug addiction, though there are also many people who commit fraud in order to sell the drugs that they get. But what is prescription drug fraud, exactly? And how does it work? Prescription drugs are the drugs which you can't get on your own, because the government has set up safeguards against their abuse. This safeguard is the prescription, which has to be written by a doctor in their normal course of business. Because people can get creative with how to get prescription drugs without getting the prescription first, the law doesn't state a bunch of ways to get them that are illegal: If it did, people would find another way, fast. Because of…
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TGIF Open Thread
It's Friday! Just 2 more working days until Monday! My CFB sneak peek with games tonight: New Mexico v @ Arizona State -27 Florida State v. @ Boston College +8 1/2 Open Thread. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]
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