Should Prison Sentences Be Based on Crimes Not Yet Committed?
The U.S. Constitution requires due process before a criminal defendant can be deprived of life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness. It is also a fundamental tenet of the U.S. justice system that defendants cannot be prosecuted for things they might do or for things they think about doing- which is why even charges of […]
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Third Circuit on Qualified Immunity for Heavy-Handed Police Tactics in Drug Bust
The Third Circuit issued a reasonable ruling Monday in a really terrifying case called Couden v. Duffy (No. 04-1732). The case concerns a 2001 drug bust gone wrong in Newark, Delaware, in which FBI and local police, with guns drawn, chased a mom and her teenage kids, threw a flashlight through the window of the […]
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Conrad Black Re-Sentenced to an Additional 13 Months’ Imprisonment
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Amy St. Eve of the Northern District of Illinois re-sentenced Lord Conrad Black, former CEO of newspaper giant Hollinger International, Inc., to serve the remainder of his sentence, as reported in Canada’s Globe and Mail. Black has served 29 months of his original 78 month sentence, imposed following his conviction […]
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FEDS DROP LANCE ARMSTRONG INVESTIGATION
Hello again blog readers. After a year hiatus, I’m rejoining the blogosphere. My thanks to my law partner, Anthony Lake, for keeping things running in my absence. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles announced Friday (no coincidence that the announcement came Friday in an effort by the government to avoid unfavorable press), that is was […]
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How Do Human Traffickers Target Children?
Many people in the United States who are being trafficked for sex are U.S. citizens, and the average age at which victims are first trafficked is between 11 and 14. Both wealthy and poor children are at risk of becoming victims of human trafficking, and often the pimps that first solicit victims to be trafficked […]
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Vermont Judge Rejects the Hudson v. Michigan Approach to No-Knock Warrants
A federal trial judge in Vermont last week ruled that the police’s failure to knock at a residence before executing a search warrant is a violation of the Vermont state constitution, even if it is no longer a violation of the federal constitution after the Supreme Court’s decision in Hudson v. Michigan. As the federal […]
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CA Moves Toward Regulating — Rather Than Wholly Criminalizing — Salvia
A big hat tip to reader J, who notes that a California bill on salvia divinorum, AB 259, has been passed through committee in a form that simply criminalizes the sale of salvia to a person under the age of 18. Persons who violate that prohibition would be subject to misdemeanor sanctions. When I was […]
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Can Comments on a Police Blog Be the Basis for a Motion to Suppress?
My eyes bugged out a little bit on reading a recent post on the blog of the LAPD that described a “surprise discovery” made by officers serving a warrant at a home in South Los Angeles where stolen property and drugs were found (a screenshot of the post is below in case it later gets edited. Click on […]
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I Always Keep My Weapons In An Altoids Container
A Terry-type search of an Atloids tin, a bundle wrapped in duct tape and a brass pipe did not violate a suspect’s Fourth Amendment rights because the officer who conducted the search “testified that he thought each of these items could be, or could conceal, a weapon,” the Ninth Circuit held today in U.S. v. Hartz, […]
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Conviction Overturned for Kentucky Pain Doctor
The Kentucky Supreme Court has tossed out the conviction of a pain doctor who had been sentenced to 20 years in prison for unlawfully prescribing medication. The evidence against Dr. Fortune J. Williams was based in part on files seized during a warrantless raid of his office — a raid that was carried out both by […]
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