For those of us who do read crime noir novels for entertainment, here is an interesting perspective. This all quote from Law.com: Legal Blog Watch. Cloak-and-Dagger Justice Perhaps it was a dark and stormy night when Scott W. Stucky was sworn in as a judge of the U.S. Court of…
Ted Sampsell-Jones, Making Defendants Speak, (Download PDF) 93 Minn. L. Rev. 1327 (2009). First, as a matter of constitutional criminal procedure, the Supreme Court should overrule . . . (you’ll be surprised what he suggests here). Second, as a matter of evidence law, courts should abandon the Gordon v. United…
First Circuit focuses on relevance tests to assess the admission of out-of-court statements offered for a non-hearsay purpose; ultimately the error was harmless, in United States v. Benitez-Avila, __ F.3d __ (1st Cir. June 9, 2009) (No. 08-1463). Trial counsel often want to call the investigator to lay the groundwork…
The Best Of Everything: Fourth Circuit Erroneously Finds That Best Evidence Rule Doesn’t Apply In Firearms Appeal Federal Rule of Evidence 1002, the Best Evidence or Original Document Rule, indicates that To prove the content of a writing, recording, or photograph, the original writing, recording, or photograph is required, except…
What Are Your Intentions?: Sixth Circuit Finds No Plain Error In DEA Agents Drug Quantity Testimony Federal Rule of Evidence 704(b) provides that No expert witness testifying with respect to the mental state or condition of a defendant in a criminal case may state an opinion or inference as to…
Here is Gene Fidell’s comment on H.R. 569, which asks be named in honor of former Chief Judge Robinson O. Everett.
If you’re a lawyer looking for first-rate appellate CLE, then please consider registering for the DRI Appellate Advocacy Seminar, to be held November 5–6, 2009 in La Jolla, California (near San Diego), at the Hilton La Jolla Torrey Pines. the (new) legal writer.
The Volokh Conspiracy is reporting on an interesting obscenity conviction in the Fourth Circuit. The cautionary tale – do not blog, chat, email, or in any other way discuss through the internet your secret fantasy of what you’d like to do with a child sexually. Besides being a very very…
A reporter for The San Diego Union-Tribune will have to testify as a defense witness in a court-martial, a military judge ruled Monday. In his 12-page ruling military judge Cmdr. Kevin O’Neill rejected Rogers’s attempts to assert a First Amendment-based reporter’s privilege and protection under the California shield law. O’Neill…
In prosecution for first-degree murder and for using a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence, testimony that defendant threatened two percipient witnesses at the scene of the crime were admissible under FRE 404(b) to show consciousness of guilt, in United States v. Begay, _ F.3d _ (9th…