News8Austin reports:
Next Thursday Maj. Hasan’s pretrial investigation, Article 32 hearing will reconvene.
According to officials, the session is called a Status Conference Hearing and will address additional preliminary measures. Officials say no witness testimony will be heard during this portion of the hearing. The Article 32 hearing will be held on October 12.
Navy Times reports:
The combat systems officer of the destroyer Cole is back on duty this week after he was arrested in a courtroom outburst over a disputed traffic ticket in Portsmouth, Va.
Lt. Timothy Barry appeared in court to challenge a speeding ticket, but the proceedings started off bad and got worse: According to a report in the Washington Times, which cited a Sept. 3 internal Navy message, Barry refused to rise when the judge entered the courtroom. When a bailiff asked him why he hadn’t stood, Barry asked whether that was required by law.
It appears that Denedo’s case is over. On 8 September 2010, the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, with C.J. Effron and J. Baker dissenting, denied the filing of a writ appeal petition out of time. The majority writes:
In support of the motion for leave to file writ-appeal petition out of time, Denedo’s counsel explained that he “erroneously believed that this case was governed by Rule 19(a)(1)(B),” which provides sixty days from the date of the decision at the CCA for filing a petition for review with this court.
Appellate defense counsel requests this court suspend Rule 19(e) pursuant to our authority under C.A.A.F. Rule 33, which states “[f]or good cause shown, the Court may suspend any of these rules in a particular case, on application of a party or on its own motion, and may order proceedings in accordance with its direction.” In our view, neither the fact of the previous Supreme Court review of Denedo’s case, nor the Padilla case are relevant to our analysis as to whether there was good cause for a late filing. Counsel’s claim that he erroneously believed that this court imposed a sixty day deadline for the appeal of writ-appeal petitions does not provide us with the requisite good cause for suspending the deadline for filing a writ-appeal.
Here is a link to some of the charge sheets through The News Tribune.
The Guardian (UK) has this report:
Twelve American soldiers face trial over an secret "kill team" that allegedly blew up and shot Afghan civilians at random and collected their fingers as trophies.
Five of the soldiers are charged with murdering three Afghan men who were allegedly killed for sport in separate attacks this year. Seven other soldiers are accused of covering up the killings as well as a violent assault on a new recruit who exposed the murders when he reported other abuses, including members of the unit smoking hashish stolen from civilians.
San Diego Online has this short piece on the Coast Guard boating case and the ongoing Article 32, UCMJ, hearing which began today.
Lawyers for the driver of a Coast Guard boat that killed an 8-year-old San Diego boy in December said the Coast Guard is prosecuting Petty Officer 3rd Class Paul Ramos in order to duck responsibility, and a lawsuit.
“The family is rightly suing the Coast Guard,” said Navy Cmdr. Brian Koshulsky, one of Ramos’ military attorneys. “It’s in the Coast Guard’s interest to blame my client.”
Here are some interesting tidbits from the CAAF orientation session for new attorneys courtesy of NIMJ.blog.
As for the rules changes, a big (and quite welcome, in my opinion) change is the new system in which nearly all CAAF pleadings are eligible for electronic filing. Be sure to redact privacy/sensitive information from such filings, as final briefs will be placed on CAAF’s webpage, starting this term.
Other changes make the already small needle’s eye to SCOTUS more microscopic for military appeals. While CAAF judges previously granted review of all appeals in which the appellant was serving 30 years or more in confinement, that is no longer the policy. Furthermore, for cases that come back to CAAF after a remand to the CCAs, CAAF will no longer automatically grant review of the case.
Here is an interesting technology case from the Third Circuit as reported by the Wall Street Journal blog.
Technology has made it increasingly easy for the government to track an individual’s whereabouts.
But on Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the Third Circuit ratcheted back the government’s surveillance power, finding that judges have the right to require warrants before police get cell phone records that could pinpoint a customer’s location. Clickhere for the AP story; here for the Legal Intelligencer story; herefor the opinion, written by Judge Dolores Sloviter.
And now for the political question doctrine.
See fn. 2., I believe at one point Mr. Jensen was complaining that the military judge wasn’t going to apply any “civilian” cases.
See fn. 3., for the judge’s rather sparse treatment of the de facto officer doctrine.
And now for some history. Those with some basic familiarity with military law and who have been following the blogs of those with military law experience will recognize the cases cited.
Court-Martial Trial Practice Blog
