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Earlier comments on this subject are here and here.

In particular here is the new NCIS policy.  NCIS video/audio taping is not new as this report suggests — Naval Criminal Investigative Service: Fraud Interview Policies Similar to Other Federal Law Enforcement Agencies (Letter Report, 04/07/97, GAO/NSIAD-97-117).

In fiscal year 1996, NCIS agents videotaped 56 interviews and 23 interrogations, 51 (or 65 percent) of which involved child abuse cases.  Most of the remaining videotapings involved cases of assaults, homicides, and rapes.  NCIS fraud agents said that they audiotape very few interviews.

Courtesy of CAAFLog the agenda is online.

You can register and pay your $50.00 online here at the JAA website.

Unfortunately they have not yet posted specifics of the location of the Symposium at GMU Law.

2010 Judicial Conference and Continuing Legal Education Program
March 10 – 11, 2010
The Catholic University of America
Columbus School of Law
3600 John McCormack Rd, NE
Washington, DC

September 17, 2009
The Supreme Court: Past and Prologue A Look at 2008 and October 2009 Terms
10:30 am – 7:00 pm, Cato Conference
To celebrate Constitution Day and the publication of the eighth volume of the annual Cato Supreme Court Review.

DC Conference on the SCOTUS certiorari process

The Yale Law School Supreme Court Advocacy Clinic and The Yale Law Journal Online, the forthcoming online platform of The Yale Law Journal, will host a half-day conference, "Important Questions of Federal Law": Assessing the Supreme Court’s Case Selection Process, on September 18, 2009, at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. The conference will consider the nature and causes of changes in the Supreme Court’s docket in recent years, as well as suggestions for reform of the certiorari process. The conference is made possible by the generous support of the Oscar M. Ruebhausen Fund.

Uncertified drug dog was still qualified by track record

The government [just barely] showed that the drug dog and the handler were "well qualified" (Illinois v. Caballes). While the dog was certified through 2006, it was not certified since, but its general reliability was enough. [Essentially, the handler can make the dog qualify by testifying to a good track record.] United States v. Colon-Arenas, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 77953 (N.D. Ind. August 25, 2009).

/tip fourthamendment.com.

The Air Force says an Alaska-based airman has been sentenced to 90 days confinement and 90 days hard labor for malingering — intentionally hurting oneself to avoid deployment.

Army Times, 3 September 2009.

Here is a link to the brief in Briscoe v. Virginia.  The case is a follow on to Crawford and Melendez-Diaz. 

Here is the Issue as reported by SCOTUSWiki.

Briscoe v. Commonwealth of VA:  If a state allows a prosecutor to introduce a certificate of a forensic laboratory analysis, without presenting the testimony of the analyst who prepared the certificate, does the state avoid violating the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment by providing that the accused has a right to call the analyst as his own witness?

For whatever reason it appears the military will stop (or reduce) profiling of journalists covering matters in Afghanistan.  Here’s:

Kevin Baron, Stars and Stripes, Mideast edition, Monday, August 31, 2009

RELATED STORIES:

• Army used profiles to reject reporters
• Pentagon: Reporter profiling under review
• Files prove Pentagon is profiling reporters
• Journalists’ recent work examined before embeds
• In the newsroom: Military puts its spin on PR story

ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. military is canceling its contract with a controversial private firm that was producing background profiles of journalists seeking to cover the war that graded their past work as “positive,” “negative” or “neutral,” Stars and Stripes has learned.

“The Bagram Regional Contracting Center intends to execute a termination of the Media Analyst contract,” belonging to The Rendon Group, said Col. Wayne Shanks, chief of public affairs for International Security Assistance Forces–Afghanistan. 

A decorated U.S. Soldier, from the State of Texas, filed suit today in U.S. Federal Court in Washington DC against a British Contractor for injuries sustained during a reckless shooting incident in Iraq.

Former U.S. Army Sergeant Kadim Alkanani is suing London-based Aegis Defence Services Limited, for an incident on June 3, 2005, in which Aegis contractor’s opened fire without warning on Sergeant Alkanani’s unit moments after they had passed through a check point on their return to base, thereby injuring Sergeant Alkanani and ending his promising military career.

Sgt. Alkanani was stationed in Iraq at the time and was a decorated soldier and a recipient of many awards, including the National Defense Service Medal, The Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, the Iraq Campaign Medal, the Army Services Ribbon, the Overseas Service Ribbon, and the Armed Forces Reserve Medal.  (Note, none of these are personal awards and are given to every soldier based on time or location of service).

NMCAA’s decision in United States v. Johnson, NMCCA 200900141 (N.M. Ct. Crim. App. 25 August 2009), nicely sets out the courts view of when and how bad language is subject to prosecution as indecent.  A totality of the circumstances factual and contextual test must be used it seems.

The precise parameters of what constitutes indecent language have been the subject of considerable debate over the years.

The court examined the impact of United States v. Brinson , 49 M.J. 360 (C.A.A.F. 1998) and United States v. Negron, 60 M.J. 136 (C.A.A.F. 2004).  In Negron the court stated that prospectively: