Court-Martial Trial Practice

I have already posted about IAC prior to trial in connection with GP’s.

Here’s a case, Ostrander v. Green, 46 F.3d 347 (4th Cir. 1995) – from the Fourth no less — that is very interesting because it makes clear there is a different standard of review that Strickland.

In its first opinion, the district court applied the wrong legal standard to Ostrander’s ineffective assistance claim. It used the Strickland v. Washington[, 466 U.S. 668 (1984),] test instead of the more specific Hill v. Lockhart[, 474 U.S. 52 (1985),] standard for guilty pleas induced by ineffective assistance. There is a significant difference between the tests. Under Strickland, the defendant shows prejudice if, but for counsel’s poor performance, there is a reasonable probability that the outcome of the entire proceeding would have been different. Under Hill, the defendant must show merely that there is a reasonable probability that he would not have pled guilty and would have insisted on going to trial.

The Ottawa Citizen reports on a new publication.  The title of the new piece is, Former Office ‘amazed’ he stayed sane during court martial.

Former infantry officer Robert Semrau, who was dismissed from the Canadian Forces for shooting a severely wounded Taliban insurgent on an Afghan battlefield, has ended a two-year silence with the publication of a new book.

The book, The Taliban Don’t Wave, attempts to place the controversial events of Oct. 19, 2008, into a broader context. Slated to be published later this month, the 312-page book details the stress, horrors and heroics of Semrau’s four-month tour of duty in Afghanistan, which ended with his arrest on a charge of second-degree murder.

Proposed 18 USC § 3014, Duty to Disclose Favorable Information and Commentary

Many recent cases have exposed the fact that federal prosecutors, whether through negligence or by design, all too often fail to abide by their constitutional duty to disclose information favorable to the defendant. To help ensure fairness in federal criminal proceedings, the Board of Directors of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) has endorsed model legislation drafted by NACDL’s Discovery Reform Task Force that would require the government to disclose all information favorable to the accused in relation to any issue to be determined in a federal criminal case.

• Read the combined legislation and commentary. (PDF)

Here is an interesting post from one of my favorite sites – federalevidence.com

Testimony by arresting officer from defendant’s suppression hearing (regarding what the officer saw as the only witness to the defendant’s confession to the charged crime) should not have been admitted as FRE 804(b)(1) former testimony in defendant’s subsequent drug distribution conspiracy trial; the defense did not have a similar motive in questioning the officer during the suppression hearing (e.g., as to show the alleged confession was not voluntary and therefore inadmissible), as the defendant would have during the trial on the merits (in examining the officer about the substance of the defendant’s alleged confessional statements), in United States v. Duenas, __ F.3d __ (9th Cir. Aug. 16, 2012) (Nos. 09-10492, 09-10496).

This case focuses on the issue of counsel’s motive in confrontation at a prior hearing.  I’m not so sure that this case helps exclude prior testimony from an Article 32, UCMJ, investigation, but . . .

http://verdict.justia.com/2012/08/17/teaching-and-learning-about-united-states-v-alvarez-the-stolen-valor-act-casehttp://verdict.justia.com/2012/08/17/teaching-and-learning-about-united-states-v-alvarez-the-stolen-valor-act-case