Appellate Law

CA1: experts in warrant applications

By S. COTUS

US v. LaFortune. No. 06-1699 affirms a conviction in a child pr0n case.  The main objection raised by the defendant is that in reviewing an application for a search warrant, the magistrate lacked "informed lay opinion, evidencing some kind of basic technical familiarity with virtual imaging and giving specific reasons why the proffered depictions could readily be ruled out as artificial creations."  The says that United States v. Syphers, 426 F.3d 461, 467 (1st Cir. 2005) (our coverage here) doesn?t require an expert opinion, but provides dicta as to ?best practices,? and that United States v. Rodriguez-Pacheco, 475 F.3d 434 (1st Cir. 2007) (our coverage here) ?never suggested that such expert opinion testimony was required to support a factfinder's determination that the image at issue depicted real rather than virtual children.?

Objections to enhancement of his sentence based on 18 U.S.C. § 2251(e) (prior conviction) are rejected for predictable reasons.

Full post as published by Appellate Law and Practice on March 18, 2008 (boomark / email).