Criminal Law

A prison so nice people "want to break in"?

Posted on June 27, 2008
In Nacogdoches the Utah-based private prison firm Management and Training Corporation hopes to construct a new immigration detention facility reports the Daily Sentinel ("Federal prison proposed for Nacogdoches," June 26). As usual, boosters portray the project as all but a dream come true, both boon to the economy and source of civic pride for the town...

SCOTUS worried about wrong 'spectacle' when prosecuting mentally ill defendants

Posted on June 27, 2008
Having focused so much on the Rothgery and Kennedy cases in recent days, I failed to update readers on the outcome of another SCOTUS case I've been waiting on, Indiana v. Edwards. The US Supreme Court last week declared by a 7-2 majority (see the opinion) that mentally ill defendants can be denied the right to represent themselves in court...

Rothgery ruling "trumped" counties leeway to delay counsel appointments

Posted on June 26, 2008
From Texas Lawyer, more clues about the impact of the recent Supreme Court ruling in Rothgery and whether it will require Texas counties to appoint counsel earlier in the process ("Released defendants to get speedier access to counsel," June 26): Wesley Shackelford, special counsel for the Texas Task Force on Indigent Defense, says the Supreme Court's ruling in Rothgery defines when "adversarial judicial proceedings" are initiated under Texas law -- an issue Shackelford says has not been totally clear since the Texas Legislature passed the Fair Defense Act in 2001...

How many innocents in prison: Exonerations make up 3% of Texas DNA case resolutions

Posted on June 26, 2008
It's hard to say if the data reflect a rate or percentage of wrongful convictions, but more than 3% of criminal cases solved by DNA since Texas began using the forensic technology have resulted in overturned convictions. Somehow I'd missed the news announced earlier this year that Texas solved its 1,000th criminal case using DNA...

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You don't suppose Judge James Nowlin is a UT alum?

Posted on June 26, 2008
My esteem for US District Judge James Nowlin increased after reading this recent order (pdf), found via the inestimable Eugene Volokh in a post from earlier this month. Wrote Nowlin: Apparently, the parties are unable to agree if the deposition of Wal-Mart's corporate representative should occur in San Antonio, Texas or in Bentonville, Arkansas...

BREAKING NEWS: Patrick Waller latest Dallas DNA exoneree; case shows need for 'blind' administrators for police lineups

Posted on June 26, 2008
Hot of the presses, the Dallas County District Attorney's Office issued a press release at 8:22 p.m. this evening announcing yet another innocent Dallas man has been exonerated by DNA evidence and will soon be released 16 years after his wrongful conviction and incarceration...

A possible explanation for Rothgery confusion

Posted on June 25, 2008
Folks are still trying to figure out what the Rothgery case decided by SCOTUS this week really means. A perhaps helpful insight comes from the blogger at South Carolina Criminal Defense Lawyer, who points out that:this was not an appeal from a criminal conviction...

Death penalty in Texas' 'Jessica's Law' not viable after SCOTUS' Kennedy decision

Posted on June 25, 2008
SCOTUSBlog reports that the US Supreme Court's ruling in the Kennedy case out of Lousiana bars states from legislating the death penalty for the crime of child rape "when the victim does not die and death was not intended." The 5-4 ruling written by swing-man Justice Anthony Kennedy will invalidate a portion of Texas' new "Jessica's Law" statute, which included the death penalty for the second offense...

CCA backs off changes to attorney-client privilege rule

Posted on June 25, 2008
The first dead-tree coverage of a proposed change to the Texas attorney client privilege rule didn't arrive until after the idea was retracted. The Court of Criminal Appeals last week backed off a proposed change to Texas' attorney client privilege rule in response to complaints generated in the blogosphere...

Dallas County data-entry errors could lead to more wrongful arrests like Walter Rothgery's

Posted on June 24, 2008
Why should anyone care if the Dallas County Sheriff has flaws in its data entry for crime reporting or allows uncredentialed people from using the system? You might ask Walter Rothgery, the Gillespie County defendant who was falsely accused of being a felon in possession of a firearm when he had no prior felony conviction...

Mental health and school finance implicated in TYC policies

Posted on June 24, 2008
Two otherwise unrelated stories about the Texas Youth Commission show how interconnected the agency and its facilities are at a fundamental level both with other social service agencies and the communities they serve.First, the Texas Observer blog wonders if the Texas Youth Commission can ever be fixed as long as it remains a dumping ground for the failures of schools and the indigent mental health system...

Asset-forfeiture dependent Sheriff views Hwy 77 as a "piggy bank"

Posted on June 24, 2008
Not long after the Texas State Senate held an informative hearing on law enforcement's use and misuse of asset forfeiture funds, NPR's John Burnett offered up this report I'd missed giving a global overview on the topic, but profiling specifically the Kleberg County Sheriff, who called US Hwy 77 a "piggy bank...

Austin Reentry Roundable seeking input on policy priorities

Posted on June 23, 2008
Tomorrow night (Tuesday, June 24) the Austin Travis County Re-Entry Roundtable invites the public to contribute to crafting the group's 2009 legislative agenda, via email:The Austin/Travis County Reentry Roundtable invites you to join us for our upcoming "Policy Reform" community forum...

YFZ Ranch dispute far from over

Posted on June 23, 2008
Grits' coverage has died down but that doesn't mean everything's over regarding the Great Eldorado Polygamist Roundup. Though I find myself with little to add beyond what's been said already, here's some recent coverage that may interest Grits readers:Fort Worth Star Telegram: Polygamist sect fights back by emerging from isolationLondon Times: What next for polygamists?Salt Lake Tribune: Was FBI probe in 1980s lost chance to curbe FLDS leaders?Salt Lake Tribune: Jeffs daughter wants to ditch her attorneySan Angelo Standard Times: CPS, judge threatened American foundationAP: Cost of raid tops $14 millionThe Spoof: Polygamists to replace same sex couples in Ikea ads (satire)The Common Room: FLDS June 22

SCOTUS to Texas: Provide counsel earlier in process

Posted on June 23, 2008
Via SCOTUSBlog, the US Supreme Court today issued its ruling in Rothgery v. Gillespie County (see the opinion and the SCOTUSWiki on the case), in which the majority held that:A criminal defendant?s initial appearance before a magistrate judge, where he learns the charge against him and his liberty is subject to restriction, marks the initiation of adversary judicial proceedings that trigger attachment of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel...

What does Rothgery really mean?

Posted on June 23, 2008
Lots of talk in the legal blawgosphere about what today's Rothgery decision from SCOTUS really means:Gideon at A Public Defender says the Rothgery ruling is narrower than I've portrayed, while TalkLeft interpreted the outcome more as I did.Orin Kerr at the Volokh Conspiracy thinks Rothgery raises as many questions as it answers...

Chronicle oversells rise in burglaries from Uniform Crime Reports

Posted on June 22, 2008
When the latest Uniform Crime Statistics came out, I mentioned that because of the poor quality of the data and the lack of contextual information, one should be wary of promoting misinterpretations of the data by singling out one area that increased and claiming it represents a crime problem...

Traveling Open Thread

Posted on June 21, 2008
I'm leaving town for a couple or three days and blogging will be light. Consider this an open thread to let me know what Texas criminal justice subjects deserve Grits readers' attention.

Overburdened parole system failing to meet minimum monitoriing requirements: Audit blames old computers

Posted on June 21, 2008
This blog frequently discusses how Texas' full jails, overcrowded prisons and high caseloads for probation officers make it difficult to closely oversee offenders, moderate rising costs, and focus on rehabilitation. In the parole system, too, they're singing a familiar song: Too many parolees under supervision by too few officers...

Isett: TYC could be 'sunsetted'

Posted on June 21, 2008
Not much detail in the article, but the Lubbock Avalanche Journal reports that Sunset Commission Chair Carl Isett says the Texas Youth Commission may be either "phased out or restructured," as well as the Texas Transportation Commission.Sen. John Whitmire has been proposing to "abolish TYC," but like Isett hasn't given precise details what that might mean other than to shift responsibility for managing most delinquent youth to the counties, presumably funded from the state budget...

Steroid use negligible among high school jocks; what about testing police?

Posted on June 20, 2008
After a Texas law passed demanding steroid testing for high school athletes, I argued the program wasted money and ignored more seriously problematic classes of steroid users, particularly in law enforcement where the state has a more compelling interest in preventing illicit steroid use...

Houston's Ron Taylor case demonstrates worst possible outcome from forensic errors

Posted on June 20, 2008
The third exoneree convicted with flawed evidence from the Houston crime lab received word this week of his pardon by Texas Governor Rick Perry, the Houston Chronicle reported today ("Ron Taylor says pardon brings new meaning to life," June 20):Ronald Gene Taylor on Thursday broke free of the bonds of the wrongful rape conviction that has defined his life for 15 years after receiving news of a pardon confirming his innocence...

Was Rockwall DA's fall from grace a singular failing or part of a pattern?

Posted on June 20, 2008
The resignation sent from a jail cell by former 2001 Texas "Prosecutor of the Year," Rockwall County DA Ray Sumrow, ends another sad saga of corruption by an elected official and leads me to reflect on how many recent high-level law enforcement types we've seen get into trouble recently:Bexar County Sheriff: Resigned to avoid prosecution for bribery related to the commissary...

Conflict Alert: Author accepts new gig promoting innocence policy reforms

Posted on June 19, 2008
A reader alerted me to the publication of a Texas House Research Organization interim report (pdf) on the subject of a proposed Innocence Commission and other reforms aimed at preventing false convictions. The HRO article gives a good overview for the uninitiated, as to the range of opinions and examples about what an "innocence commission" can become in its most useful incarnations or in its least effective ones...

Preparing for the price tag of Texas prisons

Posted on June 19, 2008
As Congress focuses on costs of the drug war, I was interested to receive notice of this brief and informative Texas Public Policy Foundation podcast titled "Preparing for the price tag of Texas prisons," featuring an interview with TPPF criminal justice policy analyst Marc Levin...

Congress interrogates economic cost of drug policy

Posted on June 19, 2008
I'm listening online right now to an interesting Congressional hearing from the US Joint Economic Committee (see the hearing page here), via Sentencing Law & Policy.Congressman Jim Webb in his opening statement declared that marijuana is now California's most lucrative cash crop, surpassing even winemakers' profits, and that 4/5 of illegal marijuana fields in California are owned by Mexican drug cartels...

American guns fueling Mexican cartel violence

Posted on June 19, 2008
Speaking of the Mexican justice system, our neighbors to the South would have a lot easier time getting crime and drug running under control if the United States didn't allow massive trafficking of guns southward, often in the same vehicles used to bring drugs north...

Mexico approves shift to more open, adversarial court system

Posted on June 19, 2008
Truly historic news from south of the Rio Grande this morning, via AP:President Felipe Calderon on Tuesday signed landmark judicial legislation that allows U.S.-style public trials and creates a presumption of innocence for the accused.Under the long-awaited constitutional amendments, guilt or innocence no longer will be decided behind closed doors by a judge relying on written evidence...

Demagoguing Amarillo Sheriff joins ranks of "clowns" "scumbags" and "maggots" he railed against

Posted on June 18, 2008
Potter County Sheriff Mike Shumate has been convicted of bribery and yesterday was sentenced to six months jail time and eight years on probation. Reported the Amarillo Globe News:He called them clowns, scumbags, maggots and idiots. He said he'd load criminals on a bus to jail where they would meet "Bubba," a fictional cellmate...

The Dead Messenger: "You do not falsely lock up people and call yourself human."

Posted on June 18, 2008
I'm not sure why there's been no MSM coverage, but whistleblower Sheri Simonelli at the Bexar County adult probation department was fired last Friday after going public with evidence that a private urinalysis lab had changed its protocols in a way that encouraged "false positives" that were then used for detention decisions...

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