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Criminal Law

Southern Criminal Law and Justice

News and analysis of criminal law and justice issues within the 11th Circuit.
By Adam Levin, Benjamin Goldberg, and Garrett Nail

Post Frequency: 0.1/day

Last Entry: January 26, 2008 at 00:19:03

Down Until Further Notice

Posted on January 26, 2008
This website is on hiatus until further notice.

Failure to File a 5K1.1 Is a Violation of Due Process If. . .

Posted on September 04, 2007
The failure to file a 5K1.1 downward departure is a violation of Due Process if the government's reason for refusing to file is to punish a defendant for exercising his 6th Amendment Right to a jury trial. The case, US v. Dorsey, was remanded to the district court to give Dorsey an opportunity to establish a substantial showing that the refusal to file the 5K1...

Basham on the 11th's Recording Policy

Posted on September 02, 2007
Howard J. Basham, author of the blog How Appealing and an appellate lawyer, writes about the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals' recording policy. Currently, the 11th Circuit allows access to recordings of their proceedings for "counsel's personal use" and the "exclusive use of the court...

Wanted: Two Amazing Civil Rights Advocates

Posted on September 01, 2007
Chris Adams of the Capital Defender's Office and Gerry Weber of the ACLU are both leaving their posts as leaders of their respective offices. From 2005-2006, I had the opportunity to work as a clinic student in the Office of the Georgia Capital Defender...

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What Is Driving Georgia's Indigent Defense Budget Debate?

Posted on August 29, 2007
Greg Bluestein, the best criminal law newsman in the 11th Circuit, writes about the impetus behind the Indigent Defense Joint Study Committee: the skyrocketing costs of the defense for Brian Nichols. Just to be clear, I think the costs are completely justified in that they are largely a response to the prosecution's expenditures and refusal to place LWOP on the table...

Premier Public Defense Training

Posted on August 29, 2007
The Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC) is up and running. It's an organization, according to their own website, "committed to providing training to new public defenders throughout the south." Frequently, new public defenders are thrown into heavy caseloads with little knowledge of what it means to be a public defender, or how to provide zealous representation to poor folk...

GA Public Defender Financial Woes 101

Posted on August 28, 2007
Greg Land of the Fulton County Daily Report does an incredible job of summarizing the myriad of financial woes facing Georgia's public defenders. Some highlights:By law, the council is restricted from requesting more than the revenue generated by certain fees and add-ons collected by superior courts and paid into a dedicated fund, which may not be used for any other purpose...

Southeastern Highway Patrols Gear-Up for Holiday Constitutional Violations

Posted on August 26, 2007
Georgia and several other bordering states are participating in Hands Across the Border, a DUI enforcement project, which runs for the six days leading up to the Labor Day weekend and coincides with other DUI enforcement projects (e.g. Operation Zero Tolerance)...

Fulton Co. Strip Search Case Takes a Big Hit

Posted on August 23, 2007
A number of inmates at the notorious Fulton County Detention Center filed Section 1983 claims against various entities and people associated with the running of the jail. The 11th Circuit released a 60 page opinion complete with charts, gutting most of the claims and leaving only the claims against former Sheriff Barrett in her individual capacity.

Kennesaw to Fight Pro-Gun Law

Posted on August 23, 2007
Kennesaw is set to challenge, via lobbying, a state law prohibiting local governments from telling folks where they can and cannot take their guns. Specifically, Kennesaw would like to prohibit guns in their parks. (See here and scroll down to 66-2)...

Judge Has PD Arrested for Failing to Have Case Ready for Trial in 24 Hrs

Posted on August 22, 2007
You've probably heard by now . . . ABC is reporting that an Ohio Public Defender was ordered arrested because he was unprepared on a case to which he was assigned one day prior to the trial. Others (Simple Justice and A Public Defender) have written better items on the matter, but I had to get this off my chest...

Please Welcome Of Counsel

Posted on August 18, 2007
Of Counsel is now up and running. An earlier post on Of Counsel:I?d like to add other Southern states to the roundup, and would be welcome to add other contributors who wouldn?t mind helping out. I?ll try and figure out how to throw in other rulings of note...

11th Cir. to Rehear Garey En Banc - Could Spell Trouble for the 6th Amendment

Posted on August 16, 2007
I wrote about U.S. v. Garey here. The 11th Circuit has agreed to an en banc rehearing. Garey, who was eventually convicted of charges related to a number of bomb threats, had expressed concerns with his then lawyer, who worked in one of the buildings he was alleged to have threatened...

New Articles on SSRN

Posted on August 15, 2007
New articles are up on SSRN. There's an interesting cross-over article covering labor law and the collateral consequences of a felony conviction and an article about what happens to the people that have been acquitted in the international criminal court.

Faking Death to Avoid Court . . . .

Posted on August 08, 2007
Steven Haun was facing charges related to exposing himself to two girls. So he did what any industrious, boat-owning criminal defendant with a snowball's chance in hell of winning his case would do: he took some unsuspecting friends out on the boat, had them tow him on a raft with a 100 foot line in the middle of the night in the Gulf of Mexico, shed his life vest to trick the friends into thinking he had fallen from the raft, swam to a nearby island where he had stashed a jet-ski, and went on the lam for a bit...

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