Ohio

Threes strikes laws - the Ohio proposal

Posted on June 04, 2008
Over the next few months, we’ll find out if Chevonne Ecclestone and Todd Torok are going to become the Polly Klaas and Richard Allen Davis of Ohio.  As I discussed last week, Klaas was the little 12-year-old girl whose kidnap, rape, and murder by Davis led to the enactment of California’s three strikes law back in [...

I hate when I do that

Posted on June 03, 2008
If you’re looking for a new post today, this is it.  I actually did two yesterday; page down, and you’ll find them.  The one right after this was supposed to appear on Wednesday; the weekly Case Update is right after that. Still getting the hang of this…  Anyway, a brand, new post for tomorrow, on the [...

Case Update

Posted on June 02, 2008
Our Watch on the Potomac continues:  at least one Supreme Court opinion is expected tomorrow.  Still on tap:  the decision on the gun rights case, which I discussed here; forfeiture by wrongdoing under Crawford (here); and the FCC’s “fleeting expletives” policy (here)...

Updates on some stuff

Posted on June 02, 2008
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned in my Case Update that there were no decisions from the 8th District.  Somewhat surprising, considering that they usually churn out about fifteen to twenty cases a week.  (According to my BFF Lexis, there were more reported cases out of the 8th District last year than the 1st [...

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Friday Roundup

Posted on May 30, 2008
Some light reading.  If I was a bright guy, I’d probably spend some time over at the Social Science Research Network reading “An Empirical Analysis of the Confirmation Hearings of the Justices of the Rehnquist Natural Court.”  Then again, maybe not...

Three Strikes Laws - The Golden State Experience

Posted on May 29, 2008
Timing is everything.  After the murder of his daughter by a parolee in 1992, California resident Mike Reynolds had been pushing the state legislature to adopt harsher laws on repeat offenders, without success.  Then a year later little 12-year-old girl named Polly Klaas was kidnapped, raped, and murdered...

A cry for help

Posted on May 28, 2008
Back in January, I did a post about the oral argument in the Ohio Supreme Court that week in the case of State v. Hairston, in which the 10th District had affirmed a 134-year sentence for a defendant convicted of three home robberies.  I’d predicted that the Court would have little trouble upholding the sentence, [...

Case Update

Posted on May 27, 2008
We’re still on standby for US Supreme Court decisions; if any come out today, we’ll have something on them later this week.  Down in Columbus, the Ohio Seven affirmed a 134-year prison sentence for a home robber, but there was an interesting concurrence; we’ll talk about that tomorrow...

Friday Roundup

Posted on May 23, 2008
Reason No. 38 why I don’t practice divorce law.  There must have been some sweaty palms over on the 3rd floor of the Lakeside courthouse, home to the Cuyahoga County Domestic Relations Division, in the wake of the Ohio Supreme Court’s decision the other day in Disciplinary Counsel v...

When a win isn’t

Posted on May 22, 2008
A win is a win is a win. At least, that’s what the appellate attorney in State v. Swann must have figured.  The defendant had been convicted of felonious assault, and at trial he’d attempted to present evidence that another person had confessed to the shooting, under the “declaration against interest” exception to the hearsay rule [...

Catching up with the 8th

Posted on May 21, 2008
A number of interesting decisions out of the 8th District this past week, vaguely reminiscent of the final scene in Carrie, where Carrie’s hand emerges from the grave to grab the arm of one of the survivors of the prom massacre. Okay, so it wasn’t anything like that...

Supreme Court decisions

Posted on May 20, 2008
Several decisions by the US Supreme Court yesterday, although none that are probably of much interest to my legions of faithful readers.  In one case, the Court upheld the right of states to exempt their own municipal bonds from taxation, while taxing those of other states...

Case Update

Posted on May 19, 2008
As I mentioned last week, it’s that time of year, when from now until the third week of June the US Supreme Court will be rolling out opinions every Monday.  There’s still some big ones to come, including the gun rights case out of DC, whether the death penalty can be imposed for child rape, [...

Friday Roundup

Posted on May 16, 2008
And yo momma’s fat, too.  From the transcript of a Michigan magistrate’s sentencing of a 20-year-old defendant for being a minor in possession of alcohol: “I don’t mean to be offensive, but you have two Operating While Intoxicated convictions and then you blow a ...

Sentencing Reform

Posted on May 15, 2008
A year or so ago, I had an oral argument in the 8th District on a sentencing issue, specifically, what the post-Foster standards for sentencing were.  In the middle of my argument, one of the judges on the panel interjected, “Wasn’t the real effect of Foster to abolish appellate review of sentences?” Last week, in State [...

Blogiversary: Your lyin’ eyes

Posted on May 14, 2008
The single most frequent cause of innocent people being convicted of crimes is mistaken identification.  This has been known for the better part of the past century, and it’s not getting any better.  The Innocence Project examined 174 cases of wrongful conviction (DNA evidence showed the defendant was innocent), and found that almost three-quarters of [...

Morality Tale

Posted on May 13, 2008
You tell me when this started to sound like a bad idea. Back in 2004, Kenneth Daniels was representing a criminal defendant, Erica French, in Hardin County, Kentucky.  Erica, it turns out, had some information of value in another case.  The prosecutor in that case, Robert Stevens, had approached her about testifying in the other case...

Case Update

Posted on May 12, 2008
Down in DC, the Supreme Court’s concluded oral arguments for the term.  Between now and the third week of June, expect a raft of decisions, probably the biggest being Heller v. DC, the gun rights case. Down in Columbus, there was another sentencing decision...

Friday Roundup

Posted on May 09, 2008
The AG Blues.  With Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann rebuffing demands for resignation, Ohio’s pols are contemplating impeachment as a course of action.  As the Columbus Dispatch notes, legislators are going to have to read up on the process; Dann would be the first statewide Ohio elected official ever to be impeached and removed...

My expertise

Posted on May 08, 2008
I offered the county a deal one time with my appointed criminal cases:  I’d forego billing for the stuff I actually did, if they’d take the caps off and I got to charge them for all the time I spent sitting around waiting for something to happen...

What’s on tap in Columbus

Posted on May 07, 2008
No, I’m not talking about the Marc “Drag Me Out Kicking and Screaming” Dann Deathwatch, where Vegas has pegged the over/under on his resignation at four days.  I’m talking about what’s going on at the Ohio Supreme Court, where eight cases are being argued this week...

Case Update

Posted on May 05, 2008
The only case out of DC this past week was the Court’s 6-3 affirmance of Indiana’s voter identification law, in Crawford v. Marion County.  Scotusblog has  an analysis of the case, if you’re interested. I don’t usually do anything with 6th Circuit cases, although I probably should...

consecutive sentencing

Posted on May 05, 2008
There were a couple of decisions on consecutive sentencing last week.  One, State v. Caraballo, was pretty straightforward.  The defendant had pled guilty to two counts of rape and two counts of gross sexual imposition.  He may or may not have had cases pending in Missouri and in Summit County as well — the record [...

Friday Roundup

Posted on May 02, 2008
And I thought being a Methodist was complicated.  The wonders of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, Congress’ attempt back in 1997 to protect religious freedom from government interference, was on full display last week in a case out of the 7th Circuit...

Indictments and mens rea

Posted on May 01, 2008
I spent a fair amount of time yesterday talking about the Supreme Court’s decision last week in State v. Blackburn.  Then again, when do I not spend a fair amount of time talking?  Today’s note will be shorter, though; the subject, State v...

Speedy Trial - Carryover prosecutions

Posted on April 30, 2008
The Ohio Supreme Court handed down a couple of criminal law decisions in the past few weeks.  One has relatively narrow impact; the other could have substantial significance.  I’ll talk about the latest speedy trial case today, and a decision on the mens rea requirements in indictments tomorrow...

Arrests and the 4th Amendment

Posted on April 29, 2008
A couple months back, I had a case where the police got a call from a gas station saying that my client was annoying customers.  The police responded, and saw my client standing by a building across the street.  They searched him and found some crack...

Case Update

Posted on April 28, 2008
Today’s menu features Virginia v. Gray, a notable US Supreme Court decision on search and seizure, which I’ll discuss in more detail tomorrow.  Closer to home, their Ohio counterparts handed down Columbus v. Kim, upholding that city’s noise ordinance against a claim of unconstitutionality, concluding that whatever one’s standards of “unreasonably loud” was, it was met [...

Friday Roundup

Posted on April 25, 2008
Russ’ Excellent Adventure.  As I told you earlier this week, I spent yesterday morning in Cincinnati in oral argument before the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.  Actually, it wasn’t “the morning”; it was about ten minutes.  I was one of ten defendants’ counsel sharing ninety minutes of oral argument about the events of the ten-week trial of [...

Cry me a (burning) river

Posted on April 24, 2008
They’s had all they can take in the City of Brotherly Love, and they’s not gonna take no more: Four veteran criminal defense lawyers sued the city and its court system yesterday, contending that fees paid to court-appointed lawyers for indigent defendants were “grossly inadequate” and that, as a result, defendants were being denied their constitutional [...

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