Results matching “first”

The Muddy Waters of Miller

November 3, 2020 3:20 PM | Posted by Steve Erickson

Today the Court heard arguments in Jones v. Mississippi.  Although I have not read the briefs in detail, the central issue is whether the "permanent incorrigibility" dicta announced in the landmark case of Miller v. Louisiana requires a finding of that fact by the trial court in order to sentence a juvenile to LWOP.  The case presents two issues, that speak to the difficulty of the Miller holding. 

First, and perhaps most apparent, is that if the Court holds such a finding is required, how would it be defined and applied?  Reasonable people can differ in what constitutes permanent incorrigibility and as the Court has said previously, it is not bound by psychological science in defining legal concepts.  

Thank goodness.    

Continue reading The Muddy Waters of Miller.

Abolish the Police?

December 27, 2019 11:02 AM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger

Some ideas of the soft-on-crime crowd are simply misguided, but some are so bizarre as to make one question their sanity. Christopher Rufo has this article in the City Journal, with the above title, on one of the latter variety.

Continue reading Abolish the Police?.

News Scan

December 27, 2019 10:19 AM | Posted by Michael Rushford
CA Has The Most Porch Pirates:  Three of the top ten regions with the most porch piracy are in California according to SafeWise, a national security system rating company.  Julia Barajas of the Los Angeles Times reports that the San Francisco metro area ranks #1 in the nation for its level of packages stolen off of porches.  The Los Angeles metro area ranked 9th, while the Sacramento metro area 10th.  The other regions in the ranking were Salt Lake City, Portland, Oregon, Baltimore, Seattle-Tacoma, Chicago, Austin, Texas and Denver.  What other factors link these places?  Well, the entire state of California has embraced sentencing reform, essentially decriminalizing theft and drug use.  Seattle, Baltimore, and Chicago have also weakened the penalties for so-called "low level" property crimes and drug use.  The Mayors of each of the cities belong to the same political party as are all of the governors of their home states but Texas and Utah.  As reported earlier, the progressive Mecca of San Francisco has the highest per-capita level of property crime of the nation's 20 largest cities.    

Most Alabama Officers Killed in Three Decades:  2019 was a deadly year for police officers in Alabama with six officers shot and killed by criminals.  The Associated Press reports that the total was the highest for the state since 1987.  Five of the six officers were killed with stolen guns. "None of the guns were in the hands of people who should have had them," according to the head of the state's ATF bureau.  A seventh Alabama officer died in a car crash while responding to a burglary.  Nationally, 128 police officers have been killed in the line of duty over the first 51 weeks of 2019.   

Robocalls

December 26, 2019 9:01 AM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
All I want for Christmas is to stop the damn robocalls.

Congress passed the Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence (TRACED) Act last week, and the President is expected to sign it. Ryan Tracy and Sarah Krouse report for the WSJ on what the act will and won't do.
Continue reading Robocalls.

Venue at 30,000 Feet

December 23, 2019 1:37 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
The Ninth Circuit has granted rehearing en banc in an interesting venue case, United States v. Lozoya, No. 17-50336. The panel decision is here. The case involves a charge of misdemeanor simple assault occurring somewhere over the Great Plains on a flight from Minneapolis to Los Angeles. A garden-variety dispute between passengers escalated to a physical blow.

Where should this case be tried? (Sounds like a law school exam question.) It is more complicated than you might think.
Continue reading Venue at 30,000 Feet.

Supreme Court Takes Excessive Force/Seizure Case

December 19, 2019 11:29 AM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
In 1985, the Supreme Court decided that a police officer's use of a level of force that the Court deemed excessive--despite being authorized by state law and consistent with a rule going back to the common law and widely adopted by the states--was an "unreasonable seizure" in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The case was Tennessee v. Garner, 471 U.S. 1. Under that case and its progeny, before a federal court can get into the question of how much force is "reasonable" it must first find a "seizure."

In a nutshell, a person is seized if either (1) he is physically stopped by the police action, or (2) he stops in obedience to the police show of authority. CJLF last briefed this issue in the Eighth Circuit case of Johnson v. Ferguson. See our brief and the post on the decision.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court took up a case presenting this issue, Torres v. Madrid, No. 19-292.
Continue reading Supreme Court Takes Excessive Force/Seizure Case.

How High? Adjusting California's Cannabis Taxes

December 18, 2019 2:17 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
California's Legislative Analyst's Office issued this report with the above title yesterday.

Proposition 64 (2016) directed our office to submit a report to the Legislature by January 1, 2020, with recommendations for adjustments to the state's cannabis tax rate to achieve three goals: (1) undercutting illicit market prices, (2) ensuring sufficient revenues are generated to fund the types of programs designated by the measure, and (3) discouraging youth use.... While this report focuses on cannabis taxes, nontax policy changes also could affect these goals.
Continue reading How High? Adjusting California's Cannabis Taxes.

USCA1 Hears Boston Marathon Bomber Case

December 12, 2019 4:05 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit heard oral argument today in the case of the surviving Boston Marathon Bomber, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. Jon Kamp has this report for the WSJ. Looks like the main issues are change of venue and jury selection. There is also an argument about the defense's attempt to introduce evidence implicating the older brother in another murder, but the probative value of that seems quite weak.
Continue reading USCA1 Hears Boston Marathon Bomber Case.

Supreme Court Argument Ignores Major Issue on Juries in Capital Sentencing

December 11, 2019 11:25 AM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
Today, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in the case of McKinney v. Arizona, No. 18-1109. The transcript is here.

Regrettably, an essential issue in the case was barely mentioned. The attorney for McKinney said, "This Court's decisions in Ring and Hurst require a jury sentencing." That is wrong, yet the attorney for Arizona completely failed to challenge it. The consequences could be catastrophic.

Continue reading Supreme Court Argument Ignores Major Issue on Juries in Capital Sentencing.

Manner v. Method of Execution

November 26, 2019 1:38 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
Last week, Federal District Judge Tanya Chutkan issued a preliminary injunction preventing the U. S. Attorney General from carrying out executions for federal capital crimes. DOJ promptly appealed. See this story in the WSJ by Jess Bravin and Sadie Gurman.

The slender reed on which this injunction rests is Congress's use of the word "manner" rather than "method" in adopting the way executions are carried out in states.
Continue reading Manner v. Method of Execution.

Crime Up in New York Subways

November 22, 2019 9:13 AM | Posted by Michael Rushford
As Kent noted in yesterday's post, San Francisco's Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system has become a dangerous place for law abiding commuters.  Today, Jenna DeAngelis of CBS New York reports that crime is rising in that city's subway system.  The NYPD reported a 10.9% increase in assaults on subways over the past year.  Over the past three days there were six violent assaults including an attack with a hammer and two stabbings.  The city's Transit Workers Union logged a 40% increase in reported assaults on transit employees.  Political leaders In both San Francisco and New York have abandoned "broken windows" policing, which had allowed police to crack down on vandalism, drug dealing, turnstile jumping, and other misdemeanors.  The logic is quite simple; when you stop enforcing laws against crime the result is more crime.             
Continue reading Crime Up in New York Subways.

Violent Crime Doubled on BART in Four Years

November 21, 2019 2:35 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger

Taylor Kate Brown reports for the SF Chron, "Homicide, rape, assault and robbery have doubled on BART [the Bay Area Rapid Transit system] in the last four years -- from 234 incidents in 2015 to 481 incidents last year -- after six years of relative stability, according to state Department of Justice records."

Continue reading Violent Crime Doubled on BART in Four Years.

First Step Act Kills Providence Man

November 18, 2019 2:40 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
When the First Step Act was pushed through Congress, we knew that its expansive drafting was going to kill people. Troy Pine of Providence, Rhode Island died on October 2. The direct cause of death was stabbing, and a formerly life-sentenced former gang leader, Joel Francisco, has been charged with that crime. See this article by Brian Amaral in the Providence Journal. The indirect cause was the way the First Step Act was written.
Continue reading First Step Act Kills Providence Man.

San Francisco Votes to Descend Further Into the Sewer

November 12, 2019 5:15 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger

The late votes tallied in the San Francisco District Attorney race came in for the anti-law-enforcement candidate, Chesa Boudin. In essence, he is going to take all the policies that have trashed a once-beautiful city and gravely degraded the quality of life there and make them all worse.  Erica Sandberg has this article in the City Journal.


Boudin pledged to stop taking first-offense drunk drivers to trial, providing they didn't injure anyone. He promised to end gang enhancements, part of a California law that adds additional prison sentences to defendants who participate in violent street gangs. As for quality-of-life crimes that harm communities, he's been open about ignoring them, stating that "crimes such as public camping, offering or soliciting sex, public urination, blocking a sidewalk, etc., should not and will not be prosecuted."
So if a drunk driver, previously caught, plows into you and leaves you paralyzed from the neck down, the DA will shrug and say, "Gee, well, he didn't hurt anyone last time he was caught driving blind drunk, so we let him go and let him continue driving. Your lifetime paralysis is a small price to pay for the wonderfulness of second chances."

The word "sewer" in the title of this post is partly figurative and partly literal.
Continue reading San Francisco Votes to Descend Further Into the Sewer.

Cross-Border Shooting Case Argued in Supreme Court, Again

November 12, 2019 4:44 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
This morning, the U.S. Supreme Court heard argument for the second time in the case of Hernandez v. Mesa, numbered 17-1678 on its second trip to 1 First Street.

A USDOJ investigation of the incident found that Sergio Hernandez and his companions were human smugglers attempting an illegal border crossing. When Agent Jesus Mesa detained one of the group, the others pelted him with rocks. Agent Mesa fired from the U.S. side of the border, and Hernandez was killed on the Mexico side. DOJ determined that Agent Mesa acted in accordance with policy.

Hernandez's parents have pursued a suit for years, alleging that he was just an innocent boy playing an innocent game when a "rogue" officer gunned him down for no reason. Because Agent Mesa and the Government are moving for judgment without a trial, these allegations are assumed to be true solely for the limited purpose of ruling on that motion. Some reports of the case mislead the public into thinking that the parents' improbable allegations are the actual facts of the case.

CJLF's amicus brief is here. Kimberly Robinson has this report on the argument for Bloomberg Law. Brent Kendall has this report for the WSJ.

San Francisco DA Election

November 8, 2019 2:24 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
See update at end.

San Francisco may (or may not) have dodged a bullet in its District Attorney election. California has largely avoided the wave of pro-criminal prosecutors being elected in a number of other cities thanks largely to California's system of non-partisan local elections. Elsewhere, the left-fringe candidates have won by winning the Democratic primary with a Soros-funded war chest in cities so heavily Democratic that the general election is a formality.

San Francisco might yet have a different result from the rest of the state, but its unusual ranked-choice system may have saved it from the worst candidate. That does not mean it will get the best, though. After all, it is San Francisco.
Continue reading San Francisco DA Election.

Misdemeanor Arrests Decline

October 15, 2019 9:13 AM | Posted by Michael Rushford
Studies indicate that misdemeanor arrests have dropped substantially over the past several years particularly in big cities.  Jacob Gershman reports in the Wall Street Journal that some experts see the drop as evidence of a "very deep reset of the fundamental relationship between police and public."  New York City saw misdemeanor arrests drop by 50% since 2010, with black men as the major beneficiaries.  In St. Louis the arrest rate for black men declined by 80% since 2005, while Los Angeles saw a 47% drop in misdemeanor arrests since 2008.  But as the article notes, many experts are confused about what is causing this drop. U.C. Irvine professor Alexandra Natapoff is probably correct in observing that "misdemeanor enforcement is much less sensitive to actual crime rates and influenced by changing political and cultural winds."  The annual numbers, even for reported felonies, is a lagging indicator which, while helpful in determining trends, does not accurately reflect the amount of crime in a given community. 
Continue reading Misdemeanor Arrests Decline.

Brainless Experts to the Rescue

October 9, 2019 8:59 AM | Posted by Michael Rushford
In a recent post, we reported on a new guidance by the New York Commission on Human Rights that declared that use of the term "illegal alien" was a form of harassment and that offenders could be fined $250,000.  Former civil rights attorney Hans Bader noted that this is a clear violation of the First Amendment, and that the term is commonly used in both federal statutes and Supreme Court decisions.  In a story in the Chicago Tribune reporter Cindy Dampier went to an "expert," Professor Claire Thomas, director of the Asylum Clinic at New York Law School, to correct this fallacy, "....it's commonplace knowledge that the term 'illegal alien' is pejorative," she says, "and that a person who wants to spread hate in this city of immigrants will face consequences."  The "expert" also pointed out another common misconception: That the term supposedly is not used in statutes and in legal circles. "The term illegal alien isn't a term that comes up in our laws," she says, noting that it does appear very rarely in pieces of federal legislation. "However, the term 'alien' is in our statutes, and you will hear people referred to as 'the alien,' when you are representing them."  Apparently, Professor Thomas' expertise does not include an understanding of Title 8 of the United States Code at 8 USC 1365 and 8 USC 1611. "Illegal alien" is also found in other statutes, like 6 USC 240, 13 USC 141, and 18 USC App. 1201 to 1203. That's at least 5 federal statutes, not to mention state laws as well. She also must have missed its use in Supreme Court rulings, such as Arizona v. United States (2012). 

Update:  In response to being called out for misleading the public in its story about the use of the term illegal alien, the Chicago Tribune prominently reposted the story as reported here.

News Scan

October 3, 2019 9:23 AM | Posted by CJLF Staff
Killer Juul: An article by CNBC reports that the Federal Prosecutors in California are issuing a criminal investigation against Juul, a high selling vaping company. Juul is a company that heavily advertises to teenagers and it is now coming into light as the death toll for Juul related illness rises. Statistics in this article indicate that "in 2016, more than 2 million U.S. middle school and high school students used e-cigarettes over a 30 day period", this is incredibly harmful to young children because it may stunt their brain development. This issue requires immediate attention because there is no way of knowing exactly what is in these Juul products that are causing lung illness and resulting in death. In a supporting article by CNBC, Mitch Zeller, director of the FDA center for tobacco products states, "there's no one compound, ingredient, constituent, including vitamin E acetate that is showing up in all of the samples" with this statement it is safe to say that all Juul products should be avoided until further information is released on what these products contain.

Oklahoma Court Upholds Death Sentence:  The Associated Press reports that Oklahoma's highest criminal court upheld the death sentence of Donnie Harris, who murdered his estranged girlfriend in 2012.  The Court's unanimous decision indicated that Harris and 25-year-old Kristi Ferguson had been in a tumultuous relationship when, late on February 18, 2012, the residents of a neighbor's home heard screaming on their front porch.  They found Ferguson nearly naked with severe burns over her body screaming in pain and Harris telling her to shut up.  First responders testified that Harris tried to keep Ferguson from telling them what happened, but she managed to say, "He did this to me. ... He threw kerosene on me and set me on fire."  Ferguson died 19 days later from second and third degree burns over 50% of her body.  Doctors testified that the pain associated with Ferguson's injuries would have been unimaginable.  Overwhelming evidence convinced the jury to find Harris guilty of pouring gasoline over the girl's body and setting her on fire, and unanimously recommend a death sentence.  Harris argued that he had not received a fair trial.   

An Easy End for Russell Bucklew

October 2, 2019 2:06 PM | Posted by Kent Scheidegger
Today's News Scan notes that Russell Bucklew was executed in Missouri yesterday. This well-deserved execution was delayed for an additional 13 years after the extended review of the judgment because of litigation over the method of execution. Bucklew's final claim was that his unusual medical condition created a risk of severe pain in a type of execution that is nearly painless for everyone else. This claim went to the Supreme Court, which rejected it by a 5-4 vote.

Alisa Nelson reports on the execution for Missourinet. The story says, "a Missourinet reporter served as a state witness of the execution." It does not say Ms. Nelson was the witness, but it reads like a first-hand account.

A line of curtains swung open in a dark room of state witnesses. Bucklew was in a room next door positioned on a gurney with a sheet over all but his head. He did not appear to say anything as the drug began working its way through his system. A few wiggles of the toes and a couple turns of the head was it, no choking or other sounds were heard or seen.
*      *      *
Continue reading An Easy End for Russell Bucklew.
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