Criminal Procedure

No warrant is needed for records showing general location of prior cellphone calls, 5th Circuit says

A federal appeals court has ruled that the federal government doesn’t need a warrant to obtain historical data showing the general location of cellphone calls. The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the constitutionality of a provision of the Stored Communications Act that allows the government to…

Aug 1, 2013 11:35 AM CDT

Witness harassment has gone digital, and the justice system is playing catch-up

Not long after a 30-year-old Cleveland woman witnessed a man being fatally shot in the back, the gunman’s friends tracked her down and threatened her about testifying against him. At first, they intimidated her the old-fashioned way. As she walked home one day, a friend of the suspect came up…

Aug 1, 2013 9:40 AM CDT

Courts in a muddle over 4th Amendment’s community caretaking exception

Some view it as a monstrous leviathan that could devour much of search-and-seizure protections. Others view it as simply a common-sense, rational justification for what police must do when performing emergency functions. Either way, the community caretaking exception to the Fourth Amendment has prompted confusion among courts over whether it…

Aug 1, 2013 8:09 AM CDT

DNA from arrested suspects is like any valid booking process, SCOTUS says

At February’s oral argument in Maryland v. King, about whether the police may take samples of DNA from people arrested for certain crimes, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said it was “perhaps the most important criminal procedure case this court has heard in decades.” He suggested that such DNA swabs…

Aug 1, 2013 8:00 AM CDT

Lawyer accused of killing ex-wife on Italian cruise can be tried in California, judge rules

A California judge has ruled he has jurisdiction to try a lawyer accused of killing his ex-wife and throwing her overboard while on a cruise off the coast of Italy. Judge Gregg Prickett of Orange County stayed his ruling to allow an appeal by the defendant, Lonnie Loren Kocontes, report…

Jul 30, 2013 12:09 PM CDT

US won’t seek death penalty for Snowden, Holder tells Russians

Attorney General Eric Holder wrote in a letter this week to the Russian government that National Security Agency systems analyst Edward Snowden won’t face the death penalty if he returns to the U.S. The letter, dated July 23 and sent to Alexander Vladimirovich Konovalov, the Russian minister of justice, follows…

Jul 26, 2013 6:42 PM CDT

Forensics review reveals hair evidence was possibly exaggerated in 27 capital cases

A review of thousands of FBI laboratory files has uncovered 27 death penalty cases in which experts may have exaggerated the reliability of hair analysis. FBI lab reports dating back to at least the 1970s assert that hair analysis can’t be used to make a positive identification, but some FBI…

Jul 19, 2013 10:45 AM CDT

‘Fnu Lnu’ defendants cause confusion for courts and at least one reporter

Fnu Lnu is an acronym rather than a name, but the fact isn’t always apparent. There are hundreds of people in the court system identified as Fnu Lnu, which means “first name unknown, last name unknown,” the New York Times reports. Some Fnu Lnus are never identified, but that doesn’t…

Jul 15, 2013 3:45 PM CDT

Zimmerman prosecutor fires IT director who testified about missing exculpatory material

The prosecutor in the George Zimmerman case has fired an information technology director who testified he was concerned that the office had failed to give exculpatory materials to defense lawyers. IT director Ben Kruidbos learned about his dismissal in a letter dispatched by the managing director of the office overseen…

Jul 15, 2013 1:52 PM CDT

Pretrial strategy in Zimmerman case may have been gambit to assert stand-your-ground in civil suits

George Zimmerman’s lawyers may have been thinking about the possibility of a future civil suit when they decided not to pursue a stand-your-ground hearing before their client’s criminal trial. The defense could have asked a judge to dismiss the criminal case based on Florida’s stand-your-ground law, which allows the use…

Jul 15, 2013 12:24 PM CDT

NSA oversight flawed by lack of legal adversaries, former FISA judge says

Testifying Tuesday during a federal oversight hearing aimed at scrutinizing secret government surveillance, former federal judge James Robertson said that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court is independent. But he said its oversight is flawed because of a lack of legal adversaries to confront the government’s actions. “Anyone who has been…

Jul 9, 2013 6:25 PM CDT

Police use of SWAT tactics has gotten out of hand, says author (podcast)

In this podcast, Balko explains how his investigations led to his new book, "Rise of the Warrior Cop: The Militarization of America's Police Forces," and what the militarization trend might mean for the country.

Jul 8, 2013 6:15 PM CDT

Even if ex-NFL player Hernandez didn’t fire gun, prosecutors will deal with others, lawyer predicts

An “interesting choice of words” by a prosecutor during a Massachusetts court hearing last week suggests that authorities may believe someone other than Aaron Hernandez actually fired the five shots that killed Odin Lloyd. But whether or not the government thinks the former New England Patriots tight end was the…

Jul 3, 2013 5:52 PM CDT

How did America’s police become a military force on the streets?

Editor’s Note: In a remarkable speech at the National Defense University in May, President Barack Obama signaled an end to the war on terrorism; maybe not an end, it turns out, but a winding down of the costly deployments, the wholesale use of drone warfare, and even the very rhetoric…

Jul 1, 2013 10:10 AM CDT

Chemerinsky: Silence is not golden, Supreme Court says

A person may not invoke the right to remain silent by being silent and not responding to police questions. That seemingly oxymoronic statement was the holding in Salinas v. Texas, (PDF) which the U.S. Supreme Court issued June 17. The result is that unless a person explicitly invokes the right…

Jun 25, 2013 6:15 PM CDT