Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff-Appellant David Becker was pulled over by Defendant-Appellee Officer Jason Bateman in a parking lot in Heber City, Utah. A confrontation ensued which ended in Plaintiff being thrown to the ground and suffering a severe traumatic brain injury. Plaintiff brought suit against Officer Bateman, the Heber City Chief of Police in his official capacity, and Heber City under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging Officer Bateman used excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment. He also asserted a claim for loss of consortium. The district court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment, concluding Officer Bateman did not violate Plaintiff's constitutional rights. Because the violation of constitutional rights Plaintiff asserted was not clearly established at the time of the violation, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s grant of summary judgment to Officer Bateman. However, the district court erred in concluding there were no genuine issues of material fact as to whether a constitutional violation occurred. The grant of summary judgment in favor of the City was therefore reversed. On remand, the district court must determine whether Plaintiff can withstand summary judgment as to the second element of his municipal liability claim. Similarly, the district court must determine whether Mrs. Becker could maintain a cause of action for loss of consortium against the City in light of the Court's ruling that a reasonable jury could conclude Plaintiff's constitutional rights were violated. View "Becker v. Bateman" on Justia Law

This appeal arose from a crime committed over thirty years ago - the rape and murder of a teenager near an isolated dam outside of Carlsbad, New Mexico. Several young men were convicted of the crime, including Petitioner-Appellee Carl Case. Those convictions were upheld by the state courts in New Mexico both on direct and collateral review, and Petitioner's first habeas petition in federal court was denied. In 2008, he filed an application for permission to file a second habeas petition with the Tenth Circuit. He claimed constitutional error occurred at trial based on the discovery of new and previously undisclosed evidence involving a trial witness, and the recantation of trial testimony by two prosecution witnesses nearly twenty years after the trial. Upon careful review of the trial court record, the Court was "satisfied" that Petitioner's due process rights were not violated and that he received a fundamentally fair trial. The Court was also satisfied that the newly discovered evidence did not require a new trial. Accordingly, Petitioner court not satisfy the requirements of 2244(b)(2)(B). Because of that, his application for permission to file a second or successive habeas petition was denied. View "Case v. Hatch" on Justia Law

Defendant-Appellant Amanda Addison and Melody St. Clair were tried for embezzling or converting funds from Northern Arapahoe Tribe’s Department of Social Services (DSS). On the third day of trial, the trial judge declared a mistrial as to St. Clair only and excluded her from the courtroom for the remainder of the trial. Addison was convicted. She appealed, raising two issues: (1) whether the exclusion of St. Clair violated Addison’s Sixth Amendment right to a public trial; and, (2) the evidence was sufficient to demonstrate criminal intent. Because the district court had a substantial reason for excluding St. Clair, no Sixth Amendment violation occurred. The evidence was sufficient to prove her knowing and intentional taking of DSS funds. Accordingly, the Tenth Circuit affirmed. View "United States v. Addison" on Justia Law

Defendant-Appellant Robert Garcia appealed a district court order that denied his motion to suppress evidence obtained from a search of his residence. On appeal, he argued that the warrant was invalid because: (1) it was stale; and (2) the address on the warrant did not match that of his residence. Upon review, the Tenth Circuit concluded that the warrant was executed before it became stale and within the time constraints of the federal rules. Further, because the warrant adopted the supporting affidavit's description of the residence, "the address mismatch [was] of no consequence." View "United States v. Garcia" on Justia Law

Former inmate Plaintiff-Appellee Tracy Keith filed a civil rights complaint pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging violations of her rights under the Eighth Amendment. Plaintiff was an inmate at the Topeka Correctional Facility between November 2006 and May 2010. While there, she participated in a vocational training program. Her instructor, Ananstacio Gallardo, engaged in unlawful sexual acts with her in 2007, and she became pregnant as a result. The Topeka Police Department then conducted an investigation which ultimately led to Mr. Gallardo pleading guilty to a charge of unlawful sexual relations and two charges of trafficking contraband. In 2011, Plaintiff filed a civil rights complaint alleging that prison employees violated her constitutional rights. Specifically, she alleged that Defendants created and allowed a policy or culture of sexual misconduct at the prison which placed her at substantial risk of harm, failed to take reasonable measures to abate the culture of sexual misconduct, and were deliberately indifferent to this substantial risk of harm. The district court granted qualified immunity to all remaining Defendants except Richard Koerner, the former warden, and Mr. Gallardo and entered a default judgment against Mr. Gallardo. Mr. Koerner appealed the district court's denial of his motion for qualified immunity. Upon review of the matter, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the denial of qualified immunity. View "Keith v. Koerner, et al" on Justia Law

Petitioner Shawn Battle filed a motion for sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. 3582(c)(2) following Amendments 750 and 759 to the United States Sentencing Guidelines, which retroactively adjusted his advisory Guidelines range. The district court granted the motion in part, granting a two-level reduction rather than the four-level reduction Petitioner requested. Although the court found at Petitioner's first sentencing that he was responsible for more than 1.5 kilograms of crack cocaine, the court did not make a specific quantity finding. At resentencing, the court held that Petitioner was responsible for 3.4 kilograms. Upon review, the Tenth Circuit rejected Petitioner's argument that the district court was barred from engaging in supplemental calculations of drug quantity in the 3582(c)(2) proceeding. However, the Court agreed that the record of the original sentencing, including the district court’s prior findings, did not support the attribution of 3.4 kilograms. Accordingly, the Court reversed and remanded the case for resentencing. View "United States v. Battle" on Justia Law

Defendant Michael Lee Wilson was convicted of first-degree murder and robbery with a dangerous weapon in Oklahoma state court and sentenced to death. The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (OCCA) ordered dismissal of his robbery conviction but affirmed his murder conviction and death sentence. Defendant sought a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma, but the district court denied his application. The Tenth Circuit affirmed in part, but vacated and remanded for an evidentiary hearing on Defendant's claims that he received ineffective assistance of counsel at the sentencing phase of his trial. After holding the evidentiary hearing, the district court ruled that Defendant had failed to establish that his trial counsel had performed deficiently or that counsel's alleged failures had affected the outcome of the penalty phase, and it denied the writ. The district court granted Defendant a certificate of appealability (COA) on his ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim, and Defendant appealed. In light of the evidence presented at the hearing before the district court, the Tenth Circuit concluded Defendant did not show that he was prejudiced by the alleged deficiencies in his counsel's performance at trial. The Court therefore affirmed the denial of Defendant's habeas application. View "Wilson v. Workman" on Justia Law

Defendant Paul Everett Rich, III, pled guilty to one count of felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. Because he had been convicted of three predicate offenses, he qualified for enhanced punishment under the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA), and was sentenced to the mandatory minimum of 180 months' imprisonment. Defendant appealed the sentencing enhancement claiming: (1) his juvenile adjudication was "dismissed" by Oklahoma courts and should not have been counted as a prior conviction under the ACCA; and (2) the ACCA violated substantive due process by considering these older, juvenile adjudications. Disagreeing with Defendant's arguments on appeal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed his sentence enhancement. View "United State v. Rich" on Justia Law

A Wyoming Highway Patrol trooper stopped Defendant Lee Vang Lor for speeding in 2007. After gaining consent to search the vehicle, the trooper found methamphetamine. The district court denied Defendant’s motion to suppress the methamphetamine, and Defendant entered a conditional guilty plea to one count of possessing methamphetamine with intent to distribute and one count of conspiracy. The district court sentenced him to 121 months' imprisonment. The Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of the suppression motion. Defendant then filed a pro se petition to vacate his sentence under 28 U.S.C. 2255 on the basis of newly discovered evidence: that the Wyoming Highway Patrol terminated the trooper who stopped Defendant because the trooper called in a false dispatch report after Defendant’s arrest but before his suppression hearing. Defendant argued this evidence would have undermined the trooper's testimony at Defendant's suppression hearing and that he was therefore entitled to a new hearing. The district court denied Defendant's 2255 petition. Defendant subsequently appealed. "A defendant is not deprived of a full and fair opportunity to litigate simply because he does not discover all potentially relevant evidence until after his suppression hearing. . . . Absent ineffective assistance of counsel or government concealment, a defendant cannot claim that the mere existence of undiscovered material evidence deprived him of an opportunity to litigate his claim." Finding no error in the district court's order, the Tenth Circuit affirmed. View "United States v. Lor" on Justia Law

Defendant Patrick Merrill Brody was convicted, after a jury trial, of willful failure to file a tax return in 2001. He was sentenced to ten months' imprisonment and filed this appeal to challenge both his conviction and sentence. Primary among the arguments Defendant raised on appeal was the insufficiency of the evidence presented against him at trial and that the trial court erred in calculating his sentence. Finding the evidence sufficient to support the sentence the trial court correctly calculated, the Tenth Circuit affirmed Defendant's conviction and sentence. View "United States v. Brody" on Justia Law