Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Petitioner, convicted of child rape and other related crimes, sought state post-conviction relief, alleging that his trial lawyers denied him effective assistance of counsel in failing to notify him of, or counsel him about, a pre-trial plea offer. After conducting evidentiary hearings, the state court refused to grant him post-conviction relief. Petitioner then petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court and that court granted the petition. Under the deferential standard the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. 2254, required, the court was unable to disrupt the state court's finding that it was not reasonably probable that such a plea would have been entered here. Accordingly, the court reversed the judgment of the district court. View "Merzbacher v. Shearin, et al" on Justia Law

This case involved the 18 U.S.C. 2703(d) orders pertaining to the Government's request for records of electronic communications relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation. The underlying facts of the investigation related to the unauthorized release of classified documents to WikiLeaks.org, and the alleged involvement of a U.S. Army Private First Class. At issue was the public's right to access orders issued under section 2703(d) and related documents at the pre-grand jury phase of an ongoing criminal investigation. Because the court found that there was no First Amendment right to access such documents, and the common law right to access such documents was presently outweighed by countervailing interests, the court denied the request for relief. View "In re: 2703(d) Application" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction and sentence for crimes related to his involvement in an investment scheme which resulted in nearly $100 million dollars in losses for investors. The court held that defendant's Fifth Amendment rights were not violated where the government limited its case to events occurring while defendant was an owner of A&O to simply prove a more narrow conspiracy than was charged in the superseding indictment. Because the conspiracy proven was within the scope of those alleged in the unredacted indictment, the narrowing at most created a non-fatal variance. Finally, the court rejected defendant's claims that his sentence was procedurally and substantively unreasonable. Accordingly, the court affirmed the convictions and sentence. View "United States v. Allmendinger" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of two firearm offenses: (1) making a false statement that was material to the lawfulness of a firearm sale, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 922(a)(6); and (2) making a false statement with respect to information required to be kept in the records of a licensed firearms dealer, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 924(a)(1)(A). On appeal, defendant challenged the denial of his motion to dismiss the indictment and the denial of his motion to suppress evidence. Concluding that the court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 1291, the court held that the district court properly denied defendant's motion to dismiss the indictment because, by virtue of the bold-print warning on the ATF Form 4473, defendant was on notice that he was not the actual buyer of the handgun if he was purchasing it for someone else. The court also held that the district court did not err in declining to suppress the receipt concerning defendant's transaction with his uncle where the warrant at issue was supported by probable cause and the court rejected defendant's challenge to the scope of the search warrant. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Abramski, Jr." on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of murder and various drug and firearm offenses in connection with a drug distribution conspiracy. On appeal, defendant argued that the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing exception to the Confrontation Clause, upon which the district court relied in admitting the victim's statement, did not apply unless a criminal defendant's sole motivation in making a witness unavailable was to prevent that witness's testimony. The court held however, that so long as a defendant intended to prevent a witness from testifying, the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing exception applied even if the defendant also had other motivations for harming the witness. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Jackson" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm. On appeal, defendant challenged the district court's denial of his motion to suppress the firearm that was the basis of the conviction. The court held that the district court did not err in concluding that the officer possessed a reasonable suspicion that defendant was trespassing at the time of the Terry stop. The court rejected defendant's argument that the officer's decision to stop him for investigatory purposes was unreasonable because other less intrusive investigatory techniques could have been used because the issue had already been considered and rejected by the Supreme Court. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Bumper" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm. The court reversed his conviction because of a post-trial change in law effected by United States v. Simmons and remanded the case for further proceedings. Defendant was again convicted and appealed on double jeopardy grounds. The court held that defendant's argument failed in light of United States v. Ellyson, where the court had concluded that where a reviewing court determined that the evidence presented at trial had been rendered insufficient only by a post-trial change in law, double jeopardy concerns did not preclude the government from retrying the defendant. Accordingly, the court found no error and affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Ford" on Justia Law

Defendants conspired to steal cocaine from a stash house of a drug cartel but were arrested just before they could attempt to complete the object of their conspiracy. The stash house and the cocaine never existed, but were rather a fiction created by undercover law enforcement officers. Each defendant was convicted on several counts related to his participation in the conspiracy and defendants raised several challenges on appeal. The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying defendants' motions to sever, and that Defendant Min's redacted confession was properly admitted against him with a limiting instruction. The court joined its sister circuits in holding that factual impossibility was not a defense to conspiracy and therefore rejected defendants' arguments that the factual impossibility of the robbery they conspired to commit rendered their convictions legally insupportable. The court also found that the evidence was more than sufficient to establish the amount of cocaine defendants conspired to possess, as well as their possession of firearms in furtherance of the conspiracy. The court further held that the detective's testimony, which was rationally based on his own personal perception, was properly admitted. The court could find no reason to overturn any of defendants' convictions. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Min" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his convictions of armed robbery and brandishing a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence. The court held that the government's effort to craft a freestanding "resemblance testimony" carve-out from settled eyewitness evidence jurisprudence was unavailing, and that the government's examination of the bank teller witness under the circumstances here resulted in the elicitation of unnecessarily suggestive evidence of identification wholly lacking reliability. Nevertheless, the court declined to find reversible error where the error in admitting the testimony did not affect defendant's substantial right to a fair trial. The court also held that the district court did not err in failing to give a Holley-Telfaire instruction. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Greene" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted by a jury of possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of ammunition by a felon. On appeal, defendant challenged the district court's denial of his motion to suppress because his incriminating statement was the product of an illegal detention. The court held that defendant's three-hour detention constituted an unlawful custodial arrest in violation of his Fourth Amendment rights; the taint of the unlawful custodial arrest was not purged by the two Miranda warnings provided during his detention or by any intervening circumstance; and the erroneous admission of defendant's statement was not harmless error. Accordingly, the court vacated the convictions and remanded to the district court. View "United States v. Watson" on Justia Law