Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

After defendant was found guilty of the lesser-included offense of possession with intent to distribute a detectable amount of PCP, he appealed the denial of his motion to suppress. The court concluded that defendant was seized when the officer touched him and instructed him to "hold on" and defendant complied. In this case, no reasonable person in defendant’s position and subject to the officer's directives would have believed that he was free to go on about his business. The Government asserts that defendant walked quickly toward a certain neighborhood, made furtive gestures, and recognized the police. Based on the facts on the record, the court concluded that the officers had no reasonable, articulable suspicion justifying their stop of defendant. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Castle" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of conspiring with her boyfriend to extort money from a prominent doctor with whom defendant had previously had an affair. The district court denied defendant's ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim, holding that defendant was not prejudiced by trial counsel’s failure to introduce expert testimony on battered woman syndrome. The district court therefore did not need to (and did not) decide whether counsel’s performance was constitutionally deficient. The court concluded, however, that defendant was prejudiced by trial counsel’s failure to introduce expert testimony on battered woman syndrome. In this case, the duress instruction would have given jurors a legal basis upon which to vote not guilty, and the expert testimony on battered woman syndrome would have supported both elements of defendant’s duress defense. The factors here add up to a reasonable probability that the jury would have had a reasonable doubt respecting guilt if expert testimony on battered woman syndrome had been presented at defendant’s trial. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded for the district court to decide whether counsel was constitutionally deficient in failing to present such testimony. View "United States v. Nwoye" on Justia Law

Defendants Knight and Thorpe were convicted of charges related to the kidnapping and burglary of a couple. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the District of Columbia prosecutes both federal offenses and most D.C. Code offenses. It may prosecute combined federal and D.C. Code charges in either U.S. District Court or D.C. Superior Court. The court concluded that there was no Speedy Trial Act, 18 U.S.C. 3161(b), violation. In this case, because the January arrests were for D.C. Code offenses, those arrests did not trigger the Speedy Trial Act’s 30-day clock. Therefore, the court affirmed as to the Speedy Trial Act issue. The court affirmed Thorpe's sentence and concluded that his sentence was procedurally and substantively reasonable. Finally, the court remanded for the district court to address Knight’s and Thorpe’s claims of ineffective assistance of counsel in the first instance. View "United States v. Knight" on Justia Law

Defendants plead guilty to conspiracy to interfere with commerce by robbing a liquor store in violation of the Hobbs Act, 18 U.S.C. 1951. Defendants argued that undercover police officers instigated the use of firearms in the reverse sting operation leading to their arrest. The court concluded that the district court did not err in applying the five-level enhancement under USSG 2B3.1(b)(2) for possession of a firearm where the actual possession of a firearm is not a prerequisite to application of the enhancement for inchoate offenses, such as the robbery conspiracy in this case. Furthermore, the record amply supports the district court’s finding that defendants intended that firearms would be possessed during the robbery and that such possession was reasonably foreseeable. The court agreed with defendants, however, that the case must be remanded for the district court to address whether the alleged police introduction of firearms into the conspiracy was sentencing entrapment. Finally, the court found no merit in defendant Hopkins' other challenges. View "United States v. McKeever" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of possessing with intent to distribute twenty-eight grams or more of cocaine base and possession of a firearm by a felon. On appeal, defendant challenged his sentence. The court concluded that the district court clearly erred in considering, as an aggravating factor, evidence that defendant was involved in an unrelated gunfight. The court could not conclude that the consideration of the evidence did not have a substantial and injurious effect or influence on defendant's sentence. Accordingly, because the error was not harmless, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Kpodi" on Justia Law

Appellant, convicted of six counts of bank robbery and one count of attempted bank robbery, appealed the denial of his 28 U.S.C. 2255(a) motion based on the ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC). Appellant contends that his booking photograph was obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and had his counsel moved to suppress it, there wouldn’t have been sufficient evidence to sustain a conviction. Because the FBI had probable cause to arrest him for bank robbery, appellant’s Fourth Amendment argument for suppression is not meritorious and, therefore, his ineffective assistance of counsel claim fails. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Stubblefield" on Justia Law

Appellants contend that the district court erred in denying their motions to suppress, relying on the court's subsequent decision in United States v. Glover. In Glover, the court reiterated the distinction drawn by the Supreme Court between two of the grounds for suppression of wiretap evidence under 18 U.S.C. 2515. The court held that a wiretap order is "insufficient on its face," where it fails to identify the Justice Department official who approved the underlying application, as required by Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, 18 U.S.C. 2518(4)(d). Accordingly, the court reversed the denial of the motions to suppress. The court otherwise affirmed the judgment, concluding that appellants' remaining contentions are meritless. View "United States v. Scurry" on Justia Law

Under a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA), the government formally initiates prosecution but agrees to dismiss all charges if the defendant abides by negotiated conditions over a prescribed period of time. This case arises from the interplay between the operation of a DPA and the running of time limitations under the Speedy Trial Act, 18 U.S.C. 3161-3174. In this case, after Fokker voluntarily disclosed its potential violation of federal sanctions and export control laws, the company and the government entered into an 18-month DPA, during which Fokker would continue cooperation with federal authorities and implementation of a substantial compliance program. In accordance with the DPA, the government filed criminal charges against the company, together with a joint motion to suspend the running of time under the Act pending assessment of the company’s adherence to the agreement’s conditions. The court held that the Act confers no authority in a court to withhold exclusion of time pursuant to a DPA based on concerns that the government should bring different charges or should charge different defendants. Therefore, the court vacated the district court’s denial of the joint motion to exclude time under the Act. The court granted the government’s petition for a writ of mandamus and remanded for further proceedings. View "United States v. Fokker Servs. B.V." on Justia Law

Defendant was sentenced to a four-year prison term for violating a condition of his supervised release. The district judge then revoked defendant's term of supervised release and imposed a 30-month term of imprisonment for the original offense that was to run consecutive to the four-year sentence. The court concluded that the district court committed plain error by erroneously invoking the Sentencing Guidelines in effect at the time of sentencing and imposing the revocation term as consecutive to rather than concurrent with the new sentence. Accordingly, the court vacated the post-revocation sentence as violating the Ex Post Facto Clause and remanded for resentencing. View "United States v. Head" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction for multiple counts of drug crimes resulting from his role in a phencyclidine (PCP) distribution ring. Defendant raised multiple challenges to his conviction, almost all of which are without merit. The court addressed two arguments in full. First, the court rejected defendant's claim that the government failed to adequately authenticate and prove chain of custody for the samples tested at the DEA laboratory and used to show defendant's constructive possession of the PCP; and second, the court rejected defendant's claim that the district court erred in admitting portions of a DEA Investigator's testimony as a summary witness where any such error was harmless. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Mitchell" on Justia Law