Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff, a death row inmate, appealed the dismissal of his claims that the ADC policy and practice of inspecting inmates' outgoing legal mail violates his Sixth and First Amendment rights. The Ninth Circuit reversed and held that ADC's current inspection policy does not satisfy the standard articulated in Nordstrom v. Ryan, 762 F.3d 903, 906 (9th Cir. 2014) (Nordstrom I). The panel explained that the standard was not satisfied because the policy calls for page-by-page content review of inmates' confidential outgoing legal mail. The policy also does not satisfy the four-part test identified in Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89–91 (1987), because ADC did not produce evidence of a threat to prison security sufficient to justify its policy, and because feasible, readily available alternatives were apparent. View "Nordstrom v. Ryan" on Justia Law

The Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the deliberate fabrication of evidence by a state official; deliberate fabrication can be established by circumstantial evidence; deliberate fabrication can be shown by direct evidence; and, in cases involving direct evidence, the investigator's knowledge or reason to know of the plaintiff's innocence need not be proved. In this case, plaintiff introduced direct evidence of deliberate fabrication, specifically, evidence that Detective Sharon Krause deliberately mischaracterized witnesses' statements in her investigative reports. A jury found for plaintiff and against defendants, but the district court granted judgment as a matter of law to defendants based on the ground that plaintiff had failed to introduce evidence that Krause knew or should have known of plaintiff's innocence. The Ninth Circuit reversed and remanded, holding that the district court misunderstood the court's precedent. Because plaintiff introduced direct evidence of deliberate fabrication, he did not have to prove that Krause knew or should have known that he was innocent. Furthermore, defendants' other challenges to the jury's verdict failed. View "Spencer v. Krause" on Justia Law

Petitioner appealed the denial of his petition for habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. 2241, contending that a congressional appropriations rider prohibits the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) from using federal funds to incarcerate him and seeking release from custody to remedy the wrongful expenditure. The Ninth Circuit affirmed the denial of habeas relief, holding that petitioner voluntarily waived his right to bring this challenge through the collateral-attack waiver provision of his plea agreement. View "Davies v. Benov" on Justia Law

To secure a conviction for misprision of felony under 18 U.S.C. 4, the government must prove not only that the defendant knew the principal engaged in conduct that satisfies the essential elements of the underlying felony, but also that the defendant knew the conduct was a felony. In this case, defendant was convicted of misprision of felony based on her acts of concealing and failing to notify authorities of her business partner's submission of false statements to the USDA in connection with a federal grant application. The Ninth Circuit held that sufficient evidence supported the jury's finding that defendant had the requisite knowledge that her business partner's crime was punishable by more than a year in custody. View "United States v. Olson" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of wire fraud, mail fraud, false declaration before a court, escape, and contempt. The Ninth Circuit affirmed the convictions, holding that the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying defendant's motion for a new trial where defendant showed a lack of diligence by waiting to obtain the new evidence at issue; there was sufficient evidence to sustain defendant's mail fraud, wire fraud, and false declaration convictions; defendant was not deprived of a fair trial because prison officials disorganized his legal materials during trial when they moved him to a different location and because two jurors gave untruthful responses about their criminal history during voir dire; defendant's right to a fair trial was not violated where, under Faretta v. California, a trial court is permitted, but not required, to terminate an incorrigible pro se defendant's self-representation; the district court did not deny defendant a fair trial by allowing him to represent himself for the duration of the proceeding; and the district court did not err in denying defendant a competency hearing. View "United States v. Brugnara" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit previously affirmed the district court's denial of petitioner's claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at sentencing, but the panel remanded for consideration of his claims of ineffective assistance at trial and on direct appeal. After the district court denied these claims, petitioner sought review from the Ninth Circuit.In this appeal, the Ninth Circuit held that it need not consider petitioner's argument that the district court erred in determining that some claims were outside the scope of the Ninth Circuit's remand, because that determination does not affect the scope of the issues before the panel here; counsel was not ineffective for failing to adequately present an overall defense theory; counsel need not explore the possibility of a mental incapacity defense of impulsivity where such a defense would have been counterproductive; and petitioner's claim that trial counsel was ineffective during voir dire in failing to discover that a juror had been the victim of a violent crime that would have disqualified that juror was also without merit. The panel denied a certificate of appealability as to all other claims and affirmed the district court's judgment. View "Greenway v. Ryan" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit filed an order granting in part and denying in part a petition for panel rehearing, and denying on behalf of the court a petition for rehearing en banc. In 2016, the court filed an opinion affirming defendant's conviction and sentence for multiple counts of conspiracy, armed bank robbery, and use of a firearm during a crime of violence. The Ninth Circuit vacated the sentence and remanded for resentencing, in light of the Supreme Court's intervening decision in Dean v. United States. The Court in Dean said that nothing in 18 U.S.C. 924(c) restricts the authority conferred on sentencing courts by 18 U.S.C. 3553(a) and the related provisions to consider a sentence imposed under section 924(c) when calculating a just sentence for the predicate count. View "United States v. Thomas, Jr." on Justia Law

Walter Liew and his company, USAPTI, challenged eight counts of conviction under the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 (EEA), 18 U.S.C. 1831(a), for charges related to their unauthorized use of DuPont chloride-route technology for producing titanium dioxide. Defendants also appealed their convictions for conspiracy to tamper with witnesses and evidence. The Ninth Circuit held that the district court did not err by giving a jury instruction regarding compilations; by rejecting a public-disclosure instruction; and by rejecting the reverse engineering and general knowledge instructions. The Ninth Circuit also held that defendants waived their right to have their argument related to the conspiracy and attempt instructions reviewed; even if this issue were reviewable, an intervening Ninth Circuit decision resolved it (United States v. Nosal). The Ninth Circuit rejected challenges to the sufficiency of trade secret evidence regarding substantive trade secret counts. However, the Ninth Circuit reversed defendants' convictions as to conspiracy to obstruct justice where the statement at issue tacked too close to a general denial to constitute obstruction of justice, and as to witness tampering where the evidence was insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Liew intimidated, threatened or corruptly persuaded a witness. Finally, the Ninth Circuit held that the district court did not err by not requiring the prosecution to disclose rough notes of the FBI's interviews with a deceased coconspirator. Accordingly, the Ninth Circuit affirmed in part, reversed in part, vacated in part, and remanded. View "United States v. Liew" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the denial of defendant's motion for a sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. 3582(c)(2), in light of Sentencing Guidelines Amendment 782, holding that defendant's original sentence was not actually "based on" a subsequently lowered guideline range. The Ninth Circuit noted that, given defendant's criminal history, in light of Amendment 780 and USSG 1B1.10(c), defendant's "applicable guideline range" would be lowered because of Amendment 782. However, because this inquiry goes only to the second requirement of section 3582(c)(2), it does not resolve whether, as a threshold matter, his original sentence was "based on" the guideline range the district court initially calculated. View "United States v. Rodriguez-Soriano" on Justia Law

The Ninth Circuit vacated convictions related to defendant's guilty plea on the ground that she was constructively denied her right to counsel when the district court denied her motions to substitute counsel without conducting an adequate inquiry. In this case, defendant did everything in her power to alert the district court to her belief that she was receiving inadequate assistance of counsel; the record reflected serious breakdowns in communicaiton and trust; defendant filed her motions promptly; and even if her motions could be considered untimely; the district court's failure to conduct an adequate inquiry and the extent of the conflict outweigh any untimeliness. The Ninth Circuit concluded that there was a substantial risk that defendant agreed that she was satisfied with her attorney's performance because the magistrate judge pressured her to accept the plea and she knew that she had to make that statement to enter the plea. View "United States v. Velazquez" on Justia Law