Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

Defendant Rebekah VanBuren raised a facial challenge to Vermont's "revenge porn" (disclosure of nonconsensual pornography) statute. Vermont’s law, enacted in 2015, makes it a crime punishable by not more than two years’ imprisonment and a fine of $2,000 or both to “knowingly disclose a visual image of an identifiable person who is nude or who is engaged in sexual conduct, without his or her consent, with the intent to harm, harass, intimidate, threaten, or coerce the person depicted, and the disclosure would cause a reasonable person to suffer harm.” The law makes clear that “[c]onsent to recording of the visual image does not, by itself, constitute consent for disclosure of the image.” The images at issue here were sent privately to a man using Facebook Messenger. Defendant described herself as the man's girlfriend. The complainant stated that the night before the pictures were publicly posted, she learned through a friend that defendant had been asking about her. The man denied a relationship with defendant, "[defendant] was obsessed with him." The complainant discovered the pictures on the man's Facebook page. A judge found probable cause for the charge against Defendant. Defendant moved to dismiss, arguing the revenge porn statute violated her First Amendment rights. The Vermont Supreme Court concluded the statute was constitutional, granted the State's petition for extraordinary relief, and remanded this matter for further proceedings. View "Vermont v. VanBuren" on Justia Law

Defendant Walker Edelman appealed a trial court order denying his motion to suppress and dismiss, in which the trial court concluded that the Vermont Legislature had effectively granted automatic and presumptive consent to an evidentiary breath test by means of the implied consent statute and therefore defendant could not challenge admission of an evidentiary breath sample as involuntarily obtained. The Vermont Supreme Court found that determination of whether consent was voluntary depended on adequate factfinding in the first instance. Here, the trial court did not hold an evidentiary hearing on the issue of voluntariness after defendant raised it, deciding instead that such a challenge was precluded by Vermont’s implied consent law. On this record, the Court could not determine whether defendant voluntarily consented to law enforcement’s request for an evidentiary breath sample. Accordingly, the Court remanded for an evidentiary hearing on this issue. View "Vermont v. Edelman" on Justia Law

Defendant Jeremy Amidon appealed his conviction by jury of lewd or lascivious conduct with a child. He argued: (1) the trial court should have granted his motion for a mistrial after the State asked prejudicial questions during voir dire that tainted the jury; (2) the court erroneously admitted evidence of his prior incarceration; and (3) that the State was improperly permitted to impeach the defense’s sole witness with a question concerning the molestation of her daughter. Finding no reversible error, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Vermont v. Amidon" on Justia Law

The State appealed a trial court's grant of defendant Ronald Dupuis's motion to suppress evidence arising from a game warden's warrantless search of his property, arguing that because defendant's "no trespass" postings did not comport with Vermont's hunting posting statute, he enjoyed no expectation of privacy. Defendant was charged with taking big game by illegal means as well as baiting and feeding deer. Although the warden testified that he saw no signs posted, defendant and others testified, and the trial court found, that defendant had posted between twenty-five and thirty signs stating "no trespassing" or "keep out" around the perimeter of his property, located approximately 100 to 150 feet apart. A gate with multiple "no trespassing" signs blocked the main entrance onto defendant's property. There was no evidence that the game warden had a warrant or suspicion of criminal activity at the time he entered defendant's land. The trial court granted defendant's motion to suppress evidence obtained from the warden's warrantless search, ruling that it violated Chapter I, Article 11 of the Vermont Constitution. The court held that by posting his land to the extent that he had, defendant "took the steps necessary to clearly communicate to the reasonable person that the public was excluded from his Bloomfield property," thereby preserving his expectation of privacy. Finding no reversible error in the trial court's judgment, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Vermont v. Dupuis" on Justia Law

At issue before the Vermont Supreme Court in this case centered on whether defendant Stuart Lizotte’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated when his online service provider, AOL, searched his transmissions, detected suspected child pornography, and sent information to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), which opened the email and attachment and provided it to law enforcement. The Supreme Court concluded AOL was not acting as an agent of law enforcement when it searched defendant’s transmissions, and that NCMEC and law enforcement did not expand AOL’s private search by viewing the file already identified by AOL as containing child pornography. In addition, any expansion of the search by opening the related email did not invalidate the warrant because the other information in the affidavit independently provided probable cause to search. View "Vermont v. Lizotte" on Justia Law

DefendantMitchell Bowen appeals his conviction for sexual assault following his guilty plea, arguing that during the plea colloquy the trial court failed to comply with Vermont Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(f) and did not establish a factual basis for the charge. The Vermont Supreme Court held that the standard for reviewing Rule 11(f) challenges in direct-appeal cases was the same as that used for challenges brought in post-conviction relief (PCR) proceedings. Under that standard, the Court concluded the colloquy in this case did not comply with the requirements of Rule 11(f), and reversed and remanded. View "Vermont v. Bowen" on Justia Law

Defendant Ernest Phillips filed an interlocutory appeal of the trial court’s denial of his motion to accept a plea agreement after lengthy litigation in the criminal division concerning defendant’s alleged sexual contact with two minors between 2012 and 2014. In November 2012, the Vermont State Police investigated allegations that defendant had sexual contact with two female minors pursuant to a complaint received from a dance school where defendant worked as an instructor. The complaint alleged defendant had engaged in sexual contact with a seventeen-year-old student and a fifteen-year-old student. On appeal of the denial of his motion, defendant argued the trial court accepted his proposed plea agreement and therefore could not subsequently reject it. In addition, he argued the trial court’s reasons for rejecting the proposed plea agreement were legally invalid. The Vermont Supreme Court granted permission for the interlocutory appeal on the following questions: (1) may a defendant waive the right to a direct appeal as a condition of a plea agreement; (2) may a defendant enter a plea to a reduced criminal charge based upon a statute that did not exist at the time of the commission of the original offense; and (3) is the trial court authorized to reject a plea agreement after accepting it. The Court answered the first question in the affirmative and therefore did not reach the second question. The third question was moot because the Court held the trial court never accepted the plea agreement. Accordingly, the case was remanded back to the trial court to reconsider whether to accept or reject the plea agreement. View "Vermont v. Phillips" on Justia Law

Defendant Amanda Stuart appealed her probation revocation arising from two probation violations. In May 2016, defendant pled guilty to negligent operation of a vehicle and reckless endangerment. The plea agreement called for concurrent one-to-twelve-month sentences, suspended with probation, to run consecutively to a sentence defendant was already serving for a past infraction. This left defendant on a “dual status” - on furlough in connection with a previous sentence and on probation for her new charges. Defendant’s probation conditions in connection with the May 2016 conviction included conditions requiring that she not buy, have, or use any regulated drugs unless prescribed by a doctor, complete the CRASH program, complete substance abuse counseling, and actively participate in and complete the reparative probation program. Contrary to the parties’ expectations at the time of the plea, defendant was not released after her May 2016 plea, but, rather, remained incarcerated until November 2016 because she could not meet a condition of her previous sentence that she secure housing. On April 17, 2017, defendant was reincarcerated for violating the furlough conditions in connection with her prior sentence after testing positive for benzodiazepines. On appeal, defendant argued, among other things, that the State presented insufficient admissible evidence to support the violations upon which the revocation was based. The Vermont Supreme Court agreed and reversed the trial court’s revocation of her probation. View "Vermont v. Stuart" on Justia Law

The four petitioners in these consolidated appeals all pled guilty to criminal offenses between 2005 and 2013. After the appeal period had passed, they initiated collateral challenges to their convictions by filing post-conviction relief (PCR) petitions and argued that the plea colloquies in their criminal cases did not comply with Rule 11(f). The PCR courts denied their petitions and all petitioners appealed. While the appeals of those petitions were pending, the Vermont Supreme Court decided In re Bridger, 2017 VT 79, holding that Rule 11(f) required a plea colloquy to include the defendant’s personal admission of the facts underlying the offense, that oral or written stipulations cannot satisfy the requirement, and that substantial compliance does not apply in determining whether the colloquy was satisfactory. Petitioners sought to apply the Bridger decision to their cases. The Supreme Court concluded Bridger announced a new criminal procedural rule and that the new rule did not apply to cases where direct review was concluded at the time Bridger was decided. Thus, in those cases, pending or future collateral proceedings must be evaluated under pre-Bridger standards. Under the then- existing standard, the Court affirmed the decisions in In re Barber, In re Smith, and In re Burke, and reversed and remanded the decision in In re Rousseau. View "In re Kenneth Barber, Jr., Theodore C. Smith, Jr., Danielle M. Rousseau, John Burke" on Justia Law

In 2016, eighteen-year-old defendant Randy Hughs had sexual intercourse with a fourteen-year-old minor, C.H., with whom he had been texting for the previous month and a half. The next day, defendant arranged to have a friend bring a “morning after” pill to C.H. When C.H.’s mother learned of the incident, she brought C.H. to the police station to file a complaint. This lead to Hughs' eventual conviction of sexual assault of a minor, for which he was sentenced to serve two and a half to five years. He contended the trial court erred by: (1) considering his decision to exercise his right to a trial in determining his sentence; (2) disregarding evidence that treatment in the community would be appropriate; and (3) failing to consider defendant’s youth as a mitigating factor. Finding no reversible error, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed. View "Vermont v. Hughs" on Justia Law