I’m happy to announce my first indigent defense practice guide, Defense Motions and Notices in Superior Court. As the title implies, it’s a court-ready guide for practitioners about common defense motions in superior court criminal cases at the trial level. While it is primarily written with non-capital felony cases in mind, the information will hopefully be useful to all criminal defense attorneys.
Phil Dixon
IDS Update with Tom Maher
For today’s post, I conducted a short interview with Tom Maher, the executive director of the Office of Indigent Defense Services (IDS), the statewide agency in North Carolina that oversees the provision of legal representation for indigent defendants in criminal and other cases. We talk about the recent raise in the rates for private assigned counsel doing high-level felony work, the status of public defense funding in North Carolina, and the importance of a robust system of indigent defense generally. Readers may be aware that I served as a private assigned counsel for many years before coming to work at the School of Government, and it’s a topic near and dear to me. Indigent defense is equally important for court actors and citizens of the state, and I hope you find the interview informative. It runs around 13 minutes, with minor edits for the sake of time and clarity. Click here to watch.
Cross-Examination on Pending Charges
Can the defense question a State’s witness about pending charges? May the State question the defendant or defense witnesses on their pending charges? The Rules of Evidence allow impeachment by conviction of a crime under Rule 609, but nothing in the rules speaks to impeachment by evidence of pending charges specifically. The question comes up frequently enough that I wanted to write about it. Read on for the answer.
Is the Court of Appeals Signaling Less Forgiveness with SBM cases?
Maybe so, if two decisions from earlier this month are any indication. They are: State v. Bishop, ___ N.C. App. ___ (Oct. 3, 2017), where the court refused to consider arguments about the reasonableness of satellite-based monitoring (“SBM”) when the issue was not preserved or properly appealed, and State v. Greene, ___N.C. App. ___ (Oct. 3, 2017), where the court refused to remand a SBM hearing when the State failed to present sufficient evidence of the reasonableness of SBM. Before I discuss those cases, some background first.
Misdemeanor Attorneys Come to the SOG
Last week we hosted nearly 30 mostly new attorneys for the Misdemeanor Defender program. The training takes place here every fall, and focuses on preparing attorneys for handling cases at the district court level. If you’d like to know more about our indigent defense education programs, jump to the end of this post to find out about available training materials and future trainings.
State v. Huddy and the Community Caretaking Exception
Huddy, ___N.C. App. ___, 799 S.E.2d 650 (April 18, 2017) was decided earlier this year and reversed the trial court’s denial of a motion to suppress. A unanimous Court of Appeals found that the search of the defendant’s home was not justified under either the knock and talk doctrine or the community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement. The knock and talk portion of the opinion is interesting (indeed, the concurring opinion is devoted solely to that topic) and invalidates the search on those grounds, but I wanted to focus on the community caretaking aspect of the opinion. Jeff previously blogged about the community caretaking exception to the warrant requirement here. Huddy doesn’t answer all of the questions raised in that post about the exception, but the opinion sheds some light on its scope and shows the balancing test for the exception in practice.
Summer Confrontation Clause Cases
This past June saw a flurry of Confrontation Clause cases from the appellate division: State v. Miller, ___ N.C. App. ___ (June 20, 2017), temp. stay allowed, ___ N.C. ___ (July 3, 2017); State v. McKiver, ___ N.C. ___ (June 9, 2017); and State v. Clonts, ___ N.C. App. ___ (June 20, 2017), temp. stay allowed, ___ N.C. ___ (July 9, 2017) (a sprawling 84 page opinion including the dissent). These make for some great summer reading, at least to me. Because the cases touch on various aspects of Confrontation Clause law (and just in case your summer reading interests vary from mine), I wanted to briefly summarize them.
When is Ignorance of the Law an Excuse?
An ancient maxim of the law is ignorantia juris non excusat, or ignorance of the law does not excuse. Put another way, it is presumed that the public knows the laws, and a defense of ignorance is typically not allowed. This principle is at the heart of the recent decision by the state supreme court in State v. Miller, ___ N.C. ___, (June 9, 2017).
State v. Glisson and Multiple Conspiracies
When a group of confederates undertake to commit a series of criminal acts, is there one conspiracy or multiple conspiracies? The case of State v. Glisson, ___ N.C. App. ___, 796 S.E.2d 124, (Feb. 7, 2017), dealt with that issue. The answer, it turns out, is fact-specific and less than crystal clear.
Walker, Jacobs, and the Importance of Preserving the Record
Two weeks ago, the SOG hosted over 50 public defenders, contract attorneys, and private assigned counsel at its annual Felony Defender training. The training provides guidance to lawyers transitioning to superior court about handling a felony case from start to finish. Topics include discovery and investigation, pretrial motions, voir dire, and jury instructions, among others. On a personal note, it was my first training in my role as Defender Educator and my first behind-the-scenes look at the effort required to plan and execute a successful course. Without the hard work of the faculty and support staff from the SOG, as well as volunteers from IDS and the private bar, the program would not have been possible. Thanks to everyone that participated. I truly enjoyed the training, especially speaking with the lawyers that attended, and I hope they found it worthwhile as well.