A UNC School of Government Blog
Jeff Welty 
More and more criminal cases involve electronic tracking. Sometimes the defendant is tracked using GPS, other times using cell site location information. Either way, interesting evidentiary questions arise. May an officer who knows how to use a tracking device testify about tracking, even if she doesn’t know much about how the underlying technology works? Who … Read more
Over the past three weeks, two convicted murderers in Florida have escaped from prison by forging bogus “motions to reduce their respective sentences and . . . court orders granting the request.” Florida is prosecuting a third inmate for unsuccessfully attempting the same scheme. A prosecutor whose name was forged by the inmates released a … Read more
The district court judges are conferring this week at the Great Wolf Lodge in Concord. I don’t know if robes are allowed on waterslides, but I expect that the judges will be pretty focused on business in any event. Among other topics, reports indicate that they’ll be hearing from former Ohio Supreme Court Justice Evelyn … Read more
Down with the law reviews, up with the blogs. Or, so says Justice Kennedy in this Wall Street Journal story. “Professors are back in the act with blogs,” he proclaims, stating that his clerks regularly survey the blogosphere to see how academics view the cases that are before the Court. I feel sure that they … Read more
Each year on the first Monday in October, the Supreme Court begins a new term. Today’s the first Monday in October 2013, so in this post, I’ll summarize several of the criminal cases that the Court will hear during the term that has just begun. This will be a selective preview rather than a comprehensive … Read more
No, the federal government shutdown hasn’t reached the School of Government — I’m just a little slow with my post today due to some teaching and other obligations. Easily the most unusual story of the week was this one from San Diego, California: a defendant was convicted of murder and sentenced to 53 years in … Read more
A new edition of the State of North Carolina Extradition Manual is now available. Although international extradition gets all the media attention — and is the subject of this blog post — state-to-state extradition is vastly more common. Particularly in border counties, it is an everyday procedure. The manual provides an overview of the process and … Read more
This week, the State Auditor released an audit of the Administrative Office of the Courts. It’s available here. One finding was that the AOC “does not make detailed . . . DWI case data readily available to the public . . . although AOC [was] asked to do so by . . . the legislature … Read more
When a person is arrested while in possession of drugs and is taken to the jail in handcuffs, may the person properly be convicted of possessing drugs in a confinement facility? The question has divided courts across the country. Last week, a majority of the court of appeals concluded that the answer is yes. State … Read more
In a post last week, I mentioned that it looks increasingly likely that Supreme Court will grant certiorari in a case considering cell phone searches. In this post, I’ll support that remark by describing two cases in which certiorari petitions have been filed and explaining why each is a strong candidate for Supreme Court review. … Read more