A UNC School of Government Blog
Jeff Welty 
Under G.S. 14-107, it’s a Class 2 misdemeanor to write a check, “knowing at the time . . . that [the check-writer doesn’t have] sufficient funds on deposit . . . with which to pay the check . . . upon presentation.” The crime may be more serious if the check-writer is a recidivist or … Read more
Duke took it on the chin last night, losing to a confident, athletic Arizona team. That’s the basketball roundup. Now for the criminal law roundup: 1. The Conference of District Attorneys has completed a review of the SBI lab cases identified as problematic in the Swecker report. The Conference’s press release states that the review … Read more
The biggest news of the last few days, of course, is that Kyrie Irving is expected to return to the court when Duke plays Hampton this afternoon. (OK, the biggest news has been from Libya and Japan, but Kyrie Irving is a close third!) In terms of criminal law news, there have also been several … Read more
The Fourth Circuit recently decided a very interesting case with a lot of North Carolina connections. The case is United States v. Foster, and it’s available here. The facts were as follows. A police officer in Henderson, North Carolina was eating lunch at a restaurant with his wife. As he left the restaurant, he saw … Read more
Suppose that the state wants to introduce the defendant’s phone records, in order to show that he called the victim in violation of a DVPO. The state subpoenas the records, and the phone company provides them, along with an affidavit from an appropriate employee stating that they are business records. Armed with the records and … Read more
Nationally, the biggest piece of criminal law news this week was that Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed into law a bill that repeals the death penalty in Illinois. He also commuted the sentences of the fifteen men on death row to life in prison. (All had been sentenced to death since 2000, when then-Governor George … Read more
I was reading the News and Observer this morning over breakfast and saw this story about jury selection in a Wake County murder case. The thrust of the story will not surprise anyone who has ever tried a lengthy case: At a time when many families are feeling pinched by the recession, prosecutors and defense … Read more
At a recent CLE, Charlotte defense attorney Chris Fialko mentioned that he’s been enjoying Atul Gawande’s book The Checklist Manifesto. Chris is a pretty sharp guy, and I had a plane trip coming up, so I bought the book and read it. I liked it too, and thought it had a few lessons for criminal … Read more
I don’t generally write about pending cases. But the high-profile homicide trial of Raymond Cook has recently wrapped up, and there’s a discrete aspect of the case that I found especially interesting. First, a brief synopsis of the facts: Cook was a physician. After drinking at a country club, then later at a bar, his … Read more
With the General Assembly in session and the Supreme Court in term, each week brings a flood of interesting news. The top story this week was probably the Court’s decision in Michigan v. Bryant, a Confrontation Clause case in which the Court held that a mortally wounded shooting victim’s statements to police about the “identification … Read more