The Impact of Melendez-Diaz on North Carolina

I was on vacation last week, and the buzz around Melendez-Diaz — see this prior post for the basics — was partly drowned out by the sound of the waves crashing on the beach. But only partly, because Melendez-Diaz is a big case, with significant implications for North Carolina, and questions about it were still … Read more

Melendez-Diaz: Crawford Applies to Lab Reports

In yesterday’s frivolous post, I said that legal news was slow. Not anymore! The United States Supreme Court decided Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts yesterday. It’s a big Confrontation Clause case, and I expect that Jessica Smith, the Crawford expert on our faculty, will eventually weigh in with an expert analysis. But since Jessie’s still busy administering … Read more

Caught on Camera

It seems that video cameras are everywhere, these days: at the bank, at every youth soccer game, in jails and prisons, at Wal-Mart. One often-cited (but apparently questionable) statistic suggests that Londoners are caught on camera 300 times per day. Americans, too, are videotaped frequently. Some of the cameras belong to police departments, who often … Read more

blank

Post-Conviction DNA Testing Heats Up

Editor’s note: A previous post concerning a United States Supreme Court case about post-conviction DNA testing appears here. Recently, I’ve been getting a lot of calls about requests for post-conviction DNA testing. Since there seems to be a bit of confusion about how these requests should be made and handled, I thought it might be … Read more

Selective Assertion of the Fifth Amendment Privilege

Suppose that an eyewitness testifies for the state on direct examination that he saw the defendant snatch an old woman’s purse and run off. The defense cross-examines the witness about whether he’d used drugs shortly before the crime took place, hoping to show that the witness’s perception was impaired. If the witness asserts his Fifth … Read more

I See Cocaine

Can a lay witness testify that she could tell just by looking at a substance that it was, in fact, a controlled substance? (Let’s assume the witness has extensive dealings with drugs and therefore a basis of personal knowledge, and leave aside the credibility issues that may arise if she has been an enthusiastic consumer … Read more

Breathalyzer Source Code

Once again, my interest in criminal law and my interest in technology have come together in a brewing legal controversy.  The issue is whether a DWI defendant who has submitted to a breath test for alcohol has a right to access the “source code” of the breath analysis machine.  The Minnesota Supreme Court, in State … Read more

Postconviction DNA Testing

The United States Supreme Court recently heard oral argument in the Osborne case, an Alaska case that asks whether a criminal defendant who claims that he has been wrongfully convicted has a constitutional right to postconviction DNA testing of biological evidence.  The transcript of the oral argument is available here, and a news story that … Read more

Careful Questioning in Child Sexual Abuse Cases

Further Update: The court has reissued an opinion in this case. On the issue discussed below, it is very similar — at a minimum — to the original opinion. Update: As of April 1, 2009, the Court of Appeals has withdrawn this opinion.  I’ll post again when the new opinion comes out. The Court of … Read more