BLOG
Here’s a question I get occasionally: What language should I use to charge aiding and abetting a violation of a domestic violence protective order (DVPO)? Here’s a similar one: If someone is arrested for aiding and abetting a violation of a DVPO, is the person subject to the 48-hour pretrial release law for domestic violence offenses? I know the scenario immediately.
Over the weekend, the Washington Post ran a story that begins as follows:
The Justice Department and FBI have formally acknowledged that nearly every examiner in an elite FBI forensic unit gave flawed testimony in almost all trials in which they offered evidence against criminal defendants over more than a two-decade period before 2000.
Of 28 examiners with the FBI Laboratory’s microscopic hair comparison unit, 26 overstated forensic matches in ways that favored prosecutors in more than 95 percent of the 268 trials reviewed so far, according to the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) and the Innocence Project, which are assisting the government with the country’s largest post-conviction review of questioned forensic evidence.
Being married to me is hard. My husband makes an off-hand comment about how the city must need money since the police are pulling people over left and right for speeding on the road he travels to work. What does he get in response? A lecture on the state’s uniform court system and the fines and forfeitures clause of our state constitution. Thankfully, he is a patient man. He took it so well that I thought I’d share the finer points of that discussion with you.
How many charges can be placed on a single charging document, such as a citation, an arrest warrant, or an indictment? Old hands use the rule of thumb, no more than two charges per citation, no more than three charges in any other pleading. But where does that rule come from? And is it even correct?
From time to time, I am asked about the right of private citizens to initiate criminal charges by approaching a magistrate. The arrest warrant statute, G.S. 15A-304, requires only that a magistrate be “supplied with sufficient information, supported by oath or affirmation” to find probable cause. The statute doesn’t limit the source of that information to law enforcement officers. As most readers know, it is common in North Carolina for private citizens to seek the issuance of an arrest warrant or a summons.
I have long thought that this was a distinctive feature of North Carolina law, but it seems to be somewhat more common than I believed.
Drones are remote-controlled aircraft. They can be equipped with cameras, and may be useful for surveillance. Does the use of drones by law enforcement officers raise any legal concerns?
The short answer is yes, in at least four ways.
Defendants who drive while impaired while their licenses are revoked for another impaired driving offense or who drive while impaired without a license and without car insurance risk more than criminal prosecution. The vehicles they drive must be seized, and, if they are convicted, will be ordered forfeited. To speed up the forfeiture process, DWI cases involving vehicle forfeitures must be scheduled within 30 days of the offense. But they rarely, if ever, are. Are defendants entitled to relief when the statutory scheduling directive is ignored? And can that relief come in the form of the dismissal of criminal charges?
Imagine that someone breaks into your house and steals something. Let’s say it’s a laptop. A week later, you see the laptop in a pawn shop. You want it back, but the shop owner says that he paid $200 for it. Must the shop owner give it back to you for free? Sell it back to you for what he paid for it? Or is he free to sell it to you on whatever terms the two of you negotiate?
A recent conversation reminded me about a question I’ve received several times over the years: On a habitual felon indictment, what should be listed as the offense date? The two main choices are (1) the date of the substantive felony with which the defendant is charged, and (2) the date of the last of the defendant’s previous convictions, i.e., the date that the defendant became a habitual felon.
The facts. A detective with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department writes a plan for a checkpoint to be conducted later in the evening. The plan states that the checkpoint will be established at the intersection of Ashley Road and Joy Street in Charlotte, NC. The plan states that the
checkpoint’s purpose is to increase police presence in the targeted area while checking for driver’s license and vehicle registration violations. The plan further states that all vehicles traveling through the checkpoint must be stopped unless the officer in charge determines that a hazard has developed or an unreasonable delay is occurring. If that situation arises, all vehicles must be allowed to pass through until the hazard or delay is cleared.
The checkpoint is conducted from 12:34 a.m. to 1:52 a.m. on the designated evening. Every vehicle that travels through the checkpoint is stopped, and the officers ask every driver for his or her driver’s license.
The question. A passenger in a car stopped at the checkpoint moves to suppress evidence obtained during the stop and subsequent search of the car, alleging that the checkpoint was unconstitutional.
If you were the court, how would you rule?