Category: Procedure

Suppose that both the local police and the federal Drug Enforcement Administration suspect that Derek is selling drugs. The police are a step ahead, and they arrest Derek and charge […]

The court of appeals in State v. Simmons, ___ N.C. App. ___ (July 20, 2010), decided this week, awarded a new trial to a defendant convicted of impaired driving, finding […]

In State v. Harbison, 315 N.C. 175 (1985), the North Carolina Supreme Court held that when defense counsel admits the defendant’s guilt to the jury without the defendant’s consent per […]

Previously, Jeff and I posted about the post-Melendez-Diaz decisions by the N.C. Court of Appeals in the Brennan and Brewington substitute analyst cases (those posts are available here, here, and […]

I was catching up on the Fourth Circuit’s recent opinions this weekend when I came across United States v. Luck. It raises some interesting issues that are not specific to […]

I regularly am asked questions about criminal case calendaring. There are relatively detailed statutory provisions regarding the calendaring of superior court cases. As to district court cases, however, the statutes […]

I’m on vacation this week, so my blogging will be a little lighter fare than usual. Today, I thought I’d call attention to this article in the FBI Law Enforcement […]

The court of appeals recently decided State v. Dark. It’s a concise opinion that summarizes and applies the black-letter law on an issue that comes up regularly: when must the […]

As I have discussed in a number of prior posts [editor’s note: the most recent of those posts is here], the North Carolina courts have been struggling with whether the […]

There’s a recurrent discovery issue in child pornography cases. Generally, it goes like this: the defendant is arrested and charged with a child pornography offense. The prosecution contends that the […]