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Trial began this week in Oregon for Ammon Bundy and six codefendants facing various charges stemming from their armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge earlier this year.  The Oregonian reports that people began lining up at 7 a.m. on Tuesday to get a seat inside the courtroom. According to USA Today, each of the seven defendants is charged with conspiring to impede federal land managers through force and intimidation, and five defendants are charged with firearm offenses.  In the waning days of the standoff, the de facto spokesman for the occupation, LaVoy Finicum, was shot and killed after he fled a traffic stop and, in an ensuing confrontation with police officers and FBI agents, appeared to be preparing to draw a handgun.  Keep reading for more news.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that a Minnesota man, Danny Heinrich, confessed in federal court to abducting, sexually assaulting, and killing Jacob Wetterling nearly 27 years ago. Heinrich’s confession was part of a child pornography plea deal in which he will not be prosecuted for his crimes against Wetterling. Following Wetterling’s abduction, Congress enacted the Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act which required states to implement sex offender registries. Keep reading for more news.

My middle child is named Charles. The other day I referred to him as Charles in Charge.  He asked me why teachers and other adults always called him that. Ah, me. It seems my cultural references are dated.

Regardless of whether you are old enough to have had a Scott Baio poster in your room, if your work involves the courts, it is a good idea to know who is in charge of district court in your district. 

Suppose John is facing a deadly assault and fears that he will be killed or suffer great bodily harm. John has a firearm but, rather than shoot his assailant, he fires a warning shot. The shot goes awry, strikes John’s assailant, and kills him. May John rely on self-defense if charged with murder? The answer may be surprising.

The fifth and final episode of the first season of Beyond the Bench is now available. The episode features Jamie Markham interviewing Anne Precythe, the Director of Community Corrections. She shares […]

Labor day weekend has arrived and it’s time to kick back, relax, and be incredibly safe while navigating the roadways of the Old North State.  The Charlotte Observer reports that the number of U.S. and North Carolina traffic fatalities rose significantly in 2015, reversing a decades-long decline.  Take Shea’s advice and don’t speed on your way to show off your new swimwear while lounging landward of the mean high-water mark of the State’s beaches.  Planning to booze it in the Land of the Sky?  Make safe transportation choices or you’ll lose it because law enforcement is cracking down on drunk driving over the holiday.  Enjoy the long weekend and keep reading for more news.

The ABA Journal reports that the U.S. Department of Justice has filed an amicus brief in a Georgia civil class action asserting that the use of money bail violates arrestees’ due process and equal protection rights when there is no meaningful consideration of their ability to pay and alternative methods of assuring their appearance at trial. The plaintiff in the case is a schizophrenic man who was arrested for public drunkenness and could not afford $160 in bail. Unable to make bail, the man was held for six days in the local jail. The challenged system differs from North Carolina’s pretrial release procedure which, in many cases, expresses a preference for unsecured or non-monetary conditions of pretrial release. Keep reading for more news.

The penultimate episode of the inaugural season of Beyond the Bench is now available! The first half of the episode was produced by Shea, and explores the penalties associated with impaired […]

On Thursday, the United States Olympic Committee issued an apology to Brazil for a “distracting ordeal” involving U.S. Olympic swimmers, bathroom vandalism, and a false report of armed robbery.  Earlier in the week, swimmer Ryan Lochte claimed that he and a few other U.S. teammates were robbed at gunpoint in Rio.  The purported robbery was a high profile example of security concerns at the Brazil games.  As it turns out, the swimmers had drunkenly vandalized a gas station bathroom and concocted the robbery story to avoid getting in trouble.  As their story started to unravel, a Brazilian judge ordered the swimmers’ passports seized.  Lochte escaped Brazil before his passport was taken, but has not escaped merciless criticism from media outlets at home and abroad.

This blog post has good news, bad news, and good news about Alyson Grine, who has served as the School’s defender educator for ten years. During that time, Alyson and I worked closely together on indigent defense education, and I wanted to write this farewell on the School’s behalf. The good news is that she is excited to start her new position this fall as an assistant professor at North Carolina Central University School of Law, and we are excited for her. You can reach her at agrine@nccu.edu. The bad news is that she will be leaving the School, and to put it mildly we are sorry to see her go. Then again, the good news is that she leaves a remarkable record of accomplishments in indigent defense education, on which we can continue to build. What has she done in the past ten years? The more apt question is what hasn’t she done.