A UNC School of Government Blog
On October 20, 2009, the North Carolina Court of Appeals decided State v. Galindo, holding that a Crawford violation occurred when the State’s expert gave an opinion, in a drug trafficking case, as to the weight of the cocaine at issue, based “solely” on a laboratory report by a non-testifying analyst. To put the decision … Read more
I’ll get to the topic of today’s post in just a moment, but first I wanted to note what I found to be a fascinating little tidbit about the Willingham case, which I’ve previously addressed here and here. It has to do with Willingham’s final words, and I promise that if you have the slightest … Read more
The criminal-law-related legal news has been coming fast and furious over the past week or so. 1. The fallout from the Bowden case continues. The case, discussed here, held that a life sentence imposed during a several-year window in the 1970s meant 80 years, subject to further reduction through good time credits. Later this month, … Read more
I was recently asked whether one spouse can properly be charged with larceny for stealing joint property from the other spouse. Apparently, this question comes up frequently with separated spouses. For example, assume that Harry and Sally are separated. Sally lives at the house they formerly shared, and Harry lives in an apartment nearby. If … Read more
The First Amendment says, in part, that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . . .” There are two religion clauses in the amendment, the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause. Lately I’ve been getting a lot of questions about the Free Exercise … Read more
My colleague Shea Denning, a frequent contributor to this blog in the area of motor vehicle law, has put together the ultimate authority on all things related to State v. Knoll, 322 N.C. 535 (1988). Her paper is a must-read for officers, magistrates, jailers, and lawyers on both sides of DWI cases. It discusses Knoll … Read more
by School of Government faculty member Michael Crowell In the last couple of years North Carolina has seen several high profile cases in which the sealing of a search warrant became an issue. One was the investigation of the murder of Nancy Cooper in Cary, and it led to last week’s North Carolina Court of … Read more
Most readers of this blog know that hearsay evidence, meaning an out-of-court statement “offered in evidence to prove the truth of the matter asserted,” N.C. R. Evid. 801(c), is presumptively inadmissible. Sometimes the proponent of hearsay evidence can introduce the evidence under one of the exceptions in Rules 803 and 804. But equally often, the … Read more
When a defendant pleads guilty, he waives a variety of rights, including the right to a trial, the right to confront the witnesses against him, and so on. The waiver of those rights is inherent in a guilty plea — there can’t be a guilty plea without such a waiver. If a defendant doesn’t just … Read more
I mentioned earlier that the court of appeals decided two satellite-based monitoring cases this week. I discussed State v. Morrow on Wednesday. Today I’ll cover State v. Stines. In Stines, the defendant was convicted of taking indecent liberties with children in 1997 and again in 2004. He was sentenced to active time for the 2004 … Read more