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The past week has seen Earth Day, the first round of the NFL draft, and continued travel repercussions from the massive cloud of volcanic ash coming from Iceland. (Best Iceland […]

The scope of a suspect’s consent to search is determined objectively, by “what . . . the typical reasonable person [would] have understood by the exchange between the officer and […]

The court of appeals issued several opinions yesterday. Among the most interesting is State v. Hopper, a case that addresses when an officer’s mistaken beliefs can support an investigative stop. […]

Regular readers of this blog know that I’m interested in electronic gadgets. One of my favorites is my Apple iPhone, so I’ve watched with great interest the saga unfolding over […]

The State’s effort to introduce photographs of a homicide victim into evidence often is met with defense objections. One objection sometimes asserted is that the photographs are inadmissible as substantive […]

As always, there’s a lot going on in the world of criminal law. 1. The headline news is, of course, Justice Stevens’s announcement that he will retire this summer. He’s […]

I wrote about satellite-based monitoring (SBM) of sex offenders ten times in 2009. The court of appeals’ recent decision in State v. Phillips gives me my first occasion to write […]

Under G.S. 20-154(a), “before starting, stopping or turning from a direct line [, a driver] shall first see that such movement can be made in safety . . . and […]

Someone asked me recently why so many defendants enter Alford pleas in North Carolina. I’ve wondered the same thing. When I was in private practice, I worked mostly in federal […]

Driving while license revoked (DWLR), a Class 1 misdemeanor, is one of the most frequently charged criminal offenses in North Carolina.  And, while certain elements of the offense are spelled […]