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Considering how close we are to the holidays, there’s been a surprising amount of activity in the criminal law world lately. Stories of interest include the following: 1. The Bowden […]

Note about holiday blogging schedule: Because I am certain that all of you are planning your holidays around this blog, I thought I’d mention that I’ll continue to post daily […]

I wrote here about grossly aggravating factors (GAFs) and Level One and Two punishment in impaired driving cases sentenced under G.S. 20-179, leaving discussion of Level Three, Four, and Five […]

The Ohio Supreme Court recently ruled that cell phones generally cannot be searched without a warrant incident to arrest. That court’s decision is here. The law in North Carolina appears […]

The principal probation reform bill (S.L. 2009-372 [S 920], summarized here) went into effect on December 1. Since then, I’ve received a number of questions about it, many of them […]

I’ve had several questions recently about how to handle cases in which the defendant was charged with DWI, failed to appear, remained absent for several years, then reappeared. Often, the […]

The top story in the papers today is the continuing fallout from the Bowden case, some background on which is available here. The News and Observer reports that Superior Court […]

Our murder statute, G.S. 14-17, defines first-degree murder, then proceeds as follows: “All other kinds of murder, including that which shall be proximately caused by the unlawful distribution of opium […]

A divided court of appeals decided another significant gun case this week. But before I talk about the opinion in State v. Whitaker, I’ll briefly summarize the legal backdrop for […]

The court of appeals ruled this week in State v. Shockley that alcohol concentration readings from two of four attempted breath samples collected within 18 minutes of one another met […]