Update: As discussed on Professor Doug Berman’s Sentencing Blog, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts recently determined that the GPS monitoring law in that state is punitive in effect, and […]
From time to time, a judge, prosecutor, or defense attorney will call the School of Government asking about the law of sexual assualts in, say, 1968. Typically, the caller will […]
Update: It has come to my attention that there may be a bit more to the AOC restitution story than meets the eye. This memo from Judge John Smith, the […]
[Update: the state supreme court reviewed this case, reversing in part, as described here.] The court of appeals published its opinion in State v. Davis this week, a case in […]
There’s a tremendous debate going on over child pornography sentencing in the federal courts. In a number of high-profile cases, judges have imposed sentences well below what the federal sentencing […]
Several recent news stories may be of interest to readers of this blog: 1. Sotomayor scuttlebutt: Judge Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings are scheduled to begin next week. There’s no reason to […]
Crime victims who aren’t citizens may be reluctant to come forward, particularly if they are in the United States illegally. Congress attempted to address this problem in 2000, by creating a special […]
I was on vacation last week, and the buzz around Melendez-Diaz — see this prior post for the basics — was partly drowned out by the sound of the waves […]
Notwithstanding federal judge Alex Kozinski’s recent quip that “the ten most terrifying words in the English language may be, ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help you,'” we […]
I recently presented a case law update at the DAs’ conference, and there was a reasonable amount of interest in a case decided earlier this year by the Court of […]