by Christopher Zoukis
The Court of Appeal of California, Second Appellate District, ruled that a statute granting prisoners who were convicted as youth offenders improved parole eligibility possibilities supersedes a different statute that requires prisoners convicted and sentenced for in-prison crimes to serve their new sentence consecutively. The …
by Christopher Zoukis
The United States Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) has taken a giant leap toward achieving its apparent goal of knowing everything about everyone: the development and launch of the Homeland Advanced Recognition Technology (“HART”) database. The database allows DHS to organize and correlate multiple biometric …
by Christopher Zoukis
A report from The Guardian reveals that the United States government paid out more than $60 million over a 12-year period to settle claims of violence by Customs and Border Patrol (“CBP”) agents.
Adding in settlements related to employment and property claims raises the …
by Christopher Zoukis
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled against a Martin County, Florida, deputy sheriff who seized an iPhone used by a bystander to take pictures and video of an accident scene. The opinion denied the deputy qualified immunity from suit over the …
by Christopher Zoukis
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled that conspiracy to commit murder in aid of racketeering, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1959(a)(5), does not qualify as a crime of violence for purposes of a United States Sentencing Guidelines § 2K2.1 …
by Christopher Zoukis
The Supreme Court of Minnesota ruled that Birchfield v. North Dakota, 136 S. Ct. 2160 (2016), in which the U.S. Supreme Court held that a state cannot use criminal sanctions to compel a DWI blood test absent a search warrant, applies retroactively to final convictions …
by Christopher Zoukis
The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit took the federal Bureau of Prisons to task for using its statutory authority to improperly prolong a prisoner’s sentence. The opinion vacated a district court opinion denying the prisoner habeas corpus relief and remanded for …
by Christopher Zoukis
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed a lower court’s ruling that a man civilly committed under the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 (“Act”) was no longer a “sexually dangerous person.” As a result of the April 10, …
by Christopher Zoukis
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit granted a federal prisoner’s 28 U.S.C. § 2255 petition because one of the predicate offenses used to enhance his sentence under the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”) could no longer qualify as a “violent felony” post-Johnson …
by Christopher Zoukis
If you live in south-central Pennsylvania and your trash is picked up by Penn Waste, a company owned by Republican State Senator Scott Wagner, you might want to pay the bill on time. If you don’t, police officers may come to your home, inventory your …
