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Aphantasia: Why Truthful Witnesses Can Sound Like Liars by Richard Resch by Richard Resch "Close your eyes. Picture it. Now tell me exactly what you saw.” Across America, police treat this as a credibility test. Every day, truthful people fail it. That is the detective in the interview room. In …
Article • October 15, 2025 • from CLN November, 2025
The Malleable Mind in the Courtroom: Why Confident Eyewitnesses Often Provide the Least Reliable Evidence by David Reutter by David M. Reutter “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were.” – Marcel Proust When jurors weigh evidence in a criminal trial, few types of …
Article • July 1, 2025 • from CLN July, 2025
California Court of Appeal Issues Writ of Mandate Directing Superior Court to Hold Evidentiary Hearing Under State’s Racial Justice Act, Ruling Defendant Provided Sufficient Evidence to Establish Prima Facie Claim of Implicit Bias by San Diego Police by Sagi Schwartzberg The California Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, granted a …
Article • July 1, 2025 • from CLN July, 2025
Biomedical Engineers Discover Pruny Fingers Yield the Same Fingerprint Patterns as Dry Ones by Jo Ellen Nott A question posed by a child in a Curious Kids column in The Conversation, a nonprofit news website written by academics, led a biomedical engineer to a discovery that could aid forensic analysis …
Mississippi Supreme Court Vacates Convictions, Holding Multiple Errors by State Resulted in ‘Legal Chaos’ That Deprived Defendant of Right to Fair Trial Under ‘Cumulative-Error Doctrine’ by Jeffrey Cohen Sitting en banc, the Supreme Court of Mississippi reversed both the trial court and Court of Appeals’ decisions that the State’s multiple …
Los Angeles Criminal Legal System Undermined by Months of Faulty DNA Testing by Jo Ellen Nott The integrity of Los Angeles County’s justice system is under fire following the news that potentially defective DNA test kits were used for months in thousands of criminal cases.  Despite being notified in August …
California Court of Appeal: Evidence Insufficient to Show Robbery Victim Moved ‘Substantial Distance’ to Support Simple Kidnapping Conviction and Amendments to § 186.22 Require Vacatur of Gang Enhancements by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney In consolidated appeals, the Court of Appeal of California, Fourth Appellate District, held that the evidence …
California Court of Appeal Announces Defendants May Obtain Brady Evidence From Police Officers’ Personnel Files in Advance of § 1172.6 Hearing Requesting Vacatur of Conviction and Resentencing for Certain Types of Murder Convictions by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The California Court of Appeal, Sixth District, held that defendants are …
Maryland Supreme Court Clarifies Process for Admitting Co-Conspirator’s Hearsay Statements During Police Interview Under ‘Declaration Against Penal Interest’ Exception, Trial Court Must ‘Parse’ Interview to Determine Admissibility of Each Statement by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The Supreme Court of Maryland clarified the process a trial court must follow when …
Article • February 1, 2025 • from CLN February, 2025
Ninth Circuit Announces ‘Hate Crime’ Sentence Enhancement Under Guidelines § 3A1.1(a) Requires Finding Defendant Motivated by Hate or Animus by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit clarified the circumstances under which a U.S. District Court may impose a “hate crime” enhancement pursuant …
Article • February 1, 2025 • from CLN February, 2025
Mass Spectrometry Being Studied as Way to Analyze Overlapping or Weak Fingerprints by Anthony Accurso by Anthony W. Accurso Desorption electrospray ionization, a type of mass spectrometry (“DESI-MS”), is being studied as a way to analyze overlapping or weak fingerprints, solving an age-old problem of evidence quality. For over a …
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Grants Habeas Relief in ‘Shaken Baby Syndrome’ Case by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The Criminal Court of Appeals of Texas, the state’s highest court in criminal cases, granted a prisoner’s habeas corpus petition based on advances in science that undermined the validity of evidence …
Article • December 15, 2024 • from CLN January, 2025
Maryland Supreme Court Announces New Constitutional Rule Requiring Voir Dire Questions Related to Child-Witness Credibility and Abrogates Prior Inconsistent Case Law by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The Supreme Court of Maryland announced a new rule of constitutional law permitting defendants to ask potential jurors during jury selection whether they …
Article • December 15, 2024 • from CLN January, 2025
Scent of Death Evidence Admitted at Indiana Murder Trial by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford In May 2024, John Hallett, 54, of Michigan City was found guilty of murdering his roommate and then dismembering the body. Prosecutors obtained the conviction by relying on novel “scent of death” evidence to prove …
Article • December 1, 2024 • from CLN December, 2024
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Announces Prosecution’s Duty to Provide Discoverable Evidence Upon Request Applies to Discoverable Items in Law Enforcement Agencies’ Possession Unbeknownst to Prosecution and Exclusion Is Appropriate Remedy for Violation by Sam Rutherford by Sam Rutherford The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, that state’s highest court of …
False Confessions and Wrongful Convictions: Known Causes and Steps to Eliminate Them by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney A s of February 2024, the National Registry of Exonerations (“NRE”) at the University of Michigan has registered 3,475 postconviction DNA and non-DNA exonerations since 1989—an average of 100 per year. Of …
Article • December 1, 2024 • from CLN December, 2024
Arkansas Supreme Court Announces Petition for Testing Forensic Evidence Based on Advances in Technology Under Act 1780 of 2001 May Be Filed by Anyone Convicted of a Crime, Not Just Those Still in State Custody by Anthony Accurso by Anthony W. Accurso The Supreme Court of Arkansas held that courts …
Article • October 1, 2024 • from CLN October, 2024
Ohio Supreme Court Announces Self-Defense Jury Instruction Does Not Require Intent to Harm or Kill Assailant by David Reutter by David M. Reutter The Supreme Court of Ohio held that a defendant need not “intend to harm or kill another person to be entitled to a self-defense jury instruction.” The …
Rhode Island Supreme Court Holds Temporal Requirement of ‘Recent Fabrication’ Exception to Hearsay Rule Not Satisfied and Scribbled Note Made by Child Victim of Sexual Abuse Years After Alleged Events Not ‘Excited Utterance’ by Matthew Clarke by Matthew Thomas Clarke The Supreme Court of Rhode Island held that an alleged …
First Circuit Announces Doctrine of Abatement Ab Initio Applies When Defendant Dies During Pendency of Direct Appeal in Published Precedential Ruling by Douglas Ankney by Douglas Ankney In a published precedential ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit adopted the doctrine of abatement ab initio for when …
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