Case Summaries
Criminal Law & Procedure
[09/07]
Wilson v. Rees
District court's dismissal, as untimely, of an inmate's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit challenging Kentucky's lethal injection protocol under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments is affirmed as Bowling v. Ky. Dept. of Corrections, 301 S.W.3d 478, (Ky. 2009), and its aftermath do not disrupt the district court's holding that defendant's complaint is barred by the statute of limitations.
[09/07]
US v. Parks
Defendant's sentence for possession with intent to distribute heroin is affirmed where defendant's prior Missouri conviction for escape from confinement was a crime of violence.
[09/07]
Rice v Rivera
District court's denial of defendant's request for habeas relief from his conviction for using a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking offense, in violation of 18 U.S.C. section 924(c), is reversed and remanded where: 1) the district court lacked jurisdiction over the habeas motion because defendant cannot now establish that section 2255 is ineffective or inadequate to test the legality of his section 924(c) conviction; 2) the government and the defendant have each forfeited any right to contend that Rule 48 could not be used in this context; and 3) district court's denial of the motion to vacate is reversed and remanded for it to be granted as the district court could not deny the motion to vacate simply because it disagreed with defendant and the government on the merits of the Bailey v. US, 516 U.S. 137 (1997) issue, for a Rule 48 motion that is not motivated by bad faith is not clearly contrary to manifest public interest, and it must be granted.
[09/07]
Armstrong v. Schwarzenegger
In a class action against California officials with responsibility over the corrections system and parole proceedings, seeking accommodations to plaintiffs' disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and the Constitution, the district court's order granting plaintiffs' motion to require defendants to track and accommodate the needs of class members housed in county jails and to ensure a workable grievance procedure for such class members is affirmed in part where: 1) defendants were responsible for providing reasonable accommodations to the disabled prisoners and parolees they housed in county jails; and 2) the district court made the findings required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) regarding the necessity for relief and the narrowness and lack of intrusiveness of the relief order. However, the order is vacated in part where injunctions, whether controlled by the PLRA or otherwise, required evidence of rights violations commensurate with the scope of the relief being ordered.
[09/03]
US v. Blitch
Convictions of defendants for conspiring to distribute 15 kilograms of cocaine are vacated and remanded as the court's failure to individually voir dire the second panel regarding its safety concerns, and her instructions to keep deliberating after the jury poll, when the jury had specifically requested to leave for the day, leads to the conclusion that the defendants should receive a new trial.
[09/03]
US v. Munoz-Camarena
A sentence for attempted illegal re-entry after deportation is vacated and remanded for reconsideration in light of the Supreme Court's decision in Carachuri-Rosendo v. Holder, 130 S. Ct. 2577 (2010), which casts doubt on the district court's calculation of the recommended Guidelines sentence in this case.
[09/03]
US v. Talamantes
In a prosecution of defendant for unlawful reentry after removal following an aggravated felony conviction, district court's imposition of a sentence of 77 months' imprisonment is affirmed as the sentence was not unreasonable and the district court did not abuse its discretion by imposing an increase under Guidelines section 2L1.2(b)(A).
[09/03]
Babick v. Berghuis
District court's denial of defendant's petition for habeas relief from his convictions for arson and first-degree felony murder, as well as a sentence of two terms of life imprisonment without possibility of parole, is affirmed where: 1) defendant's ineffective assistance of counsel claim is without merit as he has shown no prejudice as a result of his trial counsel's failure to produce an arson expert in support of his not-arson defense; 2) district court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant's request for an evidentiary hearing; 3) defendant's claim, that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to investigate the basis of a witness's testimony regarding the time of defendant's visit to the house that burned down, is rejected; and 4) defendant's claims of prosecutorial misconduct are rejected.
[09/03]
US v. Yancey
Conviction of defendant for possessing a firearm as an unlawful user of marijuana is affirmed as Congress acted within constitutional bounds by prohibiting illegal drug users from firearm possession because it is substantially related to the important governmental interest in preventing violent crime.
[09/03]
Wilson v. O'Brien
In plaintiff's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 suit against the City of Chicago and persons associated with his prosecution for attempted murder, brought after a state court set aside the conviction, plaintiff's and a witness's interlocutory appeal is dismissed for lack of jurisdiction as the collateral-order doctrine does not support an interlocutory appeal by a party to the litigation who contends that the district judge erred in resolving a dispute about an evidentiary privilege. Here, the privilege belonged to the plaintiff, not the witness, who was a law student at the time he interviewed plaintiff for the acts of which he had been convicted, and Mohawk Industries holds that the district court's resolution of the question of whether defendants may use the witness's deposition that they now possess is to be reviewed on appeal from the final decision.
[09/03]
McCormick v. Adams
A denial of a petition for habeas relief brought by a prisoner who waived his right to counsel and represented himself at trial and now claimed the waiver was not knowing and voluntary is affirmed over defendant's claims that: 1) the trial court led him to believe he could revoke his Faretta waiver at any time, and that he relied on this promise in waiving his right to counsel; and 2) he made a mid-trial request for counsel that was wrongly denied by the trial court.
[09/03]
US v. Epstein
Prior terms of imprisonment for violations of supervised release do not limit the maximum sentence a district court may impose for a subsequent violation of supervised release under 18 U.S.C. section 3583(e)(3), as amended by the Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children Today Act of 2003 (PROTECT Act).
[09/03]
US v. McGilberry
District court's conviction of defendant for conspiracy to distribute marijuana is affirmed where: 1) sufficient evidence supported defendant's conviction for conspiracy to distribute marijuana; 2) government proved a single conspiracy as alleged in the indictment; and 3) the court did not err by permitting the government to introduce subsequent propensity evidence under Federal Rule Evidence 404(b).
[09/03]
Socha v. Pollard
District court's dismissal of defendant's petition for habeas corpus as untimely, in concluding that another district judge's order extending the limitations period was an impermissible advisory opinion and thus of no effect because the court issued the order before defendant had filed his petition, is vacated and remanded where: 1) an order accepting a filing after the limitations period has run is not beyond the power of the district court, and it is effective if it can meet the standards for equitable tolling that the Supreme Court described in Holland v. Florida, 130 S. Ct. 2549 (2010); and 2) the district court erred by focusing too closely on the fact that defendant had not already filed something that he had labeled as his petition as, not only does the motion anticipate an imminent action in which defendant and the state will be adverse, but also the parties have opposing interests on the immediate question of whether to toll the statute of limitations.
[09/03]
People v. Jones
Conviction and sentence of defendant for being a felon in possession of a firearm and other crimes are affirmed for the most part where: 1) the information in the affidavit supporting the search warrant was not stale and supported the trial court's probable cause finding; 2) defendant is barred from arguing that the sentence violated Penal Code sectin 654 because the trial court sentenced him within the maximum term negotiated in the plea agreement; 3) defendant was not deprived of effective assistance of counsel; and 4) defendant may be eligible for additional presentence custody credit if a prior serious felony conviction is stricken for that purpose.
