criminal law

ProPublica reports on how the criminal prosecution of Etan Patz's alleged killer might have been jeopardized because police did not tape the interrogation: the "interrogation room, it turns out, was fully equipped to do what a growing body of expert opinion has insisted be done in such moments: a full videotaping of a suspect’s interaction with detectives, from the start of an interrogation through any possible formal confession. Judges, defense lawyers, and even many prosecutors have come to see such comprehensive videotaping as the single most important factor in securing reliable confessions and preventing the wrongful convictions that can stem from false confessions. In New Jersey, where Hernandez was being questioned, taping interrogations in homicide cases has been required by law since 2005. The detectives, however, never turned the cameras on during what would become seven hours of interrogation. They remained off, in fact, until 2:57 that afternoon, when Hernandez was finally ready to formally confess."

ProPublica further reports that the accused killer's defense counsel is going to seek to have the confession ruled to be illegitimate.

Two Arizona reporters have received a $3.75 million settlement because they were falsely arrested in 2007 by Sheriff Joe Arpaio. The Phoenix New Times reports that their co-founders "Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin were taken from their homes in the middle of the night and jailed on misdemeanor charges alleging that they violated the secrecy of a grand jury -- which turned out never to have been convened."

Two-and-a-half years after the paper published the sheriff's address as part of an investigation into the sheriff's commercial real estate transactions, Arpaio and Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas "collaborated to appoint Phoenix attorney Dennis Wilenchik as a 'special prosecutor' to go after the paper. He issued grand jury subpoenas for the notes, records, and sources of the paper's reporters and editors for all Arpaio-related stories over a broad period of time, as well as for the IP addresses of New Times' readers of such stories," according to the New Times.

Even though the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Jones the law enforcement's installation of GPS devices on suspects' vehicles  are searches under the Fourth Amendment, the Second Circuit has reasoned '"Jones left open the question of whether the warrantless use of GPS devices would be 'reasonable—and thus lawful—under the Fourth Amendment [where] officers ha[ve] reasonable suspicion, and indeed probable cause' to conduct a search,'" according to The New York Law Journal. The GPS tracking of the defendants in the case before the Second Circuit was not done with delibrate, reckless or gross disregard for their Fourth Amendment rights and was done with reasonable reliance on court precedent before the U.S. Supreme Court decided Jones, The Journal also reports. So the panel decided the evidence related to the search was in good faith and didn't need to be excluded.
 

The New York Court of Appeals ruled today that Fox News reporter Jana Winter is protected by that state's media shield law from identifying her anonymous law enforcement sources in reponse to a Colorado defendant's subpoena, Politico reports. New York's highest court was sharply divided in a 4-3 decision.

Winter had an exclusive about a notebook belonging to James Holmes, who is charged with the mass killing at the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.

The majority said a ruling against Winter would violate New York's strong public policy favoring the protection of journalists, which made New York "'the media capital of the country, if not the world,"' Politico reports. The dissent said Colorado laws should apply.

Joan Orie Melvin, a former Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice convicted of using the resources of her judicial chambers on her political campaigns, is arguing that the charges against her should be dismissed or that she should get a new trial or sentence, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. Orie Melvin's defense counsel said in their brief to the Pennsylvania Superior Court that the trial judge, Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Lester G. Nauhaus, was biased, as demonstrated by expressing "'personal opinions and improperly commenting on the evidence in front of the jury,'" the Pittsburgh paper reports. 

Nauhaus crafted an unusual sentence for Orie Melvin, including ordering her to write apologies on a picture of herself in handcuffs to every judge in Pennsylvania.

Joan Orie Melvin, a former Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice convicted of using the resources of her judicial chambers on her political campaigns, is arguing that the charges against her should be dismissed or that she should get a new trial or sentence, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. Orie Melvin's defense counsel said in their brief to the Pennsylvania Superior Court that the trial judge, Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Lester G. Nauhaus, was biased, as demonstrated by expressing "'personal opinions and improperly commenting on the evidence in front of the jury,'" the Pittsburgh paper reports. 

Nauhaus crafted an unusual sentence for Orie Melvin, including ordering her to write apologies on a picture of herself in handcuffs to every judge in Pennsylvania.

A best practice developed by the Innocence Project to ensure accurate eyewitness identification could be running afoul of the First Amendment. The Daytona Beach News-Journal reports on local law enforcement's use of witness identifiation affidavits that direct witnesses to crime not to talk to the media; these affidavits were recommended to try to avoid wrongful convictions. Seth Miller, of the Innocence Project of Florida, told the newspaper that cases that receive a lot of media coverage can taint witnesses' opinions and potentially lead to wrongful convictions. But an attorney who practices in the area of media law said having law enforcement tell witnesses not to talk to the press violates their First Amendment rights.

The Washington Post reports on the criticism that the International Criminal Court is facing in Africa: "The 11-year-old court of last resort was set up to take on some of the world’s most heinous crimes. But its choice of cases has frustrated African leaders, who say that comparable crimes elsewhere in the world are being ignored and that race is a factor in the decision-making. With Kenya’s president and deputy president on trial, African leaders are pushing for changes that some ICC advocates say would undermine the court completely. At stake is the future of a court whose creation was touted as a major breakthrough in ensuring that those who commit crimes against humanity do not escape justice — a dream that African nations, more than any other region in the world , signed up for."

The International Association of Chiefs of Police is urging law enforcement agencies "to adopt new guidelines for conducting photo lineups, videotaping witness interviews and corroborating information from jailhouse informants, among 30 recommendations," The Washington Post reports. The Post further reports that more than 20 states record interrogations statewide, and another 850 law enforcement agencies voluntarily record interrogations.

Fair Trials International argues that international police work is improperly influenced by political motives, The Washington Post reports. Fair Trials International said that Interpol is used by members, including Russia, Belarus, Turkey, Iran and Venezuela, to pursue political ends. FTI cites a case in which a Russian environmental activist was arrested in Spain even though he was accepted as a political refugee in Finland; Pyotr Silaev spent six months in a Spanish jail until a Spanish court ruled that his arrest was politically motivated, The Washington Post further reports.