Appellate Practice

Appeals court stays secret witness testimony at Jodi Arias capital murder case resentencing

On Thursday, a judge presiding over the resentencing of Jodi Arias in a highly publicized capital murder case allowed secret witness testimony. By Monday, media organizations, including the Arizona Republic, had obtained an order from the Arizona Court of Appeals nixing the practice. It prohibits Maricopa Superior Judge Sherry Stephens…

Nov 4, 2014 3:35 PM CST

OJ Simpson asks Nevada Supreme Court for new trial

O.J. Simpson has thrown a legal Hail Mary in the hopes of getting his 2008 conviction for armed robbery and kidnapping thrown out. The Associated Press reported Monday that Simpson’s lawyers have filed their final appellate brief to the Nevada Supreme Court. Simpson, who was convicted of leading a group…

Oct 27, 2014 3:53 PM CDT

Prosecutors will appeal Oscar Pistorius verdict and sentence

South African prosecutors announced they will appeal both the judgment and sentence handed down to sprinter Oscar Pistorius. The New York Times reported that Nathi Mncube, a spokesman for the National Prosecuting Authority in South Africa, sent out a tweet Monday saying that prosecutors “will be appealing both the conviction…

Oct 27, 2014 2:00 PM CDT

Lawyer who didn’t share client payments with his partners is disbarred

Reversing an earlier decision to suspend a prominent Muskegon, Michigan, criminal defense attorney for two years for misappropriating client payments that should have been shared with his law partners, the state’s Attorney Disciplinary Board has revoked his license to practice. That means Shawn P .Davis will have to wait at…

Oct 24, 2014 5:15 PM CDT

Ex-nurse gets jail time for ‘assisting’ suicide in comments made on Internet chat boards

After years of legal battle, it appears that a former nurse may be headed to jail for assisting and attempting to assist the suicide of two individuals outside the U.S. through comments he made on Internet chat boards. Described as a morbid predator by a Minnesota appeals court that upheld…

Oct 15, 2014 3:15 PM CDT

New DOJ policy bans waiver of potential ineffective-assistance claims against defense counsel

In a new policy announced Tuesday that is effective immediately, the U.S. Department of Justice says an individual who takes a plea cannot waive a potential ineffective assistance claim against his or her legal counsel by doing so. That means federal prosecutors can no longer include such waiver language in…

Oct 14, 2014 3:37 PM CDT

Judge dismisses murder case against 3 men over prosecutorial misconduct, says they can’t be retried

Three defendants in a “horrible” murder, torture and robbery case are by no means Boy Scouts, a Philadelphia judge said Thursday. But, explaining that constitutional rights apply to the guilty as well as the innocent, Common Pleas Judge Benjamin Lerner dismissed murder charges against Aquil Bond, Jawayne K. Brown, and…

Oct 10, 2014 2:20 PM CDT

Appeals court says councilman ousted for letting homeless pal stay at city hall must be reinstated

Corrected: A Prairie Village councilman who was removed from office because he allowed a homeless friend to stay overnight at city hall during 2012 must be reinstated, a Kansas appeals court has ruled. A district court judge removed David Morrison from office a year ago, after the council voted to…

Oct 10, 2014 11:10 AM CDT

Woman who won new murder trial despite earlier manslaughter plea bargain won’t be retried

A Kentucky woman who took a manslaughter plea because she was afraid she would be convicted of a murder she didn’t commit won a new trial in July. Now the government has decided that Susan Jean King won’t be retried, the Courier-Journal reports. “In our minds, this is a complete…

Oct 9, 2014 5:10 PM CDT

7th Circuit explains how acquitted murder defendant can still be punished by sentencing judge

Acquitted by a jury in the fatal shooting of a rival Latin Kings gang member, Martin Anaya nonetheless was blamed for the murder by the federal district judge who oversaw his Indiana racketeering and drug conspiracy case. As a result, Anaya had his sentence enhanced to two concurrent 30-year terms.…

Oct 8, 2014 3:20 PM CDT

Once on death row for murder committed when he was 1,000 miles away, Texas man is free after plea

Construction laborer Manuel Velez was on the job in Tennessee, some 1,000 miles from his home in Brownsville, Texas, when his girlfriend’s 1-year-old son sustained fatal head injuries, according to medical evidence provided by an expert witness for the prosecution. But Velez was nonetheless convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced…

Oct 8, 2014 2:10 PM CDT

Using adverbs recklessly can hurt your appeal and vex the courts

Adverbs can be a boon and a bane to lawyers who argue over the meaning of words such as “knowingly,” “intentionally” and “recklessly” and sprinkle them throughout their briefs. Indeed, the number of disputes over how to interpret adverbs in criminal statutes has surged since the 1980s, the Wall Street…

Oct 8, 2014 7:57 AM CDT

Judge complains about smelly appeals documents; can the culprit be sniffed out?

An Indiana appeals judge smells something amiss in an appeal of a prostitution conviction. In footnote 1 in a Sept. 30 opinion (PDF), Judge Edward Najam Jr. has a complaint about the transcript: It “emits an unpleasant odor” of smoke. The Indiana Law Blog noted the footnote and the Indianapolis…

Oct 8, 2014 7:00 AM CDT

5th Circuit rejects convicted Ponzi schemer Allen Stanford’s 299-page brief

The man convicted of running the second-largest Ponzi scheme in American history filed a 299-page pro se brief with the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the Dallas Morning News and Vice collaboratively reported. R. Allen Stanford, who is representing himself after firing his court-appointed attorney, had his…

Oct 7, 2014 3:14 PM CDT

Judge refuses to follow state supreme court order to dismiss voter ID suit, steps aside from case

Faced with a state supreme court order telling him to dismiss a lawsuit that challenged a state statute requiring voters to produce identification, a Wisconsin judge is pursuing a highly unusual course of action. In a Thursday order, Dane County Circuit Judge Richard Niess said he could not in good…

Sep 24, 2014 2:15 PM CDT