Yesterday, in Snyder v. United States, the Supreme Court held that 18 USC 666 prohibits bribes to state and local officials, but does not prohibit  gratuities to state and local officials. The difference between a bribe and a gratuity is largely one of timing of the agreement: a bribe is given to a public official to induce them to take future action, while a gratuity is given to a public official to thank them for taking a past action.  (But, note that “rewards” are still covered by Section 666). Applying the statute to gratuities would create “traps for unwary state and local officials.” The court trots out various examples:  “Is a $100 Dunkin’ Donuts gift card for a trash collector wrongful? What about a $200 Nike gift card for a county commissioner who voted to fund new school athletic facilities? Could students take their college professor out to Chipotle …

At long last, the Supreme Court last week issued its eagerly-anticipated decision in United States v. Rahimi, involving a post-Bruen Second Amendment challenge to 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8), which criminalizes possession of a firearm while one is subject to a domestic violence restraining order. Unsurprisingly to anyone who listened to the oral argument, the Court, in a majority opinion authored by Chief Justice Roberts, voted 8-1 to uphold the criminal ban.

Justice Thomas dissented. Justice Sotomayor issued a concurring opinion, joined by Justice Kagan. And Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, and Jackson each penned separate concurrences. So there’s lots to review in the 100+ page opinion, more than can be done in this blog post. However, the top-level takeaways from the (relatively brief) majority opinion are as follows:

Clarification of the Bruen test: “relevantly similar” wins the day. Over the last two years, many lawyers (and judges) have …

Today, in Brown v. United States, the Supreme Court held that state drug convictions count as ACCA predicates if they involved a drug that was on the federal drug schedules at the time of the state conviction. In Brown, legislatures had eliminated two substances from the relevant drug schedules – hemp and ioflupane – between the time of the petitioners’ original cases and their ACCA cases. Thus, the state and federal drug schedules did not match at the time of their ACCA cases. The petitioners argued that, under the categorical approach, their prior state cases were not ACCA predicates.

The Supreme Court rejected this argument, finding that the drug schedules at the time of the ACCA conviction are essentially irrelevant. In reaching this decision, Justice Alito highlighted the facts of the petitioners’ prior drug offenses at length, emphasizing that the petitioners had possessed marijuana and cocaine, “not hemp …

Yes, the Second Circuit means it! If the district court doesn’t explain why a special condition of supervised release is required in a particular case, the Circuit will vacate the condition.

Today, yet again, the Second Circuit vacated a condition of supervised release because the district court did not explain the reasons for imposing the condition or make an individualized assessment it was necessary for Mr. Syed. In Mr. Syed’s case the vacated condition was broad electronic and GPS monitoring, without any reasonable suspicion required. In that way Syed is a lot like United States v. Salazar, decided last year.

But, in a broader sense, Syed is just the latest in a string of Second Circuit decisions vacating conditions of supervised release. See also United States v. Alex Oliveras, No. 21-2954 (2d Cir. March 15, 2024), United States v. William Jimenez, No. 21-2954 (2d Cir. March 18, 2024), …