Anyone appealing a criminal conviction is used to uphill battles. Now there is one more. In a near-unanimous decision issued today, the Supreme Court held that the strict plain-error test applies to unpreserved Rehaif claims, explicitly stating that anyone raising this type of claim faces an “uphill climb.” Why? According to Kavanaugh, J., writing for … Read more
Last week, the Circuit closed the door on any Davis issue relating to 18 U.S.C. § 111(b), holding that 18 U.S.C. § 111(b) is a crime of violence. Even though this was a matter of first impression for the Circuit, it issued a per curiam decision without ordering full briefing (or indeed any briefing by … Read more
Last week, the Circuit rejected an argument that the International Parental Kidnapping Crime Act was unconstitutionally vague as applied to a father who refused to bring his United States-citizen children to the US from Yemen to visit with their mother, even though the children had been living in Yemen for a number of years and … Read more
In a decision on Thursday, the Second Circuit upheld Betsy Ramos’s two-year sentence for a violation of supervised release, finding that a district court may take recidivism enhancements into account in determining whether the maximum potential term of imprisonment for a crime is more than 20 years, qualifying the crime as a Grade A violation, … Read more
Mincing no words, Judge Cabranes, writing for a two-judge majority, proclaimed today that a 17-year sentence was so “shockingly low [ ] that, if upheld, [it] would damage the administration of justice in our country.” Judge Hall, however, disagreed, saying that, “I fear the majority would prefer to substitute its sentencing preferences for that of … Read more
The first challenge to a new breed of warrants is pending in the Eastern District of Virginia. Law enforcement is using “geofence” warrants to sweep up large amounts of data on all the cell phones in a particular geographic area. Rather than seeking a warrant for information about one person or one cell phone, these … Read more
The Second Circuit today issued a Jacobson remand for the district court to explain how it decided that a person represented by the Federal Defenders office was still “non-indigent” under Section 2014(a). (See the summary order in United States v. Rosario). For those who haven’t encountered this issue yet, section 2014(a) is the “Justice for … Read more
When agents came to search his business, Mr. Drago asked, why and what crime was being investigated? The agents said, look at the warrant. But…the warrant didn’t say what crime they were investigating. Instead, it completely failed to state any crimes at all. Even the government admitted the warrant was invalid. But, it argued that … Read more
Unfortunately, the Supreme Court might decide that the answer is yes. The Supreme Court has granted cert in a case out of Kansas, in which a police officer ran the license plate of a passing car (for reasons unexplained in the Kansas decision given that there was no traffic infraction) and saw that the registered … Read more
Finding valid defenses to illegal reentry charges tends to be challenging. Today, the Second Circuit issued a lengthy summary order in United States v. Lewis that, unfortunately, won’t make it any easier. Here’s what happened: Mr. Lewis was charged with illegally reentering the United States. The defense planned to argue that Mr. Lewis, who was born … Read more