Monday, October 31, 2011

Keep Your Eyes Out for Eyewitness ID Ruling: Argument This Week

The Supreme Court will hear the case of Perry v. New Hampshire on November 2, 2011. The issue presented is whether an eyewitness identification should be excluded when the circumstances make the identification unreliable even where the police did not create the circumstances. The Supreme Court last considered eyewitness identification in 1977 in Manson v. Brathwaite where the Court held that eyewitness identification should not be excluded if the circumstances are reliable.

Mistaken identifications lead to wrongful convictions. Of the first 250 DNA exonerations, 190 involved eyewitnesses who were wrong, as documented in “Convicting the Innocent,” a recent book by Brandon L. Garrett, a law professor at the University of Virginia. A number of groups have written amicus briefs for the Court to consider in Perry including the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Innocence Project, and the American Psychological Association. All briefing is available on Scotus. Stay tuned.

Sunday, October 30, 2011

New Report from ACLU on "Sneak and Peek" Warrants Permitted by Patriot Act

The ACLU reports that between October 1, 2009 and September 30, 2010 federal judges permitted government "sneak and peak" warrants permitted by the Patriot Act. The ACLU contacted the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts to obtain up-to-date numbers on how frequently the government uses the "sneak and peek" searches (also called delayed-notice searches), a government surveillance tool authorized by the Patriot Act. The report (available here) shows that in 2010, sneak and peek warrants were issued more than twice as often as in 2009, and more than three times as often as in 2008.

Google Refuses to Take Down Videos of Police Brutality

Google refused the request of a U.S. law enforcement agency earlier this year to remove a YouTube video showing police brutality, it has been revealed.

The web giant did not give details about the contents of the video, not pictured, but said it turned down the petition for it to be taken down between January and June this year.

'We received a request from a local law enforcement agency to remove YouTube videos of police brutality, which we did not remove,' Google wrote in its Transparency Report. The Google Report delineates content removal requests by party requesting the removal, the reason for the removal, and whether the request was complied with.

Full article here.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Collateral Consequences of Criminal Record: NACDL to Start Task Force

NACDL released today that they will be holding an inaugural hearing in Chicago, Ill. this Thursday and Friday to address the issue of the criminal record syndrome. It goes something like this: Potential Employer: Have you been convicted of a felony? Potential Applicant: Yes, as a juvenile. The collateral consequences of a criminal conviction are far reaching and NACDL proposes to address the issue starting this week in Chicago for two days of hearings from
Press Release(Oct. 17, 2011) – It has been reported that as many as one in four American adults have a criminal record, some 65 million people. The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) is a leading national voice calling attention to this matter of significant public concern -- the vast expansion in recent decades of the criminal law and its intended and unintended consequences in American society. In addition to its ongoing work in our courts, legislatures and the public square to combat the overcriminalization of conduct in U.S. society, NACDL is also focused on the consequences of conviction – specific legal barriers, generalized discrimination, and social stigma – which have likewise become more numerous and severe, more public, and more permanent. They affect jobs and licenses, housing, public benefits, judicial rights, parental rights, interstate travel, and even volunteer opportunities. To this end, NACDL recently established the national Task Force on Restoration of Rights and Status After Conviction to undertake an inquiry into how legal mechanisms for relief from the collateral consequences of conviction are actually working, in state and federal systems, and develop comprehensive proposals for reform. The co-Chairs of the Task Force are attorneys Rick Jones of New York City and Vicki Young of San Francisco. The Task Force will be holding its inaugural hearing in Chicago, Ill., this Thursday and Friday, Oct. 20 and 21, 2011. Approximately two dozen witnesses over the course of two full days will testify before the task force providing a range of personal and professional experiences, perspectives and expertise on the important practical issues surrounding barriers to re-entry and the collateral consequences of a criminal record. Witnesses will include Judge Paul Biebel, Presiding Judge, Cook County Circuit Court, Criminal Division and John Schomberg, General Counsel, Office of the Governor of Illinois, as well as individuals who themselves confronted barriers to re-entry and other stakeholders.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

DNA Training Resources One Stop Shopping

The National Institute of Justice has gathered all of the animations and videos from the training courses on DNA.gov. The NIJ encourages people to use these as resources in teaching or other work and ask only that acknowledgment is given to DNA.gov and NIJ as the source. Here is a link to everything that is available. A list of topics include: Forensic DNA for Officers of the Court; DNA: A Prosecutor's Practice Notebook; Collecting DNA Evidence at Property Crime Scenes; Laboratory Orientation and Testing of Body Fluids and Tissues for Forensic Analysis; DNA Amplification for Forensic Analysts; Amplified DNA Product Separation for Forensic Analysts; STR Data Analysis and Interpretation for Forensic Analysts; Population Genetics and Statistics for the Forensic Analysts; Communication Skills, Report Writing and Courtroom Testimony for Forensic Analysts; and Advanced and Emerging DNA Technologies and Techniques.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Barry Scheck Interview: Public Defenders, "Liberty's Last Champion"

Here is an interesting profile of Barry Scheck on New York 1 where he addresses Troy Davis's recent execution, DNA exoneration, the O.J Simpson case, his early career as a public defender in the Bronx and how it all led to the birth of the Innocence Project.