For as long as we can remember, the word on the street has always been that cops cannot lie. So if you’re doing a drug deal with an undercover cop, and you ask him point blank if he’s a police officer, then he has to tell you the truth. He...
“Why is this case here, except as an opportunity to upset Melendez-Diaz?” So wondered Justice Scalia during oral argument a couple weeks back in the case of Briscoe v. Virginia. For some background, see our previous post on this case here. Briefly, the Supreme Court held last year in Melendez-Diaz...
Not again. It looks like yet another instance of federal prosecutors exercising terrible judgment. Writing for a unanimous Supreme Court this morning, soon-to-retire Justice Souter clarified what “facilitation” means in criminal law. A buyer calling up a drug dealer to arrange the purchase of some drugs does not count. Apparently,...
Although the nation of Sierra Leone has had an extradition treaty with the United States in effect since 1935, the African country has never complied with a single request for extradition. Until yesterday, that is. Its government never complied with such requests, one might argue, because there really was no...
2009 New York Drug Sentencing Guide What with all the drug law reforms happening in New York, we thought we’d put together a quick-and-easy guide to what they mean. Click here to view it in PDF form. We used to do this all the time back when we were prosecuting...
Gang crime is on the rise, the FBI reports. The politicians and prosecutors, however, are focusing on white-collar crime these days. Here’s a look at why this is happening. Gang crime seems to have increased, ironically, as a result of improved anti-gang law enforcement in the big cities. According to...
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