Articles Posted in U.S. Supreme Court

From the American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section: http://www.abanet.org/crimjust

I”n a case arising from a felony domestic assault and habitual offender charges, where the defendant had at least six different appointed attorneys between the time of his arrest and his trial, the trial court denied the defendant’s motion to dismiss for want of a speedy trial. The Vermont Supreme Court, however, reversed, holding that the conviction must be vacated, and the charges dismissed, because the State did not accord a speedy trial as is required by the Sixth Amendment. The Supreme Court held that The Vermont Supreme Court erred in ranking assigned counsel essentially as state actors in the criminal justice system, stating that assigned counsel, just as retained counsel, act on behalf of their clients, and, in the absence of institutional breakdowns of the public defender system, delays sought by counsel are ordinarily attributable to the defendants they represent.”

The full opinion can be accessed at http://topics.law.cornell.edu/supct/cert/08-88

January 23, 2009 From the American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section “> www.abanet.org/crimjust“>

Spears v. US, No. 08–5721

The government appealed a sentence for conspiracy to distribute cocaine base and powder cocaine in which the District Court reduced the sentencing range for crack cocaine from the 100 to 1 ratio to a 20 to one ratio based on the U. S. Sentencing Commission guidelines and the Smith and Perry cases. The District Court imposed a sentence based on a 20 to 1 ratio which was its interpretation of the mandatory minimum sentence in the case. The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the district Court’s interpretation of the minimum sentence in the case and imposed a tougher sentence based on the 100 to 1 ratio. The Supreme Court remanded for rehearing by the Eighth Circuit which again imposed the tougher sentence. On rehearing the Supreme Court reversed stating, “we now clarify that district courts are entitled to reject and vary categorically from the crack cocaine Guidelines based on a policy disagreement with those Guidelines.”