U.S. Supreme Court Update: Criminal Cases and News
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.”
U.S. Presidential Memoranda: Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and Open Government*
January 21, 2009,
President Obama also released the following Memoranda on January 21: “the Memorandum on the Freedom of Information Act, which re-establishes a presumption of openness under FOIA and orders the Office of Management and Budget to ‘update guidance to the agencies to increase and improve information dissemination to the public,’ and the Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government, which lays out several ways in which the new Administration will ‘work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration.’ ” Both address issues of longtime inerest and concern to the American Association of Law Libraries
THE WHITE HOUSE
New York Appellate Criminal Cases Origiinating from the New York Supreme Court NY County – Lexis
Update from the Lexis Alert Service,
January 19.21, 2009:
1. People v. Starnes, 5042, 5249/05, SUPREME COURT OF NEW YORK, APPELLATE DIVISION, FIRST DEPARTMENT, 2009 NY Slip Op 125; 2009 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 119, January 15, 2009, Decided, January 15, 2009, Entered, THE LEXIS PAGINATION OF THIS DOCUMENT IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE PENDING RELEASE OF THE FINAL PUBLISHED VERSION., THIS OPINION IS UNCORRECTED AND SUBJECT TO REVISION BEFORE PUBLICATION IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS.
Upgraded Library Web Resource Announcement
State of New York Supreme Court Criminal Term Library (New York County)
Inspired by the recent New York Unified Court System Report Green Justice: An environmental Action Plan for the New York State Court System*, the New York Supreme Court Law Library, Criminal Term (New York County) is pleased to announce a major upgrade to the section of our website dealing with search engines. Our objective is to best serve your information needs through enhanced access to reference and research sources. Consequently, we have have provided a wide variety of general Internet search engines as well as search engines that specifically target legal information sites. Moreover, we have included in our resource page meta search engines which combine the search results and different technologies of multiple companies (e.g. Google and MSN). We hope that these resources are another means for you to conveniently and best retrieve information from the Internet. Our new search engine page is located at: /nyc_criminal/search_engines.shtml .
You may wish to reacquaint yourselves with out library homepage which is located at: http://www.nycourts.gov/library/nyc_criminal/ .
ABA: US Supreme Court Update. 2009-01-15.
Supreme Court Update: A Service from the ABA Criminal Justice Section www.abanet.org/crimjust
CHAMBERS V. UNITED SATES The Court ruled in Chambers v. United Sates (No. 06-11206) that a failure to report for prison does not count as a violent crime under a federal law intended to keep repeat criminals in prison longer.
A unanimous court on Tuesday threw out a mandatory 15-year prison term given to Deondery Chambers, who pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a gun. Chambers had three prior convictions, which prosecutors argued and lower courts agreed brought him under the federal Armed Career Criminal Act.
But one of Chambers’ convictions was for his “failure to report” for weekend jail stays. The government contended that not showing up for the weekend confinement was akin to an escape and should be treated as a violent crime.
Justice Stephen Breyer rejected that argument in his opinion for the court. Breyer said a report that examined failures to report to prison found no evidence that defendants were more likely to resist arrest and potentially injure law enforcement officers or others.
In a separate opinion, Justice Samuel Alito said the court is called on too often to interpret the career criminal law and suggested that Congress come up with a list of specific crimes that should trigger application of the law.
JIMINEZ V. QUARTERMAN In a second criminal case, the court unanimously ruled for a Texas prison inmate seeking federal review of his 43-year prison term. The court interpreted a dead line determining when a judgment is final for purposes of section 28 U.S.C. 2244 (d)(1)(A). The USSC held that a federal appeals court in New Orleans was wrong to find that Carlos Jiminez had missed a deadline for filing his paperwork in federal court. Justice Clarence Thomas delivered the opinion, holding that where a state court grants a criminal defendant the right to file an out-of-time direct appeal during state collateral review, but before the defendant has first sought federal habeas relief, his judgment is not “final” for purposes of section .2244 (d)(1)(A) until the conclusion of the out-of-time direct appeal, or the expiration of the time for seeking certiorari review of the appeal.
The Chambers v. U.S., 06-11206, and Jiminez v. Quarterman, 07-6984 cases are available at http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/08slipopinion.html.
——————————————————————————–
Continue reading
New York Appellate Criminal Cases Originating from the New York Supreme Court NY County – Lexis. January 12 ,15, 2009.
Update from the Lexis Alert Service,
January 12 ,15, 2009
1. People v. Kelley, 4996, 6077/06, SUPREME COURT OF NEW YORK, APPELLATE DIVISION, FIRST DEPARTMENT, 2009 NY Slip Op 49; 2009 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 67, January 8, 2009, Decided, January 8, 2009, Entered, THE LEXIS PAGINATION OF THIS DOCUMENT IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE PENDING RELEASE OF THE FINAL PUBLISHED VERSION., THIS OPINION IS UNCORRECTED AND SUBJECT TO REVISION BEFORE PUBLICATION IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS.
New York: Jonathan Lippman Has Been Nominated by Governor David Paterson to Serve As the Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals
Governor David Paterson has nominated Jonathan Lippman, currently presiding justice in the Appellate Division First Department of the State Supreme Court, to fill the chief judge’s post that was vacarted when Judith Kaye retired. See Press Release announcing the nomination.
Seeking Funding Ideas for Court*
QUESTION:
We as a court are in the process of looking under every rock for potential funding sources. To that end we are interested in getting ideas and tips about short- or long-term legislation and policies around the nation that have provided directed funding to court programs or projects. Specifically, temporary filing fee assessments, temporary fine enhancements, fees for ongoing technology improvements, etc… We intend to use these as ammunition for similar funding should that possibility exist or become necessary during our legislative process. The sky is the limit here and we are looking for ideas so any thought would be helpful.
RESPONSE
Proposed Democratic Senate Committee Assignments for 111th Congress
On December 22, 2008 we posted a list of House committee assignments preferred by many freshman in the 111th congress.
Although we have heard nothing more about House commitee assignments, we have heard from the Senate. Senate Majority Harry Reid has announced a partial list of the committee assignments he anticipates members of the Democratic Caucus will hold during the 111th Congress. As required by Senate rules, Senator Reid will meet with the Republican Leader to finalize the make-up of each Committee. For additional information including the anticipated committee assignment click on the link below
Partial List of Democratic Senate Committee Assignments Proposed for the 111th Congress