LexMonitor

Case o' The Week: 22, a Tad Too Few -- Ressam and Substantive Reasonableness Review

In an en banc opinion, the Ninth last week delivered a watershed sentencing decision that will control all future sentencing appeals in the Circuit.(If the appeal involves recanting cooperating Algerian terrorists caught at the Canadian border). UnitedStates v. Ressam,2012 WL 762986 (9th Cir. Mar....

Ode To Saint Patrick

As a child I wished I could find a wayTo skip the joys of St. Patrick's Day:Chauvinism rampant and coercing green,To celebrate beer and Gaelic spleen.That merry robed Pat, with uplifted truncheon,He whacked scaly wildlife into extinction.But history forced me to change my view,To realize that I...

Phillips v. Ornoski, No. 04-99005 (3-16-12) (Reinhardt with B. Fletcher; partial dissent by Kleinfeld).In this capital petition, the 9th excoriates the prosecutor for wilfully misleading the jury and withholding evidence as to a special circumstance that may have impacted the death verdict....

U.S. v. Del Toro-Barboza, No. 10-50487 (3-14-12) (Gould with Noonan and Ikuta).In an appeal from bulk cash smuggling in violation of 31 U.S.C. 5332 and exporting money under 31 U.S.C. 5324, the 9th affirms the conviction and sentence. The defendants were caught with $500,000 in a box in the bed of...

U.S. v. Ressam, No. 09-30000 (3-12-12) (en banc).Sitting en banc, the 9th considers the 22-year sentence imposed upon the so-called "Millennium Bomber" and holds that it has "a definite and firm conviction" that the district court committed "clear error" in its sentence, and thus the sentence was...

Case o' The Week: Broaching the Breach - Whitney and Prosecutorial Breach of Plea Agreements

"The government's argument [on appeal] is disingenuous."Expect good things to follow, when the analysis of an AUSA'sbreach of a plea agreement begins with that blunt assessment. United States v.Whitney, 2012 WL 718483, *4 (9th Cir. Mar. 7, 2012), decision available here.Players: Decision by...

U.S. v. Whitney, No. 10-10118 (3-7-12) (Reinhardt with B. Fletcher and Tashima).A deal was struck between the government and the defendant. At sentencing, the prosecutor breached explicitly and implicitly some provisions. Specifically, the prosecutor disclosed information in a debriefing that was...

U.S. v. Loughner, No. 11-10339 (3-5-12) (Bybee, concurrence by Wallace, dissent by Berzon).In a number of appeals arising from the involuntary pretrial medication of the defendant (the Tucson shootings), the 9th affirms the district court's decisions, holding that the doctors at FCI-Springfield...

Case o' The Week: Pitch Dark & White - Competency in Federal Court

A defendant is convinced he can kill his attorney from heaven, that defense counsel forged a legal treatise on a computer and re-attached the book's cover as part of a conspiracy for conviction, and is inexplicably fixated on an insignificant event that took place with a sheriff's deputy years...

U.S. v. Bolivar, No. 11-30055 (2-29-12) (Graber with Tashima and Rawlinson).The probation officer searched a probationer's apartment. Nothing unusual there. In looking through a closet, though, filled with clothing of the boyfriend, a backpack was seen. Inside was a sawed off shotgun that belonged...