Featured Articles

Identity Theft or Defamation?

Susan Brenner
June 05, 2008 11:47

A recent Wisconsin case illustrates how identity theft can incorporate elements of defamation while remaining a separate and distinct offense.The case is State v. Baron, 2008 WL 2201778 (Wisconsin Court of Appeals). The case's docket number is 2007AP1289-CR; you can use it to find the opinion on...

Recent Articles

Absurdity

Susan Brenner
October 08, 2008 12:00

This is to some extent a follow-up to my last post on the Adam Walsh Act, 18 U.S. Code § 3509. As I noted there, the Act requires prosecutors to maintain custody of the digital images of child pornography they intend to use in a prosecution, as long as they give defense experts a reasonable ...

18 U.S. Code § 3509(m)

Susan Brenner
October 06, 2008 10:34

If you’ve ever watched old movies about criminal trials, you’ve probably seen the moment when the defense springs its surprise evidence on the prosecution and wins the case. I read a book severalf years ago about Earl Rogers, a famous criminal defense lawyer who practiced in the Los Angeles area ar...

EnCase, Consent & Kyllo

Susan Brenner
October 03, 2008 12:23

This is a follow-up to the post I did on Monday (“Encase and Consent to Search a Computer”). It’s actually a follow-up to the thoughtful and thought-provoking comments sankyu contributed to that post.The issue I raised in my post was whether the police’s using EnCase to search a hard drive – with t...

Private and Not-So-Private Searches

Susan Brenner
October 01, 2008 12:31

An issue that often gets overlooked when we talk about police's searching and seizing property is the role of private citizens in that process. While most of the time it will be police officers -- local, state or federal -- who search for and seize evidence, sometimes private citizens get...

Encase and Consent to Search a Computer

Susan Brenner
September 29, 2008 10:30

EnCase, as you may know, is the leading software police officers (and others) use in conducting a computer forensics analysis of a computer. It’s routinely employed by law enforcement; if you're not familiar with it, you can read about it here.In an earlier post I wrote about consent as an e...

Textual Obscenity?

Susan Brenner
September 26, 2008 12:25

On August 7, Karen Fletcher, a 56-year-old agoraphobic, was sentenced to five years probation after she pled guilty to violating federal obscenity law. According to a story in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, she has spent the last seven years in her home, unable to leave. The charges against her...

Power

Susan Brenner
September 16, 2008 15:19

This is what it looks like where I am . . . only much, much worse. Estimates are that between 300,000 and a million people here are without electricity because of an incredibly windstorm on Sunday . . . four hours of sustained winds 60 mph+. I'm one of those people . . . no electricity = no...

The DOJ and the WTO

Susan Brenner
September 12, 2008 13:00

This post is specifically about the U.S. District Court of Utah’s opinion in U.S. v. Lombardo, 2007 WL 4404641 (2007), but it’s also about how cyberspace often leads to a clash between domestic, national law and international law.The Lombardo case began with a 34-count indictment which charged an as...

Failed Defense: First Sale Doctrine

Susan Brenner
September 10, 2008 12:27

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit recently decided a case involving a conviction under 18 U.S. Code § 2318: U.S. v. Harrison, 534 F.3d 1371 (11th Cir. 2008).The relevant portion of § 2318 provides as follows: Whoever, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (c), k...