In advance of a short hiatus (light-to-nonexistent posting next week), we thought you might find the following links of interest …
Mapp v. Ohio is about to turn 50. What, you thought the exclusionary rule always applied to the states? (True in Wisconsin a long time, though, with Hoyer v. State, 180 Wis. 407, 193 N.W. 89 (1923) turning 88 this year.)
Fantasy predictions for SCOTUS. Purely for entertainment purposes, no wagering allowed.
Mississippi Supreme Court Reprimands Judge Who Sent Lawyer to Jail for Refusing to Say the Pledge of Allegiance. Wonder who got the worse end of that deal.
Advice on oral argument; and on written advocacy.
From the academy:
- Amy Knight Burns, Insurmountable Obstacles: Structural Errors, Procedural Default, and Ineffective Assistance (Stanford Law Review, Vol. 64, 2011);
- Derek Wikstrom,‘No Logical Stopping Point’: The Consequences of Padilla v. Kentucky’s Inevitable Expansion (Northwestern University Law Review, Vol. 106, 2012);
- Colin Miller, When Innocence Is Pink: Why There Is A Gender Gap In Exonerations Of The Wrongfully Convicted And Efforts That Might Shrink It;
- Carissa Hessick and Andy Hessick, Recognizing Constitutional Rights at Sentencing, 99 Cal. L. Rev. 47 (2011);
- Shane Witnov, Investigating Facebook: The Ethics of Using Social Networking Websites in Legal Investigations.
Statutory Rape Law Held Unconstitutionally Open to Selective Enforcement, As Applied to Sex Between Two Minors. Ohio supreme court decision. Charge was for “statutory rape,” i.e., strict liability offense based on age of victim, where both participants were under age threshold of 13. Statute held unconstitutionally vague because it supports discriminatory enforcement: “when two children under the age of 13 engage in sexual conduct with each other, each child is both an offender and a victim, and the distinction between those two terms breaks down.” And, arbitrary enforcement of the statute violates equal protection. (Eugene Volokh: significant chance of SCOTUS review.)
Attorney’s Testimony Against Removed Judge Requires Recusal Of Colleague. (The post title is a bit misleading; the decision of the Nebraska supreme court is premised on the judge’s admitted “personal prejudice” against the attorney, albeit for the reason mentioned in the title.) Judge removed because, under Nebraska statute, disqualification required when impartiality might reasonably be questioned. Court goes on to say that “most” jurisdictions decline to apply harmless error review to judicial disqualification (fn. 14 and accompanying text), and “agree(s) that a traditional harmless error analysis is inappropriate.” Court proceeds to adopt 3-part test that, though resulting in relief here, leaves a bit to be desired. Note, however, that our supreme court has applied a traditional harmless error test for appearance-of-bias disqualification, State v. Walberg, 109 Wis.2d 96, 109, 325 N.W.2d 687, 692 (1982).
Your turn: if you’ve got a link worth sharing, just submit it in the Comment box below.
