The government filed a motion for reconsideration of the ruling granting defendant's amended motion for a new trial.

The district court vacated defendant's conviction and ordered a new trial, pursuant to Fed. R. Crim. P. 33. The ruling was based alternatively on the late disclosure of the previous conviction of ...

The defendant had already served the imprisonment portion of his sentence when an earlier appeal resulted in a finding that he had served excess time in prison. On remand, he then moved for a reduction in his term of supervised release to offset the extra prison term he had served. ...

Here, some 17 years after his conviction for a 1980 murder, the Third Circuit granted habeas relief to the defendant on the grounds that the prosecutor’s use of eleven peremptory strikes to exclude African-Americans from the jury violated the principles laid down in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986). ...

This case is noted as an example of the wide judicial gap that exists on the controversial issue of drug-contaminated currency. While numerous scientific studies have established that a significant percentage of all the currency in circulation in the United States tests positive for traces of cocaine, the courts differ ...

Three defendants filed interlocutory appeals from a decision entered by the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division that denied their motion for summary judgment.

Plaintiffs, black women, were 90 American citizens who were searched at an airport when reentering the country after foreign travel. ...

The United States District Court for the District of Columbia entered a final judgment of conviction after a jury found defendant guilty of violating federal law by making false statements in a matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch of the government of the United States. Defendant appealed.

Incidents ...

Defendant conditionally pled guilty to possession of a firearm after previously being convicted of three felonies, in violation of 18 U.S.C.S. § 922(g). Defendant appealed from the United States District Court for the District of Kansas the denial of his motion to suppress evidence.

The officers went to the home ...

The defendant moved to have the Court reduce its restitution order by the amount of funds that had previously been administratively forfeited and remitted to the victim. While the Government claimed that it did not oppose the motion in principle, it argued that case law appeared to limit the Court’s ...

Here, on a remand after an earlier downward departure had been vacated, Judge Friedman found a way to fashion the same sentence of 24 months in prison based on an adjustment for minor role and a departure for extraordinary post-sentencing rehabilitation.

This is one of those rare drug sentencing cases ...

Justice has been slow in coming to James Benn, the petitioner in this case. He was convicted in 1991 of first-degree sodomy and attempted rape of P.M. The principal evidence against Benn was the testimony of P.M., but there was considerable question about the reliability of her testimony.

Judge Weinstein ...

This case is noted for its timely and exhaustive review of the case law relating to downward departures based on a defendant’s “cultural assimilation” to the United States. In this case, the defendant, a 25-year old Mexican citizen who came to this country with his family when he was nine, ...

In April, 2003l, Congress built an artificial fence around judicial discretion by enacting, hastily and with virtually no debate, the Feeney Amendment, a last-minute add-on to the Prosecutorial Remedies and Tools Against the Exploitation of Children Today (“PROTECT”) Act of 2003, Pub.L. 108-21, 117 Stat. 650 (2003). As Judge Weinstein ...

This is the first case we have seen to address one of the latest of the Federal government’s ever-growing arsenal of new-fangled crimes - namely identity theft under the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act of 1998 (Pub.L. No. 105-318) (“ITADA”). That Act, as passed by Congress, is a challenge ...

This case is noted for its detailed discussion of the methodology to be followed and the factors to be considered when a court considers a Rule 35(b) motion for a reduction of a sentence based on post-sentencing cooperation.

After the defendant in this case was sentenced to a mandatory minimum ...

This case is noted for Judge Adelman’s thought-provoking analysis of a sentencing departure based on his finding that several of the primary purposes of sentencing had previously been satisfied, a factor that thus allowed mitigation of the punishmant.

As he so often does, Judge Adelman has cast light on an ...