Here, by a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court rejected as too restrictive a Florida state law that prevented persons with an IQ score of 70 or more from arguing against the death penalty on the basis of an “intellectual disability”.

In Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002), the Supreme ...

The Fifth Amendment provides, inter alia, that “[n]o person shall be…subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” In this brief, per curiam decision, a unanimous Supreme Court reaffirmed the inviolate nature of its rule that double jeopardy attaches once a jury has ...

In 2007, the Supreme Court issued its seminal decision on police liability arising out of high-speed chases. It held that the police had not acted unconstitutionally when they tried to stop a suspect fleeing at high speed by ramming the suspect's car from the rear, forcing it to crash, and ...

This case involves the correct interpretation of a clumsy and abstruse provision of the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 (MVRA) which provides that, in the case of a crime “resulting in damage to or loss or destruction of property of a victim,” restitution is mandatory; and that the sentencing ...

In this case, the appellant, Keith Thomas, an inmate in a California state prison, filed a petition for writ of mandamus in the district court, seeking to compel Attorney General Eric Holder to reclassify marijuana as a Controlled Substances Act (CSA) Schedule V controlled substance. Schedule V encompasses those drugs ...

The plaintiff in this case, Jerry Markadonatos, filed a putative civil rights class action, under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, against the Village of Woodridge, IL, claiming that the $30 “booking fee” that it charges every arrestee in its custody violates both the procedural and substantive due process rights of the ...

On May 12, 2014, in a Memorandum to all U.S. Attorneys and various departments within the Justice Department, James M. Cole, Deputy Attorney General, announced that henceforth the F.B.I. and other federal law enforcement agencies would be required to videotape interviews with suspects “in most instances” - a policy change ...