In January, 2001, some three months after the Supreme Court vacated Anthony Smith’s original 405-month sentence in this drug case and remanded the case back to the Seventh Circuit for reconsideration in light of its ruling in Apprendi v. New Jersey, a panel from the Seventh Circuit simply reaffirmed the ...

Here the Court granted habeas relief to the Petitioner after concluding that he was denied the effective assistance of counsel in death penalty case under the Sixth Amendment where, at sentencing, his counsel offered no mitigating evidence, made no argument of any sort prior to sentencing, and refused to plead ...

The defendant in this case filed an Apprendi appeal challenging the life sentence he received on a cocaine conspiracy count. His argument was that the indictment had failed to specify any drug quantity, but merely stated that he had conspired to distribute a "detectable amount" of cocaine. The defendant was ...

Here the Court held that the Supreme Court's decision in Old Chief v. U.S., 519 U.S. 172 (1997), announced a new constitutional rule of criminal procedure which did not fall within one of the Teague exceptions, and so could not be used retroactively.

In this case the Court affirmed the ...

Although the Court ultimately held there was no reversible eror, it did hold that when a district court intends to rely on a document other than the PSI at sentencing, it must make a copy available to counsel in advance of the sentencing hearing.

The defendant in this case pled ...

Here the Court reversed Judge Justice's decision reported at 37 F.Supp.2d 855 holding that the termination provisions of the PLRA were unconstitutional because they violated the separation of powers and due process provisions of the Constitution.

The defendants in this case exchanged some $ 1 million of large-denomination bills for small denomination bills, for which they received commissions of approximately $95,000. They pled guilty to one count of conspiring to participate in the affairs of an enterprise through a pettern of racketeering. The disctrit court sentenced ...

Here the Court held that the district court committed structural error that was automatically reversible when it permitted the Government to use one of its "saved" peremptory challenges to remove a juror on the sixth day of an eight day trial.

This is an interesting decision in which the Court ...

This Memorandum and Order amends and augments Judge Nickerson’s earlier ruling, reported at 128 F.Supp.2d 739 (E.D.N.Y. 2001) (Norris I) (P&J, 1/22/01), in which he suggested that, at sentencing, he was not going to impose certain Guideline enhancements to the defendant’s sentence that were recommended by the Probation Department and ...

In holding that the district court's failure to comply with Rule 32(c)(3)(A) of the Fed.R.Crim.P. required a remand for a new sentencing, the Court rejected the Government's argument that the defendant had to show actual prejudice as a result of the error before he could get a new sentencing. Citing ...

This case involved a defendant who argued that the court should disregard her conviction for money laundering on the grounds that it was atypical money laundering conduct; and that her sentence should be based strictly on the fraud guideline, since that Guideline reflected more closely the underlying criminal conduct. In ...

The defendant in this case was charged with violating 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9), which makes it a crime for any person "who has been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, to . . . possess in or affecting commerce, any firearm or ammunition." However, under ...

Here the Court held that that medical necessity is not a defense to criminal charges for manufacturing and distributing marijuana; although the decision left open a number of questions including whether individual patients can assert that defense.

In this case the Supreme Court held, by a vote of 8-to-0, that ...

Although the Ex Post Facto clause applies primarily to “laws” and does not, of its own force, apply directly to judicial decisions, the Supreme Court has held that the prohibition against ex post facto laws is incorporated to a limited extent in the notion of due process.

Thus, in Bouie ...