Many civil libertarians long objected to the reliance on local policy on money and property seized in drug stops and raids. I have previously written about drivers being stripped of any cash that they cannot clearly account for in highway stops and the windfall such seizures represent for some departments. The federal government has been repeatedly criticized for its seizures, which are shared with local departments. Now this program is at the heart of a controversy in Gwinnett County where Sheriff Butch Conway used money from the federal program to purchase a Hellcat muscle car for use as his official car. However, the story gets much, much worse in my view after Conway’s department cited the other use of the car beyond transported Conway in Knight Rider fashion. Continue reading “Georgia Sheriff Suspended From Federal Program After Using Funds To Buy Hellcat Muscle Car”
Category: Criminal law
Eric Stagno, 34, insisted that he was only enjoying Planet Fitness’s policy of being a “Judgment Free Zone” . . . when he walked around naked and started doing exercises on the yoga mats.
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the lingering questions left from the Strzok testimony. While it may seem like a thousand years after Helsinki and the Cohen tape, the testimony of Strzok was shaped by highly dubious instructions from the FBI not to answer core questions. It is highly doubtful that a majority of these refusals would be upheld under judicial review — starting with the first question asked of Strzok.
Here is the column: Continue reading “On Contempt: The FBI Has Congress’ Number”
In a moment reminiscent of the William Jefferson freezer cash seizure, police in Williamston (Michigan) have reported the discovery of $63,392 in cash during a second search of the home of Rev. Jonathan Wehrle. He is a Catholic priest charged with embezzling more than $5 million from an Okemos parish. To make matters worse for Wehrle, the cash was still in bundles of $2000 with paper bands reading “For deposit only – St. Martha Parish and School.” There is a time to pray and a time to plea. This would be the latter. Continue reading “Laying Hands On The Faithful: Police Find Fortune In Cash Hidden In Lavish Home Of Catholic Priest”
There is a bizarre criminal case in South Miami where Bryan Deneumostier, 33, has been arrested after filming and posting men tricked into having sex with him under the pretense that he was a bored housewife. Deneumostier allegedly ran the site for four years where gay men would pay to watch straight men tricked into having sex with him. The charges in the case may surprise you.
Florida gas station store owner Mehedeun Hasan, 22, is facing a charge of attempted murder after shooting Rennie Defor, Jr. as he was trying to steal beer worth $36. It is another example of the common law rule that you cannot protect property with potentially lethal force.
MGM Resorts International has gone to an extraordinary point to forum shop for more sympathetic judges: it is actually suing the victims of last year’s Las Vegas concert mass shooting. The move has outraged many as MGM shamelessly sues grieving families and individuals to get before the more conservative federal bench. It is a move that is a stark reminder of how corporations openly forum shop for judges as well as the view of the federal bench as being more sympathetic to corporate defendants. What is all the more unsettling is that MGM and Mandalay Bay could well succeed.
Continue reading “Changing Dealers? MGM Resorts Sues The Victims In The Mandalay Bay Massacre”
Jose Nahun Lopez-Cruz, 24, appears to follow a rather flexible view of the criminal code. When police approached him while illegally parking, Lopez-Cruz introduced them to his 15-year-old wife but assured the officers that “It’s OK, she is gonna be 16 soon.” It didn’t. He was charged with sexual assault of a child.
In one of the most troubling orders issued by a court in years, U.S. District Judge John F. Walter issued an order on Saturday to the Los Angeles Times to remove information from an article describing a plea agreement between prosecutors and a Glendale police detective. The detective is alleged to have been in the pocket of the blood-soaked Mexican Mafia. The newspaper discovered the details in a posted order on PACER the online court database, which was supposed to be left under seal. I have been in cases when such mistakes have occurred but the court’s actions in this case drive to the heart of press freedom in this country. In my view (which will hardly surprise our regular readers), the order is a direct and dangerous violation of the First Amendment. [UPDATE: After a national outcry, the judge has rescinded his order and says that he was not sure that the LA Times had obtained the material legally.]
The one thing that you can say about Leonard Richards, 75, is that he is not your ordinary politician. Where politicians often run on putting people into jail on a tough-on-crime platform, Richards started with himself and is currently serving a life sentence in a Minnesota prison. While that would bar him from running for a state office, he can run for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Sen. Amy Klobuchar.
Continue reading “Minnesota Murderer Runs For U.S. Senate From Prison”
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the most recent indictment of Russian military intelligence figures for hacking the computer systems linked to the Clinton campaign and the Democratic party. Once again, the indictment seems straightforward in what is says and what it does not say. Yet, the Washington spin machine quickly put forward highly distorted accounts, including media reports that worked hard to avoid acknowledging obvious elements of the indictment.
Here is the column: Continue reading ““O Goody Ruskies”: Mueller Finds Witches But Which Witches Are We Hunting?”
Over the course of the last year, I have been highly critical of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein for his selection of Robert Mueller as Special Counsel and his failure to recuse himself from the Russian investigation. However, the most recent effort to impeach Rosenstein is unwarranted and unwise. According to news reports on Friday, Reps. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., and Jim Jordan, R-Ohio are preparing articles of impeachment to subject in the coming weeks against Rosenstein.
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on continued claims about undocumented immigrants and their legal status. There is a growing misrepresentation of the status issues that are deeply concerning. While undocumented status can be treated as a civil matter, it is also a criminal matter when a person enters the country illegally. Some politicians and commentators have been stating simply that all undocumented persons are non-criminals while others have suggested that persons are “perfectly legal” if they claim asylum even if they entered illegally. The point is that not all such persons should be treated criminally, but rather these statements can be dangerously misleading for families considering an illegal crossing. The Trump Administration has shifted enforcement toward greater criminal than civil enforcement. As for asylum claims, they are not the majority of illegal entries but the numbers are clearly rising. We are required under international law to consider such applications, but that does not mean that the entry was lawful or that such cases cannot raise risks of criminal enforcement. With so many lives at risk, we need to be more accurate in how we describe the legal realities of illegal entry.
Here is the column:
Continue reading ““Perfectly Legal”: The Perilous Rhetoric Of Immigration Politics”
We discussed the arrest of Stormy Daniels this week and the curious Ohio laws making any touching between strippers and customers a crime, even the touching of clothing. The arrest was part of an operation with four undercover officers. The later dropping of the charges only deepened questions over the need for the string operation and the arrest of Daniels, who real name is Stephanie Clifford. Continue reading “Daniels Charge Dismissal Deepens Doubts About Police Sting Operation In Columbus”
Brian R. McNaughton, a former associate professor at Colorado State University, has been criminally charged for his alleged faking of an offer of employment from the University of Minnesota to secure a raise. That $5,000 raise became a costly addition as part of a criminal charge of attempting to influence a public official.