The Recordnet.com reports on the non-capital referral decision in United States v. Platero. The commanding general of Fort Stewart, Ga., did not talk directly with the families of two soldiers killed in Iraq a year ago – including the Carrillo family of Stockton – before making the decision to pull the death penalty off the…
Continue reading ›Stars & Stripes reports on the continuing trial of United States v. Wickware. The wife of a Spangdahlem Air Base airman charged with murder in the abuse death of his infant son testified at his court-martial Monday. Note the comment of an experienced military judge about how difficult these cases can be for the fact-finder…
Continue reading ›SCOTUSBlog reports their “petition of the day,” which is a criminal evidence case with potential relevance to military justice practitioners – Childers v. Florida, if granted. Issue two is: 2. Should the Court resolve a conflict in the Circuits and clarify whether its Confrontation Clause precedents, Olden v. Kentucky, 488 U.S. 227 (1988), Delaware v.…
Continue reading ›Giannelli on Junk Science and the Willingham Execution Paul C. Giannelli (Case Western Reserve University – School of Law) has posted The Execution of Cameron Todd Willingham: Junk Science, an Innocent Man, and the Politics of Death on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Cameron Todd Willingham was tried and executed for the arson deaths of…
Continue reading ›There is some reason to believe that the result in United States v. Fosler may only benefit him. Fosler objected at trial. It is believed that all of the Fosler trailers are either guilty plea cases or not guilty plea cases where the accused did not object at trial. There’s a good argument – stated…
Continue reading ›El Paso Times has a short piece on one of their native sons. When El Paso’s Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas was killed during an ambush in Haditha, Iraq, in 2005, a search for the perpetrators left 24 Iraqis dead. Investigators are still trying to find out the truth of what happened that day in the…
Continue reading ›The Press Enterprise reports: A military hearing over whether three Hawaii-based Marines should go to trial for alleged hazing of a squad member who later killed himself in Afghanistan concluded Friday and a commander will now make a final determination. Looks like some interesting litigation. Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents didn’t read the Marines their…
Continue reading ›The Augusta Chronicle has a piece on a whatever happened to – – – Willie Joe King. Thcourt-martial of Willie Joe King for the murder of fellow Army Pvt. Joseph Poye often brought more questions than answers.. . . [i]n March 1964, King was taken back to Fort Gordon for his trial on charges of…
Continue reading ›Prof. Colin Miller takes up the current status of Crawford with this intriguing title: Post-Bryant Case Law Confirms Scalia’s Fears. His premise quite simply is that we are back to Ohio v. Roberts and measuring “reliability” using different phraseology. In my view, a test that hinges upon the hidden and empirically unknowable “primary” purposes of…
Continue reading ›Does anyone know why the public can’t access ACCA or the TJAGSA websites? I know when I try to access (using Chrome, Firefox, or IE) you get a site certificate error and can’t get past it. I have clients, their families, and others asking the same question?
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