Court-Martial Trial Practice

Maybe, maybe not. The effort to create one through the Congress has stalled. So courts must deal with the issue on a case by case basis. With renewed interest on possible legislation recognizing a reporter’s privilege, the courts remain divided on whether to recognize a reporter’s privilege and on the scope of any privilege; the…

Anyone who has done more than a few cases as TC or DC knows this. Certainly this was one of the first points made to me by my SDC when first reporting to then NLSO Norfolk in 1980 out of J school, and learned and reinforced over the years. A Defense Department review of criminal…

Who would have guessed that police crime labs would exaggerate the quality of their work. A review of thousands of FBI laboratory files has uncovered 27 death penalty cases in which experts may have exaggerated the reliability of hair analysis. ABA Journal

San Diego Mayor Bob Filner (D), a self-described “hugger” who is facing allegations that he sexually harassed female staffers, is scheduled to be thekeynote speaker at a conference on military sexual assault next month. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/17/bob-filner-sexual-assault-conference_n_3610780.html

As an SVC in Colorado Springs, Colo., former prosecutor Capt. Lorraine Sult says that she has found her clients’ needs are different from what she previously recognized. Some would rather have their attackers go to counseling than get jail time, for example. “As prosecutors (and politicians), we think they just want the conviction,” she says.…

We all know judges who actually or appear to put their thumb on the scales. In this modern age it’s perhaps more likely to be the key of that smartphone. . . A former prosecutor who is now a Texas judge has admitted in a letter that she aided another judge who, it is claimed,…

Prof. Colin Miller asks, and then gives. The recent opinion of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida in Dingman v. Cart Shield USA, LLC, 2013 WL 3353835 (S.D.Fla. 2013), addresses three interesting questions under Federal Rule of Evidence 609: (1) are convictions resulting from nolo contendere pleas potentially admissible under…

If a witness fails to object? What if the witness has discussed all with the prosecutor? Anyway . . . Fourth Circuit concluded it did not need to determine the scope of the psychotherapist-patient privilege since the respondent had waived any privilege; circuit notes the obligation “to timely assert the psychotherapist—patient privilege,” United States v.…

An outspoken congressman says he is troubled by allegations the Marine Corps commandant and his legal advisers manipulated criminal cases stemming from a vulgar war-zone video. http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/article/20130708/NEWS05/307080023

http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/students/groups/osjcl/issues-and-articles/volume-102/