YOUR MILITARY DEFENSE COUNSEL SHOULD CHALLENGE THE APPLICATION OF THE MILITARY RULE OF EVIDENCE 311. THE RULE VIOLATES THE U.S. CONSTITUTION. WE ARE CHALLENGING THAT AT THE U. S. SUPREME COURT NOW. In many courts-martial, your military defense counsel will have to deal with evidence obtained from digital devices, like…
Two recent decisions of CAAF condone unlawful or bad practices when OSI, CID, NCIS, and CGIS search cellphones; United States v. Shields and United States v. Lattin. As a result, the MCIOs are unlikely to change their unlawful or bad practices. More than sloppy police work gets two passes because…
NMCCA has an interesting case on the scope of a consent search and subsequent actions when looking for evidence on a cellphone. I think many times we have seen this issue. The MCIO gets a “limited” or narrow consent, but then just goes ahead and looks at everything claiming “plain…
There was a substantial basis for finding probable cause, and this didn’t even approach “bare bones.” “We must take care not to confuse a bare bones affidavit with one that merely lacks probable cause.” The motion to suppress was properly denied. United States v. Gilbert, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 7590 (6th…
We have had a number of military cases of the years involving searches of lawyer “files” or other materials. Here is an interesting opinion from the Fourth Circuit about “taint teams.” The Fourth is not generally known as a defense friendly court. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion 31 October…
I’ve had several cases of serious and fatal car wrecks. In the process the investigators have “searched” the car’s onboard computer. There’s is quite a bit of information than can be retrieved to evaluate such things as speed, acceleration, and braking, that can aid in a prosecution. So, here is…
A couple of interesting items from John Wesley Hall’s excellent Fourth Amendment blog. Without something to go on, the court declines to ascribe a supposed error in an address as a mere typo. Moreover, the affidavit fails to provide any nexus to defendant and the place to be searched, and…
Sommers & Bohm, The Voluntariness of Voluntary Consent: Consent Searches and Psychology of Compliance. 128 YALE L. J. 1962 (2019). Consent-based searches are by far the most ubiquitous form of search undertaken by police. A key legal inquiry in these cases is whether consent was granted voluntarily. This Essay suggests…
Posted on September 2, 2018 by Hall on his excellent blog. To get a search warrant for home surveillance equipment, the affidavit for the warrant has to show some inference or fact that there is, in fact, one to be found there. The mere fact they are a lot cheaper these days isn’t…
In British football, a player can commit a foul which is technical and the other team gets a free kick, and everyone keeps playing. More serious fouls can result in a yellow card (two in a game and you are off the field) or a red card which means immediate…