Many people who have been convicted on a misdemeanor charge or certain felonies for which they were not sentenced to prison can, after certain conditions are met, apply to the court for what is commonly called an “expungement” of the conviction. This relief is available under several statutory schemes,…
Way back in 1971, President Nixon declared a “War on Drugs.” The federal drug control agencies were dramatically beefed-up, the DEA was created (1973). Quaint as it seems now, much of the effort was directed at marijuana. Back in those innocent days, marijuana was considered a major drug problem.…
KNOCK AND TALK: A TACTIC POLICE USE TO BYPASS THE WARRANT REQUIREMENT It’s the middle of the night. Someone is banging on your door yelling for you to open the door. Whoever it is does not identify himself and you do not recognize the voice. The adrenaline rushing, you grab…
Our system of justice is designed to be impartial and fair. But judges and juries are not robots. In any criminal case, the judge and jury will not only view the evidence with neutral eyes and ears but will also rely on “soft” skills such as intuition and biases.…
JUVENILE JUSTICE REFORM Not that long ago, 17 years ago to be exact, the voters in California were in a get tough on juvenile crime mood. Proposition 21, the Juvenile Crime Initiative, was passed by a wide majority of California voters. The proposition dismantled much of the juvenile justice system,…
LAWYER, LAWYER, YOUR PANTS ARE ON FIRE In what must have been a bizarre spectacle in a Florida court, a defense attorney, while delivering his closing argument in an arson case, started fiddling with his back pocket and had to run out of the courtroom when smoke started billowing out…
A POWERFUL TOOL IN THE DEFENSE TOOLBOX: THE MOTION TO SUPPRESS Here’s an interesting case that caught my eye: Narcotics officers in Colorado Springs observed a driver in his parked vehicle conducting what appeared to be a narcotics transaction. The officers made contact with the driver and after a…
DEPORTABLE CRIMES With immigration a big topic in the news, many are confused about who exactly can be deported from the United States. It goes without saying that someone who is in the US without going through the proper channels, i.e., no visa allowing entry (undocumented), can be deported in…
CRIME RATES REMAIN STABLE THROUGH CALIFORNIA’S POLICY REFORM ERA In 2011 the Public Safety Realignment Bill became law in California. This legislation was designed to stem the “revolving door” of non-violent criminals in the state prisons. Realignment, as it is commonly called, was in response to the severe overcrowding in…
HOW TO BE A DRUG DEALER WITHOUT GETTING BUSTED No, I am not really going to tell you how to break the law and get away with it, but Purdue Pharma certainly knows how to deal an extremely dangerous drug, which has been abused by millions in this country, without…