BLOG BULLETS: A recent Sentencing Commission report on the career offender guideline supports an argument that the guideline is not a product of Sentencing Commission research and expertise, and so not deserving of any deference for that reason. The report (a) confirms the guideline is solely the product of a Congressional directive; (b) has the […]

BLOG BULLETS: A Tenth Circuit case supports the argument that the California drug statutes aren’t divisible and the holding to the contrary in Coronado v. Holder, 759 F.3d 977 (9th Cir. 2014), is wrong. The Tenth Circuit case does hold Coronado’s ultimate holding was correct, but it bases that holding on a conclusion that jury […]

In a post I put up at the beginning of the month, I suggested the Supreme Court’s recent Mathis decision raised doubt about the Ninth Circuit’s holding in Coronado v. Holder, 759 F.3d 977 (9th Cir. 2014), that the California drug statutes are divisible.  (See “Mathis May Open Up More Doors Than You Think” in […]

BLOG BULLETS: The new amendment narrowing the “crime of violence” definition in the career offender guideline took effect August 1. The amendment eliminates burglary of a dwelling from the definition, eliminates the residual clause, and narrows the definition of extortion in a way that probably undercuts a prior Ninth Circuit decision in United States v. […]

BLOG BULLETS: Mathis not only upholds Rendon but raises doubt about the Ninth Circuit’s holding in Coronado v. Holder, 759 F.3d 977 (9th Cir. 2014), that the overbroad California drug statutes are divisible. One line of attack is Mathis’s citation of California Penal Code § 952 as an example of a state statute which courts […]

BLOG BULLETS: In its recent decision in Mathis v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 2243 (2016), the Supreme Court has agreed with the Ninth Circuit that a list of alternatives makes a statute divisible only if the alternatives are elements between which a jury has to unanimously choose. Mathis reiterates the categorical approach’s focus on […]

Los Angeles County supervisors voted Tuesday to pay $10.1 million to a man who spent 20 years behind bars before having his murder conviction overturned in 2011. Francisco Carrillo Jr. was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in 1992 in the fatal drive-by shooting of Donald Sarpy in Lynwood. Carrillo, who was 16 at the time […]

BLOG BULLETS: The Supreme Court’s two Johnson cases – combined with the Leocal case – mean (1) the residual clause can’t be used to categorize a prior conviction as a “violent felony” or “crime of violence” and (2) the force clause can be used only if (a) the force was “violent” force and (b) the […]

BLOG BULLETS: The general rule is that motions and/or objections don’t need to be renewed once a judge has definitively ruled. Motions and/or objections do need to be renewed if the court hasn’t ruled definitively or if you want to rely on new facts or circumstances that come up after the ruling. There are also […]

At the end of my last post on hearsay principles, I said I’d touch on some of the exceptions to the hearsay rule in this next post.  So here are some selected points about some selected exceptions I find interesting. • The coconspirator’s admission exception in Rule 801(d)(2)(E) (technically not an “exception” but part of the […]