Outsourcing police report dictation
One California city is now sending audio files of dictated police reports to a transcription service in Tennessee. They think this will be a good way to save money. Here's the basic description of what they are doing:
Vallejo Police Outsource Report Writing | NBC Bay Area: “The police department in cash-strapped Vallejo, Calif., may have found a way to save a little money.The Police Department is now using a transcription service based in Tennessee -- Nashville-McLintock Transcription and Consulting Services -- to write up its police reports.
The reports are dictated into a digital audio file then sent via a secure connection to Nashville-McClintock, where retired law-enforcement officials write them up.
The practice is less expensive than hiring new personnel and could possibly elicit more details from officers who might otherwise keep it brief if they had to do the typing themselves.”
Any practicing criminal lawyer, whether prosecutor or defense attorney knows that this is a seriously bad idea. Police reports are used in litigation to refresh police officers' recollections of events that often happened several years back.
Outsourcing the transcription will present a type of chain of custody issue in court. The question will be, is the transcription actually a true representation of that the officer said, and then is what the officer said a true account of what actually happened?
Criminal defense lawyers will want to hear the original audio, and the state will have to produce it, adding an additional expense that wouldn't be there if the officers simply wrote the reports themselves.
It is really scary to watch government agencies fall all over themselves and think that they are responsible for enforcing the laws in this country.
North Carolina idiots face criminal charges after Dominos video
Two goofballs in their 30's face criminal charges in North Carolina after doing some disgusting things with the ingredients and taking a video of it.
Dominos says they are reviewing their hiring policies. I personally will stick to pizza joints where there is a very present private owner.
Not on the menu: Pizza workers charged in pranks: "CONOVER, N.C. – A gross video posted on YouTube showing a Domino's Pizza worker stuffing cheese up his nostril and waving salami under his rear end as he is making sandwiches has led to charges against him and a co-worker who recorded him, authorities said Wednesday.
Kristy Lynn Hammonds, 31, of Taylorsville and Michael Anthony Setzer, 32, of Conover are each charged with distributing prohibited foods. Police chief Gary Lafone says it is the same North Carolina statute that forbids any tampering with Halloween candy.
In the video, Setzer is making sandwiches while a giggling Hammonds narrates and urges him to 'do it again, do it again' in putting the cheese up his nose. It appears he threw some of the cheese in the garbage but some went on a sandwich.
Setzer says: 'This is Michael's special Italian sandwich.'
Hammonds says the sandwiches were meant to be delivered soon to customers and that 'little did they know that the cheese was in his nose.'
Domino's spokesman Tim McIntyre said the workers were fired and there is no evidence any of the tampered foods were served to customers. He said the company also may pursue a lawsuit."
The charge is "distributing prohibited foods." Interesting concept. You can turn a pig's rear end into a sausage and eat it. But if you are like Mr. Setzer and rub that pig's rear end on your own, it's a crime.
With this stapled to Mr. Setzer's resume, he's a natural to work cleanup at a sausage processing factory.
DUI homicide bail differences between states
There have been a wide range of bail amounts in DUI related homicides this month. Here's a quote about one in a Florida DUI homicide case:
Judge sets $75,000 bail for suspect in double-fatal DUI: "Randy Archiquette, the suspect in two crashes that killed two women last night, could be free if he posts $75,000 bail.
Hillsborough County Circuit Judge Walter Heinrich set bail for Archiquette, of 12610 Bramfield Drive in Riverview, during his first court appearance this morning.
Archiquette, left, is charged with two counts of DUI manslaughter, one charge of vehicular homicide with leaving the scene, and one charge of vehicular homicide."
Compare that to Rhode Island at $25k and California at $2 million and we can see that DUI homicide bail amounts are all over the map.
Missouri public defenders forced to accept cases
Overworked and underfunded, a Missouri public defense agency decided to stop taking cases to preserve the quality of the work that it was able to handle.
If you are accused of a crime in Missouri, and can't afford to hire a private criminal defense lawyer, you are entitled to a public defender. The catch is that the Missouri public defense system is the second least funded per capita system in the country. While public defenders in most states are overworked, the MO system is an extreme. Here's are quotes from a good article that discusses the ruling:
Appeals court says Missouri public defenders cannot refuse new cases - Kansas City Star: "A Missouri appeals court ruled Tuesday that the state’s public defender system cannot decline to accept new cases because of its caseload crisis.
The opinion, from a three-judge panel in Kansas City, throws out a state regulation that allowed public defender offices to refuse cases until caseloads had declined to a more manageable level.
. . .
Missouri ranks 49th among U.S. states in per-capita spending on indigent defense. Offices in Kansas City and Liberty, which serve Jackson, Clay and Platte counties, have not stopped taking cases."
Here is the entire opinion from the Missouri Court of Appeals.
We'll see what happens at the Missouri Supreme Court level, but at the moment, if I were a public defender in Missouri I would think long and hard about going private. If I were accused of a crime in Missouri, I would not want a public defender, not because they are bad, but an overextended criminal defense attorney is just like a surgeon running on a week of no sleep... might be the best lawyer in the world, but presently lacks the capacity to do everything possible in every situation.
Fullerton California DUI Homicide
Sometimes it is hard for even a DUI defense lawyer to have any sympathy for somebody accused of a DUI type offense.
Man Charged with Murder & Drunk Driving in MLB Pitcher's Death | Cleveland Leader: "According to the district attorney's office, Gallo was driving a minivan at 65mph in a 35mph zone around 12:35am Thursday in Fullerton, CA. He was on probation and his license had been suspended after a previous DUI charge. Police say he ran a red light and hit the car that Adenhart was in, killing the pitcher, 20-year-old California State University student Courtney Stewart and law student Henry Pearson, 25."
Prosecutorial misconduct in Florida
For anybody who thinks that prosecutors always play by the rules and always seek justice (rather than wins) in criminal cases, here is your weekly reminder.
FEDERAL JUDGE SANCTIONS GOVERNMENT $600,000 FOR SECRETLY TAPING DEFENSE LAWYER: "In a blistering 50-page opinion (PDF) today criticizing the 'win-at-any-cost behavior' of federal prosecutors who secretly taped a defense lawyer, a federal judge in Florida has awarded more than $600,000 in sanctions against the government.
The money, which the United States must pay to a South Florida physician it
accused of prescribing pain medication without a proper medical purpose,
will cover more than half of Dr. Ali Shaygan's defense costs, reports the
South Florida Sun-Sentinel.The 36-year-old doctor, who lives in Miami Beach, was acquitted in March of
141 counts of unlawful prescribing. As a result of his overprescribing, the
government had contended, a West Palm Beach man died of a drug overdose.The prosecutors who tried the case were Sean Cronin and Andrea Hoffman.
Midway through trial, the defense team learned that attorney David Markus,
one of three lawyers representing Shaygun, had been secretly recorded by
witnesses with approval from the government. The conversations-which the
government says were made to investigate possible witness-tampering-violated
legal ethics rules and U.S. Attorney's Office policy, according to the
newspaper, because they were not disclosed to the defense prior to trial.Alicia Valle, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office, says mistakes
were unintentionally made in the case, and that it has been referred to the
U.S. Department of Justice for further investigation, apparently concerning
the conduct of the prosecution, according to the Sun-Sentinel.After a two-day hearing after the jury's March 12 not-guilty verdict, U.S.
District Judge Alan Gold awarded $601,795.88 to Shaygun. In his opinion,
which accorded the most criticism to Cronin as lead prosecutor, the judge castigated the government for pursuing an 'unfounded' witness-tampering probe based on 'personal animus against the defense team,' the newspaper
writes."
The more power some people have, the less ethically they behave. While the vast majority of prosecutors are good and decent people who play by the rules, the ethical rules exist to prevent the few from doing this type of thing.
Supreme Court to clarify Miranda Warnings?
There is a chance that the US Supreme Court will review a Florida case holding the pre-interrogation warnings that the officers gave the suspect were inadequate under Miranda v. Arizona.
What does Miranda require? | SCOTUSblog: "When he was taken by Tampa police to headquarters for questioning, he was given Miranda warnings. Detectives, reading from a standard form, included this warning in their recital: ‘You have a right to talk to a lawyer before answering any of our questions.’ Powell agreed to talk to them, and then provided the incriminating statement. He appealed his conviction, challenging the adequacy of that warning.
The Florida Supreme Court took on the issue, treating it as a matter of ‘great public importance.’ In its ruling, that Court remarked: ‘In this case the warning was misleading. The warning said ‘before answering any questions.’ The ‘before questioning’ warning suggests to a reasonable person in the suspect’s shoes that he or she can only consult with an attorney before questioning; there is nothing in that statement that suggests the attorney can be present during the actual questioning.’ That, it said, is a direct violation of the Supreme Court’s Miranda decision."
(Via SCOTUSBlog.com.)
On the one hand, it would be good to get some clarification on the issue. On the other hand, at least from a criminal defense lawyer's perspective, that SCOTUS hears the case does not bode well for the potential outcome.
Mobile web use caused fatal accident: Woman gets 6 years in prison
There are certain things that impair a person's ability to safely drive as much as alcohol or drugs. Using a cell phone is one them. Putting on makeup is another. Being extremely tired is another.
Below is an article describing a woman in California who was sentenced to six years in prison for killing another person because her multitasking (paying bills on her cell phone while speeding) was more important to her than the lives that she was putting in danger.
Calif woman gets 6 years for fatal texting crash: "REDDING, Calif. – A woman who crashed into a line of stopped vehicles while text-messaging on her cell phone has been sentenced to six years in a California prison for killing a woman in one of the vehicles.
Deborah Matis-Engle was sentenced Friday by a judge in Redding, Calif.
Investigators said Deborah Matis-Engle was speeding and text messaging when she slammed into the vehicles stopped at a construction zone in August 2007.
Shasta County prosecutor Stephanie Bridgett said the 49-year-old woman had paid several bills by cell phone in the moments before the crash.
She was in the middle of one of those transactions when she struck a vehicle that burst into flames, killing 46-year-old Petra Winn.
Defense attorney Jeffrey Stotter said he will appeal."
If instead of using her cell phone, she was drunk or on drugs, nobody would have a problem with a six year sentence. In fact, most people would think it was way too lenient.
This woman is just as bad as any drunk driver. Just as most drunk drivers don't intend to kill somebody, I'm sure she didn't either. But she did intend her actions, and should have been able to foresee the potential consequences, just as a person who chooses to drink and then drive should know the risks.
I'm a defense attorney, so this position will not be a popular one amongst my peers, but I'll say it anyways. This woman deserves every bit of six years, if not more. She needs to serve as an example to millions of others who are doing the same thing as her on the roads every day.
If we enforce DUI laws and abhor the decision to drink and drive, we must treat equally dangerous and negligent actions while driving equally. While I feel sorry for her to have to spend six years of her life behind bars, she did kill another human being because she was too self-involved to care about other people.
