Brown & Little, P.L.C. » Entries tagged with "court of appeals"
Poor Charlie Brown
I’ve mentioned Anders briefs before. It’s the defense-lawyer equivalent of licking your master’s hand in submission. A creative lawyer can always find some issue somewhere, and filing a brief more or less saying your client should’ve been found guilty based on the record is just embarrassing. If you aren’t sold on not filing Anders briefs solely because they’re humiliating to any competent lawyer, Arizona’s court of appeals recently provided another reason. In an opinion last week, the court disagreed with an appellate public defender’s assessment that only frivolous issues existed on appeal. The lawyer apparently reviewed the record enough to set forth a sufficient background to reveal potential issues, but he didn’t see at least one issue that the court saw. I can’t imagine much worse for a … Read entire article »
Filed under: Arizona Cases, Courts
Making Bad Law
I recently had an interesting talk with a prosecutor. I litigated a case against him a little while back, and I thought it had decent facts for a motion to suppress. The officer’s report clearly stated that he had completed the traffic stop, issued a warning, and told the occupants they were free to go before re-initiating contact and asking them, “hey, do you mind if I take a look in the car?” There’s an Arizona court of appeals case from last year called State v. Sweeney. In it, the court held that, after a traffic stop has concluded, an officer must have reasonable cause to initiate a second detention of a suspect. Based on the totality of the circumstances, the officer in my case didn’t have … Read entire article »
Filed under: Arizona Cases, Prosecutors, Search and Seizure
Arizona DUI Stupidity
Imagine you’re sitting in the comfort of your own home, enjoying a glass of fine single barrel Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey. It’s about midnight, and you’re on your third or fourth when you hear the back window of your home shatter. You can hear that someone is trying to break into the house, and you run to call 911. As you frantically rush through the house, you see someone breaking in through the front window as well. You have no time to think, and not knowing what else to do, you swing open the door leading to your garage and jump in your car. You lock your doors, fire up the engine, open the automatic garage door, and speed off while calling the police. Congratulations, you … Read entire article »
Filed under: Arizona Cases, Arizona Statutes, DUI
Actual Control (Again)
Recently, I was surprised when Division Two looked at an issue very close to (if not the same as) something I previously discussed in a post. The issue in State v. Zaragoza was “actual control,” and most of the commentary I’ve read seems to claim that the opinion narrows the term significantly. Here it is. Although I have no doubt that it’s a step in the right direction and may well assist me in future motions, I am skeptical about how positive an effect the opinion is likely to have. Like any appellate opinion, it can be narrowed by its facts. The time line isn’t entirely clear to me, but I think the officer was on top of things as soon as the defendant got in the … Read entire article »
Filed under: Arizona Cases, DUI
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