Blueford v. Arkansas

On February 22, the Court will hear oral argument in Blueford v. Arkansas, a case concerning the application of the Double Jeopardy clause to a case in which the jury deadlocked on a lesser-included offense but unanimously voted against the greater offense.

Alex Blueford was charged with capital murder. Blueford was left with the two year old son of his live-in girlfriend  while she went out. Shortly thereafter, Blueford took the child to the hospital, he had sustained massive trauma to the head and was in cardiac arrest.  Blueford stated at the hospital that he did not know the cause of the injuries but that the child had been jumping around his room beforehand. The state at trial argued that Blueford had purposely abused the child by slamming him into the floor.

The jury could deadlocked on the lesser-included offenses of manslaughter and negligent homicide, but determined that he was not guilty of capital murder and the lesser-included offense of first-degree murder. Specifically, after the jury was unsuccessful at agreeing in deliberations, the trial judge specifically asked them the ratio of votes for each offense.

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United States v. Jones

On December 23, 2012, the Supreme Court released its much-anticipated opinion in United States v. Jones. The Court unanimously found that the FBI’s use of 24/7 GPS tracking for 28 days was a search under the Fourth Amendment, and therefore upheld the D.C. Circuit.

Walter Dellinger, a former Acting Solicitor General who was on-brief for the defendant,
Jones, called the Court’s decision in Jones “a signal event in Fourth Amendment history.”
It was “a great day for the Fourth Amendment,” added Stephan Leckar, who gave the oral argument on behalf of Jones. And Stephen Shapiro, who wrote an amicus brief for the ACLU, called the case “an important victory for privacy.”

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Perry v. Perez

On Monday, January 9th, the Court hear oral arguments in Perry v. Perez and Perry v. Davis, which consolidated a number of cases regarding the redistricting of Texas electoral maps.

The case involves questions regarding the role of the courts in implementing redistricting plans, as well as the scope of their authority. Specifically, Perry argues that the district court did not have authority to create interim electoral maps while new electoral maps drawn by the Texas Legislature based on the 2010 census results were pending before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

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Williams v. Illinois

On Tuesday, December 6th, the Court will hear arguments in Williams v. Illinois to resolve an evidentiary question: “Whether a state rule of evidence allowing an expert witness to testify about the results of DNA testing performed by non-testifying analysts, where the defendant has no opportunity to confront the actual analysts, violates the Confrontation Clause.”

The issue comes out of the Court’s 2004 opinion in Crawford v. Washington, in which the Court held that, in order to introduce testimonial statements prepared prior to trial against a criminal defendant, the Sixth Amendment required the government to make the declarant available for cross examination.

That holding has significantly altered trial proceedings where the government seeks to introduce lab results in criminal cases. Prior to Crawford, the state could introduce the report itself. Now, because the Court has determined that lab reports are testimonial statements, prosecutors can only do so if they make available for cross examination the lab technician who prepared the report.

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National Meat Association v. Harris

The opinion pages of the Law Weekly have recently been abuzz with talk of National Meat Association v. Harris.  Georgetown students have weighed in on the Georgetown Supreme Court Institute’s policy of permitting advocates to request closed-door moot courts, which the National Meat Association (“Petitioner”) did in this case.  The animal rights community is strongly invested in the case because the Petitioner is bringing a preemption challenge to a California law that requires humane treatment of animals above and beyond the requirements of the Federal Meat Inspection Act (“FMIA”).  So far, the debate has centered on the Supreme Court Institute’s policies and the questionable behavior of the meatpacking industry.  Little has been said about the legal merits of the case.

            The issue presented to the Supreme Court is whether a California law requiring slaughterhouses to “immediately euthanize” any nonambulatory animal on its premises, rather than to hold and inspect them, is preempted by federal law.

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