• Whose Side Are You On?

    From his death row cell, Raphael Holiday drafted letter after desperate letter to lawyers who represent the condemned. He begged for their help to plead for mercy from Governor Greg Abbott, to try any last-ditch legal maneuvers that might stave off his impending execution. For more than 4 years, Holiday was represented by Wes Volberding […]

  • Inmates Serving Drug Sentences Are Dangerous! Yea, Right!

    You want to see the demographics of the typical inmate serving a federal drug sentence, look no more. This will illustrate how your hard earned tax dollars are being (mis)spent. At the end of the FY 2014, individuals serving drug sentences accounted for 49% of the total federal prison population. 45% of the 95,305 individuals […]

  • Academics Implore AG Lynch To Establish Contours For Filing 851 Enhancements.

    The arbitrary manner in which AUSAs file §851 prior conviction enhancements has lead to substantial sentencing disparities nationwide. Some districts file §851 enhancements with impunity while some never file them. As a result, several academics have challenged AG Lynch to establish contours that will guide when this enhancement will be applied. The upshot of the […]

  • Arkansas Judge’s Holistic (Predatory) Approach To Sentencing.

    Alright, we all look for common qualities in people who are going to wear a black robe and be entrusted with the vast authority with which judges are imbued. We want our judges to be smart, have great temperaments, and be people of integrity. This last quality must be optional to the electorate in Wynne, […]

  • Eat Fresh BOP Chow!

    Jared Fogle was a morbidly obese student at Indiana University and solved his crippling weight problem by eating Subway food. Eventually, Fogle became a celebrated pitchman for Subway and the face of their brand, earning millions of dollars. However, Fogle had a dirty little secret that emerged and was the subject of a federal prosecution–he […]

  • Figures Lie And Liars Figure!

    My father always said that figures lie and liars figure. That piece of advice has molded me into the consummate cynic that I am. The following data about the evolution of federal sentences over the past 25 years is disturbing. Across all six major categories of federal crime — violent, property, drug, public order, weapon, […]

  • The Falcon And The Snowman

    Those criminal defense lawyers who regularly practice in federal court likely have not encountered a federal parolee in 20 years. This is for good reason as parole was abolished for all federal offenses with the enactment of the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 (SRA). However, for those convicted of offenses before the SRA was enacted […]

  • It Helps To Have Friends In High Places!

    Many of us subscribe to the old adage “it ain’t what you know, it’s who you know.” Additionally, if you’re a federal prisoner serving an eternity in the BOP, it helps to have friends in high places. The following illustrates these truisms. Federal trial judges have little leeway in sentencing when prosecutors trigger mandatory-minimum statues […]

  • Bare Necessities

    Ibrahim Bare was convicted of engaging in a illicit firearms trafficking and the district court imposed a computer-search condition to his conditions of supervised release even though Bare did not use a computer to commit the firearms offense. A split Ninth Circuit panel rejected Bare’s claim that a computer-search condition to his supervised release conditions […]

  • Federal Charges versus State Charges

    What Are the Differences Between State and Federal Criminal Charges?

    Being charged with a state or federal crime means that you need to find a criminal lawyer near Columbus . While most criminal defense attorneys largely handle state law charges, fewer attorneys are competent in both state and federal criminal laws and qualified to represent defendants on any criminal charge. In criminal law, federal charges […]