Another Habeas Slap-Down From the Supreme Court; Where Is Habeas Law Heading?

The Supreme Court summarily overturned yet another habeas grant earlier this week in Coleman v. Johnson (No. 11-1053).  Johnson was convicted in Pennsylvania state court as an accomplice and co-conspirator in a murder.  Without getting into all of the details, let’s just say that the state’s case against Johnson was circumstantial and something less than airtight.  Johnson thus sought to have his conviction overturned in state court on the ground that the evidence was insufficient to support the jury’s verdict, invoking Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1979).  The state courts rejected this claim, as did a federal district court, but the Third Circuit reversed.

The Supreme Court overturned the Third Circuit’s decision in a brusque per curiam opinion.

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SCOTUS Decides Blueford, Declines Opportunity to Tighten Up Double Jeopardy “Manifest Necessity” Rule

On some apparently flimsy evidence of intent to kill, the State of Arkansas prosecuted Alex Blueford for the capital murder of his girlfriend’s one-year-old son. After deliberating for some time, the jury reported that it had unanimously voted to acquit on both capital murder and a lesser-included murder charge, but was deadlocked on another lesser-included offense, manslaughter. The judge sent the jurors back to deliberate further. Meanwhile, Blueford requested that the jury be given a new verdict form on which it could enter a partial verdict of acquittal on the greater offenses. The judge declined and, after another half hour of fruitless deliberations, declared a mistrial.

Can Blueford now be retried in front of a new jury on the capital-murder charge? The prosecutor announced an intention to try, and Blueford predictably objected on double jeopardy grounds. Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court overruled his objections, clearing the path for a second trial. 

Continue ReadingSCOTUS Decides Blueford, Declines Opportunity to Tighten Up Double Jeopardy “Manifest Necessity” Rule

Seventh Circuit Affirms Money-Laundering, Conspiracy Convictions of Car Dealers for Cash Sales to Drug Traffickers

Amir Hosseini and Hossein Obaei, who operated three Chicago-area automobile dealerships, sold many luxury cars to drug dealers over a ten-year period. Hosseini and Obaei were apparently popular with this market segment because of their willingness to take large cash payments in small bills. Eventually, federal prosecutors caught up with them, and, following a five-week trial, they were convicted by a jury on 97 counts of conspiracy, money laundering, mail fraud, illegal transaction structuring, bank fraud, and aiding and abetting a drug conspiracy. The Seventh Circuit has now affirmed these convictions and the 15- and 20-year sentences that went along with them.

Had it been properly preserved, the most substantial legal issue on appeal would have been the question left open by United States v. Santos, 553 U.S. 507 (2008): whether, in a traditional money-laundering prosecution, the government must prove that the allegedly laundered proceeds are net profits, as opposed to gross receipts, of the underlying crime. (See my blog post about Santos here). However, since the Santos issue was raised for the first time on appeal, the court used plain-error review and found that the defendants could not satisfy the standard given the “unsettled state of the law.” (2)

Hosseini and Obaei also raised an interesting voir dire issue.

Continue ReadingSeventh Circuit Affirms Money-Laundering, Conspiracy Convictions of Car Dealers for Cash Sales to Drug Traffickers