It has been almost 50 years since Dirty Harry hit the big screen in 1971. In this scene, loose canon crimefighter Harry Callaghan meets with the San Francisco District Attorney and an appeals court judge. They inform a discombobulated Harry that the evidence he seized from a suspected serial killer would be inadmissible in court. Criminal defense has changed a lot since then. Today, the search warrant rule is much more prosecutor-friendly than it was back then. In fact, the...

The key crime statistics for the last weekend of July included 74 shootings, 12 fatalities, zero arrests (so far), and lots of excuses. What does the spike mean for criminal defendants in Cook County and elsewhere? In a press conference, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson essentially blamed community members for not coming forward with information to police. “You all know who these individuals are,” an exasperated Johnson claimed. Other officials blamed “gangs” and gun owners for...

The plot thickens as police officers take the information they learned and try to get search warrants for the homes of Kevin, James, and Paul. The judge approves limited warrants for Kevin and Paul’s house. They live together and there is at least some evidence against both of them (Paul sold Vicodin to Sarah and Kevin was connected with the “doctor” who over prescribed pills.) But the police simply have to follow James until they find him breaking a law...

Now, we come to the exciting conclusion of this gripping saga. In reality, plea bargains resolve about 90% of criminal cases. So, in many situations, the end is rather anticlimactic, at least from a Hollywood perspective. Let’s assume that prosecutors dropped the drug possession charges against James’ girlfriend Vicki. After all, the evidence was very, very weak. That leaves us with the Three Musketeers. There are some issues with the evidence, which may warrant a trial. Then again, our three...

For the next few posts, let’s consider the fictional plight of James, Kevin, and Paul. These three guys are all high school teachers in their 30s. Teaching has many advantages, but it is also rather predictable and, sometimes, a little dull. The Three Amigos yearn for a little more adventure. Plus, they got hooked on old Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous reruns on Hulu, and they want to find a way to expand their incomes. They soon begin altering...

Since this is a criminal defense blog, we all knew that was only a matter of time before Kevin, Paul, and James have to face the music. But a lot of things must happen first. Sarah is a new teacher at the school and her back is killing her. As she vents to a colleague about the fact that her doctor cut off her Vicodin, her colleague mentions that there is a guy from the math department who may have...

The best way to permanently bury a criminal record in drug cases is an expungement or sealing proceeding. But such procedures are not available to everyone. The law usually limits expungement and sealing to persons with no criminal record and certain types of criminal prosecutions. Moreover, there is usually a waiting period 2 years after successful completion of deferred prosecution to begin the expungement process and of up to five years on some types of cases. Because of these drawbacks,...

Relief from a prior drug conviction is a common feature of many marijuana legalization pushes, and also one of the most attractive features of these initiatives. Currently, marijuana is a controlled substance under both state and federal law. Any conviction is serious business. Typically, the record does not specify the type of substance. So, many people assume that when they see a drug conviction on your record is for something much stronger, like LSD or cocaine. Partially in response to...

State lawmakers recently approved a measure that would not only allow people to substitute medical marijuana for their opioid prescriptions, but also streamline the medical marijuana process. If the governor signs the bill, it may increase the confusion with regard to drug laws in this area. Since 2011, opioid overdoses have killed over 11,000 people in Illinois. Marijuana overdoses have killed zero people over that same time period. While marijuana’s side-effects continue to be hotly debated, “Opioids kill people, and...

There is a growing undercurrent in Illinois law that possession of small amounts of marijuana for personal use is not a major crime. In fact, there is a growing body of evidence that marijuana arrests serve no useful purpose and simply soak up law enforcement resources. The other side of this equation is that the fines that courts collect from marijuana arrests, and the probation cases these arrests engender, help keep many criminal justice systems financially afloat. However, everyone can...

Details are still sketchy regarding a South Side defense of property shooting that seriously wounded two people. Apparently, two men in their 20s entered a store on West 75th Street. They brandished weapons and made threats. The business-owner then fired several shots, hitting one attacker in the abdomen and the other one in the arm. After fleeing the scene, both would-be armed robbers showed up a short time later at a nearby hospital. They are both expected to survive. A...

A federal jury ordered the City of Chicago to pay over $17 million to a man who spent over two decades serving time for a crime he did not commit. Much earlier, prosecutors charged Jacques Rivera with the 1988 shooting death of 16-year-old Felix Valentin. A jury convicted Mr. Rivera, largely on the testimony of lone eyewitness Oscar Lopez, who was only 12 at the time. More recently, Lopez has told several people several times that Rivera was not the...

The setting may sound like fiction, but it is very much a true story that is taking place right here in Cook County. The victim’s husband says it was a tragic car accident; the prosecutor insists it was murder. In 1973, a 19-year-old woman died after sustaining a cervical spine fracture. The coroner’s report listed the cause of death as “accidental.” Now, prosecutors say they have uncovered evidence that the woman’s now 76-year-old husband killed his wife and staged the...

A local 27-year-old man must wait for his trial date in jail, after a Cook County judge denied pretrial release. He was running from Chicago police trying to make a traffic stop on North Le Mai Avenue when the man went through two stoplights and smashed into a taxicab. That cab, which was at the intersection of Grand and Dearborn, carried a 66-year-old woman in the rear seat. She was killed almost instantly, according to authorities. Three other people —...

In a previous post, Sargent Sam had just made a really bad decision. Although he was not drunk, those Mexican beers were definitely enough to give him a buzz. When it comes to the “blow or not to blow” choice, some might point to one of those impairment charts which purport to connect the number of drinks with a BAC score. These charts only apply to Joe and Jane Average, so they are pretty much useless. Many people, including some...