Plead the Fifth (Cir.)
Plead the Fifth (Cir.)
Latest Episodes
State Rights in Criminal Prosecution? Perhaps.
In this episode, we discussed a recent case U.S. v. Seekins, in which the federal public defender attempted to push the Fifth Circuit to revisit the scope of interstate commerce in the criminal justice context. By a close vote (7-9), the Fifth ...
"Oops.", says Justice Willett.
In Shepperd v. United States, an attorney represented his client, the criminal defendant, and also the government's key witness at the same time. Two weeks before trial, this conflict of interest was finally made known to the defendant, who imm...
"May I search your phone, with good faith?"
Can a police officer search a criminal suspect's cell phone in full, when the only charge in the warrant was drug possession, and the affidavit provided barebone justification? This is the question the Fifth Circuit was presented in U.S. v. Mor...
"Do I need to listen to the Supreme Court?" The Fifth Circuit Has Doubts.
When the U.S. Supreme Court remands a case back to a circuit court, how much room does the circuit court have to "play around"? The Fifth Circuit's response is "a lot". The U.S. Supreme Court remanded the SB8 case back to the Fift...
A Retirement and A Resignation
In this episode, we talked about Justice Breyer's retirement and Justice Gregg Costa's unexpected resignation from the Fifth Circuit. Justice Breyer's retirement announcement proposes an opportunity to the Biden administration and the replaceme...
