Currently, Florida and five other states continue to use fewer than 12 jurors in at least some criminal trials. In Florida, where all noncapital crimes are tried before six-member juries, roughly 5,000 criminal convictions are currently pending on direct appeal.
This Tenth Circuit case is interesting for two reasons. One, it accepts the government's concession that it's plain error to sentence an assault defendant more harshly simply because he was an off-duty police officer. Sentence vacated. Two, it's kind of the 1997 Julia Roberts movie My Best Friend's Wedding (but an R-Rated version where Rupert Everett almost gets shot).
Apparently, the key to a life well lived is to find a partner that you relish as much as the Seventh Circuit relishes castigating lawyers for inaccurately certifying the completeness of the short appendix required by Circuit Rule 30. Seventh Circuit practitioners: beware. The appendix must include oral rulings that bear on the issues. Or else...
Most criminal defendants try to avoid being sentenced under the Armed Career Criminal Act, which sets a 15-year mandatory minimum for certain defendants if they have three previous convictions for certain qualifying offenses. Defendant: In the district court, I pleaded guilty and accidentally agreed that I had three qualifying offenses. But in reality, I had only two! So my 212-month sentence is a mistake. Sixth Circuit: Shrugs. You and your lawyer should've been more careful.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court granted certiorari to decide "[w]hether Stinson v. United States, 508 U. S. 36 (1993), still correctly states the rule for the deference that courts must give the commentary to the Sentencing Guidelines." Beaird v. United States, No. 25-5343 (Apr. 20, 2026) (cert. granted).
This program is a skills-based workshop during which participants work on one of their own cases and learn how to use fact-busting and principles o
Appeals filed by indigent and low-income litigants at the U.S. Supreme Court have fallen sharply in recent years and are now at their lowest level of the 21st century, according to reporting by the ABA Journal.
In en banc news, the Third Circuit on Monday declined to reconsider its decision blocking Alina Habba from serving as acting U.S. attorney for New Jersey, denying the Justice Department's petition for rehearing and leaving intact a decision that sharply curtailed the government's use of creative maneuvers to install interim federal prosecutors.
In the days following 9/11, co-founder of Falls Church, Va. Islamic Center tells followers they should repent, leave the U.S., join the mujahideen, go to Pakistan for combat training, and otherwise help Muslims defend Afghanistan. He's convicted of a slew of offenses in 2005, including soliciting others to levy war against the U.S.
Defendant: Yes, the gov't proved there was a conspiracy to smuggle cocaine into the United States. And, yes, the gov't proved that I, an aircraft mechanic, entered the avionics compartment of an airplane to retrieve something that I likely knew was illegal. But they didn't prove I knew it was narcotics. Second Circuit: You're right.