Jeff’s away and has left me in charge of the news roundup. So there’ll be no Gizmodo stories this week. (I’m still figuring out how to work my iPhone.) Fortunately, the week was full of criminal law news that doesn’t require the cracking of any source codes. 1. The General Assembly adjourned on Tuesday, July 3, ending its work for 2012 with some pre-4th-of-July legislative fireworks. In the waning hours of the session, the legislature overrode Governor Beverly Perdue’s veto of three controversial bills: the bill modifying the 2011 state budget act (now S.L. 2012-142), the bill authorizing fracking in North Carolina (now S.L. 2012-143), and the bill amending the Racial Justice Act (now S.L. 2012-136). Like the Racial Justice Act itself, the amendments to that 2009 legislation have attracted national as well as statewide attention. Law Professor Doug Berman’s comment that “the reform of the RJA in North Carolina does not end a significant number of notable legal and policy question[s] surrounding the administration of capital justice in the Tar Heel State” already has proved prescient. The News and Observer reports here that four death row inmates have filed documents in Cumberland County court challenging the amendments and seeking to have their cases heard under the 2009 law. 2. Speaking of legislation, my colleague John Rubin has been dutifully summarizing criminal legislation as it is enacted. If you’d like to receive those summaries via email, you may sign up here. No need to worry if you’ve missed the first few [...]
Faculty Coordinators
