News Roundup

Published for NC Criminal Law on October 30, 2015.

My family and I went to the State Fair last weekend, the same day as Bobby Joe Snyder, the third registered sex offender to be arrested at the Fair this year. WRAL has the story here. We had a good time, watching some clogging, cheering for the Axe Women Loggers of Maine, and eating fried Oreos. In other news: Fourth Circuit to rehear cell site location information case. I blogged here about United States v. Graham, the case in which the Fourth Circuit ruled that a search warrant is required to access cell site location information over a protracted period. The court has granted the Government’s petition for rehearing en banc. Stay tuned for future developments. FBI Director feels a “chill wind blowing through American law enforcement.” FBI Director James Comey recently gave a speech at the University of Chicago Law School. It was wide-ranging, touching on his affinity for basketball, his work as a prosecutor, sentencing reform, and policing. One part of the speech has proven controversial: Comey’s suggestion that some major cities have seen a spike in violent crime because police feel besieged, in part by a rise in citizens’ video recording of officers, and so are less vigorous in their work. The text of the entire speech is here. I found it thoughtful and worth reading, but whatever the accuracy of Comey’s suggestion, I seriously doubt that the people-recording-the-cops genie is going back in the bottle. Deputy fired after arrest of student. In a related development, the Associated [...]