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The contents of an envelope tucked under the windshield wiper of your car parked on a city street doesn’t seem as ominous as a citation hand-delivered through your driver’s side window by a law enforcement officer illuminated by the flashing blue lights of her police vehicle. But both may land you in district criminal court. That’s because, like the violation of many of the motor vehicle laws...

In prior posts, I discussed transferred intent and criminal negligence. Intent and criminal negligence, along with malice and willfulness are some of the common states of mind that the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt to obtain a criminal conviction. With strict liability crimes, the prosecution’s case is easier. Strict liability crimes do not include a mental state as an...

Suppose a defendant acts intending to do one thing but ends up doing something else. For example, suppose the defendant shoots at A, intending to kill A, but misses and kills B, an innocent bystander. Is the defendant criminally liable for the unintended harm to B? Under the doctrine of transferred intent, the answer is yes. The doctrine of transferred intent provides that when a defendant...

One of the most frequently litigated issues in North Carolina drug cases is constructive possession. Jeff wrote about one case (here) over a year ago. My research shows no less than eleven published cases in the last two years (click here for a full case listing in my online Criminal Case compendium), including one earlier this month by the North Carolina Court of Appeals in State v. Terry....

The New York Times recently published this piece on Google cars that drive themselves.  And we’re not just talking about steering a straight line down the interstate.  One car even navigated the hairpin turns on San Francisco’s famously curvy Lombard Street. The cars use navigation systems and software capable of sensing nearby objects and reacting to their presence.  Google cars reportedly...