Articles Tagged with criminal defense

A Chicago-area woman is facing charges of emailing death threats to former President Donald Trump. She also mentioned his son Barron in the threat. The 41-year-old defendant is accused under federal law of transmitting threats to kill or injure, according to the U.S. attorney’s office here in Chicago. 

According to federal authorities, the defendant sent the following message: “I will state that I will shoot Donald Trump, Sr. AND Barron Trump straight in the face at any opportunity I get!” She emailed this statement to the head of an educational institution in the Palm Beach, Florida, area. 

Understanding the Law

A Marissa, IL, man is facing federal charges for constructing a destructive device (a pipe bomb). According to police, the man intended to use the pipe bomb to blow up his former wife’s vehicle. He admitted to lighting the device and throwing it at people who confronted him inside his trailer park in April. The device, however, failed to detonate. A second suspicious device was also located inside his trailer. 

Possession of an unregistered destructive device is a federal crime punishable by up to 10 years in federal prison. 

Possession of an Unregistered Destructive Device

A Chicago-area man has been sentenced to 18 years after the deaths of four of his customers due to overdose. The statute under which he was charged is meant to hold drug dealers accountable for the overdose deaths caused by their products. While the law makes sense in some ways, it fails to account for the millions of opioid deaths caused by pharmaceutical companies who lied about their product, facilitated its entry into the black market, and profited in the range of billions from the lives they destroyed. In some cases, these executive drug dealers are facing racketeering charges for knowingly funneling thousands of doses to locations with small populations. The orders to these locations were so large that even if every member of the community had a prescription, it would still be too much. These orders were, of course, diverted to the black market. Executives have faced criminal prosecutions based on what they knew or should have known about the orders. Nonetheless, not one of them is facing a first-degree reckless homicide charge.

Understanding the Law

The Chicago man has been charged under Wisconsin Statutes 940.02. The relevant portion of the statute reads as follows:

Kelly’s attorneys have petitioned the court to withdraw from Kelly’s Chicago trial two months before the trial on racketeering charges is set to begin. According to the attorneys, they have asked to withdraw after two junior attorneys demanded a larger role in Kelly’s defense. The attorneys sent a letter to the presiding judge requesting withdrawal from the case. While they did not give their reasons, the letter indicated that it would be “impossible” to continue to represent Kelly.

Essentially, it appears as though two junior attorneys are being given a greater role in the criminal defense of Kelly, much to the chagrin of his head counsel. The judge can decide, if they are so inclined, to deny the request. The attorneys have requested a hearing to address the issue.

That could be the most likely outcome given that numerous delays have resulted in the forestalling of Kelly’s prosecution. It is unclear, however, that Kelly would benefit from another delay, as he has been incarcerated here in Chicago since January. He is currently charged with racketeering, numerous sex crimes, and coercing or influencing witnesses and jurors. 

Chicago prosecutors have dropped charges against Charles Thomas after he successfully completed a court diversion program. Police accused Thomas of aggravated assault of a police officer and criminal damage to property. The campus police officer who apprehended Thomas also shot him. Thomas, a fourth-year political science major, was allegedly smashing car windows and damaging apartment windows.

Bodycam footage shows Thomas approaching the officer with a crowbar. The officers identified Thomas as a mental health case. Thomas’s mother says that he has never had any symptoms of mental illness, but college age is when a number of disorders such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder begin to emerge. His mother said his family had a history of bipolar disorder.

The student was shot, albeit non-fatally, and likely required to get mental health counseling for his problems. The charges against him were dropped in lieu of the pretrial diversion program. It is unclear if he had to make restitution to the university or the individuals whose property he damaged as part of the pleading.

Two 18-year-old men are facing charges of terrorizing two other men who had arranged dates on the popular Tinder App. Jahziah McDonald and Jeremiyah Mannie were denied bail after the prosecutors said that the attacks were organized. The men have been charged with aggravated kidnapping, aggravated vehicular hijacking, and aggravated robbery—all of which are felonies. The men did not have adult records. However, one faced juvenile charges related to auto theft. A third female teenager was used to lure the men to the attack. The teenaged girl will face juvenile charges. A fourth individual who attended the attacks was released uncharged. 

Hook-up Site Robberies Targeting Men

Men are not usually the target of hook-up site robberies. Generally, it is women who have to be more careful. However, anyone can be the victim of this sort of attack without regard to their gender. In this case, men hoping to hook up with a pretty girl were lured to a secluded place where the attack could be conducted. One man was forced to withdraw money from his account at an ATM. 

Law enforcement uses a number of techniques to convict criminal defendants that appear on the surface to be scientific, but really are not. No, we are not talking about DNA evidence, which has been used to exonerate many wrongfully-accused defendants. We are talking about other forensic techniques that were created by the FBI, but have scant scientific merit. In this article, we will take a look at some of that junk science.

Profiling and Behavioral Sciences

We all love Thomas Harris novels and TV shows like Criminal Minds, but the truth is profiling is useless. Not only is it basically stereotyping, but you can pull any Joe off the street and get a similar result to what a trained profiler would produce. 

mihai-surdu-DeI2BMIMDFA-unsplash-copy-300x200The man whose conduct lit the fire that set off the #MeToo movement will stand trial in Manhattan facing five charges relating to sex crimes. Harvey Weinstein has been accused by over 80 women of sexual misconduct and the trial promises to be a historic indictment of Hollywood culture and even American culture. 

Weinstein will face a litany of witnesses who will testify before the court and recount sexual misconduct before a jury. Some of these women will be recounting experiences from uncharged sex crimes while others will act as witnesses for crimes that have been charged. In this respect, it is similar to the strategy used by prosecutors to convict Bill Cosby of multiple counts of rape and sexual assault. 

Weinstein has maintained his innocence.

matt-popovich-60437-copy-300x162Based on the strength of testimony from other Chicago cops and a Chicago judge, police officers Xavier Elizondo and David Salgado were recently found guilty of stealing cash and drugs and otherwise profiting on the drug trade they were supposed to be eliminating. The federal trial made national headlines because it detailed the type of corruption that goes on every day in Chicago. These police were accused and then convicted of lying on search warrants, using money and drugs from seizures to pay off informants who would provide anonymous information to judges who would then authorize illegal searches.

If you are concerned that this is a civil rights violation, then you are thinking about this the right way. So-called John Doe search warrants that have anonymous informants tattling on suspects were at the heart of the problem these two Chicago police officers caused. Nonetheless, these search warrants will continue to be used long after this trial has concluded.

Officers Remain Free

samara-doole-259144-unsplash-copy-200x300The body of 2-year-old Kirien Knox was found dismembered in Garfield Park Lagoon. The shocking details of the slaying moved those who witnessed the photos to tears. The man charged with the murder, Kamel Harris, has pleaded not guilty.

According to the prosecution, the boy’s mother, Lanisha Knox, left her son with Harris and five others at an apartment while Knox headed out to set up a new life in Iowa, get jobs, and find an apartment. At some point, Harris stopped responding to calls or texts made by Knox.

Police and the prosecution believe that, at some point, Harris “snapped” and murdered the boy and then tried to dispose of the body. However, they did not list a cause of death. They did, however, indicate that Harris snapped because the boy cried incessantly after a “painful reaction to milk.”

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