Florida Bar Reference #2211695N
Approval Period: 02/22/2023 - 08/31/2024
“Expert” testimony from law enforcement officers, often about the way those who sell drugs operate, can help get the Government across the finish line to a guilty verdict. Challenges to the testimony aren’t often successful but aren’t impossible. A 2020 case from the Ninth Circuit, United States v. Valencia-Lopez, 971 F.3d 891 (9th Cir. 2020), will give you a pathway for challenging the reliability of the testimony with the help of Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and Rule 16 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure.
In this month’s video Aaron Israelite covers the possibilities. Aaron is a 2009 graduate of the University of Texas Law School. He’s been a law clerk for a federal district court in Phoenix and a law clerk for the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He’s been a trial lawyer with the Federal Defenders of San Diego since 2012.
We recorded the video last summer at the Federal Defender Conference in Denver
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Florida Bar Reference #2211697N
Approval Period: 01/24/2023 - 07/31/2024
In this month’s video, Federal Judicial Center host, Brenda Baldwin-White, talks with Laurie Levenson, Professor of Law at Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, about recent issues in the areas of criminal procedure and evidence. She focuses on Special Masters, whether a victim's DNA may be used in unrelated prosecutions against the victim, using attorney admissions against a criminal defendant, the current status of the Bond search doctrine, standards for the "custody" requirement for Miranda, how recent gun laws affect standards for stopping motorists, whether bad parking is sufficient for reasonable suspicion, Sixth Amendment limits on agency interviews of detainees, limits on fingerprinting practices, driverless cars and Fourth Amendment issues, legality of multiple pat downs during one stop, baggy pants and the Fourth Amendment, the extent to which the smell of marijuana is a ground for reasonable suspicion, coercion and involuntary interrogations, chalking tires and the Fourth Amendment, massage parlors and the Fourth Amendment, and the impact of amended Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 16 and proposed Amendment to Federal Rule of Evidence 702 on expert evidence in criminal cases.
Professor Levenson worked as an Assistant United States Attorney in Los Angeles for many years as both an appellate and trial lawyer. She joined the Loyola University faculty in 1989. She has been a visiting professor at the UCLA School of Law and at the Pepperdine University School of Law. She leads Loyola University’s capital habeas litigation clinic and the Project for the Innocent.
Florida Bar Reference #2208835N
Approval Period: 10/25/2022 - 04/30/2024
It happens too often. A client is arrested by state authorities, held in the county jail, and initially prosecuted by the State but then the case goes “federal.” The client gets his federal sentence, is returned to state court where he gets a “concurrent” sentence only to discover later the sentence isn’t concurrent—the Marshals don’t pick him up until he finishes his state sentence, and he gets no credit for the state sentence when he finally arrives at the Bureau of Prisons. The problem: primary vs. secondary custody.
In this month’s video, Andrew Szekely, an Assistant Federal Public Defender from Maryland, will cover the basics of primary vs. secondary custody, help you identify common pitfalls, and provide practice pointers to help you advocate for your client when there are both state and federal charges.
Andrew is a 2004 graduate of the George Washington University School of Law. He worked as a state public defender and was in private practice before joining the Federal Public Defender in 2016.
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Clients and former clients often call about one problem or another they are faced with in the Bureau of Prisons. In this month’s video, you’ll get an overview of the administrative remedy process. The speakers, Jeff Carson, a retired operations manager from the Bureau of Prisons, and Laura Rovner, a professor at the Sturm College of Law, will discuss the most common complaints and will tell you how you can help resolve them.
Jeffrey Carson has worked as a consultant since 2015 advising lawyers and others about the best way to help those serving sentences in the Bureau of Prisons. Recently he joined the office of San Francisco lawyer Alan Ellis. He worked in the Bureau of Prisons beginning in 1988 with stints as a case manager and as the operations manager at the Bureau’s Sentence Computation Center.
Laura Rovner is a graduate of the Cornell University Law School. She’s taught at the Syracuse University School of Law and the University of North Dakota School of Law. At the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, she teaches in the Civil Rights Clinic, which represents clients in cases involving prisoners’ rights, disability rights, and employment discrimination. You can find her TED talk on the web in which she talks about the harm suffered by those prisoners held for years in solitary confinement. She was named by Denver’s 5280 Magazine as one of the “Top Lawyers in Civil Rights.”
Florida Bar Reference #2207110N
Approval Period: 08/25/2022 - 02/29/2024
Stanford University Law School Professor Jeffrey Fisher is a rock star among a select group of Supreme Court litigators. He’s argued over 40 cases before the Court including the landmark cases of Crawford v. Washington and Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, in which he persuaded the Court to adopt a new approach to the Constitution’s Confrontation Clause; Riley v. California, in which the Court for the first time applied the Fourth Amendment’s protections against unreasonable searches to digital information on smartphones; and Ramos v. Louisiana, which established that the constitutional right to a jury trial requires a unanimous verdict. He has handled other path making cases involving the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury free from racial bias, the right of same-sex couples to marry, and the Eight Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment. Most of all, he finds a way to win, regardless of the makeup of the Court.
In this month’s video, Professor Fisher, as he always does, offers his seemingly inescapable logic clearly and simply. He provides insight into today’s Court, and, in accord with the title of his presentation, promotes strategies that once may have been couched in terms of the now disfavored rule of lenity, but work as well under a different name.
Most of us aren’t Supreme Court litigators, but it all starts at the trial level and in the Courts of Appeal. Professor Fisher’s presentation will help you start it.
Florida Bar Reference #2205637N
Approval Period: 07/20/2022 - 01/31/2024
Three decades ago, the Supreme Court said that the commentary in the Guidelines Sentencing Manual has “controlling weight unless it is plainly erroneous or inconsistent” with the text of the guideline. A few years ago, in Kisor v. Wilkie, 139 S. Ct. 2400 (2019), the Supreme Court altered the established rule of deference to administrative agencies, holding that courts should defer to agency interpretations only if the regulation is “genuinely ambiguous.” Lawyers around the country are using the argument to challenge the Guidelines’ Commentary, arguing that courts should not rely on the Commentary unless the text of the guideline is “genuinely ambiguous.”
The most immediate example for us in the Eleventh Circuit is the case of United States v. Brandon Dupree, Case No. 19-13776, in which the court heard an en banc oral argument on June 21st. Dupree has argued a conspiracy conviction cannot count as a “controlled substance offense” for the career offender provision. The argument is that the text of the guideline, which speaks in terms of a substantive offense, is unambiguous, so courts cannot rely on the commentary, which expands the definition of “controlled substance offense” to include a conspiracy.
In this month’s video, two lawyers with the National Sentencing Resource Counsel, Shelley Fite and Christina Woehr, will guide you through the Kisor argument and suggest how to succeed with it. You’ll find it has real potential to change sentencing outcomes.
Shelley Fite is a 2006 graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School. She began her legal career as a law clerk to United States District Court Judge Lynn Adelman and spent 13 years as an assistant federal public defender in Wisconsin. She joined the National Sentencing Resource Counsel in 2021.
Christina Woehr is a 2010 graduate of the Columbia Law School. She clerked for United States District Court Judge J. Antonio Fuste, worked for a private firm in New York City, and spent seven years as an assistant federal public defender. She has been with the National Sentencing Resource Counsel since 2021.
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Florida Bar Reference #2205071N
Approval Period: 06/23/2022 - 12/31/2023
Though the Supreme Court has said that “[i]n our society liberty is the norm, and detention prior to trial . . . is the carefully limited exception” trial courts are detaining pretrial defendants at an increasing rate. Around the country, it is often being done in violation of the Bail Reform Act.
In this month’s video, Alison Siegler, the Director of the University of Chicago’s Federal Criminal Justice Clinic discusses the results of her study that found many federal judges and prosecutors were seemingly unaware of key provisions of the Act. In her dynamic presentation, she’ll tell you what you need to know about the Act and will suggest strategies to help you gain your client’s release.
Alison Siegler is a 1998 graduate of the Yale Law School. She has testified before the House Judiciary Committee about federal bond reform and spoken to hundreds of federal magistrate judges about pretrial release. Before founding the Law School’s Federal Justice Clinic, she was an Assistant Federal Public Defender in Chicago and a law clerk for U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman.
Florida Bar Reference #2204079N
Approval Period: 05/25/2022 - 11/30/2023
Erwin Chemerinsky, the Dean of the University of California, Berkely, School of Law, will present his take on this term’s Supreme Court cases and other recent decisions important to those practicing criminal defense.
Dean Chemerinsky is the author of twelve books, including leading casebooks and treatises about constitutional law, criminal procedure, and federal jurisdiction. He is the author of more than 250 law review articles, a contributing writer for the Opinion section of the Los Angeles Times, and writes a regular column for the Sacramento Bee, the ABA Journal, and frequent op-eds in newspapers across the country. He regularly argues cases before the United States Supreme Court.
In 2017, National Jurist magazine named him the most influential person in legal education in the United States.
The presentation is longer than our usual one at an hour and forty-five minutes.
Florida Bar Reference #2202961N
Approval Period: 04/06/2022 - 10/31/2023
Even the most experienced lawyers can struggle to find the path through the rules governing character evidence and impeachment. The Federal Rules of Evidence contain a series of rules. Rules 404(a) and 404(b) allow the use of character testimony in limited circumstances, including the use of prior criminal convictions to impeach. The methods of proving character are set out in Rule 405. Rules 412, 413, and 414 govern the use of character evidence in cases of sexual abuse. In Rules 607, 608, and 609, you’ll find the specifics of impeachment.
In this month’s presentation, Rene Valladares, the Federal Public Defender for the District of Nevada, will guide you through the maze. Rene is an adjunct professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Boyd School of Law and the University’s Criminal Justice Department. He recently wrote a Defender’s Guide to Federal Evidence: A trial Practice Handbook for Criminal Defense Attorneys, published by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
Florida Bar Reference #2202198N
Approval Period: 03/11/2022 - 09/30/2023
Among its many provisions, the First Step Act (FSA) provides opportunities for certain individuals to earn time credits (separate from good time credits) and be released from prison or transferred to prerelease custody based on those credits. In January 2022, the Department of Justice finally issued the regulations governing the Earned Time Credit, and retroactively applied credits, resulting in the early release of thousands. Whether our clients will benefit from this aspect of the FSA depends on whether they are excluded (due to immigration status, conviction, or judicial findings at sentencing), their risk score (as determined by BOP's new risk assessment tool: PATTERN), their participation in programming, and the availability of programming. This session will summarize these custodial provisions of the FSA, identify what we know and don't yet know about BOP's implementation of these provisions, and discuss how to best set our clients up to take advantage of the new potential benefits.
Presenters Liz Daily is an Assistant Federal Public Defender and the Appellate Chief in the District of Oregon. She has worked on numerous district court and appellate court cases involving challenges to Bureau of Prisons policies and procedures, including successful litigation challenging the BOP's failure to properly implement earned time credits in 2021. Before joining the Federal Public Defender in 2014, Liz worked as an appellate defender in Oregon and a trial-level public defender in Brooklyn, NY. She also clerked for the Immigration Courts in Seattle and Portland. Liz is a 2006 graduate of Lewis & Clark Law School.
Patricia Richman is National Sentencing Resource Counsel for the Federal Public and Community Defenders, where she leads legislative work. Previously, Patricia served as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the District of Maryland and as an associate at Williams & Connolly LLP. Before joining SRC in 2020, Patricia was detailed to Senator Durbin's (D-Ill) Judiciary Committee staff, where she led his criminal justice portfolio and First Step Act oversight efforts.
Florida Bar Reference #2201297N
Approval Period: 02/10/2022 - 08/31/2023
From complex defense theories to sentencing mitigation and compassionate release, Federal Public Defenders and Panel members routinely deal with diverse issues at the intersection of medicine and law. While medical experts are often instrumental to our objectives, failing to properly access and manage experts can cost time, money, and results. By knowing the ground rules and proven strategies for working with medical experts, it's remarkably easy to improve outcomes, navigate contracting, and secure top-tier physicians and surgeons to bolster your case. This webinar will address proven strategies to maximize success with medical experts. During this live 1-hour session, Dr. Burton Bentley II will share actionable insight learned from over 8000 cases, while Assistant Federal Defender Andrea Dechenne Bergman will focus on the challenges lawyers tackle every day and how to most effectively present medical expert evidence, particularly in sentencing.
Dr. Burton Bentley II is a board-certified Emergency Medicine physician and a nationally recognized authority on complex issues at the intersections of medicine, business and law. He earned his M.D. degree at the University of Arizona, completed a residency in Emergency Medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and practiced Emergency Medicine full-time for 21 years before developing a novel medical device that he patented and commercialized. Dr. Bentley now devotes his energy to Elite Medical Experts, a consulting firm that aligns Professors of Medicine and Surgery as experts in complex litigation. In addition to working with over 4000 clients including law firms, governmental entities, and corporations, Dr. Bentley serves as a frontline resource for Federal Public Defenders whose cases require strategic and tactical insight.
Andrea Dechenne Bergman has been an Assistant Federal Public Defender in New Jersey for 24 years. She graduated with a B.A. in English Literature from Skidmore College and a J.D. from Santa Clara University School of Law.
Florida Bar Reference #2200015N
Approval Period: 01/05/2022 - 07/31/2023
Government forensic experts in criminal cases can be full of misleading ideas and opinions that pass for “science” in the courtroom. Colorado defense attorney Collette Tvedt will explain the foundations of effective cross examinations and reveal some of the existing myths and assumptions around GPS, ballistics, DNA, and fingerprint evidence that can be undercut through cross examination.
Ms. Tvedt will teach the guiding principles for using an expert: “Expert i.C.P.R.” These four principles will help you effectively select, prep, and examine experts for litigation. You will also learn techniques to create theme-based cross examinations and story-rich direct examinations.
Ms. Tvedt is a nationally known attorney and lecturer who has been practicing criminal defense for over 20 years. She represents a broad range of clients facing investigation or prosecution from white-collar to violent crimes. She is a 1980 graduate of the Rutgers University School of Law. She is a faculty member of the National Criminal Defense College.
Florida Bar Reference #2109634N
Approval Period: 11/10/2021 - 05/31/2023
In September, the United States Sentencing Commission publicly released the Judiciary Sentencing Information platform, or "JSIN". The Commission describes JSIN as a data tool "specifically developed with the needs of judges in mind." According to the Commission, JSIN provides judges with easier access to sentencing data for "similarly-situated defendants." In this presentation, Sentencing Resource Counsel Jayme Feldman and Tina Woehr explore JSIN's capabilities and limitations and discuss how the tool may affect defense strategies at sentencing (and beyond).
Jayme Feldman leads the Sentencing Resource Counsel’s advocacy before the Sentencing Commission. Before joining the Sentencing Resource counsel, she was an Assistant Federal Public Defender in New York. She earned her J.D. from the University of Buffalo Law School.
Before joining the Sentencing Resource Counsel, Tina Woehr worked as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in both Texas and Arizona and was an associate with a New York law firm. She is a graduate of the Columbia Law School.
Florida Bar Reference #2108974N
Approval Period: 10/20/2021 - 04/30/2023
We regularly see conspiracy cases that ensnare those who are most culpable, but also those on the margins. From the defense standpoint, they are difficult cases. In this month’s presentation, Rene Valladares, the Federal Public Defender for the District of Nevada, will talk about why conspiracy cases pose such a problem for our clients, will cover the basic elements of conspiracy, common defenses, evidentiary issues, and practice tips.
Rene is also an adjunct professor at the University of Nevada’s law school. He regularly lectures on various criminal law and procedure topics including evidence and the defense of conspiracy cases. The National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys recently published Rene’s book, Guide to Federal Evidence: A Trial Practice Handbook for Criminal Defense Attorneys.
In Borden v. United States, 141 S. Ct. 1817 (2021), the Supreme Court held that a criminal offense that requires only a mens rea of recklessness cannot count as a "violent felony" under the Armed Career Criminal Act's (ACCA's) force clause or elements clause. ACCA enhances the sentence of anyone convicted under 18 U.S.C. SS 922(g) of being a felon in possession of a firearm if she has three or more prior convictions (whether state or federal) for a "violent felony" or a "serious drug offense," or both. The increase in penalty is severe: A 10-year maximum sentence turns into a 15-year minimum. This webinar analyzes the Borden decision and its application to the ACCA and other enhancements in pending and future cases, and cases that are final on direct review, e.g., post-conviction remedies. The webinar will also discuss strategies to challenge application of ACCA's force clause beyond Borden's holding.
The Office of Defender Services presented this webinar last month.
Presenters
Paresh Patel is the Appellate Chief at the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the District of Maryland. He has been at the Federal Public Defender since 2003. Before then, he worked as a staff attorney at the Public Defender Service in Washington, D.C. and the Office of the Appellate Defender in New York, New York. In 1999-2000, he clerked for the Honorable Ancer L. Haggerty of the United States District Court for the District of Oregon in Portland. Paresh earned his J.D. from American University in 1996, and he received his undergraduate degree from the University of Southern California in 1993.
Erin Rust was counsel of record in United States v. Borden, 141 S. Ct. 1817 (2010), and is an Assistant Federal Defender serving in the Appellate Unit at Federal Defender Services of Eastern Tennessee, Inc. She has been with Federal Defender Services since 2014 handling retroactive/post-conviction cases and district court cases in the Trial Unit before transitioning to appeals. Previously she was in private practice. Erin earned her J.D. from Washington University in St. Louis in 2010, and her undergraduate degree from Maryville College in 2006.
Florida Bar Reference #2106541N
Approval Period: 08/01/2021 - 02/28/2023
This month’s webinar, led by two lawyers, one from a federal public defender office and one a member of a Criminal Justice Act panel, focuses on how to deal with a federal criminal appeal from start to finish. The session covers everything from ordering transcripts, communicating with your client, identifying issues, drafting briefs, preparing for oral argument, and navigating post-decision litigation. It will also cover substantive points to address common concerns that arise in appeals and tips on avoiding typical mistakes. It is an ideal session for anyone new to federal appeals and for any experienced practitioners looking for a refresher.
Adeel Bashir is an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the Federal Public Defender's Office in Tampa. Adeel has litigated a wide range of appeals involving federal statutory and constitutional interpretation and the federal sentencing guidelines. His notable cases include Yates v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 1074 (2015), and Rehaif v. United States, 139 S. Ct. 2191 (2019).
Susan Lin is a partner with the firm of Kairys, Rudovsky, Messing, Feinberg & Lin in Philadelphia. She is a criminal defense and civil rights trial attorney who is also experienced in litigating federal appeals and post-conviction claims. She teaches trial advocacy at the Temple Law School and at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Susan is a 2004 graduate of Yale Law School. She has clerked for a United States District Court Judge and worked as an Assistant Public Defender at the Defender Association of Philadelphia and as an Assistant Federal Public Defender in the trial and appellate units of the Federal Community Defender Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
Florida Bar Reference #2105365N
Approval Period: 07/01/2021 - 01/31/2023
In this month’s video Stanford Law School professor Jeffrey Fisher provides an update on recent Supreme Court decisions affecting federal criminal practice, issues under consideration by the Court, and issues for the future.
Jeffrey L. Fisher is a professor at Stanford Law School and co-director of its Supreme Court Litigation Clinic. He is also special counsel at O’Melveny & Myers LLP. His academic and Supreme Court work runs the gamut of federal constitutional and statutory matters, with an emphasis on criminal procedure issues.
Professor Fisher has argued over forty cases in the Supreme Court. Among his successes are Riley v. California and Carpenter v. United States, involving the Fourth Amendment’s application to digital information, and Crawford v. Washington and Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, involving the Confrontation Clause. Professor Fisher was also co-counsel for the plaintiffs in Obergefell v. Hodges, in which the Court held that the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees same-sex couples a right to marry. In 2006, the National Law Journal named him one of the 100 most influential lawyers in the country – the youngest person on the list – and he has remained on that list ever since.
Professor Fisher formerly served as a law clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court of the United States and to Judge Stephen Reinhardt on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He also is a recipient of the Heeney Award, the highest honor bestowed by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
Florida Bar Reference #2104955N
Approval Period: 06/15/2021 - 12/31/2022
In this month’s webinar, Sentencing Resource Counsel Jayme Feldman and Laura Mate, focus on the fundamentals of federal sentencing law, from the Constitution to the statutes, to the Sentencing Guidelines. They include a tour of the Sentencing Guidelines Manual, with an eye toward understanding its basic structure and its theories. Their goal is to give you the knowledge you need for creative sentencing advocacy—to show where the legal framework is rigid and where it bends, so you can work toward the best outcome for you client.
Jayme Feldman is an attorney with the National Sentencing Resource Counsel Project for the Defender Services Division of the United States Courts. Before joining the Sentencing Resource Counsel, she was an assistant federal public defender in the Western District of New York. She graduated in 2010 from the School of Law at the University of Buffalo.
Laura Mate is the Director of the National Sentencing Resource Counsel Project. In years past, she had been an assistant federal public defender in the Western District of Washington and an associate with Perkins Cole in Seattle. She is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School.
The Training Divison originally broadcast the webinar in March of this year.
Keeping Your Client’s Sentence as Short as Possible
Florida Bar Reference #2104174N
Approval Period: 05/10/2021 - 11/30/2022
In this month’s recorded webinar, Assistant Federal Public Defenders Liz Daily and Stephen Sady provide you with practical tips to keep your client’s stay in the Bureau of Prisons as short as possible. They discuss the importance of the presentence report in determining your client’s security level and placement in the Bureau of Prisons, pretrial credit, details about the Residential Drug Abuse Program (RDAP), the new earned time credits under the First Step Act, the basics of compassionate release, avoiding unintended consecutive sentences, and habeas corpus relief.
Liz Daily is the Appellate Chief in the District of Oregon. She is a 2006 graduate of the Lewis & Clark Law School and his been with the office since 2014. Before coming to the Federal Public Defender Office, she was an appellate public defender in Oregon, a trial-level public defender in Brooklyn and clerked for immigration courts in Seattle and Portland.
Stephen Sady is the Chief Federal Public Defender for the District of Oregon. He is a 1977 graduate of the Lewis & Clark Law School. He has been with the office since 1981. He has litigated cases involving the Bureau of Prisons, including a case before the Supreme Court regarding good time credit calculations. He writes and teaches on subjects including federal sentencing, pretrial motions, appellate advocacy, representation of Guantanamo prisoners, and post-sentence challenges to the use of prior convictions to enhance sentences.
The Training Division of the Defender Services Division broadcast the webinar on May 5, 2021.
Court Web: New Developments in Federal Criminal Law and Procedure
Florida Bar Reference #2102929N
Approval Period: 04/01/2021 - 10/31/2022
This month’s video is from the Federal Judicial Network. Host Brenda Baldwin-White talks with Laurie Levenson, Professor of Law at Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, about new developments in federal criminal law and procedure. Their discussion will focus on recent cases before the Supreme Court on issues regarding the standard for seizures under the Fourth Amendment, the meaning of the "use of force" clause of the Armed Career Criminal Act, the Eighth Amendment as it applies to juvenile sentencing, the scope of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, retroactivity of new Sixth Amendment decisions, the applicability of the hot pursuit doctrine in misdemeanor cases, and the scope of the "community caretaking" exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement. Professor Levenson will also address new federal discovery practices, the impact of COVID-19 on speedy trial rights, federal felony murder law, and the future of qualified immunity in excessive force cases.
Ms. Levenson teaches evidence, criminal law and procedure, and trial advocacy. She is the author of a number of publications, including Federal Criminal Rules Book (2018 ed. Thomson West); Roadmap on Criminal Law (4th edition); Criminal Procedure (Aspen Publishers 2018); Glannon guide to Criminal Law (4th ed. 2014).
The Judicial Network broadcast the presentation live on March 31, 2021.