Reuters: “Serious threats to U.S. federal judges have more than doubled over the past three years, part of a growing wave of politically driven violence.” There is no data base about serious threats to state judges nor is it easy to find data on serious threats to Canadian judges. But the absence of data should not undermine our concern about safety.

Many times  when state Supreme Courts make a ruling on independent state grounds based upon that state’s constitution there is some textual difference between the US Constitution and the state constitution. The opinion of the Hawaii Supreme Court begins by stating ” Article I, section 17 of the Hawai’i Constitution mirrors the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. We read those words differently than the current United States Supreme Court. We hold that in Hawai’i there is no state constituional right to carry a firearm in public.”

 The Supreme Court of Hawaii unanimously ruled this week that the state’s constitution does not include the right to carry a firearm in public. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Read the opinion. SUPREME COURT OF HAWAII

Sentencing is never an easy task but surely deciding what to do with a teenager or your adult convicted of a brutal crime is a judge’s greatest challenge. The Massachusetts Supreme Court’s new ban on life-without-parole sentences for “emerging adults” under 21 follows a trend over the past decade that has seen more than two dozen states also limit sentences for young adults. BOLTS

A Synthesis of the Science and Law Relating to Eyewitness Misidentifications and Recommendations for How Police and Courts Can Reduce Wrongful Convictions Based on Them

Seattle University Law Review, Vol. 47, No. 1, pp. 1-118 (2023).

Henry F. Fradella

Arizona State University – School of Criminology and Criminal Justice

Date Written: October 27, 2023

Abstract

The empirical literature on perception and memory consistently demonstrates the pitfalls of eyewitness identifications. Exoneration data lend external validity to these studies. With the goal of informing law enforcement officers, prosecutors, criminal defense attorneys, judges, and judicial law clerks about what they can do to reduce wrongful convictions based on misidentifications, this Article presents a synthesis of the scientific knowledge relevant to how perception and memory affect the (un)reliability of eyewitness identifications. The Article situates that body of knowledge within the context of leading case law. The Article then summarizes the most current recommendations for how law enforcement personnel should—and should not—conduct eyewitness identification procedures. Finally, the Article concludes by making law and policy recommendations for handling eyewitness identification evidence in ways that can reduce wrongful convictions. 

• In today’s Washington Post, BJI Executive Director Judge Jeremy Fogel commented on how Justice Thomas might analyze recusal standards in cases involving former President Trump.
  From the article, three excerpts:
  —Retired federal judge Jeremy Fogel said Thomas doesn’t necessarily need to recuse if the Supreme Court plans to approach Thursday’s case through the lens of whether Trump’s ballot status should be up to Congress — instead of debating whether the Jan. 6 attack was an insurrection.
  That’s because the justices will be asking technical, procedural questions about the very first court hearing on the matter in Denver. Fogel said the justices could ask questions such as, “What is the power of the states [with] respect [to] this particular constitutional amendment?” They could also ask “Was the hearing conducted fairly?” and “Was it an adequate process of fact-finding?”

  For that reason, “the specific issues that [they’d be] deciding in the insurrection case [would] not implicate the interests of [Thomas] or anyone to whom he’s close,” said Fogel.
  —Fogel said Thomas should also weigh how his decision to hear the case will affect the public’s perception of the court and its eventual ruling.
  Ginni Thomas’s involvement “raises the question of whether he can fairly assess the gravity of the conduct that President Trump is accused of,” Fogel said. “Even if it’s not the precise issue that the court is deciding, it [may create] the appearance that he is going to try to find a way to rule in President Trump’s favor because of his wife’s affiliations and advocacy.”
  —Thomas has so far sat out one Jan. 6-related case: An appeal by Eastman related to his efforts to help Trump block certification of the 2020 election. Thomas didn’t list a reason for his recusal, but it may be because Eastman is the justice’s former law clerk and friend.


  Fogel called Thomas’s decision to recuse himself from the Eastman case a “no brainer.”

  But the court did not indicate when it took the Colorado ballot case that Thomas, or any justice, would sit out — which means it is almost certain that all will participate.

  The result, according to Fogel: “People who are already wary or critical are going to be more wary and more critical,” he said.

Confrontation, the Legacy of Crawford, and Important Unanswered Questions

 The city of Grants Pass, Oregon, wants the justices to allow them to criminalize homelessness in the name of public safety. OREGON PUBLIC BROADCASTING The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that such laws used to justify the closing of homeless encampments violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. LOS ANGELES TIMES.

“In the 24 hours since the Colorado Supreme Court kicked former President Donald Trump off the state’s Republican primary ballot, social media outlets have been flooded with threats against the justices who ruled in the case,” NBC News reports.

Since then the threats have regrettably simply increased. There are judges and lawyers who disagree with the decision by the Colorado Supreme Court. There are judges and lawyers in Canada who may well be bewildered by what is happening in the United States. But all of us need to unite. The threats to the Colorado Supreme Court Justices are unacceptable. Now is not the time to remain silent.

“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

—Martin Niemöller