The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees a criminal defendant the right to effective assistance of counsel at both the trial and appellate level. A defendant raising an ineffective assistance claim in a post-conviction proceeding must meet a two-prong…
Category: Federal Criminal Law
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Hate Crime
Terrorism is a serious charge in the United States. While some associate terrorism with planes flying into buildings or bombs exploding, acts of teror can take on many forms.
Today Americans must deal with domestic terrorism as part of…
2022
Category: Death Penalty | Federal Criminal Law
The death penalty is generally a state matter. Until the thirteen executionswere carried out during the Trump presidency, there had not been a federal execution since 2003.
President Joe Biden stated last year that there would be no executions…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Federal Fraud | Fraud | Wire Fraud
Before 2010, federal prosecutors routinely used the honest services component of the federal fraud statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1346, to criminalize the failure of public officials and corporate executives to report their financial gains from business dealings with corporate or…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law
There are 403 chapters in the United States Code. Each chapter has statutes that prohibit offenses specific to each chapter. Many, if not most, of these federal statutes cover crimes that are often complex. They can be confusing, which is…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Obstruction of Justice
Obstruction of justice may appear in dramatic movie courtroom scenes, but it can, and sometimes is, charged as a real criminal offense—one that carries significant consequences – especially when charged at the federal level.
What sort of actions constitute “obstruction…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Weapon Crimes
Weapons charges in Texas generally trigger images of large numbers of guns and/or knives. However, when it comes to weapons charges under the law, it doesn’t end with guns or knives. There are many things that are considered weapons.
…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | SCOTUS | terrorism
In the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attack on the Twin Towers in New York City, America was besieged with fear, suspicion, and hostility towards Muslims and anyone associated with the Islamic faith. Not even the nation’s First…
2022
Category: Federal Criminal Law | Guns
A tragic set of circumstances recently unfolded in the Dallas area that involved guns – and it turned out the person who riggered the circumstances shouldn’t have had guns in the first place.
A man took several hostages at a…
2022
Category: Credit Card Fraud | Federal Criminal Law | Fraud
Credit card fraud can be perpetrated on a very large scale. Some criminal organizations steal information from many people at once, usually through some type of online scam or phishing scam.
In the federal system, credit card fraud can…