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NACDL’s mission is to serve as a leader, alongside diverse coalitions, in identifying and reforming flaws and inequities in the criminal legal system, and redressing systemic racism, and ensuring that its members and others in the criminal defense bar are fully equipped to serve all accused persons at the highest level.
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The law of expert evidence has experienced significant recent developments. This presentation will discuss the recent amendment to Federal Rule of Evidence 702 (experts) and what we as criminal defense lawyers can do to take advantage of the amendment (especially when it comes to excluding government sponsored expert evidence). The presentation will also cover the recent Supreme Court decisions in Diaz v. United States (opinion on ultimate issue), and Smith v. Arizona (Confrontation Clause).
Brief of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, (ACLUM) Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Massachusetts Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (MACDL), and National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) as Amicus Curiae in Support of Respondent.
Powerpoint slides by Wendy Bach and Stephen Ross Johnson. Presented at the NACDL Post-Dobbs Defender Skills Summit in July 2023
Defense lawyers increasingly are dealing with cellphones and location issues. Per Call Measurement Data files provide an estimate of the location of a cellphone. (Call Detail Record files, on the other hand, provide the location of the cell tower that served a call.) Richard Miletic explains the technology used, the error rate, and the basis to exclude PCMD under Daubert.
Although voluntariness is a mainstay of the U.S. legal system, voluntariness and its flip side, coercion, are ill-defined. Likely because of this ambiguity, admissibility decisions for contested confessions have been inconsistent. Some modern-day, often-used interrogation techniques (e.g., investigators feigning friendship) are coercive, even if they appear innocuous and non-adversarial.
Letter to the Judicial Conference Standing Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure regarding proposed changes to procedures in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Brief of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers as Amicus Curiae in Support of Respondents.