Background: Robert E. Vanella, acting for the news organization The Delaware Call, submitted a Delaware Freedom of Information Act request seeking seven categories of records concerning Delaware State Police troopers. The requests covered current troopers’ names, salaries, ranks, prior employment, résumés, and demographic information, as well as information about former troopers. DSP denied the requests in…
Held: The Delaware Supreme Court held that DSP failed to carry its statutory burden concerning the employment-history and former-officer requests. Its affidavit neither adequately described the search for responsive records nor established that no records existed; indeed, it indicated that DSP possessed at least some responsive information. On remand, DSP must produce responsive records or provide a sworn account satisfying the…
Background: The defendant was indicted for rape, assaulting an intimate partner, and threats arising from his approximately three-year relationship with the complainant. After the defense agreed that prima facie evidence existed while preserving its arguments for trial, the Central-Lod District Court ordered him detained through the end of the proceedings.
Held: Justice Khaled Kabub allowed the appeal and ordered the defendant transferred to detention under electronic monitoring and continuous human supervision, with an absolute prohibition on direct or indirect contact with the complainant. The case was returned to the District Court to establish and implement all required conditions.
Background: Segrue Investments Limited challenged Swindon Borough Council’s refusal to issue revised Community Infrastructure Levy liability notices for two residential developments at a former HSBC bank. The notices assessed total CIL liability of £125,274.64. Segrue contended that the existing building qualified as an “in-use building,” which would reduce that liability to zero.
Held: Sir Peter Lane granted permission at the rolled-up hearing but dismissed every ground. The statutory review and appeal procedures in regulations 113 and 114 were a suitable alternative remedy. The substance of the evidence and arguments on which Segrue later relied could, with reasonable diligence, have been assembled and advanced through those procedures. Regulation 65(5) did not require the council…
Background: Thomas Clark, an inmate at Lebanon Correctional Institution, sent five electronic requests to prison officials seeking eight items: ViaPath Technologies terms of use and its contract with the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction; body-worn-camera and stationary-surveillance footage relating to a search of his cell; Aramark’s proposal for ODRC’s food-services contract; employee rosters; and the…
Held: The court granted a limited writ concerning Aramark’s proposal. Clark presented evidence that the proposal had existed separately from the food-services contract already produced, and ODRC did not adequately rebut that showing. The court ordered ODRC either to provide the proposal and certify that it had done so or to certify that the proposal does not exist or is not…
Background: Gary Aller, president of Educational Facilities Development Services, was indicted on felony conspiracy and fraud charges arising from a school district construction project. The superior court remanded the first indictment after concluding the State had presented procurement rules that were not in effect when the alleged conduct occurred. The State later obtained a second indictment…
Held: The Arizona Supreme Court held that a former defendant who lawfully possesses grand-jury transcripts must still satisfy the Ronan “particularized need” framework before using them in related civil litigation. The court rejected Aller's proposed lesser standard, explaining that Arizona law continues to protect grand-jury secrecy and that statutory access to transcripts after indictment does not authorize their further disclosure or…
Background: Stephen Ennis, Shane Irwin and Sean O’Hanlon brought separate inquiries under Article 40.4.2° of the Constitution challenging their detention in Cloverhill Prison after the District Court refused or revoked bail. Each had appeared without legal representation amid a dispute over criminal legal-aid remuneration that had left many accused persons unrepresented at District Court bail hearings.
Held: Mr Justice Garrett Simons held that detention under a facially valid order made by a court of competent jurisdiction is ordinarily lawful for Article 40.4.2° purposes, even where the decision may contain an error of fact, law or procedure within jurisdiction. Immediate release is available only in a rare and exceptional case involving a default of fundamental requirements, a fundamental…
Background: Kaixiao Liu and Lanyue Xiao were convicted by a jury of kidnapping, manslaughter, misconduct in relation to human remains, and attempting to pervert the course of justice. Liu was also convicted of failing to comply with obligations relating to a computer search. They lived in an Orewa household known as the Ark, where Liu led…
Held: Downs J sentenced Liu to 10 years and five months’ imprisonment for kidnapping and manslaughter, with a minimum period of imprisonment of 50 per cent. The Court imposed concurrent 18-month terms for attempted perversion of justice and misconduct in relation to human remains, and entered a conviction only on the computer-search offence.
Background: Rashad Tee Sellers was convicted of murdering Stephon Walthrust, who was shot in a parked car in Stamford. Surveillance footage placed Sellers near the scene, but did not capture the shooting or show a gun. Police recovered clothing matching that worn by Sellers in the footage, but no firearm.
Held: The Connecticut Supreme Court reversed and ordered a new trial. It held that the trial court abused its discretion by denying a Porter hearing solely because the underlying methodology was considered well established. Under the court’s gatekeeping obligation, a trial court must consider new evidence that may call the continued reliability of a scientific methodology into question.
Background: Wells Fargo filed this foreclosure action in 2015 against Sa and Gladys Ulu Tupulua concerning their Waiʻanae property. It later assigned the mortgage to UMB Bank, which was substituted as plaintiff. Because the note was endorsed in blank, the foreclosing plaintiff had to establish that Wells Fargo possessed the original note when it filed the…
Held: The Supreme Court of Hawai‘i vacated the ICA’s judgment and remanded. It held that UMB’s summary-judgment evidence left a genuine factual dispute about whether Wells Fargo possessed the note on January 20, 2015, when the complaint was filed. Although the declarations and spreadsheet were admissible, the spreadsheet contained undefined and ambiguous entries, including “Location Move,” that were not adequately explained.
Background: The Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland and respondent Jay Barry Shuster jointly filed a petition asking the Supreme Court of Maryland to transfer Shuster to disability inactive status by consent and to grant appropriate relief.
Held: The Supreme Court of Maryland granted the parties’ joint petition. Pursuant to Maryland Rules 19-736(c) and 19-740(c), the court transferred Shuster to disability inactive status by consent.
Background: A Massachusetts landlord may correct a defective lease-termination notice and bring a second summary process case without having the entire dispute barred by claim preclusion, the Appeals Court held. The decision gives General Laws c. 239, § 7, its literal force: a judgment in a summary process action does not bar a later action to…
Held: The Appeals Court reversed in an opinion by Justice Shin. Section 7 says that a judgment in a summary process action “shall not be a bar” to a later action by either party to recover the property or damages for trespass. Eng's second complaint sought possession and unpaid-rent damages, so it fell within that language. Because applying claim preclusion would…
Background: The Indiana Court of Appeals affirmed David Hollowell’s convictions in a cold case that turned on DNA evidence developed two decades after the crimes. In April 2003, a thirteen-year-old girl was sexually assaulted in her Charlestown home by an armed man. When her stepfather returned, the assailant shot him in the head and fled, leaving…
Held: Judge Pyle’s opinion first upheld the DNA warrant. Hollowell argued that the tip was hearsay from an informant whose reliability the affidavit did not establish. The panel agreed that an uncorroborated tip from an unknown source cannot alone establish probable cause, but held that the detective corroborated this tip with facts that were not easily obtained. The investigation connected Hollowell…