Articles Posted in Federal Criminal Trials

Demarick Hunter is serving a sentence of 15 years and 8 months in federal prison for possessing a firearm. The Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) provides for a minimum sentence of 15 years for career criminals who carry firearms. Mr. Hunter’s prior convictions do not qualify him as a career criminal under the ACCA. The…

Some prosecutors are a little like complaining children, they are never satisfied unless they get their way, and they will continue to whine for a long time until they do. This past Friday, in an appeal involving a white collar federal criminal prosecution the Supreme Court took a case to answer whether federal prosecutors can…

Criminal cases in the federal courts here in Atlanta are no different than in other parts of the country. Criminal defense attorneys and prosecutors make their arguments in front of federal judges, who under our Constitution are appointed to lifetime positions by the President, with the consent and approval of Congress. However, what happens when…

We are working on a federal criminal case here in Atlanta where one of the issues is whether the police broke the law when a wife gave them her husband’s computer and the police then searched through it finding incriminating materials. This is becoming more and more common, questions revolving around whether one person can…

The right to have a lawyer defend a person against federal criminal charges was affirmed yesterday in a major ruling issued by the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. The case, United States v. Stein, affirmed a decision by a District Judge who dismissed all charges because the prosecutors violated the Sixth…

The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit recently issued a very lengthy opinion that covers a variety of sentencing issues we see quite often in federal white collar cases. Although this case came out of the appellate court that covers Denver, we see similar issues in cases here in Atlanta, the rest…

Federal prosecutors are more and more fond of trying to seize assets from people who are prosecuted for federal crimes. We see this quite a bit in money laundering and white collar crime cases. However, a recent federal case that started in South Florida shows that the details are always important, and a good lawyer…

Federal agents who work for the FBI, DEA, ATF and the like can sometimes be very crafty in trying to get a suspect to make a statement that later will be used in court. There is an old saying in my business that it’s mighty hard to catch a fish that won’t open its mouth.…

The final step of dismissing federal criminal charges against a medical doctor took place today in Atlanta when we got word that the United States Attorney’s office agrees that our client fulfilled his part of a pretrial diversion agreement. This case is a lesson in several aspects of federal criminal cases: 1) the feds will…

Most folks who know me or who might stumble across this blog recognize that I practice mostly federal criminal law here in Atlanta. I have been doing this for about 23 years now, and still enjoy my work immensely. Nevertheless, there are some aspects of being a criminal defense lawyer here in Georgia (or anywhere…