Each screening panel consists of four members who will serve two-year terms. (Half of the first appointees will begin with one-year terms in order to stagger the terms.) The panels will establish, for each judicial department, a roster of private attorneys who are qualified to provide effective legal representation for indigent persons charged with capital crimes. Appointed attorneys will be paid by the State.
An attorney added to a screening panel's roster must demonstrate to the screening panel that he or she meets certain minimum standards. The minimum standards will prescribe the criminal defense and trial experience and specialized capital case training that an attorney must have so as to be qualified to handle a capital case.
The Board of Directors of the CDO, after consultation with the Administrative Board of the Courts (the Chief Judge of the Court of Appeals plus the four Presiding Justices), will propose these minimum standards this month. To take effect, the Court of Appeals, after inviting written comments from interested parties, must approve the proposed minimum standards.
Each screening panel is responsible for proposing a schedule of fees - - subject to the approval of the Court of Appeals -- that the State will pay appointed attorneys in death penalty cases.
Each Appellate Division will consult with its respective screening panel on establishing rates of fees and expenses to be paid by the State for expert, investigative and other services required by indigent defendants in capital cases.
The four Presiding Justices are: Hon. Francis T. Murphy (First Department); Hon. Guy J. Mangano (Second Department); Hon. Anthony J. Cardona (Third Department); Hon. M. Delores Denman (Fourth Department). The Board of Directors of the CDO are: Arthur L. Liman, Chair; John R. Dunne; Christopher E. Stone. Kevin E. Doyle is the Acting Capital Defender.
Led by the New York State Coalition for Criminal Justice, the participants of the alliance called for a careful analysis of the policy in hopes of avoiding its likely repercussions for inmates as well as guards. Implementation of the policy has contributed to dangerous prison overcrowding and health hazards. It has prompted lawsuits by unionized prison staff and inmates alike. Thousands of inmates in several prisons have gone on hunger strikes to protest the change.
While the Pataki Administration argues that the policy will save the financial cost of building new prisons, it was criticized for ignoring the potential liabilities associated with uprisings, increased recidivism, disease, lowered supervision standards and general deteriorating prison conditions.
As of early July, the state has identified 780 double cells in 13 medium and maximum-security prisons.
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If the current trend continues as predicted by law enforcement experts and criminologists, there will soon be 6 million Americans behind bars or on probation or parole -- the number of full-time students enrolled in four- year colleges and universities nationwide.
Not surprisingly, criminologists and politicians disagreed as to whether the large number of Americans behind bars had any effect on the crime rate. While politicians perceived the report as encouraging since it has resulted in lower crime rates, criminologists warn that any gain in terms of reduced crime has been disproportionate when measured against the vast increase in the numbers of prisoners. "We should think very hard about the trade-off" between the tripling in the prison population and the relatively small decrease in crime, said Alfred Blumstein, a criminologists at Carnegie Mellon University.
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The case has been watched closely by death penalty counsel for clarification on the funding of the "one-bite-at-the-apple" habeas investigation and appeal that the U.S. Supreme Court gave death row inmates in McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U.S. 467.
The ruling came a day before the House Appropriations Committee approved the elimination of all funding for post-conviction defender organizations (PCDO's), formerly known as death penalty resource centers. Funding for the Legal Services Corporation was proposed to be slashed from $400 million to $278 million in fiscal 1996. "LSC: $278M; Death Row Lawyers: 0," The National Law Journal, 7/31/95, p. A11.
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In People v. Shamail Rizwan, filed last month in Criminal Court, New York County, Judge Sheryl L. Parker rejected a prosecution argument that DMV records are public records in which a defendant can claim no expectation of privacy. Last spring Judge John Cataldo had rejected a prosecution argument that DMV records were not subject to suppression because they were not physical evidence. People v. Michel Thomas, N.Y.L.J., 4/3/95, p. 29, col.3.
Judge Parker ruled in Rizwan that while a defendant has no standing to oppose the introduction of public records into evidence, DMV records can be subject to suppression as "fruits" of an unlawful seizure. A "defendant need not establish an expectation of privacy in evidence classified as "fruit" of an unlawful search and seizure, provided he has an expectation of privacy in the seizure that directly led to the `fruit,'" the judge said. She ordered a hearing to determine the legality of the stop of Mr. Rizwan's car and the subsequent computer check of the DMV records by the arresting officer which revealed Mr. Rizwan's six prior license suspensions.
In Thomas, Judge Cataldo ruled that a police request to see a driver's license and registration must be justified by probable cause because random traffic stops "constitute an impermissible intrusion on a motorist's freedom of movement." He added that although the information the defendant sought to suppress is information contained in the computer record of a state agency, "this does not bar suppression." "[T]he defendant's factual allegations sufficiently assert that an illegal stop occurred and that but for that stop the defendant's DMV records would not have come to light," the judge said in ordering a suppression hearing.
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Since then, Peter Gerstenzang and Edward Fiandach have submitted to the Backup Center several additional related rulings including: People v. Edward Conrad and People v. Norman Lancaster (Fishkill Village Ct., 8/14/95); People v. Scott Casey (Moreau Town Ct., 7/6/95); People v. Todd Johnson (Chili Town Ct., 6/26/95); People v. Richard Wetzler (Southeast Town Ct., 5/10/95); People v. Robert Hamilton, Jr. and People v. David Baptista (Oswego City Ct., 4/4/95); People v. Frank Delise (Newark Valley Town Ct., 4/2/95); People v. Boulton, 625 NYS2d 428 (Troy City Ct.); Michael Pringle v. Terrance Wolfe (Supreme Ct., Wayne Co., 3/17/95); People v. Kent Sisco (Supreme Ct., Broome Co., 2/22/95); People v. Nuchow, 623 NYS2d 1006 (Orangetown Town Ct.); and Josip Maricevic v. Justices of the Ashland Town Court (Supreme Ct., Greene Co., 1/17/95)
For more information on these rulings, contact the Backup Center. If you are aware of other rulings regarding challenges to 1193(2)(e)(7), please submit them to the Backup Center.
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The cost of this new volume is $25. If you purchase a new volume, you may also obtain these new charges on a computer disk, which costs $5.
To obtain more information, contact: Criminal Jury Instruction Manuals, Box 3139, Church Street Station, New York, NY 10008.
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