Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

A jury convicted Defendant of aggravated burglary and sexual intercourse without consent. Defendant argued on appeal that his convictions should be reversed because his standby counsel had a conflict of interest, the district court erred by modifying the jury instructions regarding aggravated burglary during jury deliberations, and his counsel was ineffective for failing to obtain an independent medical expert. The State conceded reversible error on the instruction issue and requested that Defendant's conviction for aggravated burglary be vacated on that basis. The Supreme Court reversed Defendant's conviction for aggravated burglary and affirmed Defendant's conviction for sexual intercourse without consent, holding (1) Defendant's standby counsel did not have an active conflict of interest that required reversal of Defendant's sexual intercourse without consent conviction; and (2) because the record did not fully explain why an independent medical examination or expert was not ultimately obtained by Defendant's counsel, Defendant's claim that his counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to obtain a medical expert could not be reviewed on appeal. View "Longjaw v. State" on Justia Law

After a bench trial in justice court, Defendant was convicted for DUI per se. At the close of the State's case-in-chief, Defendant moved the justice court to dismiss the charge on grounds of insufficient evidence, arguing that the margin of error in the Intoxilyzer breath test's result created reasonable doubt that Defendant's alcohol concentration had, in fact, reached the statutorily prohibited level. The district court affirmed the justice court's denial of Defendant's motion, concluding that Defendant had forfeited his right to challenge the veracity of his breath test. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) Defendant had an evidentiary right to challenge the veracity of his Intoxilyzer breath test at trial, and the district court erred in concluding otherwise; but (2) the district court did not err in concluding that there was sufficient evidence to support Defendant's conviction, as a rational trier of fact could have found beyond a reasonable doubt that Defendant's alcohol concentration was over the statutorily proscribed limit. View "State v. Gai" on Justia Law

Appellant appealed from his conviction in the district court of one count of felony aggravated assault. Appellant argued (1) his conviction should be reversed under the plain error doctrine because law enforcement failed to investigate his claim of justifiable use of force as required by Mont. Code Ann. 45-3-112; and (2) he received ineffective assistance of counsel because his attorney failed to move for dismissal of his charge. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) Appellant failed to establish that any alleged failure of law enforcement officials to comply with section 45-3-112 prejudiced his defense requiring the Court to exercise plain error review; and (2) Appellant failed to establish that his counsel's representation was ineffective. View "State v. Mitchell" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Appellant Bobby Cooksey was convicted of deliberate homicide. The district court sentenced Appellant to a term of fifty years in prison with credit for time served. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court properly denied Appellant's motion for a new trial; (2) the district court properly excluded Appellant's offered evidence concerning the presence of the drug Paxil in the deceased's blood; (3) the investigation of the crime was conducted in compliance with Mont. Code Ann. 45-12-112; and (4) Appellant failed to establish that the prosecution's statements during closing argument constituted unfairly prejudicial misconduct. View "State v. Cooksey" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of felony partner or family member assault. The district court designated Defendant a persistent felony offender and committed him to the department of corrections (DOC) for the statutory minimum period of five years. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding evidence that the complaining witness had a history of a felony forgery charge over a decade before Defendant's trial based on the remoteness in time of the forgery charge and the substantial evidence in the record to support the assault against the witness; and (2) the district court lawfully based its sentence upon Defendant's likelihood of reoffending and the court's desire to rehabilitate him. View "State v. Thompson" on Justia Law

Birth mother N.S. (Mother) and birth father K.R. (Father) appealed a district court order that terminated their parental rights to their four-year-old twin daughters, T.R. 1 and T.R. 2. Mother also appealed the District Court’s order denying her a new trial. The issues on appeal were: (1) whether the District Court abused its discretion by terminating Mother and Father’s parental rights; (2) whether the District Court erred in finding it was in the children’s best interests to terminate those rights; (3) whether the District Court erred in finding the Department of Health and Human Services (the Department) made reasonable efforts to reunify the family; (4) whether the District Court adequately addressed the appropriateness of the treatment plans in its Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law. Furthermore, Mother asserted that the District Court abused its discretion by denying her a new trial based on new evidence. Upon review, the Supreme Court found substantial evidence in the record to support the District Court’s findings that the conditions rendering Mother and Father unfit were unlikely to change within a reasonable time, and that it was in the best interests of the children to terminate the parental rights. "It [was] manifest on the face of the briefs and the record that there was not an abuse of discretion."

This matter involved two cases, one involving two youths who appeared in youth court for detention hearings and one involving an adult who pled guilty to driving under the influence in justice court. After appearing in district court, the youths filed motions to substitute district court judge, and the court denied the motions as untimely. After the adult pled guilty in justice court, she appealed only the justice court's denial of her pretrial suppression motion, which the district court denied as untimely. The Supreme Court granted a petition for writ of supervisory control for the youths and denied it for the adult, holding (1) the district court improperly determined that the youths had filed untimely motions for substitution of district judge; and (2) the district court correctly denied the adult's motion for substitution of district court judge, as no right exists under Mont. Code Ann. 3-1-804 to substitute a district judge in an appeal of a specific pre-trial legal ruling from justice court.

Appellant James Davis appealed from his conviction of one count of criminal distribution of dangerous drugs by accountability, claiming that the State presented insufficient evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he provided assistance in the drug deal that preceded his charge. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that a rational trier of fact, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, could not have found that Davis purposely promoted or facilitated the sale of drugs, and therefore, the district court erred when it denied Davis' motion to dismiss the charge of criminal distribution of dangerous drugs by accountability on the basis of insufficient evidence.

Appellant Michael Miller was convicted of the deliberate homicide after a jury trial. The Supreme Court affirmed his conviction. Miller subsequently filed a petition for postconviction relief, alleging his trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance and that his appellate counsel's failure to raise his trial counsel's ineffectiveness on direct appeal constituted ineffective assistance. The district court dismissed Miller's petition for failure to state a claim, reasoning that Miller had exhausted his remedy of appeal and that his ineffectiveness claims were record-based assertions which he did or reasonably could have raised on appeal. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that Miller's claims against his trial counsel were without merit, and thus, he could not state a claim of ineffectiveness against his appellate counsel for failing to raise ineffectiveness claims against his trial counsel in his direct appeal.

The State charged Anthony Leyva with sexual intercourse without consent. Pursuant to a plea agreement, the State dismissed the charge and filed an amended information charging Leyva with burglary by remaining unlawfully in the victim's home with the purpose to commit a sexual assault therein. Defendant was subsequently convicted of burglary following his plea of guilty. The district court sentenced him to twenty years in prison, fifteen years of which the court suspended on numerous conditions. Leyva appealed the conditions of his suspended sentence. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part, holding that the district court erred in imposing a condition designating Leyva as a Level II sexual offender, as, pursuant to controlling precedent, a district court cannot attach a sexual offender designation to a burglary conviction. Remanded for correction of the sentence.