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How Virginia Drug Arrests May Be Challenged

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgzj1oICymA

Richmond, Virginia federal and state criminal defense attorney Tony Stelly, explains how it is possible to successfully challenge an arrest for drug possession, including marijauna.

Experienced defense attorneys know that the first step in a client's defense of a criminal charge will be to ascertain the validity of arrest, as well as the validity of the search of the client, or his car or truck or home. Many convictions are avoided where the defense lawyer has "done his homework" before trial and has successfully challenged because there was no probable cause to justify the law enforcement officer's actions. 

In particular, where an arrest or search is based on information obtained from a police informant, there are circumstances where the arrest or warrant is subject to attack because insufficent information was available to establish the probable cause that is ALWAYS required before the arrest is made or the search warrant issued.  

Facebook images catch New Zealand burglar

By RAY LILLEY

Associated Press Writer

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Police in New Zealand nabbed a burglar after posting security camera footage of him trying to crack a bar's safe on the Internet networking site Facebook.

Police said it was New Zealand's first such Facebook arrest and said they would use the site again to fight crime, as law enforcement officials and lawyers increasingly turn to online networks for purposes other than their original ones to provide social interaction.

"Facebook was very, very handy, and it's a good little tool," Senior Sgt. John Fookes of Queenstown police told The Associated Press on Thursday.

The burglar, wearing a face-covering balaclava and carrying a bag of tools, broke into a tiny storage room inside the Franklin Tavern in the tourist town of Queenstown early Monday and tried to cut into a safe containing $12,000 (NZ20,000) in takings from gambling machines.

After nearly an hour in the cramped space, the burglar removed his balaclava and gloves and looked around — red-faced from fruitless toil. As he left, the video shows the man suddenly spotting the lens of the security camera that was recording his every move.

"He looks around and sees it and there's just a shocked look of 'gutted,' said tavern assistant manager Mel Kelly. "His face definitely drops."

Officers posted the footage on the Queenstown police Facebook page and identification was "very, very quick; overnight, we had a number of responses" from the public, Fookes said. "If we've got something that the public can help us with then we'll certainly be putting it on Facebook."

The man was charged with two counts of burglary and was due to appear in court on Jan. 26.

A court in Australia last month approved a mortgage lender's application to use Facebook to serve legal documents on a couple who had defaulted on their payments. The previous month, a restaurateur in the Australian city of Melbourne reportedly used Facebook to track down a group who racked up a large bill then fled without paying.

Officer’s Threat to Have Drug-Sniffing Dog Called to Scene of Traffic Stop Voids Drug Possession Conviction

On August 5th, the Virginia Court of Appeals rejected the claims of the Commonwealth that police officers had not “seized” the defendant when they told him they were going to get a drug-sniffing dog to “go over his car” unless he gave permission for them to search it. In Middlebrook v. Commonwealth, the issue before the court was whether that statement to Middlebrook, which prompted his admission he had marijuana in the car, arose from a consensual encounter or not. The trial court found that the encounter was consensual, and that the admission was voluntary.

The Court of Appeals disagreed and threw out Middlebrook’s conviction because the officers lacked any legal basis to detain him, other than their unformulated suspicion’s that he might be selling drugs. And, the court held, after the officer told him that he was going to call the dog to the scene, “no reasonable person would have felt free to leave.”