Admissible Admissibility

Question: Florida Law-admissibility of taped phone conversations? I understand that according to FL statute 934.03; two party consent is generally required for a recorded conversation to be admissible. I also understand that according to statute 934.03 (2)(a)3C; it is lawful for a law enforcement officer (or someone acting under the direction of law enforcement) to record a call that evidenced a crime. However, I would like to know if a similar recording would be admissible if the subject of the recording had no knowledge of the recording and was represented by counsel. Counsel was NOT present during the recording of the conversation; isn't any information gathered inadmissible if questioning happened without legal counsel present?

Answer: Hi, Well you asked a couple of questions. Your first being about admissibility. Generally, anything that is relevant and would tend to prove a fact of consequence is admissible. Depending on the circumstances, your lawyer may be able to file a motion in limine to have the evidence excluded. As for your hypo, it depends on the circumstances. Were you previously placed under arrest for the crime? Where you arraigned? If you were arragined, then your 6th Amendment rights attached and secretly taping you or having someone tape you in a coercive manner would violate your rights if it was for the purpose of obtaining a confession. However, if you hadn't been arrested, anything you say voluntarily comes in, you have no expectation of privacy in conversations you have with other people, even if you tell them in confidence. Hope that helps

Question: Admissibility of prior acts? ? I saw a recent episode of Law & Order (episode name was Encore). In it a man's first wife died under suspicious circumstances. Later his second wife died and he was arrested for her murder. In champers Jack McCoy was arguing that the details of his first wife's death were admissible under malno(sp?). I can't find any information on this, probably because I'm spelling it wrong. Can anyone help me?

Answer: Without knowing the new york laws, let me explain it using the Federal Rules of Evidence. Prior bad acts are almost never admissible. HOWEVER, they can be used if they show a pattern of behavior, AND they go to plan, motive, opportunity or intent. Thus, the fact that I ran a stop light would not be admissible to show that, this time, I ran a stop light. However, if I ran 10 stoplights in the last year, and always when I am late to work; and they can show I was late to work when I ran the stop light, then perhaps the evidence would show that, when I am late to work, I run stop lights. The rule is there because, in general, the mere fact that you have done bad things before make it no more or less probable that you committed the actual crime you are charged with this time. But, the jury will likely use the evidnece against you, thinking you are a bad person. Thus, the fact that I commit a rape, makes it no more or less probable that I committed the murder with which I am being charged. On the other hand, the fact that I committed 10 previous murders might be admissible, to show that I was the person who committed the murder, because, since I committed 10 other murders using the same kind of weapon, under the same circumstances, this murder fits a pattern of behavior making it likely that this is one of my crimes (part of a crime). Hope this helps.

Question: can anyone grammar check this please!? The best evidence rule Is a common law rule of evidence which can be traced back at least as far as the 18th century? The general rule is that secondary evidence, such as a copy or facsimile, will be not and admissible if an original document is available. The rationale for the best evidence rule can be understood from the context in which it arose: in the eighteenth century a copy was usually made by hand by a clerk (or even a litigant). The best evidence rule was predicted on the assumption that, if the original was not produced, there was a significant chance of error or fraud in relying on such a copy. In the age of digital facsimiles, etc. the rule is more difficult to justify. The likelihood of actual error (as opposed to more illegibility) through copying is slight. The balance of convenience favors avoiding needless effort and delays where there is no dispute about the fairness and adequacy of a digital facsimile. Further, it is by no means clear what the ‘original’ of an electronic communication such as an email actually is: as many as eight electronic ‘copies’ of a message might come into existence from creation to receipt. The best evidence rule is also thought to be the basis for the rule precluding the admissibility of hearsay evidence, although the two rules are now quite distinct.

Answer: all good

Question: amnesty for illegal immigrants is already in the house? the bill is ready in the house, if the approved it 12 millons of illegals will become permanent residents, what do you think about it?? http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c1… H.R.264 Save America Comprehensive Immigration Act of 2009 (Introduced in House) TITLE V--LEGALIZATION FOR LONG-TERM RESIDENTS SEC. 501. EARNED ACCESS TO LEGALIZATION. (a) In General- Chapter 5 of title II (8 U.S.C. 1255 et seq.) is amended by inserting after section 245A the following: `ADJUSTMENT OF STATUS ON THE BASIS OF EARNED ACCESS TO LEGALIZATION `Sec. 245B. (a) In General- The Secretary of Homeland Security may adjust the status of an alien to that of an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence if the alien-- `(1) was physically present in the United States for a continuous period of not less than 5 years immediately preceding the date on which this provision was enacted and has maintained continuous physical presence since then; `(2) has at all times been a person of good moral character; `(3) has never been convicted of a criminal offense in the United States; `(4) in the case of an alien who is 18 years of age or older, but who is not over the age of 65, has successfully completed a course on reading, writing, and speaking words in ordinary usage in the English language, unless unable to do so on account of physical or developmental disability or mental impairment; `(5) in the case of an alien 18 years of age or older, has accepted the values and cultural life of the United States; and `(6) in the case of an alien 18 years of age or older, has performed at least 40 hours of community service. `(b) Treatment of Brief, Casual, and Innocent Absences- An alien shall not be considered to have failed to maintain a continuous presence in the United States for purposes of subsection (a)(1) by virtue of brief, casual, and innocent absences from the United States. `(c) Admissible as Immigrant- `(1) IN GENERAL- The alien shall establish that the alien is admissible to the United States as immigrant, except as otherwise provided in paragraph (2). `(2) EXCEPTIONS- The provisions of paragraphs (5), (6)(A), (6)(B), (6)(C), (6)(F), (6)(G), (7)(A), (9)(B), and (9)(C)(i)(I) of section 212(a) shall not apply in the determination of an alien's admissibility under this section. `(d) Security and Law Enforcement Clearances- The alien, if over 15 years of age, shall submit fingerprints in accordance with procedures established by the Secretary of Homeland Security. Such fingerprints shall be submitted to relevant Federal agencies to be checked against existing databases for information relating to criminal, national security, or other law enforcement actions that would render the alien ineligible for adjustment of status under this section. The Secretary of Homeland Security shall provide a process for challenging the accuracy of matches that result in a finding of ineligibility for adjustment of status. `(e) Inapplicability of Numerical Limitations- When an alien is granted lawful permanent resident status under this subsection, the number of immigrant visas authorized to be issued under any provision of this Act shall not be reduced. The numerical limitations of sections 201 and 202 shall not apply to adjustment of status under this section. `(f) Termination of Proceedings- The Secretary of Homeland Security may terminate removal proceedings without prejudice pending the outcome of an alien's application for adjustment of status under this section on the basis of a prima facie showing of eligibility for relief under this section.'. (b) Clerical Amendment- The table of contents is amended by inserting after the item relating to section 245A the following: `Sec. 245B. Adjustment of status on the basis of earned access to legalization.'. SEC. 502. LEGALIZATION PROVISIONS FOR CHILDREN. (a) In General- Chapter 5 of title II (8 U.S.C. 1255 et seq.), as amended by section 201, is further amended by inserting after section 245B the following: sorry the link is not working, try this: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?…

Answer: I think that the amnesty should be given to those who are really working and to those that are behaving good.

Question: Isn't this the real danger of bring the Gitmo prisoners into the United States? THE TERRORISTS' BEST US HOPE By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN Published in the New York Post on May 23, 2009 President Obama is attacking a red herring when he defends his decision to send the worst terrorists at Guantanamo to United States prisons by saying the likelihood of escape from secure federal facilities is very low. Of course it is. No rope ladder or prison laundry truck is likely to do the trick. But when it comes to federal judges, we can't be so sure. The reason we sent the terrorists to Guantanamo in the first place, rather than bring them onto US soil, was never really connected to worries that they might escape. The Bush administration feared, quite correctly, that if the inmates were in federal prisons on US territory, federal judges would take their pleas for constitutional rights more seriously. That argument is still true, and bringing the terrorists to the United States puts us at risk that they could be freed by court order. Some detainees will be tried in US courts on US soil. The first will be tried in New York. This raises two problems: First, if he is acquitted, where will he be released? Likely, he'll just be invited to walk out the door and onto the streets of New York. Second, is there a danger of terrorist retaliation or attempts to interdict the trial with violence? Trying a terrorist in the Big Apple serves to paint a bull's-eye on the courthouse. The recently foiled plan to attack New York City synagogues demonstrates that terrorists have the city in their sights, as they have since the 1993 World Trade Center attack. Could Obama find a worse place to conduct a trial? The very concept of trying terrorists under US law is a slippery slope. We specifically allow our military and intelligence operatives to proceed without the procedural safeguards enumerated in the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth amendments. Why? Because we didn't plan for trials in civilian courts, we didn't take care to see that the evidence was obtained so as to be admissible in civilian courts. If Obama is now to reverse field and try these terrorists, the results might be disastrous. It's unlikely that the prosecutors would be able to use all the evidence against them because it wasn't gathered with an eye to its admissibility in a criminal trial. The best evidence couldn't be used against the 20th hijacker, Zacharias Moussaui, so he did not get a death sentence or even life in prison. If terrorists are acquitted or released by a federal judge's ruling, the odds are good that they will go right back to fighting against us. In our book, "Fleeced," we describe some of the most egregious examples of freed terrorists' returning to their wicked ways. And former Vice President Dick Cheney in his address Thursday said that one in seven of the detainees freed from Guantanamo has rejoined the terrorists. Consider the case of Abdullah Mehsud, who was captured in Afghanistan and, after hiding his identity as second-in-command of a Pakistani Taliban group, was freed after two years at Gitmo. Once free, he kidnapped two Chinese engineers who were working on a hydroelectric dam and killed one of them. Obama's plans will put his kind right in our midst, awaiting either a trial they may win or a federal court ruling that may spring them.

Answer: First of all, most of the people detained at Gitmo weren't Terrorist, they were innocent people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time who were racially profiled for being middle-eastern. Second of all, do you have stats of how many people escape from federal prison? Thought.

Question: HOW WILL THIS EFFECT THE AMERICAN PUBLIC? THE TERRORISTS' BEST US HOPE By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN Published in the New York Post on May 23, 2009 Printer-Friendly Version President Obama is attacking a red herring when he defends his decision to send the worst terrorists at Guantanamo to United States prisons by saying the likelihood of escape from secure federal facilities is very low. Of course it is. No rope ladder or prison laundry truck is likely to do the trick. But when it comes to federal judges, we can't be so sure. The reason we sent the terrorists to Guantanamo in the first place, rather than bring them onto US soil, was never really connected to worries that they might escape. The Bush administration feared, quite correctly, that if the inmates were in federal prisons on US territory, federal judges would take their pleas for constitutional rights more seriously. That argument is still true, and bringing the terrorists to the United States puts us at risk that they could be freed by court order. Some detainees will be tried in US courts on US soil. The first will be tried in New York. This raises two problems: First, if he is acquitted, where will he be released? Likely, he'll just be invited to walk out the door and onto the streets of New York. Second, is there a danger of terrorist retaliation or attempts to interdict the trial with violence? Trying a terrorist in the Big Apple serves to paint a bull's-eye on the courthouse. The recently foiled plan to attack New York City synagogues demonstrates that terrorists have the city in their sights, as they have since the 1993 World Trade Center attack. Could Obama find a worse place to conduct a trial? The very concept of trying terrorists under US law is a slippery slope. We specifically allow our military and intelligence operatives to proceed without the procedural safeguards enumerated in the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth amendments. Why? Because we didn't plan for trials in civilian courts, we didn't take care to see that the evidence was obtained so as to be admissible in civilian courts. If Obama is now to reverse field and try these terrorists, the results might be disastrous. It's unlikely that the prosecutors would be able to use all the evidence against them because it wasn't gathered with an eye to its admissibility in a criminal trial. The best evidence couldn't be used against the 20th hijacker, Zacharias Moussaui, so he did not get a death sentence or even life in prison. If terrorists are acquitted or released by a federal judge's ruling, the odds are good that they will go right back to fighting against us. In our book, "Fleeced," we describe some of the most egregious examples of freed terrorists' returning to their wicked ways. And former Vice President Dick Cheney in his address Thursday said that one in seven of the detainees freed from Guantanamo has rejoined the terrorists. Consider the case of Abdullah Mehsud, who was captured in Afghanistan and, after hiding his identity as second-in-command of a Pakistani Taliban group, was freed after two years at Gitmo. Once free, he kidnapped two Chinese engineers who were working on a hydroelectric dam and killed one of them. Obama's plans will put his kind right in our midst, awaiting either a trial they may win or a federal court ruling that may spring them. Go to DickMorris.com to read all of Dick's columns! ______________________________________… PLEASE FORWARD THIS E-MAIL TO FRIENDS AND FAMILY AND TELL THEM THEY CAN GET THESE COLUMNS E-MAILED TO THEM FOR FREE BY SUBSCRIBING AT WWW.DICKMORRIS.COM! THANK YOU!

Answer: The ones who have been paying attention already realize this, but the sheeple won't be affected... they are blind to any issue with obama, and especially with his judgment, or intent...

Question: What is the summary of the article "Obama set to revive Military Commisions"? The article is below: Obama Set to Revive Military Commissions Changes Would Boost Detainee Rights By Peter Finn Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, May 9, 2009 The Obama administration is preparing to revive the system of military commissions established at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, under new rules that would offer terrorism suspects greater legal protections, government officials said. The rules would block the use of evidence obtained from coercive interrogations, tighten the admissibility of hearsay testimony and allow detainees greater freedom to choose their attorneys, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. The military commissions have allowed the trial of terrorism suspects in a setting that favors the government and protects classified information, but they were sharply criticized during the administration of President George W. Bush. "By any measure, our system of trying detainees has been an enormous failure," then-candidate Barack Obama said in June 2008. In one of its first acts, the Obama administration obtained a 120-day suspension of the military commissions; that will expire May 20. Human rights groups had interpreted the suspension as the death knell for military commissions and expected the transfer of cases to military courts martial or federal courts. Officials said yesterday that the Obama administration will seek a 90-day extension of the suspension as early as next week. It would subsequently restart the commissions on American soil, probably at military bases, according to a lawyer briefed on the plan. "This is an extraordinary development, and it's going to tarnish the image of American justice again," said Tom Parker, a counterterrorism specialist at Amnesty International. A White House official said no final decision has been made, and one source involved in the discussions said the plan awaits Obama's approval. The administration's extension would allow it to meet a requirement to provide Congress with 60 days' notice of any rule changes in the way the commissions function, officials said. Congress established the commissions in 2006 after the Supreme Court struck down a system of military tribunals created by the Bush administration. The Obama administration's plan to reinstate the commissions with modifications reflects the fear that some cases would fail in federal courts or in standard military legal settings. "It looks a lot more difficult now than it did on Jan. 20," said one government official. Civil liberties advocates, who insist that federal courts can handle terrorism cases, vowed to challenge any new process. "We'll litigate this before they can proceed, absolutely," said Anthony D. Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. "Any effort to tinker with military commissions would be an enormous mistake. There is no way to fix a flawed process that has not rendered justice." Under the administration's rule changes, hearsay evidence would be admissible if a judge determines it is reliable, officials said. That provision would allow the government to introduce some intelligence material that would ordinarily be barred in federal court or military courts martial, the officials said. There is precedent for admitting hearsay evidence in international courts, including at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Romero said allowing hearsay in any U.S. courtroom is a "greater travesty than Bush administration justice." It is unclear whether some cases would still go to federal court or perhaps other military proceedings for trial. During the presidential campaign, Obama criticized the commissions as failing to provide "swift and sure justice" for terrorism suspects, including Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, who was captured in March 2003. Since the opening of the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay in January 2002, three detainees out of the 779 who have been held there have been convicted of terrorism offenses. The system has been subject to repeated legal challenges. An administration official said yesterday that Obama, while a senator, had agreed that military courts with sufficient safeguards were an appropriate venue for cases against detainees but thought that the 2006 Military Commissions Act was "sloppy" and rushed for political purposes. The administration's decision to close the Guantanamo Bay prison has been the focus of intensifying criticism from Republicans and some Democrats who say they fear that holding and trying detainees in the United States poses security risks. Expectations that the administration will soon allow a handful of Chinese Muslims who were captured in Afghanistan and who are detained at Guantanamo to live in the United States has caused concern among some legislators and

Answer: Hugs and lollipops for all detainees!