| D. Minnesota |
|
Reminder: These case digests are provided for informational purposes only, and do not constitute legal advice. Anyone conducting legal research on a particular topic or in a specific jurisdiction is advised to supplement these materials with their own efforts or those of a qualified attorney whom they have hired for that purpose.2010U.S. v. Andrist, Criminal No. 10-205(1) (DWF/AJB) (D. Minn. 10-26-2010) — Defendant moved to suppress search warrants issued for his computers and storage devices, arguing that there was no probable cause to support the warrants. The Court noted that the warrants were issued following a call from a computer repair shop to police reporting the presence of child pornography on Defendant's computer. Based on a totality of the circumstances, the Court said, there was probable cause for the issuance of the warrants.U.S. v. Petters, Civil No. 08-5348 ADM/JSM (D. Minn. 9-15-2010) — During the provision of forensic accounting services for a company in receivership, PricewaterhouseCoopers charged $400 per hour for computer forensics work. A challenge to the hourly rate was filed by the company in receivership. However, the Court found that the rate was reasonable "in light of the complexity and magnitude of this Ponzi scheme." U.S. v. Luoma, 07-CR-254 (JMR/JSM), 10-CV-1354 (JMR) (D. Minn. 8-25-2010) -- Petitioner filed motion to set aside his sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. In January 2008, petitioner pled guilty to possession of child pornography and was sentenced to 46 months in prison and lifetime of supervised release. In his 2255 motion, petitioner argues among other things that his attorney provided ineffective assistance of counsel by failing to investigate relevant information. Specifically, petitioner claimed that his attorney failed to investigate whether he had reported child pornography to authorities at Yahoo!, and that his attorney did not give him a chance to testify about errors in the examination of his hard drive. The District Court found that there was no evidence that petitioner was prejudiced in either instance, nor that it would have made a difference in his trial. More importantly, petitioner waived all non-jurisdictional defects by effectively pleading guilty. The motion was denied. Teichberg v. Smith, Civil No. 09-456 (D. Minn. 8-17-2010) -- Plaintiff was detained on suspicion of trespassing shortly before start of Republican National Committee convention in Minneapolis. After questioning and a warrant check, plaintiff was allowed to leave, but police retained his backpack, which contained cameras and a computer. After an application for a search warrant was denied, plaintiff's possessions were returned to him, roughly 14 hours after they were seized. Plaintiff filed a civil suit against the officers for violation of various constitutional rights and state law claims, and the officers moved for summary judgment. After reviewing the facts and discussing applicable law, the District Court concluded that the initial stop, the inspection of the back, and the retention of plaintiff's possessions were all reasonable under the circumstances and no legal violations occurred. The motion for summary judgment was granted. Stepnes v. Ritschel, Civil No. 08-5296 ADM/JJK (D. Minn. 6-1-2010) — Two hard drives belonging to plaintiff were reviewed by the Minneapolis Police Department and a forensic report was generated. The report was stored on a compact disc and contained various documents, folders, and subfolders. Counsel for one defendant provided a copy of the forensic report to counsel for various co-defendants, despite an order from a state court judge barring such distribution because of the possible presence of material protected by attorney-client privilege. Co-counsel subsequently spent approximately six hours examining the forensic report. When the mistake was discovered, plaintiff moved to disqualify defense co-counsel from representing her clients. The Court denied the motion, finding that co-counsel had not intentionally disregarded the state court order and had taken reasonable steps to avoid viewing allegedly privileged material. No advantage was conferred on defendants' by their access to the forensic report. |
Please Donate
If you find the resources on this site interesting, or if they have saved you and your client time and money, please support CFD with a donation.
