Rick Horowitz Criminal Defense Blog

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Rick Horowitz

Latest from Rick Horowitz Criminal Defense Blog

I write not about the legal concept known as the “fruit of the poisonous tree” which has to do with suppression motions. This ancient doctrine makes certain evidence, because illegally obtained, inadmissible in court, but does not apply often anymore. Prolegomena to the Establishment of Violent, Racist Police Forces Our courts long ago gave up on the idea that any search that benefited the police and prosecution could be illegal. We now have both the…
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The coronavirus quarantine has been rough. I hear it’s been rough on a lot of people, but I’m not going to lie: it’s been rough on me. Among other things, I finally determined that the steady drumbeat of horrific, and frequently idiotic, Facebook posts required me to deactivate my account a few weeks ago. Yeah, required. Twitter may be next. But a couple days ago, I awoke to the possibility of hope regarding legalized racism,…
“Death to the Constitution!” “Long Live the Constitution!” Seems like these days, we can’t make up our minds. The same person on different occasions, depending on the circumstances in which they find themselves, will make both those statements. They want free speech. Then they don’t. They want police to back off on protesters. Then they don’t. They think we should let everyone live free. But then they don’t. The only things that seem clear are…
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My favorite hobbies involve creating things. I bake sourdough breads, and have been creating my own recipes since long before coronavirus hit. I build things out of wood. That’s a more recent hobby, and one of the first things I ever built is what I call the “Proofer Beyond a Reasonable Doubt,” which (obviously) I built because of my breadmaking hobby, and named it what I did because of my work here. But by far…
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The California State Bar results are out. As is too often the case, the results were not pretty. And so we have a chance again to visit the question of whether we want lower quality lawyers, or better quality schools, or maybe just eliminate the licensing requirements. As you read through this post, by the way, keep in mind that even when the State Bar accidentally released information on what they were going to test,…
There is a sickness worse than coronavirus in our land. I must write about it, even though I don’t feel fully qualified to speak on all aspects of it. I just hope I say something useful. Backlash of Bigotry A man—Ahmaud Arbery—goes jogging in Georgia. A former high school football player, Arbery liked to stay in shape. People often saw him jogging in the area. But there’s a sad detail you may have already guessed:…
The judges, and particularly the presiding judge, of the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of Fresno, are showing a reckless disregard for human life. Our judges have decided to cram people together, potentially for hours, into a few small courtrooms. They show a reckless disregard for how many jurors die because of these poor decisions. They show a reckless disregard for how many attorneys die because of these poor decisions.…
Now arrives Apocalyptic Justice. I’ve done a lot of thinking about this the last few days. I’m sure a lot of people have. Some of those people are probably smarter than me. A lot of them are not. In any event, I’m going to talk mostly about what is happening with the courts and jails today. I’m not planning to dip too deeply into the Coronavirus Catastrophe, which I wrote about the other day. Also,…
This morning has been a dose of “what happens when science is not taught in our schools,” as my morning reading careened from probable-cause-creating dogs to various stories about the coronavirus catastrophe, culminating in a discussion with a colleague about our recent mumps mania at the jail, and the need for Senate Bill 938. Mumps Mania Hits the Fresno County Jail Around about the beginning of February, I wrote a post about the mumps outbreak…
The latest political kerfuffle concerning the courts—de rigueur for the Literally Shaking Crowd to amplify—is Senator Schumer’s alleged threats towards two associate “justices” of the United States Supreme Court. For some time now, I’ve been pondering what I think of as the balls, strikes, and bullshit comments from the Chief, John Roberts. For those who don’t know, John Roberts somewhat famously—and disingenuously—said in his opening statement to the Senate during his nomination hearing that I…