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Maryland Court Upholds Officer’s “Pat Down” Search of Defendant

The Fourth Amendment protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures. Under established case law, an officer who “pats down” or “stops and frisks” a person must be able to justify the intrusion by pointing to “specific and articulable facts” that, when considered together “with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably…

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Maryland Court Upholds Conviction of Robbery and Other Related Charges

Depending on the circumstances, a defendant charged in a criminal action may be able to assert several different defenses, some of which could result in a reduction of the severity of the charges or an acquittal. In a recent case, the defendant was convicted of robbery with a deadly weapon…

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Maryland Court Denied Defendant’s Motion to Suppress Evidence

There is no question that criminal arrests vary from case to case. But every defendant is entitled to certain protections under the law. And in many cases, the defendant (the person arrested or charged with a crime) may be entitled to raise any number of applicable defenses. Such defenses may…

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Refusal to Suppress DNA Evidence Does Not Violate Constitution or Maryland State Law

The collection, retention, and use of DNA evidence in a criminal matter can raise various privacy concerns. In a recent Maryland case, a homeless man, George Varriale, voluntarily provided his own DNA samples to the local county police department in order to clear himself as a suspect in an alleged rape…

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What is a “Dying Declaration” in Maryland?

A recent appellate case considered the “dying declaration” exception to the rule against hearsay evidence, among other things. The defendant was indicted for first-degree murder, armed robbery, conspiracy, and possession of a firearm by a person not permitted to have one. Before the trial, he moved to suppress the victim’s…

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Late Discovery of Impeachment Evidence in Maryland

What happens when a criminal defendant learns that an expert who testified against him does not have the credentials he claimed to have at trial? In an interesting recent case a defendant discovered that a ballistics expert had embellished his credentials after his conviction for first-degree murder, first-degree sexual offense and…

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