In this civil forfeiture proceeding, the government’s failure to file its forfeiture petition within the 90-day time limit of 18 U.S.C. § 983(a)(3) was not jurisdictional, and the 4th Circuit says because a drug defendant did not invoke this statute ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

The 4th Circuit denies post-conviction relief for a defendant’s 240-month sentence for conspiracy to distribute cocaine, enhanced due to defendant’s prior North Carolina drug conviction; the rule defendant advances from a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court case is not retroactively applicable ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

A criminal defendant’s right to be advised that he could face deportation after a guilty plea is not a “watershed rule” that applies retroactively on collateral review, the 4th Circuit says. The issue here is whether the right recognized in ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

An engineer who mailed a client county a valid permit cut off an old set of plans and attached to a new plan for a county airport runway extension committed mail and wire fraud, and the 4th Circuit rejects his ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

A high-school student and her parents lose their First Amendment Establishment Clause challenge to a Spartanburg County public school system’s policy of allowing public school students two academic credits for off-campus religious instruction offered by private instructors; the 4th Circuit ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Civil Rights Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

A Maryland limited-services pregnancy services center wins an injunction against enforcement of a local ordinance that would require it to post a sign saying it did not have a “licensed medical professional on staff”; the 4th Circuit reverses the district ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Civil Rights Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

The 4th Circuit upholds summary judgment for a Baltimore “Pregnancy Center” on its challenge to a local ordinance the Center said violated its free speech rights by compelling it to post signs saying the Center did not provide or make ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Civil Rights Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

A defendant convicted of receipt of movies depicting female minors in sexual acts cannot overturn his 15-year mandatory minimum sentence under 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(b)(1) with a claim that the trial court misinterpreted his earlier conviction for possession of obscene ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

Appellant, a Virginia nonprofit group called “The Real Truth About Abortion Inc.,” loses its constitutional challenge to a regulation of the Federal Election Commission that appellant says is unconstitutionally vague with regard to whether “Real Truth” has to make disclosures ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Civil Rights Judge Paul V. Niemeyer

A defendant convicted of distribution of crack cocaine for sale of drugs to a confidential informant also can be convicted of conspiracy to traffic crack cocaine, based on his interactions with the confidential informant before he started working as a ...

Tagged with: 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Criminal Judge Paul V. Niemeyer