Registration is now open to federal defender staff and CJA Panel attorneys for the FY 2013 Multi-Track Federal Criminal Defense Seminar being held August 8-10, 2013 in Buffalo, NY. As with all of our training programs, there is no registration fee. The program will begin Thursday morning, August 8th and end by mid-afternoon on Saturday, August 10th. A limited amount of financial assistance is available to qualifying CJA panel attorneys to cover a portion of travel costs.
The Multi-Track Seminar offers in-depth instruction in a variety of areas of federal criminal practice. This year the tracks will be:
Forensics, including, among other topics, an Overview of the Law Since the NAS Report; DNA for Dummies; Ballistics; Toolmark Evidence; Arson; Reading the Medical Examiner's Report; Eyewitness Identification; and Hair and Fiber Evidence.
Mental Health and Mitigation, which will cover identifying, developing, and understanding mental health and mitigation, including relevant changes in "to-be published" DSM-5 that practitioners may encounter in their practice, and with an emphasis on the importance of mental health symptoms and history, all of which are critical to the effective representation of clients throughout a case.
Digital Age Litigation - What Do All the Advances Mean? - which will focus on the digital aspects of federal criminal litigation, including GPS, pinging, Fouth Amendment issues, and electronically stored information.
Fundamentals of a Federal Criminal Case, which is designed as an overview for new (and not so new) federal CJA practitioners; this program addresses topics that are essential to defending clients in federal criminal cases, including the basics of working up a federal criminal case, release issues, sentencing guidelines, and beyond.
A flyer about the program is attached. For questions about the substance of the seminar, please contact Frank Draper at Frank_Draper@ao.courts.gov; for questions about logistics, please contact Jenna Shepard at Jenna_Shepard@ao.uscourts.gov.
Karen Holsendorff
Meeting Manager
On June 12, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (CCA) held that former death row inmate Jerry Hartfield has been held in prison for 33 years despite having no valid conviction. The court concluded: "The status of the judgment of conviction is that Petitioner is under no conviction or sentence." Hartfield, an illiterate man with an IQ of 51, had his capital conviction overturned by the same court in 1980 because his trial jury was improperly selected. The court ordered a new trial for Hartfield, but that trial was never held. In 1983, then-Governor Mark White attempted to commute Hartfield's death sentence to life, but the CCA's recent ruling said the commutation was invalid because Hartfield had no conviction and hence, no sentence. He has remained in prison--not convicted of any crime--the entire time. The CCA's ruling was prompted by a request from the 
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