Charlotte Criminal Lawyer Blog
Attorney J. Bradley Smith answering the question: “A past conviction is keeping me from finding work what can I do?”
A recent and worrisome trend among some police departments should have criminals deleting their Facebook and Instagram accounts. News out of New York indicates that officers in the NYPD are searching for suspects’ photos on Instagram and Facebook then running them through the departments’ sophisticated new facial recognition system.
Experts say that detectives have begun cracking cases thanks to the technology that links mug shots with pictures pulled off of various social networking websites. Beyond just social networking sites, the facial recognition unit also combs pictures collected from a vast network of surveillance cameras.
In one recent case, a woman complained about having jewelry stolen by the friend of a friend. She had no idea what the man’s name was, but knew she had seen his picture on Facebook. Police then clicked through the social network until they located the picture of the suspect which they then ran through the facial recognition software, coming up with a mug shot, name and eventually an address.
Police say the new futuristic technology has helped them solve dozens of cases. Now even cases with sketchy information, perhaps even just a nickname, is all they need to snoop around on social media and locate a picture which they can then scan and hopefully find a name.
One good example of how the facial recognition software is being used to solve crimes involves the case of several cab drivers who were held up at gunpoint and robbed in the Bronx. Police said the suspect would call for a ride and then jump in the back seat of the cab and flash a weapon, getting away with large amounts of money. A security camera snapshot from one of the cabs showed the suspect’s face, which was then scanned through the facial recognition software. A match was found in less than an hour, linking the image from the cab to an old mug shot.
The Stand Your Ground law in Florida became a critical component of the recent trial of George Zimmerman who shot and killed Trayvon Martin in February of 2012. Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder in the death of the teen, but argued that he acted in self-defense and should be exempt from prosecution under the state’s Stand Your Ground law. Since his acquittal, many have wondered whether similar arguments could be made if the incident had happened in North Carolina rather than Florida. Though the two states’ laws are not identical, they are very close and the result may have turned out much the same.
The state Supreme Court issued a ruling on the matter this week and found that such lab tests can stand on their own if cited by an expert witness offering an independent opinion. Other have argued that this conclusion is incorrect and that a lab test should face the same amount of scrutiny that a person would face and that means the analyst who conducted the test should be required to testify at trial.
Federal prosecutors say the leader of the fake prescription ring, Joshua Balkind, is already in prison serving a 20-year term. The other two participants were sentenced to 70 months in prison this Wednesday. Officials say the scheme worked by having Balkind make fake prescriptions using software on his home computer. He would then give the fake oxycodone prescriptions to drug addicts like Rhodes and DeYoung and essentially split the take, giving the addicts several pills and taking the rest to sell on the streets at a steep markup.
The case, Peugh v. United States, concerned a man who committed bank fraud back in the late 1990s. It took a long time for his case to be tried and for a sentence to be handed down, more than 11 years in fact. By 2010, a new round of sentencing guidelines had been issued which contained a suggested sentencing range of between 70 and 87 months for Peugh’s crime. The issue was that at the time the crimes were perpetrated, the sentencing range was dramatically more lenient, only 30 to 37 months. The judge who heard the case ultimately chose a 70-month sentence, something that many believed was clearly influenced by the new guidelines.
The arrests were the result of a four-year undercover investigation into illegal hunting practices known as Operation Something Bruin. Officers with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission and the U.S. Forest Service worked together using social media to infiltrate poaching circles and record legal violations. The investigators created fake social media profiles and found out about illegal organized hunts on federal land.
The case involves a horrible 1992 Texas double murder case where the suspect voluntarily answered police questions for nearly an hour. However, as the police asked more incriminating questions about shotgun shells found at the scene, the suspect stopped talking. Prosecutors later used Salinas’ silence against him and portrayed it as evidence of his guilt. The strategy worked like a charm for prosecutors and Salinas was found guilty.
Surprisingly, Bynner is the third person to be charged with crimes against nature in North Carolina since March. Just last month, a 21-year-old man from Wake County was arrested and charged with four felony counts of crimes against nature. The man, Seadon Collins Henrich was a volunteer at the Wake County animal shelter and was also charged with three felony counts of disseminating obscenity. Police say Henrich abused several dogs in his care and then took photographs of the incidents.