Nose for crime or just bad scents? Drug dogs and the search-or-sniff dichotomy

Last year, one of our readers sent me an article about one of two pending appeals in the Supreme Court of the United States about the use of drug-dogs and the admissibility of searches and seizures based on drug-dog indications.The two appeals are Florida v Jardines and Florida v Harris. An overview of the cases …

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Dupas v The Queen [2012] VSCA 328: trial judges do not have to assume the evidence presented to them is correct when assessing its probative value

In Dupas v The Queen [2012] VSCA 328 the Victorian Court of Appeal, sitting as a bank of five judges, declined to follow the precedent of R v Shamouil (2006) 66 NSWLR 228, a decision of the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal. In Shamouil, a mid-trial Crown appeal on the exclusion of key prosecution evidence, …

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Changes to the County Court Criminal Procedure Practice Note

These changes come in on Monday 21st January.The amended note (36 pages) can be found here. Even more helpfully, a Notice to Practitioners (kind of an EM for practice notes) has been made available here. Most changes are minor procedural tweaks. Perhaps the most significant change is the Criminal Registry's express prohibition on filings by …

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Putting in an appearance

The Magistrates' Court Criminal Procedure (Amendment No. 3) Rules 2012 took effect last Tuesday, 1st January 2013.The amendments specify that it's acceptable for an accused person who is not on bail to receive an adjournment at first mention without the necessity for an appearance at court, provided they:a) apply for the adjournment as soon as …

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