Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Appellant was twice convicted in municipal courts of riding a motorcycle without wearing proper headgear. Appellant appealed, seeking a trial de novo. The prosecution subsequently dismissed the charges with prejudice. The district court issued remittiturs, returning the cases to the municipal courts. Thereafter, Appellant filed a motion for his attorney fees and court costs, arguing that Nevada's helmet law is unconstitutionally indeterminate and that his ticketing and prosecution were without probable cause and malicious, entitling him to recover attorney fees as "costs of the action" under Nev. Rev. Stat. 176.115. The district court denied the motion. The Supreme Court dismissed Appellant's appeals, holding that it lacked jurisdiction to hear Appellant's cases where, because they originated in the municipal courts and were heard on appeal by the district court, the district court's appellate jurisdiction was final. View "Stilwell v. City of N. Las Vegas" on Justia Law

Appellant was charged with trafficking, possession for sale, and possession of controlled substances. Appellant filed a motion to suppress the evidence, arguing that the warrantless search of his car that uncovered illegal drugs was prohibited by the Fourth Amendment. The search was conducted after a highway patrol officer saw Appellant run a red light and followed him into a parking lot to issue him a ticket. While the ticket was being processed, a drug detection dog was summoned, and the dog alerted for the presence of drugs in Appellant's car. The district court concluded that for a warrantless automobile search to pass muster under Nevada law, both probable cause and exigency beyond the exigency inherent in a car's ready mobility must be shown. Because the State did not prove exigent circumstances beyond the car's mobility, the district court suppressed the evidence. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) exigency is not a separate requirement of the automobile exception to the constitutional warrant requirement; and (2) the drug detection dog's alert provided probable cause to search Appellant's car. Remanded. View "State v. Lloyd" on Justia Law

Appellant filed a request with the Administrative office of the Courts (AOC) pursuant to Nevada's Public Records Act (Act) seeking access to certain records related to Nevada's Foreclosure Mediation Program. The AOC agreed to provide some of the documents in redacted or statistical form but refused to disclose other information as either privileged or confidential. Appellant subsequently filed a petition for a writ of mandamus to compel the AOC to produce all of the requested documents in their original form. The district court denied the petition, concluding (1) the AOC was a judicial entity and thus not subject to the Act; and (2) the requested documents were otherwise confidential as a matter of law. The Supreme Court affirmed without deciding whether the Act applied to the AOC, as the records in question were confidential as a matter of law. View "Civil Rights for Seniors v. Admin. Office of Courts" on Justia Law

Appellant was convicted of attempted burglary. The following year, Appellant was honorably discharged from probation. More than a decade later, Appellant filed a petition for a writ of coram nobis seeking relief from the judgment of conviction because his trial counsel did not inform him of the immigration consequences of his plea. The State argued that the writ of coram nobis was abolished by statute. The district court construed Appellant's petition to be a post-conviction petition for a writ of habeas corpus and denied relief. At issue on appeal was whether the writ of coram nobis exists in Nevada. The Supreme Court affirmed the district court's decision to deny the petition, holding (1) the common-law writ of coram nobis is available in Nevada only for petitioners who are no longer in custody on the judgment being challenged and may be granted only to address errors of fact outside the record that were not known to the court entering the judgment, could not have been raised earlier, and affect the validity and regularity of the decision itself in that they would have precluded the judgment from being rendered; and (2) the ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim raised by Appellant was not within that limited scope. View " Trujillo v. State" on Justia Law

Because Petitioner tested positive for drugs prior to a hearing in the juvenile drug court, the judge held Petitioner in contempt of court. Petitioner moved to stay the contempt order, contending that she could not be held in direct contempt because she did not not cause any disturbance in the presence of the court or violate any court order. The juvenile court refused to change its contempt ruling. One month after Petitioner filed a petition for a writ of mandamus with the Supreme Court, the juvenile court vacated its order finding Petitioner in direct contempt. The Supreme Court denied Petitioner's petition as moot, holding that because the district court vacated its contempt order, the proceeding was moot, and no exception to the mootness doctrine applied. View "Paley v. Second Judicial Dist. Court" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of first-degree murder and robbery. The Supreme Court affirmed Defendant's convictions, holding (1) the district court did not err in admitting inflammatory lyrics to a rap song Defendant wrote in jail awaiting extradition to Nevada; (2) the district court did not plainly err in admitting a coconspirator's out-of-court statement that Defendant "went off" and "just started shooting"; (3) the district court did not err in failing to suppress a statement Defendant made to Nevada detectives during a non-custodial interrogation; and (4) Defendant's remaining assignments of error also failed. View " Holmes v. State" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of burglary while in the possession of a deadly weapon and related counts. The Supreme Court identified certain errors in Defendant's sentence on direct appeal and remanded for a new sentencing hearing. After Defendant was resentenced, he filed five successive post-conviction petitions for a writ of habeas corpus. The district court granted Defendant's untimely and successive fifth petition, concluding that he received ineffective assistance of counsel at his resentencing hearing and ordering a new sentencing hearing. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the district court erred in determining that Defendant established good cause sufficient to excuse the procedural bars to a consideration of his habeas petition on the merits. Remanded. View " State v. Greene" on Justia Law

Logan D. was adjudicated delinquent for lewdness with a minor for an offense that occurred when Logan was seventeen years old. The law at the time of Logan's adjudication provided the juvenile court with discretion to require Logan to submit to adult registration and community notification if it determined that Logan was not rehabilitated. The Legislature subsequently passed a bill mandating that all juveniles ages fourteen an older adjudicated for certain sex offenses register as adult sex offenders and be subject to community notification. Logan and twenty other juveniles filed motions asking the juvenile court to find the bill unconstitutional as applied to juvenile sex offenders. The juvenile court declared the bill unconstitutional as applied to juvenile sex offenders. The State filed a petition for a writ of prohibition or mandamus. The Supreme Court granted the petition, holding that the retroactive application of mandatory sex offender registration and community notification requirements on juveniles adjudicated for certain sex offenses did not violate the due process and ex post facto clauses of the United States and Nevada Constitutions. View "State v. Eighth Judicial Dist. Court" on Justia Law

Defendant in this case was in custody awaiting trial on a charge of murder with the use of a deadly weapon. Defendant successfully litigated a motion to suppress his incriminating statement to police based on his assertion that his statement was obtained through the use of extrinsic falsehoods. The State appealed the denial of the motion to suppress. The district court subsequently set a trial date and denied the State's request to stay the trial pending resolution of its appeal. The State subsequently renewed its motion with the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court granted the State's request for a stay, holding (1) four factors govern the Court's exercise of discretion in ruling on a stay motion of a criminal proceeding pending resolution of an interlocutory suppression appeal; and (2) the factors weighed in favor of granting the state's motion in this case and staying the trial pending resolution of the State's appeal. View " State v. Robles-Nieves" on Justia Law

Defendant was charged with attempted sexual assault of a child under fourteen and related charges. Defendant faced strong evidence, including his own admissions, that he had sexual contact with his daughter. During trial, defense counsel made a strategic decision to concede there had been some sexual contact between Defendant and his daughter. The jury found Defendant guilty of all the charges. Defendant appealed, asserting that the district court's canvass concerning his counsel's concession strategy was inadequate, and therefore, his consent was involuntary and unknowing. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) although the district court's inquiry did not fully comply with Hernandez v. State, which provides that a court, when faced with a concession of guilt by defense counsel during trial, must canvass the defendant to determine whether he knowingly and voluntarily consented to the concession of guilt, the rationale underlying Hernandez is unsound and the opinion therefore must be overruled; (2) a concession-of-guilt strategy is not the equivalent of a guilty plea and, therefore, the trial judge has no obligation to canvass a defendant concerning a concession-of-guilt strategy; and (3) consequently, any deficiencies in the canvass conducted in this case did not warrant relief. View " Armenta-Carpio v. State" on Justia Law