California Appellate Report

An ICE agent trying to have sex with an undercover cop pretending to be a 13 year old prostitute . Classic.

I was going to mention this opinion today simply as a reminder of a very common check scam. One to which, sadly, a nontrivial number of law...

You don't see many federal criminal appeals involving a misdemeanor. Typically you simply serve your sentence -- here, six months -- and...

It's a death penalty case. I totally understand why counsel for the defendant, who's out of peremptory challenges, wants this juror ...

I occasionally pursue old opinions for fun. This Supreme Court opinion -- Ex Parte Milligan -- was published exactly 160 years ago, to the ...

I wrote this back on the same day the amendment to the opinion came out on March 23, and today the Court of Appeal issues this . Today'...

It's entirely appropriate that this Ninth Circuit opinion was issued on April Fool's Day. Look, I understand that some conservative...

There was only one published opinion in the Ninth Circuit, California Supreme Court, and California Court of Appeal today. And even that one...

Rarely have I been as confused reading an opinion as I am right now. I think  I understand the substance of the opinion. Under the relevant ...

Hear hear , Justice Richman.

The Court of Appeal this afternoon refuses to grant relief to Robert Q. Bergstrom, who is accused of molesting several of his relatives and...

The third time's not a charm; as a result, the windy single-lane Route 101 through Humboldt County will now get wider. The California De...

If it were me, on remand, I wouldn't disqualify the law firm here. A party was employed by a company and alleges wrongful termination. D...

One of the (many, many) suboptimal things about becoming an older lawyer is that you forget whether the rule you're thinking about is an...

Is this entire appeal about whether or not the appellant is entitled to two additional days of presentence custody credit (and thus two few...

Are you kidding me?! Thomas Panas is in San Mateo county, working (presumably) for a tech company making nearly $20,000/month in salary, ano...

Would you retry this one ? Eric Perez gets pulled over in a traffic stop. It turns out he's been driving on a suspended license since 19...

Are you sure about this? When you get a fraud judgment against a California corporation that doesn't pay it, you can get up to $50,000 o...

Justice Yegan begins this opinion by essentially summarizing it, saying: "A defendant confined in jail in county one, cannot willfully...

Criminal cases are often depressing. You often see people at their worst. And, obviously, there are often horrific acts at issue. This opini...

Oh my God .

You've got to slog through nearly a hundred single-spaced pages of this opinion to get a complete sense of what's going on. That, I...

Sometimes, kids are great, and adults suck. After an elementary school class about Martin Luther King Jr., a first-grade kid named B.B. -- I...

With respect for Judge Owens, I would have dissented in this one . Issac Tekola is a drug dealer in Santa Barbara. Not a huge one, but not a...

This is a relatively unremarkable opinion . Except for one thing. Defendant moved for mental health diversion, claiming that his illness was...

Hours after taking office in 2025, President Trump signed an executive order barring the entry of all  refugees, even those who were already...

It's a high-profile case, so Judge Owens knew it would get some attention. It's about the overnight fire on the Conception  off the ...

It's Fix The City versus the City of Los Angeles. And . . . the City wins. Both below and on appeal . So no fixing the city. It's on...

Nothing published (yet, at least) from the Ninth Circuit or California Court of Appeal today, so I thought I would briefly mention this publ...

I really, really like everything about this opinion. It's equitable. It's reasonable. It's fair. It shows compassion. It's ...

Fifteen years in prison seems about right to me for this years-long, ten-figure Medicare fraud. Even without the additional two years that t...

The Ninth Circuit delivers some bad news today to a segment of the plaintiff's bar. Particularly that segment located in Montana. It...

Strange language in this opinion . Defendant, who was convicted of murder and sentenced to 50 years in prison, files a petition under the Ra...

Judge Bennett has a point in his dissent . Unlike the majority, he thinks that the district court's legal error at sentencing was harmle...