July 2023 Maryland Certiorari Grants
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court of Maryland granted certiorari in one case, which asks the Court to reconsider its decision in Stewart v. State, 399 Md. 146 (2007), in light of recent case law concerning voir dire.
The question presented is below.
Read More…Representation and Colorblindness in Maryland’s Appellate Courts
Among the most high-profile decisions issued by the United States Supreme Court last month was the conservative majority’s long-anticipated 6-3 opinion ending race-conscious admissions in virtually all public and private colleges. Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harv. Coll., 143 S. Ct. 2141 (June 29, 2023). It did so on the grounds that the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause mandates colorblindness when admitting or rejecting potential students. Drawing on Justice Harlan’s lone dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson (1898), the majority opinion (and concurrences) repeatedly emphasized that, although much of American society attributes meaning to racial identity and diversity, seventy years of Supreme Court jurisprudence has established—as a bedrock principle—a colorblind Constitution.
Read More…After Six Months of Being Civil
In January, after 16 years with the Maryland Attorney General’s Criminal Appeals Division, I joined the appellate practice at Goodell, DeVries. After six months, I am reflecting on the biggest differences between civil and criminal practice.
The biggest shock for me has been the relative dearth of civil case law. In my first month at Goodell, I vainly searched for cases on nuanced points of civil litigation, terrified that my legal research skills had suddenly abandoned me. Eventually, I realized that searching was not the problem. The cases I wanted just don’t exist.
Read More…Zadeh v. State: Timeliness, Motion to Suppress, and Voluntariness
In Zadeh v. State (No. 11, Sept. Term 2022, Opinion by Hon. Andrea M. Leahy), the Appellate Court of Maryland (ACM) remanded the case – yet again – because the trial court failed to instruct the jury on the voluntariness of Zadeh’s statement to police. Before reaching the merits, the ACM addressed the important question of the time requirement for filing motions to suppress on remand.
Brief Summary of Facts and First Reversal: On August 4, 2014, Takoma Park Police responded to a call reporting that a woman, Larlane Pannell-Brown, was screaming at her house. When the police arrived, they found her husband, face down, bleeding from trauma to his head. However, police were unconvinced by Ms. Pannell-Brown’s screams once they discovered that she was having an affair with Hussain Ali Zadeh, a man 20 years her junior. In the first trial, Zadeh was jointly tried with Pannell-Brown, and both were convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 30 years in prison. However, the Supreme Court of Maryland reversed Zadeh’s conviction because he was unfairly prejudiced by non-mutually admissible evidence at the joint trial. State v. Zadeh, 468 Md. 124, 163-64 (2020).
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