New Jersey Criminal Defense Law Blog

Paris Hilton, a hotel heiress known for being a hard-partier, has been charged with committing a felony drug crime over the weekend, but her attorney is asking the public not to rush to judgment. Hilton, 29, was arrested on Friday night in Las Vegas along with her rumored boyfriend, Vegas nightclub mogul Cy Waits, 34. Hilton has been charged with possession of a controlled substance.

Law enforcement officers pulled alongside Waits' Cadillac Escalade on Friday night. According to the officers, they smelled the odor of marijuana and noticed Hilton rolling up a passenger window. The police officers pulled the pair over and administered field sobriety tests to Waits, which he failed. Waits was charged with DUI.

While the DUI investigation was underway, Hilton asked law enforcement if she could wait in a more private location away from the gawkers and photographers who had gathered around the scene.

A man pleaded guilty in federal court earlier this week for his part in an insider trading scheme involving Walt Disney Co. Yonni Sebbag, the boyfriend of an assistant to a top executive with Disney, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit securities fraud and wire fraud, both federal crimes. 

Sebbag's girlfriend, Bonnie Hoxie, was an assistant to Zenia Mucha, the head of corporate communications at Walt Disney Co. According to the Los Angeles Times, Prosecutors accuse Hoxie of obtaining advance information on Disney's second-quarter earnings. Hoxie allegedly then passed this confidential information on to Sebbag who allegedly tried to sell the information to investors involved with at least 33 investment companies.

A recent article in The Wall Street Journal examines the relatively new issue of "sexting" among teenagers and how states around the country are trying to approach the behavior. Technology continues to rapidly change, necessitating the tweaking of existing sex crime laws to fit the reality of the times. Sexting involves the sending of nude or partially-nude photographs via cell phone. The practice has popped up in schools around the country, prompting school officials, parents, and prosecutors to scramble with how to deal with it.

Sexting could be the exchange of photos between a couple or could be a high-tech form of bullying or harassment. When the practice began, most incidences would fall under a state's child pornography laws, which most involved believe to be too harsh. A teen charged with child porn for sending a nude picture could end up with sex offender status, called a "scarlet letter" by one defense attorney interviewed by the Journal.

As reported in the previous post, after deliberating for two weeks on 24 counts of corruption against former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, a federal jury reached a decision on just one count Tuesday and the judge ordered a mistrial for the other charges. Prosecutors have already said they will retry Blagojevich and have already been planning their next approach.

Trial watchers have said that there are a number of things that could change this time around. One thing that won't change is the visibility in the media of the case and the high cost. One thing that will change is prosecutors' approach to explaining and laying out their case for jurors. Jurors complained that the case was overly complicated and the overlapping charges related to racketeering, extortion, and fraud difficult to sort out.

After 14 days of deliberation, a federal jury in Chicago convicted Rod Blagojevich, the former governor of Illinois on one count of lying to the FBI. The jury deadlocked on 23 other corruption charges and the judge ordered a mistrial. Prosecutors have said they will retry the former governor on charges of racketeering, extortion and fraud.

The corruption investigation began in 2004 and led to the arrest of Blagojevich in December 2008, along with his chief of staff. One of the charges against Blagojevich is that he tried to sell Obama's state senate seat after it was vacated upon Obama's election to the presidency. According to The Washington Post, one juror said that the group voted 11-1 to convict Blagojevich on the charge of trying to sell Obama's seat.

Local law enforcement and drug treatment centers have a popular new drug on their radar. Typically sold with a wink and a chuckle as incense or potpourri, the visually similar substance provides the user with a high similar to cheap marijuana. Sold under such monikers as "K2," "Genie," "Yucatan Fire," "Spice," "Smoke," "Sence," "Zohai," and "Skunk," the synthetic substance is a major problem for law enforcement in that it is completely legal in New Jersey and is widely available in smoke shops and online. The substance does not show up on traditional drug screening tests.

Mount Olive narcotics officer Detective John Walker states that a person cannot be charged with possession or use of synthetic marijuana via traditional means, but it is possible to be charged if caught driving under the influence of the drug. Individuals should be careful about New Jersey's "huffing" statute, drafted mainly to charge those abusing nitrous oxide and glue. That statute could also be used to charge those found using synthetic marijuana. Walker says too many people are quick to try any substance if they think it will get them high, often without knowing any of the substances contents or actual effects.

Another lawsuit has been filed against USA Swimming alleging sexual abuse by a former swim coach. According to ABC News, a lawsuit was filed this week in California by Jancy Thompson, a former Olympic hopeful. The lawsuit names as defendants USA Swimming, Pacific Swimming (the regional level of the swim team), and West Valley swim club (her local team). The lawsuit also names her former coach, Norm Havercroft, who Thompson alleges began sexually molesting her at the age of 15, four years after he began coaching her.  

The lawsuit accuses USA Swimming of allowing Havercroft to continue to coach children after hearing complaints of his sexual misconduct with children. ABC News reports that USA Swimming attorneys and insurance brokers met with another alleged victim of Havercroft's in 2002, and a confidential civil settlement was reached. According to ABC News, USA Swimming denied, on a separate occasion involving a separate lawsuit and different coach, knowing of any sexual misconduct by Havercroft.

The Vatican had a victory Monday in the U.S. Catholic clergy sex abuse scandal when a lawyer asked a court to dismiss a lawsuit three U.S. men he represents had brought against the Holy See. The lawyer said in filings in U.S. federal district court in Louisville, Kentucky, that the U.S. courts had placed an impossible burden of proof on the plaintiffs to prove their case.

The Vatican is protected by a law that says that sovereign nations are immune from lawsuits. The Vatican is located in Rome, but is considered a sovereign nation. The Vatican said that the reason the plaintiffs had dropped their case after six years is because they finally are admitting that they have no proof to back up their charges.