Civil Law

Fifth Circuit Finds Evidence That One of Defendants Attorneys Slept During His Capital Murder Trial Insufficient to Prove Ineffective Assistance of Counsel

It’s often said that the ineffective assistance of counsel test is so tough to satisfy that even evidence that a defendant’s attorney slept during trial is insufficient to satisfy the standard. The latest example is Alvarez v. Guerrero, 2025 WL 3719047 (5th Cir. 2025).

In Alvarez, “Juan Carlos Alvarez was sentenced to death for the murders of Michael Aguirre and Jose Varela.” He later appealed, claiming that one of his two trial counsel slept during trial.

A majority … Read the rest

Supreme Court

Erroneous admission of a murder confession as “harmless?”

Erroneous admission of a murder confession as “harmless?”

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The Relist Watch column examines cert petitions that the Supreme Court has “relisted” for its upcoming conference. A short explanation of relists is available here.

It has been more than a month (and two conferences) since the Supreme Court has relisted a case for the first time; I’ve been doing this column for more than a decade and I can’t remember another dry spell of that length. As we head into this week’s conference, at which the court … Read the rest