Won remand to the trial court for reconsideration of defendant’s motion for new trial/post-trial discovery based on DNA profiling and blood testing in sexual assault/kidnapping case. Argued by student attorney. (On remand the trial court vacated the convictions and ordered new trial.)

Writ of habeas corpus claiming ineffective assistance of counsel: trial counsel had conflict of interest where counsel, himself convicted of murder in a notorious court case, continued to practice law while taking appeal and represented petitioner at trial without taking any precautions to ensure that jurors did not hold lawyer’s conviction against his client. Habeas case originally tried in Superior Court by student attorneys; students co-wrote appellate briefs and participated in oral argument before Connecticut Appellate and Supreme Courts. Connecticut Supreme Court ultimately ruled for petitioner and ordered new trial.

Our client was a 21 year old mother with a two year old baby. The father of the baby was an underage school mate of the client at the time of conception. Three years after alleged criminal act, State charged client with sexual assault in the second degree (statutory rape), which carries mandatory 9 month prison sentence and which would also have required that client register and appear on an Internet web-site for ten years as a Sex Offender under Connecticut’s “Megan’s Law”. Clinic negotiated with prosecutor for reduction of charge to misdemeanor to avoid mandatory jail time, then filed numerous pleadings, including a motion challenging Megan’s law’s constitutionality as applied to client and a motion for the court to recognize the child as a “victim” under state law and to appoint a lawyer to represent child’s interests (in having mother not subject to Sex Offender registration). Court recognized child as “victim” and permitted a guardian ad litem to appear to represent child’s interests. The Court later issued an order that the state may not require the client to comply with either the community notification or the registration requirements of Megan’s Law. On the misdemeanor charge, client received suspended sentence and a short period of “conditional discharge” (similar to unsupervised probation).

Our client was an 18 year old high school student charged with a felony for stabbing another teenager in the back during a street brawl. Although the victim’s injuries were not life-threatening, both the prosecutor and judge expressed views at the outset that the crime was too serious for resolution through a form of pretrial probation, called accelerated rehabilitation, that, once completed, results in the defendant having a clean record. After extensive investigation of the numerous eyewitnesses in the case and protracted and intense negotiations with the prosecutor, the charges were reduced and client was ultimately given accelerated rehabilitation.

In the middle of a first degree sexual assault trial, the defendant’s attorney contacted the Criminal Clinic and we agreed to file a “motion in limine” and supporting memorandum of law on the defendant’s behalf asking that the trial judge bar the state from using the defendant’s arson conviction last year for impeachment purposes when the defendant testified in his defense. Connecticut evidence law makes such a felony conviction presumptively admissible for impeachment purposes. Working on extremely short notice, three student attorneys researched and drafted a lengthy memorandum setting forth multiple grounds for barring impeachment and one of the students presented oral argument to the court–which granted the motion in limine for the defense. The defendant testified and was later acquitted by the jury.

Criminal Clinic prevailed in habeas corpus action on behalf of prisoner by showing that a 1996 parole eligibility law violates the ex post facto prohibition in the federal constitution. Testimony established that the petitioner and over 800 other Connecticut inmates in like circumstances (in prison for offense committed before effective date of new parole law) must under the law serve an extra 35% of their sentences before becoming parole eligible. The Attorney General appealed. Two Trial Division students represented petitioner at his habeas trial. After an appellate clinic student argued the case on appeal, the Supreme Court affirmed the judgment in our client’s favor. Johnson v. Commissioner, 258 Conn. 804 (2002).

Seven day trial in 1997. Two inmates at Connecticut’s “supermax” facility, Northern Correctional Institution, made multiple statutory and constitutional challenges to an administrative directive that denies inmates confined in that institution the opportunity to earn statutory “good time” reductions in their actual term of incarceration. Student co-tried case and two students appeared in the cases on appeal. Beasley v. Commissioner, 50 Conn. App. 421 (1998), aff’d, 249 Conn. 499 (1999).

Four month murder trial in Rockville Superior Court. Four legal interns acted as co-counsel with a Clinic attorney and the Public Defender. Students had active involvement in pretrial motions practice and hearings, jury selection, developing trial strategies, performing investigations, client counseling, etc.

Clients ran underground needle exchange program in Willimantic to combat spread of AIDS through sharing of needles by IV drug users. Common law necessity defense raised; efforts included joining in successful lobbying effort to have legislature de-criminalize possession of hypodermic needles.

Client charged with first degree larceny for AFDC, TFA, and Food Stamp Fraud of over $10,000 in benefits. After investigation, the Clinic prevailed on prosecutor to reduce charge to third degree larceny, making client eligible for Accelerated Rehabilitation (“AR”). Negotiated terms of AR to reduce restitution sum to $4,000, with further reduction of that figure by set-off for sums that the Department of Social Services was already administratively recouping by reducing client’s current benefits. Client in the end paid less than $2,000 in out-of-pocket restitution. The prosecution was dismissed in September, 2000.