Ohio Legacy Trust Act

Ohio House Bill 479, passed in December, adopting the Ohio Legacy Trust Act, went into effect last Wednesday, March 27, 2013, making substantial changes "modifying certain property rights in the Ohio Trust Code; to require the recording of personal property transfers with the county recorder upon request; to regulate the temporary conveyance of trust real property for financing purposes; to grant probate courts concurrent jurisdiction with court of common pleas general divisions over certain actions involving the designation or removal of certain beneficiaries, title change involving joint and survivorship interests, alleged gifts, or the passing of assets upon death other than by will, intestate succession, or trust; to regulate the use and enforceability of certain loan covenants in nonrecourse commercial loan transactions; and to make certain changes in the exempt interests law, the fraudulent transfers law, the secured transactions recording law, and the rule against perpetuities.”

  The main objective of House Bill 479, commonly known as the Ohio Asset Management Modernization Act (OAMMA), is to create legacy trusts, also known as asset protection trusts, in Ohio.

  The Ohio State Bar Association Estate Planning, Trust and Probate Law Section Council which worked diligently to craft and pass House Bill 479 has scheduled its First Annual Ohio Asset Protection and Legacy Trust Institute on April 22, 2013, providing 6.75 total CLE hours, including one hour of ethics for attendees. ( Announcement )

Text of Bill
Legislative Service's Analysis

Hamilton County Domestic Relations Domestic Dispute Center

Ohio's supreme Court news service yesterday reported the Hamilton County Domestic Relations Court is continuing to change the way residents' resolve disputes with its newly formed Dispute Resolution Center, which it started working to implement last year and plans to incorporate Early Neutral Evaluation (ENE) -- a type of alternative dispute resolution that will allow parents and their attorneys to meet to discuss possible financial and custody solutions without having to go before a judge -- by late summer if the court receives additional funding to assist in the program.

Court Administrator Lisa Gorrasi told the news service, "Family law disputes that result in protracted and contentious litigation have long standing ill effects for all involved, especially the children The Hamilton County Court of Domestic Relations is committed to utilizing dispute resolution techniques and practices to reduce this negative impact on the families that we serve.  Our Dispute Resolution Center will allow us to incorporate an additional service to offer as families transition through our court and as they continue their lives as co-parents of their children."

[See our May 2011 post]

 

New Ohio assault amendments in effect

We remind our criminal attorneys this morning that amendments to Ohio's assault statute (ORC 2903.13) brought about by the passage of HB 62 last year went into effect last Friday, March 22, 2013.

The Legislative Service summarizes that "Preexisting law, unchanged by the act, prohibits a person from knowingly causing or attempting to cause physical harm to another or to another's unborn or recklessly causing serious physical harm to another or to another's unborn. A violation of the prohibition is the offense of "assault." Under preexisting law, assault generally is a first degree misdemeanor (unchanged by the act), but it is a felony in specified circumstances. Formerly, assault was a fifth degree felony if committed in specified circumstances against an employee of or visitor to a state or local criminal or juvenile correctional facility, a fourth degree felony if committed in specified circumstances against a person performing emergency medical service or against a peace officer or investigator of the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation, and a third, fourth, or fifth degree felony in a number of other specified circumstances."

"HB 62 retained the preexisting penalty provisions for the offense of assault but adds two new sets of circumstances in which assault either is a first degree misdemeanor with special penalty provisions or is a fifth degree felon:

• expands the penalty enhancement provisions in the offense of assault to include an enhanced penalty if the victim of the offense is a "health care professional" of a "hospital," a "health care worker" of a hospital, or a security officer of a hospital whom the offender knows or has reasonable cause to know is such a professional, worker,

• expands the penalty enhancement provisions in the offense of assault to include an enhanced penalty if the victim of the offense is a "judge," "magistrate," "prosecutor," or "court official or employee" whom the offender knows or has reasonable cause to know is a judge, magistrate, prosecutor, or court official or employee and if the victim is engaged in the performance of the victim's duties

"With regard to Community control sanctions for fourth and fifth degree felonies, HB 62 specifies that assault, when committed against hospital personnel or justice system personnel in circumstances in which the act makes the offense a fifth degree felony, is now a "qualifying assault offense" and then modifies the community control provisions previously described, so that they apply to those qualifying assault offenses and so that a court cannot "override" the provisions based on the offense resulting in harm to a victim unless the harm is serious physical harm."

ORC 2903.13 [Effective Until 3/22/2013] Assault.
Text of HB 62

Traffic Lights & Cameras, Good Buddy

[The entry below is intended as an overview with respect to the increased & wide-spread interest in the various issues surrounding speed, traffic and red-light cameras around the nation albeit with our particular concern of the Cincinnati,southwest Ohio region of the country ]

You can almost hear the diesel whine and air-brakes, the refrain of Burt Reynolds, Jackie Gleason, "Snowman," "Frog," "Smokey & the Bandit," --- "East Bound & Down, Good Buddy……" The infamous small town highway speed trap seems being eulogized --- or maybe resurrected --- into 21st Century light sabers and speed racers, although the primary reasons have doubtlessly not changed.

An NBCNews article last month heralded "Lights, cameras, reaction: Resistance builds against red-light cameras," noting, "A rarity 15 years ago, red light cameras have become ubiquitous in many U.S. cities. Communities in 24 states and Washington, D.C., now use the cameras to try to decrease illegal -- and sometimes deadly -- traffic violations. Supporters say it's worked.

"Red light cameras are one piece of a growing network of automated traffic enforcement. Cameras now monitor speed, bus and high-occupancy-vehicle lanes and intersections with stop signs. Proponents like Washington, D.C. police chief Cathy Lanier, which began using the cameras in 1999., says they help to deter accidents, nab violators and allow states and municipalities to keep an eye on the roads for less…. She was quoted as saying 'that's dramatic!'"

Critics of red light programs worry about the Big Brother aspect of using cameras instead of cops, and many are saying the cameras, systems & procedures behind them -- generally run by private companies -- have spread not because they make streets safer, but because they mean profit for cities and companies.

"Recent news stories have fueled opposition," that article read. "In Chicago, an alleged pay-to-play scandal led the mayor to ban one company from bidding for future contracts. Millions were spent on pro-camera lobbying in Florida and other states. In Iowa, doubts about the constitutionality of using cameras as traffic enforcers led a state senator to introduce a bill to ban red-light cameras – a move already taken by at least nine other states."

The topic isn't really new, though. Cameras first received serious attention in the United States in the 1980s following a highly publicized crash in 1982, involving a red light runner who collided with an 18-month-old girl in a stroller (or "push-chair") in New York City, according to Wikipedia's red-light camera article.. A community group worked with the city's Department of Transportation to research automated law enforcement systems to identify and ticket drivers who run red lights, and New York's red-light camera program went into effect in 1993. ( Here ) 

The popular/media jury, though, still largely holds the same position as years before, exemplified by a Chicago Tribune’s 2009 article's saying "if improved safety is the goal of red-light cameras, then it is a mission largely unaccomplished for the first crop of area suburbs that raced to install the devices after they became legal in 2006, according to state data."

--- And Wikipedia also notes that the State of Ohio was the first in which the issue of whether a city has jurisdiction under the Ohio Constitution to issue citations based on speed cameras was heard by the Ohio Supreme Court in September 2007, in the case of Kelly Mendenhall et al. v. The City of Akron et al. The court ruled, in a decision certifying state law questions, in favor of the city, saying Akron's ordinance didn't change speed limits established by state law or change police officers' ability to cite traffic offenders; targeted identical conduct as state law, but did not replace it , merely supplemented it, and so represented a valid exercise of the city's home rule authority. That Court, however, also noted that "although there are due process questions regarding the operation of the Akron Ordinance and those similar to it, those questions are not appropriately before us at this time and will not be discussed here."

Enter our own little corner of the argument and current local concerns. Last July the Village of Elmwood Place passed an ordinance implementing an automated speed enforcement program, entering into a service agreement with Optotraffic, LLC, a Maryland-based corporation that provides local government entities with automated speed & traffic enforcement service and equipment. The Village then passed a second ordinance to the effect that "anyone asking for an 'administrative hearing' as a result of the program would be assessed a $25.00 fee, even if the request had been made before the law's passage, implementing the entire package effective September 1, 2012. On Nov. 29th. a group of concerned residents & businesses filed suit addressing due process aspects of Elmwood's program including their contention that "Ohio Revised Code 1905.01 et seq. authorizes the Village of Elmwood Place to establish a Mayor's Court to hear & determine any prosecution for the violation of the municipal corporation…. The Village may only exercise jurisdiction to 'hear & decide' a case pursuant to Chapter 1905 of the Revised Code. As a result, all administrative hearings on Notices of Liability must be conducted before a Mayor’s Court…."

On Thursday, March 7, 2013, Hamilton County Common Pleas Court Judge Robert Ruehlman found in favor of those plaintiffs, characterizing the Village's program as "nothing more than a high-tech game of 3-card Monty and a scam the motorist cannot win," which pretty much made this a national news story in a very short time. Judge Ruehlman's decision effectively shuts down Elmwood's program including any scheduled hearings and, at least temporarily, excuses those who have received notices from having to pay them. The Village filed an immediate appeal.

Cases similar to ours challenging a private companies' rights to hand out citations have been heard, such as Amanda Ward v. ACS State and Local Solutions Inc., d/b/a LDC Collection Systems, a December 2008 case challenging the City of Dallas' red light camera program, which was dismissed in March 2009. In short, there was no court order in effect that affects the City's right to administer and enforce its "red light camera" program, including the collection of civil fines from violators. Current and past outstanding fines and penalties that were still due, which was upheld by the Dallas Court of Appeals in November 2010.

The Insurance Institute of Highway Safety currently shows that a majority of state statutes do not address automated devices such as speed & red-light cameras with Arkansas, Maine, Mississippi, Nevada, New Jersey, South Carolina (with narrow exceptions), Texas, Utah, and Wisconsin, however, having enacted prohibitions on red light, speed or other photo enforcement camera uses. One can possibly add Ohio to that list as a bill was introduced in the state's House on Feb. 20, 2013 seeking "to prohibit the use of traffic law photo-monitoring devices by municipal corporations, counties, townships, and the State Highway Patrol to detect traffic signal light and speed limit violations.."

Wikipedia’s "red light" article touched on "privacy concerns," noting that that argument had been addressed back in early 2003 with Idris v. City of Chicago, a case initially commenced by car owners who said that they had been fined even though someone else was driving their cars at the time, maintaining that Chicago's system violated the equal protection and due process clauses of the Constitution's fourteenth amendment. The district court held otherwise and entered summary judgment for the defendants. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals upheld in 2009.

We lastly took occasion to glimpse at reported instances where cities in the US have been found to have too-short yellow light intervals at some intersections where red light cameras have been installed. Here, Wikipedia’s article comments that although national guidelines addressing the length of traffic signals are available, most/many traffic signal phase times are determined by the government employees of the city, county or state for that signalized location.

Enter the National Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD).

Back in 1966, Congress passed the Highway Safety Act, P.L. 89-564, 72 Stat. 885 (1966), which is now codified at 23 U.S.C. § 401 et seq., requiring all states to create a highway safety program by December 31, 1968, and to adhere to uniform standards promulgated by the U.S. Department of Transportation as a condition of receiving federal highway-aid funds. The Department simply adopted the entire MUTCD by reference at 23 C.F.R. 655.603. Thus, what was formerly a quasi-official project became an official one. States are allowed to supplement the MUTCD but must remain in "substantial conformance" with the national MUTCD and adopt changes within two years after they are adopted by FHWA. (See here )

The last adoptation was in 2009 with the states being required to adopt the 2009 National Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) as their legal state standard for traffic control devices in 2011. These standards required engineering practices to be used to set yellow light timing durations at individual intersections and or corridors. For guidance to state authorities, MUTCD states yellow lights should have a minimum duration of 3 seconds and a maximum duration of 6 seconds."

"MUTCD," the DOT's announcement read, "did not require or recommend any particular methods for determining the durations of these critical safety intervals in the traffic signal sequence. A compliance date of December 31, 2014 (5 years), or when timing adjustments are made to the individual intersection and/or corridor, whichever occurs first, was established for highway agencies to use engineering practices to determine times for the yellow change intervals and red clearance interval at their existing signalized locations and to revise the timing of those intervals based on the determinations."

Simplifying Ohio municipal tax codes

A few sparks are beginning to be seen as Ohio's House Ways & Means Committee undertakes deliberations HB 5, which is intended to simplify the state's tax structure and help businesses that operate in multiple communities by reducing where they have to pay taxes, simplifying the forms they use and standardizing definitions & deductions.

That might not be as easy as it may sound.

A Cincinnati.com article yesterday related that according to Amy Mignogna, director of tax policy for the Ohio Society of CPAs, Ohio is the only state that allows every municipality to establish its own tax rates, forms and rules about income and deductions -- and, Southwest Ohio's four counties alone have 53 municipal tax plans that will be affected should HB 5 become law. Townships don't assess income taxes but can receive them through a cooperative agreement with a city or cities involving a Joint Economic Development District or Zone.

"The first municipal taxes were levied in the 1940s," Mignogna was quoted as saying. "Now there are 600 communities across Ohio with 300 tax-related forms, each having its own definition of what is taxed, rates, filing requirements, deadlines and reciprocity amounts… It's an accounting nightmare."

Cincinnati.com's article said proponents of the bill had introduced a like bill last October as a municipal tax reform package, but that that measure had died when the legislative session ended in December. "They reintroduced a modified package on Jan. 30, ranking it as one of House Republicans' priority bills, all but guaranteeing its passage in some form this year."

A reader’s digest look at the bill includes:

• Its creating a Municipal Tax Policy Board, composed of seven Governor-appointed municipal tax administrators, to create rules, prescribe forms and other documents, provide instructional materials to taxpayers, and take other actions concerning the state-wide administration and enforcement of municipal income taxes.

• Requiring municipal corporations levying an income tax as of January 1, 2015, and that intend to continue levying the tax thereafter to amend or repeal and re-enact their existing income tax ordinances in a form to comply with the bill's limitations; amended or re-enacted ordinances continuing an existing tax rate above 1% do not require voter approval.

• Expressly prohibits municipal corporations and tax administrators from adopting rules to administer a municipal income tax that conflict with statutory limitations on the tax or rules of the Municipal Tax Policy Board.

Legislative Service's analysis of HB 5

Reminder Ohio attorneys: Late CLE Compliance Deadline Approaching

The Ohio Supreme Court Office of Attorney Services today reminds attorneys practicing in the state with last names beginning with the letters M through Z that they have until April 30 to make up their continuing legal education hour deficiencies.

See announcement

Murder conviction & death sentence overturned by "unconstitutionally prosecutorial silence"

The timing of this report is uncanny in view of yesterday's posting.

CNN this morning carried a story about an Arizona woman, now 49 years old, convicted by in a jury trial of murder, conspiracy to commit murder, child abuse and kidnapping on October 12, 1990, less than a year after her 4-year-old son was found dead, and being sentenced to death a few months later, is now having those convictions -- and the death penalty -- thrown out by the 9th. Circuit Court of Appeals after having been on death row for the last 22 years.

The case involved the murder of the boy by the boy's mother's roommate and another man. The roommate was apprehended, convicted of first-degree murder in the boy's killing and sentenced to death. The second man had told a detective that the boy's mother, Debra Milke, was involved in a plot to kill her son, but then neither men testified to that assertion in court -- "In fact," CNN reported, "no other witnesses or direct evidence (linked) Milke to the crime" other than the detective's testimony, and after pleading not guilty, Milke stood trial and tried to convince a jury that her account -- and not the detective's -- was the true one.

"The judge and jury believed the detective testimony, the article says… but they didn't know about his long history of lying under oath and other misconduct.
"Specifically, the judge noted that the detective had been suspended five days for taking 'liberties' with a female motorist and lying about it to his supervisors; judges had tossed out four confessions or indictments because he had lied under oath on those occasions; and that judges suppressed or vacated four other confessions because he had violated those persons' constitutional rights."

Ninth Circuit Chief Justice Alex Kozinski blasted the Phoenix prosecution for remaining "unconstitutionally silent" on the "history of misconduct" of its key witness, the detective. "The state was aware of the evidence in the detective's personnel file and had an obligation to produce those documents," Kozinski said. "... There can be no doubt that the state failed in its constitutional obligation."

Kozinski has ordered the state to turn over that dectective's personnel records to Debra Milke's lawyers, after which "a police official" must state, under oath, that everything has been disclosed and nothing has been "omitted, lost or destroyed," CNN relates

"This is done, the district court will then have to order Milke's release unless prosecutors inform the court within 30 days that they plan to retry her soon."


MILKE V. RYAN 07-99001 Phoenix District Court Prisoner Death Penalty 03/14/2013

Ohio Statute of Limitations -- Rape & Sexual Battery

Two noteworthy bills were introduced in the Ohio legislature this week we wanted to pass along advance notice on to our readers.

The first is HB 99, which would prohibit "any agency, its employees and/or agents, from seizing or authorizing the seizure of any firearm from a person lawfully in possession or control of a firearm, except when a law enforcement officer reasonably believes the immediate seizure of said firearm is necessary for the safety of the officer or another person, or to preserve said firearm as evidence.

"and to prohibit the establishment of a firearm registry, and law enforcement officers and/or international agents from enforcing a firearms registration requirement or firearm ban"


The second bill is SB 83, seeking to eliminate the statute of limitations on rape and sexual battery, where it is currently now twenty years.

Passage of this bill would result in there now being no statute of limitations in Ohio for murder, aggravated murder, rape, and sexual battery ( Statute of Limitations; Criminal Offenses ).

Common Wrongful Conviction Factors

Mounira Al Hmoud over at the Blog of Legal Times, Tuesday morning, posted that a three-year study conducted by the Washington Institute for Public and International Affairs Research at American University, funded by the U.S. Justice Department's National Institute of Justice, identified 10 factors common in wrongful convictions, as opposed to cases in which innocent defendants were acquitted or had their charges dismissed before trial in a first-of-its-kind study, called "Predicting Erroneous Convictions: A Social Science Approach to Miscarriages of Justice," released March 11th.. [ 433 Pp. PDF ]

Jon Gould, a lawyer, social scientist, and director of the Washington Institute for Public and International Affairs Research, was the principal investigator of the project.

Ten factors were identified by Gould and his team, including the state's death penalty culture or "punitiveness," meaning the number of executions per population; the strength of the prosecution & defendant's case; whether the prosecution withholds evidence (commits Brady violations); forensic evidence errors; the age of the of defendant; the defendant's criminal history; intentional misidentifications; lying by non-eyewitnesses; and the use of family witnesses to testify on behalf of defendant.

"[T]he only way to establish what causes an erroneous conviction is to understand which factors are exclusive to erroneous convictions as against other sets of cases," Al Hmoud reported the study found. "Missing so far in the literature is a study that asks how the criminal justice system identifies innocent defendants in order to prevent erroneous convictions, though, according to Gould, prevention begins at the police station starting with the interrogation and investigation of alibis, which, if not conducted carefully, can lead to a 'perfect storm' of errors made worse by collective tunnel vision."

Gould also observed that a major talking point of contention would lie in the justice system's often not having a vehicle to investigate when an error occurs in a case how to try to prevent similar errors from occurring in other cases in the future. "Unlike airplane crashes where the National Transportation Safety Board moves in to investigate and reconstruct events in an effort to prevent future catastrophes," he said, "wrongful convictions have not often been investigated beyond case studies."

Cancelled: What's New in Tax Law, March 15

With apologies for any inconvenience, the Hamilton County Law Library announces the cancellation of the You and the Legal System program, "What's New in Tax Law", scheduled for Friday, March 15, due to very low registration. We just couldn't justify asking a tax attorney come at this busy time of year to present to only one or two people. Our You and the Legal System series is a collaboration with the Cincinnati Bar Association's Lawyer Referral Service. We offer programs monthly on a variety of legal topics of interest to the public. We strongly encourage advance registration for all of our events. All of our upcoming programs for legal professionals and for the general public are listed on our Educational Events page.

Recently introduced Ohio legislation

Ohio Senate Bill 44, introduced back on Feb. 20 and now in the Criminal Justice Committee , seeks to authorize the civil commitment of sexually violent predators,require sexually violent predators who are released from prison be monitored by global positioning system devices, and require those prisoners so released to pay the cost of monitoring by global positioning system devices if they are able.

House Bill 87, introduced last Wednesday, February 27, 2013, would amend sections 2950.01, 2950.11, 2950.12, and 2950.13 of the Revised Code to provide notice to long-term care facilities when Tier III or similar categories of sex offender/child-victim offenders indicate an intent to reside in that facility or registers an address within the specified geographical notification area which includes the facility, and to amend the versions of sections 2950.11 and 2950.13 of the Revised Code scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2014.

And House Bill 86, also introduced on Feb. 27, would create Revised Code Sec. 3109.054. which would provide that:

(A) In any divorce, legal separation, or annulment proceeding and in any proceeding pertaining to the allocation of parental rights and responsibilities for the care of a child in which the court becomes aware of facts that may indicate that there is a risk of abduction of a child by one parent, the court shall, on its own motion or upon the motion of either parent, determine whether measures are needed to prevent the abduction of the child by one parent.

To make that determination, the court shall consider the following:

(1) The risk of abduction of the child;
(2) Obstacles to the location, recovery, and return of the child if abducted;
(3) Potential harm to the child if the child is abducted.

Federal Sentencing Guidelines "law" or "advice" ex post factoly?

"As constitutional landmark cases go, Peugh v. United States, also heard by the Supreme Court on Tuesday, Feb. 26th., has flown well under the radar thus far," ScotusBlog's Rory Little posted Mon, February 25th., "but at issue is no less than the appropriate constitutional test for identifying an 'ex post facto' law. When the U.S. Sentencing Commission changes its (now advisory) Guidelines to treat certain sentencing factors more harshly, does it violate the Ex Post Facto Clause to apply such changed Guidelines to criminal conduct that was completed before the change?"

Peugh's petition for a writ of certiorari is here; Solicitor General's reply in opposition here.

King vs. Maryland, DNA Collection & Privacy

Lyle Denniston at ScotusBlog on Tueday, February 26th. related "Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., pronouncing that it was 'the most important criminal procedure case the Court has had in decades,' upon hearing arguments in Maryland v. King (docket 12-207), even while letting on that he has no difficulty making up his mind on it as the Supreme Court returned to the idea of how much leeway the Constitution gives police to adopt new technology to solve crimes. Amid much fretting on the bench about 'cold cases' not yet wrapped up, the Justices examined closely whether routine warrantless police sampling of DNA of persons arrested for serious crimes will be allowed."

Denniston found that the Justices hearing Maryland were "closely divided" and that "the deeply contested nature of the case was evident from its opening minutes," an observation that didn't go unnoticed by other writers. Tony Mauro at Law.com/National Law Journal noted "the libertarian streak of some of the court's conservatives was on display, with justices expressing worry about the implications of a Maryland law—similar to those in 27 other states—that does not require a search warrant before police can use a swab to take a DNA sample from inside the mouths of those arrested for serious crimes."

Kentucky, by the way, is in the process of passing their own "time of arrest" legislation now.

Mauro had also noted that "the attacks from the court seemed to leave the Maryland law in tatters until Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben rose in support of DNA sampling. Dreeben, the long-time expert on criminal law for the SG's office, changed the dynamics of the argument when he told the court, 'The future is near where there will be rapid DNA analyzers that are devices that can analyze and produce the identification material in the DNA within 90 minutes. And the design of the program is to put them at the booking station so that DNA can be taken and within 90 minutes that information is known.' Suddenly, DNA sampling began to look to the justices like fingerprinting, which has long been viewed as constitutional. If the DNA sample could be processed that quickly, then it could be justified as a method of verifying the identification of the suspect and of informing the bail decision."

CNN.com pointed out that "the DNA Identification Act of 1994 created a national database in which local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies can compare and share information on DNA matches from convicted felons, but courts have been at odds on just when such samples can be collected and the information distributed."

In that regard, we came across the footnote in Wikipedia's entry on the Katie Sepich Enhanced DNA Collection Act of 2010, which Congress passed last December,which provides funding to states to implement minimum and enhanced DNA collection processes for felony arrests…. "The Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, in the United States v. Pool, upheld that the federal statute allowing collection of DNA samples prior to conviction for inclusion in the national DNA database does not represent a violation of constitutional rights. In issuing its ruling, the court specifically held that the collection does not represent a violation of 4th Amendment rights. The court also dismissed claims of violations of 5th and 8th amendment rights. High courts in Maryland,in 2003 and Virginia in 2007, also ruled that DNA upon arrest does not violate the Fourth Amendment. Maryland's supreme court, however, in April of last year with this case, Maryland v. King, reversed itself.


King's petition for a writ of certiorari is here, and the State of Maryland's reply in opposition here.