FREE TX Bar Criminal Law and Procedure Questions and Answers

Question 1

A pet breeder is in the business of breeding calves at his cattle ranch where he has a stable of prolific cows who are very fertile. The newborn calves need constant attention and care.
One day one of the employees inadvertently leaves the fence door open and a newly-born calf breaks free and goes to his neighbor's land. The breeder went to the neighbor's land to retrieve the calf for its safety and to make sure it was unharmed.
However, he was arrested on a trespass charge after entering the land. The breeder appealed. Will the court dismiss the charge?

Accepted Answer

Yes, because he had a limited privilege to enter the land to prevent harm to his chattel.

Answer

The breeder had a limited privilege of private necessity to enter the neighbor's land. This privilege allows a person to trespass onto another's property to protect their own chattel from serious harm, such as a newborn calf wandering into danger. While the entry is technically a trespass, it is excused due to the urgent need to prevent greater harm, though the landowner may still be entitled to compensation for any actual damages caused by the entry.

Question 2

The state charged the accused with the intentional murder of a former girlfriend. He admitted to killing her, but asserted that he lacked the intent to murder, due to his suffering from a personality disorder complicated by two days of drinking alcohol heavily.
The trial judge instructed the jury that "the law presumes that a person intends the ordinary consequences of his voluntary acts." The judge did not tell them that they had a choice or could infer another conclusion; they were told only that the law presumed it. The accused was convicted of depraved heart murder and sentenced to 100 years in prison.
On appeal, the appellant argued that the court took the fact-finding task of determining criminal intent out of the jury’s hands by in effect ordering them to find intent. The jury could have felt that they were being told that they had no other choice. The state supreme court affirmed the conviction, but the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
Will the Court likely reverse the conviction?

Accepted Answer

Yes, because the wording of the instruction could have been viewed by juniors as a mandatory direction to find that there was intent to murder.

Answer

The jury instruction, stating that "the law presumes that a person intends the ordinary consequences of his voluntary acts" without further clarification, could be interpreted as a mandatory presumption. Such an instruction effectively removes the element of intent from the jury's consideration and shifts the burden of proof to the defendant, violating the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that mandatory presumptions regarding an element of a crime are unconstitutional because they undermine the prosecution's burden to prove every element beyond a reasonable doubt.

Question 3

A small town police officer pulled over a driver for speeding. He believed that the driver was acting irritable and fidgety, but he had no articulable reason to think anything was wrong. He searched the car anyway and found two cartons of freshly canned peaches, which were owned by the driver's neighbor and reported stolen off of her porch 24 hours earlier.
Authorities charged him with theft under the state criminal code. His motion to suppress the evidence because of an unlawful search was denied.
On appeal, will the appellate court likely reverse the lower court decision denying the motion to suppress?

Accepted Answer

Yes, because the search was unconstitutional due to the officer having no probable cause that would justify searching the car.

Answer

The Fourth Amendment protects individuals from unreasonable searches and seizures, requiring probable cause for a search. While the officer had a valid reason to stop the car for speeding, the driver's 'irritable and fidgety' demeanor alone does not establish probable cause to believe that criminal activity was afoot or that evidence of a crime would be found in the car. Therefore, the subsequent search of the vehicle without probable cause or another valid exception to the warrant requirement was unconstitutional, making the evidence inadmissible.

Question 4

A criminal defendant went to trial and was convicted. After exhausting his appeals, he filed for post-conviction relief, alleging that he had been deprived of his Sixth Amendment right to the effective assistance of counsel. He established that his counsel had not advised him of the benefits of plea bargaining, and had withheld several offers for guilty pleas from the government.
The offers expired for lack of a response. The sentence he received was at least seven to eight years more than if he had entered a guilty plea. Will the court likely decide that the defendant was denied the effective assistance of counsel?

Accepted Answer

Yes, because plea bargaining is a critical stage of a criminal case and an attorney who ignores that process is constitutionally ineffective.

Answer

Plea bargaining is recognized as a critical stage of a criminal proceeding, where a defendant has a Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel. An attorney's failure to inform a client of plea offers or to advise them on the benefits and risks of such offers falls below an objective standard of reasonableness. If this deficient performance prejudices the defendant by leading to a significantly harsher sentence than they would have received through a plea, it constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel.

Question 5

The criminal accused was indicted and arrested by federal authorities on narcotics offenses and released on bail. While out on bail, and not represented by counsel, he met in a bar with an accomplice who had been charged in the drug conspiracy. The accomplice was wired and communicating the whole conversation to a detective sitting in a car down the street. The accused made incriminating statements.
At the trial, the detective who recorded the conversation was permitted to testify to the taped remarks of the accused and to other hearsay about the accused in the prosecution’s case-in-chief. The trial court and the state courts ruled that the detective's testimony was admissible evidence in the prosecution’s proof of the crime against the defendant.
Defendant appealed his conviction into the federal courts and the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. What is its probable ruling?

Accepted Answer

The Court reversed the conviction, holding that his statements, made after indictment and without counsel, could not be used against him to prove guilt.

Answer

Once a defendant has been formally indicted, their Sixth Amendment right to counsel attaches. The government is then prohibited from deliberately eliciting incriminating statements from the defendant in the absence of their counsel. Here, the use of a wired accomplice to obtain statements from the accused after indictment, and without counsel present, violated this established Sixth Amendment right, rendering the statements inadmissible in the prosecution's case-in-chief.

(TX Bar) Texas Bar Exam Practice Test

(TX Bar) Texas Bar Exam Practice Test

FREE TX Bar Criminal Law and Procedure Questions and Answers