The Sonoma County Sheriff's Office must comply with subpoenas issued by the county's civilian oversight board as part of a whistleblower investigation into alleged misconduct, a state appeals court ruled Thursday.
When Citrus Heights police began investigating a Bay Area man for possible involvement in a home invasion robbery, they came across an unexpected piece of evidence: their suspect was wearing a GPS device as a condition of release for his pending murder case, according to court records. Now, eight months after he was released from jail, 34-year-old Jashawndre Upshaw is back behind bars, this time facing two violent felony cases.
"What's most problematic is that the extraordinary has become ordinary. It's just a matter of course now that when you issue an opinion that some people don't like, you're going to get threats, you're going to get death threats, and that is obviously problematic on many levels."
Serena CJ Rodriguez, 25, will return to Judge Gutierrez's Dept. 9 courtroom, at 8:30 a.m. May 4 and again on Sept. 28 for trial confirmation and at 8:30 a.m. Oct. 19 for a trial management conference. Judge Gutierrez set her trial for Oct. 28 at 10 a.m., with the trial expected to last 8 to 10 weeks.
DHS has alleged that Martinez intentionally ran over a Homeland Security Investigation special agent, causing another agent to fire defensive shots to protect himself, his fellow agents, and the general public.
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As you know, Section 215 authorities are not interpreted in the same way that grand jury subpoena authorities are, and we are concerned that when Justice Department officials suggest that the two authorities are 'analogous' they provide the public with a false understanding of how surveillance is interpreted in practice.
If you are a lawyer, are interested in being an AUSA, and support President Trump and anti-crime agenda, DM me. We need good prosecutors. And DOJ is hiring across the country. Now is your chance to join the mission and do good for our country.- Chad Mizelle (@chad_mizelle) January 31, 2026
In 1996, the Supreme Court decided Whren v. United States, which came about when plainclothes vice officers patrolling in the District of Columbia passed a truck in a "high drug" area and "their suspicions were aroused." They had a hunch that the truck was involved in a drug operation. They chose to wait until it had violated a traffic ordinance (turning without a signal) and then used that violation as an excuse to stop the truck. In the course of searching the truck, they found crack cocaine.
David Lammy's plans to introduce judge-only criminal trials in England and Wales will save less than 2% of time in crown courts, the Institute for Government (IFG) has said. In a report that casts doubt on the ability of the changes, which will slash the number of jury trials to achieve their goal of wiping out the courts' backlog, the thinktank described the gains from judge-only trials as marginal.
A federal magistrate judge rejected that warrant, noting that Good was already dead and could not be considered a suspect for a warrant. It was widely reported that the Justice Department chose not to investigate the ICE officer who shot and killed Good, but the details about how top Justice officials directed the altering of the investigation and search warrant and how it was rejected as weak by a federal judge have not been previously reported.
It seems to me that the nature of the exercise which is required in vetting is different from the exercise in disciplinary proceedings. In disciplinary proceedings, in common with many situations in which a decision-maker has to decide whether an event occurred in the past, the balance of probabilities is a sensible way to decide that question of fact. Either an event happened or it did not.