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SANFORD, Fla. (AP) — The attorney for the family of a black teenager fatally shot by a neighborhood watch captain said Tuesday that the boy was talking to his girlfriend on his cell phone when the confrontation began. She did not hear the shooting.

Their phone call was discussed at ...

A 36-year-old Texas man was sentenced Monday in federal court in Dallas to 30 years in prison followed by 30 years of supervised release on his guilty plea to conspiracy to traffic women for prostitution, including those involved in adult escort websites headquartered in Dallas and Fort Worth as well ...

PITTSBURGH — Despite looming federal regulations and rock-bottom market prices, leaders in the natural gas business are confident the shale boom that's helped revitalize economies from Pennsylvania to Wyoming is only just getting started.

Companies from across the sector, from multibillion-dollar outfits such as Chesapeake Energy to small-town hardware stores, ...

Despite assurances from Clint Eastwood and Eminem, Detroit's rebirth may be on hold, as the city is on a Greece-like track to run out of money before summer, and things are getting increasingly testy between the state's Republican governor and the city's Democratic mayor.

Although the automotive sector and some ...

BALLWIN, Mo. — The fatal shooting of a woman and her three young daughters at a Missouri resort has been ruled a murder-suicide.

Christine Adewunmi, 37, and her daughters Lauren, 8, Samantha, 6, and Kate, 3, were discovered Saturday afternoon on a gravel road at the Blue Springs Ranch & ...

NEW YORK — It was a decade when tens of millions of people in the U.S. experienced mass unemployment and social upheaval as the nation clawed its way out of the Great Depression and rumblings of global war were heard from abroad.

Now, intimate details of 132 million people who ...

BILLINGS, Mont. — Sixty-four bison from Yellowstone National Park were due to arrive at northeast Montana's Fort Peck Reservation, under a long-stalled relocation initiative meant to repopulate parts of the West with the iconic, genetically pure animals.

Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer described the bison transfer as a major step in ...

ORLANDO, Fla. — College students around Florida rallied Monday to demand the arrest of a white neighborhood watch captain who shot an unarmed black teen last month, though authorities may be hamstrung by a state law that allows people to defend themselves with deadly force.

Students held rallies on the ...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The International Space Station should be getting its first commercial cargo shipment in early May.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp., better known as SpaceX, plans to launch its Dragon capsule from Cape Canaveral on April 30. The Dragon will take a few days to get to the ...

WASHINGTON — Should babies conceived using the frozen sperm of their deceased father get his Social Security survivor benefits?

The Supreme Court grappled with that question Monday in the case of Florida twins whose benefits claim was rejected by the government. Their mother used her husband's frozen sperm to conceive ...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP)— Embattled San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi on Monday was sentenced to three years' probation and must participate in a domestic-violence program after pleading guilty to false imprisonment in a closely watched case that has gripped this city for nearly three months.

The sentencing for the misdemeanor came ...

NEW YORK — The New York Mets owners and a trustee for Bernard Madoff's fraud victims settled Monday for $162 million in a case aimed at repairing the damage from a massive investment scheme.

The Mets owners will not pay anything for three years.

Jury selection had been set to ...

HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) — The last straw for 17-year-old Alton Burke was a note left on his door. The high school dropout picked up the phone and re-enrolled at South Hagerstown High.

Alton missed roughly 200 days of class, but Heather Dixon, the student intervention specialist who left ...

A defendant who denied living in an apartment at the time of a search did not waive his reasonable expectation of privacy in the apartment where he actually paid the rent. A ruse to get defendant to open the door of the apartment did not violate the Fourth Amendment. It would have if the ruse led to consent, but this one didn’t. People v. Nelson, 2012 Colo. App. LEXIS 419 (March 15, 2012).

“[W]e need not conduct the balancing test for an Article 1, Section 11 determination because the manager of the motel evicted Harper immediately upon his arrest and then gave officers permission to search the room.” Harper v. State, 2012 Ind. App. LEXIS 102 (March 15, 2012).*

Defendant consented after he was told he was free to go. His prior possession offenses made the officer “curious.” McLain v. State, 2012 Ind. App. LEXIS 106 (March 16, 2012).*

Police with information that a suicidal person is driving to a location to kill himself can stop the car. State v. Dunn, 2012 Ohio 1008, 2012 Ohio LEXIS 688 (March 15, 2012):

[*P22] Thus, we hold that the community-caretaking/emergency-aid exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement allows police officers to stop a person to render aid if they reasonably believe that there is an immediate need for their assistance to protect life or prevent serious injury.

[*P23] In this case, officers received a dispatch regarding an allegedly armed and suicidal person with an imminent plan to kill himself upon reaching a certain destination. Given that stopping a person on the street is "considerably less intrusive than police entry into the home itself, Illinois v. McArthur, 531 U.S. 326, 336, 121 S.Ct. 946, 148 L.Ed.2d 838 (2001), the officers' effecting a traffic stop to prevent Dunn from harming himself was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. Thus, the community-caretaking/emergency-aid exception to the Fourth Amendment warrant requirement allows police officers to stop a driver based on a dispatch that the driver is armed and plans to kill himself.

Defendant fled at high speed across city boundaries from Cleveland to Lakewood City, and officers from the latter actually arrested him. Jurisdictional limits on police officers are irrelevant for Fourth Amendment purposes. United States v. King, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 5407, 2012 FED App. 0270N (6th Cir. March 12, 2012).

A drug dog was called at the conclusion of the traffic stop, and it took 50 minutes to arrive. Since there was reasonable suspicion, this did not unreasonably extend the stop. Federal cases have permitted such detentions for longer. United States v. Adams, 2012 CCA LEXIS 87 (N.-M. Ct. App. March 15, 2012).*

Pro se defendant didn’t file a motion to suppress, so he couldn’t challenge the search on appeal. State v. Henderson, 2012 Ohio 1040, 2012 Ohio App. LEXIS 930 (8th Dist. March 15, 2012).

Buccal swab for DNA requires a court order if defendant doesn’t consent. People v Smith, 2012 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 1983, 2012 NY Slip Op 1896 (4th Dept. March 16, 2012):

An order compelling an individual to provide corporeal evidence, such as blood or saliva for DNA analysis, constitutes a search and seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment (see Skinner v Railway Labor Executives' Assn., 489 U.S. 602, 618; Schmerber v California, 384 U.S. 757, 767; Matter of Abe A., 56 NY2d 288, 295). Although no New York statute expressly authorizes courts to compel uncharged suspects to supply a DNA sample (see Abe A., 56 NY2d at 293-294; cf. CPL 240.40 [2]), the Court of Appeals has held that a court may issue an order to obtain a blood sample from a suspect so long as the People establish: "(1) probable cause to believe the suspect has committed the crime, (2) a clear indication' that relevant material evidence will be found, and (3) the method used to secure it is safe and reliable. In addition, the issuing court must weigh the seriousness of the crime, the importance of the evidence to the investigation and the unavailability of less intrusive means of obtaining it, on the one hand, against concern for the suspect's constitutional right to be free from bodily intrusion on the other. Only if this stringent standard is met ... may the intrusion be sustained" (Abe A., 56 NY2d at 291). Here, the court determined that the People satisfied the requirements of Abe A. set forth above, and defendant does not expressly challenge that determination. Rather, defendant contends that (1) he was denied due process because the second order compelling defendant to provide a buccal swab was not made upon notice to him; and (2) the method of collecting the swab, i.e., the use of the taser, was excessive and objectively unreasonable. We agree with defendant on both counts, and thus that reversal is required.