Bar Admissions

No. 7 Dwayne Steven Spence v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) May a police officer search the contents of an arrestee’s cell phone as a search incident to arrest without a warrant? 2) Does a trial judge’s announcement that a jury trial waiver is “freely and voluntarily given” comply with Rule 4-246(b)’s requirement that the court “determine[] and announce[] on the record that the waiver is made knowingly and voluntarily”?

Attorney for Appellant: Katherine P. Rasin
Attorney for Appellee: Brian S. Kleinbord

AG No. 15 Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Mira Sugarman Burghardt

Attorney for Petitioner: Raymond A. Hein
Attorney for Respondent: Mira Sugarman Burghardt

No. 11 Quioly Shikell Demby v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) Were Appellant’s Fourth Amendment rights violated when an officer, pursuant to a valid arrest, read text messages to and from others located on his cell phone without a warrant? 2) Are the independent source or inevitable discovery doctrines applicable where an officer, using information found by warrantlessly searching an individual’s cell phone, later obtains a search warrant for that cell phone’s contents?

Attorney for Appellant: Brian M. Saccenti
Attorney for Appellee: Carrie Williams

No. 43  Ronald Sinclair v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) May the police search the contents of an arrestee’s cell phone without a warrant, incident to his valid arrest? 2) Did CSA mistakenly conclude that Rule 4-252 is satisfied, and appellate review is available, whenever a trial court allows a previously filed pretrial omnibus motion to be withdrawn “without prejudice”? 3) If so, has Petitioner “waived” his claim under Rule 4-252, thereby precluding any form of appellate review, even discretionary review under Rule 8-131(a)? 4) Even if review under 8-131(a) is legally available, should this Court decline to exercise its discretion to engage in such review here because the record is deficient?

Attorney for Petitioner: Amy E. Brennan
Attorney for Respondent: Todd W. Hesel

AG No. 73 (2013 T.)  Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Earl Americus Smith

Attorney for Petitioner: Raymond A. Hein
Attorney for Respondent: Leonard J. Casalino

No. 40  Aaron Harrison-Solomon v. State of Maryland

Issue – Criminal Law – Where Petitioner was committed to the Department of Health & Mental Hygiene pursuant to a finding that he was not criminally responsible, was subsequently conditionally released, and did not violate any of the conditions of his release, did the circuit court have jurisdiction, after the expiration of the order of conditional release (OCR), to grant a motion to “extend” the OCR filed five days prior to its expiration?

Attorney for Petitioner: Nenutzka C. Villamar
Attorney for Respondent: Joshua N. Auerbach

No. 35 Estela Espina, et al. v. Steven Jackson, et al.

Issues – Constitutional Law – 1) Can the General Assembly contravene or restrict by statute self-executing rights in the state constitution? 2) Does the Local Government Tort Claims Act (LGTCA) encompass and serve to cap self-executing constitutional rights? 3) With 96.5% of the verdict stripped from the petitioners, is the application of the LGTCA damages cap to the facts here unconstitutional under Art. 19? 4) Did CSA err in applying the LGTCA cap to the constitutional deprivations here after the jury found malice and the County stipulated to scope of employment? 5) Did CSA err in holding that all wrongful death claims are reduced to one claim?

Attorney for Petitioner: Timothy F. Maloney
Attorney for Respondent: Victoria Shearer

AG No. 31(2013 T.) Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Lance Butler, III

Attorney for Petitioner: JaCina N. Stanton
Attorney for Respondent: Lance Butler, III

No. 37 Marcus Lee Smiley v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) Did the trial court err in admitting the prior recorded statement of an unavailable witness after finding that Petitioner procured the witness’s unavailability at trial? 2) Did the lower court err in failing to suppress an extrajudicial identification of Petitioner where his photograph was one of only two in a photographic array which was not visibly altered and his clothing matched the shooter’s described attire? 3) Should MD adopt, either as a matter of State constitutional or evidentiary law, a standard for evaluating the admissibility of eyewitness identifications which better reflects present scientific knowledge concerning eyewitness memory?

Attorney for Petitioner: Marc A. DeSimone, Jr.
Attorney for Respondent: Cathleen C. Brockmeyer

No. 38 David Payne, et ux. v. Erie Insurance Exchange, et al.

Issue – Insurance Law – Under Maryland Indemnity Insurance Co. v. Kornke, et al., 21 Md.App. 178, 319 A.2d 603 (1974) and its progeny, did the trial court err in holding that Erie was not required to provide coverage to a second permittee using an insured’s car within the named insured’s original grant of permissive use?

Attorney for Petitioner: Thomas W. Farrington
Attorney for Respondent: Howard Meinster

AG No. 1 Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Darlene M. Cocco

Attorney for Petitioner: Lydia E. Lawless
Attorney for Respondent: Darlene M. Cocco

AG No. 30 (2013 T.) Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Carl Stephen Basinger

Attorney for Petitioner: JaCina N. Stanton
Attorney for Respondent: Michael P. May

No. 39 Anne Arundel County, Maryland, et al. v. Harwood Civic Association, Inc., et al.

Issues – Zoning and Planning – 1) Whether the prima facie aggrievement standard established in Bryniarski v. Montgomery Cnty. Bd. of Appeals, 247 Md. 137 (1967), should be expanded beyond challenges to administrative land use decisions to include challenges to legislative comprehensive zoning enactments? 2) Whether the “almost prima facie” standard as established in Ray v. Mayor of Balt., 430 Md. 74 (2013), should be expanded beyond challenges to administrative land use decisions to include challenges to legislative comprehensive zoning enactments? 3) Whether CSA properly applied the “legal boundaries” standard of review to the legislative actions of the County Council? 4) Whether CSA erred in imposing the “consistency” requirement of § 1-417(b) of the Land Use Article? 5) Whether the considerations established as relevant to special aggrievement in Ray v. Mayor of Balt. apply equally to cases in which a private citizen challenges the validity of legislatively enacted comprehensive zoning? 6) Whether Land Use Article § 1-417 (enacted in 2012) required that comprehensive zoning enacted by Anne Arundel County in 2011 be consistent with the Anne Arundel County General Development Plan? 7) Whether the title to Chapter 674, Laws of Maryland 2013 retroactively required comprehensive zoning enacted by Anne Arundel County in 2011 to be consistent with the Anne Arundel County General Development Plan? 8) Whether Md. Code Ann., Art. 66B § 1.04(f) required comprehensive zoning enacted by Anne Arundel County in 201 to be consistent with the Anne Arundel County General Development Plan? 9) Because one element of unlawful spot zoning requires zoning that is inconsistent with the comprehensive zoning plan, can a local legislative body unlawfully spot-zone a particular property when adopting legislation that enacts into law a new comprehensive zoning plan, when all zoning included in the legislation is part of that plan?

Attorneys for Petitioner: Gregory J. Swain and Phillip C. Dales
Attorney for Respondent: Russell B. Stevenson, Jr.