Bar Admissions

AG No. 15 (2016 T.) Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Benjamin Jeremy Woolery

Attorney for Petitioner: Raymond A. Hein
Attorney for Respondent: William C. Brennan, Jr.

No. 3 University of Maryland Medical System Corporation et al. v. Brandon Kerrigan, a minor et al.

Issues – Civil Procedure – 1) Did CSA substitute its judgment and fail to defer to the wide discretion owed to the trial court’s reasoning in support of transfer? 2) Did CSA fail to review this case on its individual merits by placing too much reliance upon Scott v. Hawit, 211 Md.App. 620 (2013), a decision with different facts? 3) Did CSA err by holding that the residence of foreign plaintiffs should not factor into the convenience of the parties analysis under Md. Rule 2-327(c)?

Attorneys for Petitioner: Raymond L. Marshall and Curtis H. Booth
Attorney for Respondent: Howard A. Janet

No. 1 Jamal Sizer v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) Where the police make an illegal stop of a person, discover a valid, pre-existing arrest warrant, and seize evidence from the person during a search incident to arrest, must the admissibility of that evidence be determined based on an application of the “attenuation factors,” as held in Utah v. Strieff, 136 S.Ct. 2056 (2016), Cox v. State, 397 Md. 200 (2007), and Myers v. State, 395 Md. 261 (2006), or may a court, as CSA did in this case, reject the attenuation doctrine and find that such evidence will always be admissible because the arrest warrant constitutes an “independent source”? 2) Did the hearing judge correctly rule that the discovery of a valid pre-existing arrest warrant did not attenuate the connection between the illegal stop of Petitioner and the evidence seized from him shortly thereafter? 3) Where a person is under no obligation to interact with the police, does flight to avoid that interaction, by itself, justify a Terry stop; and if so, does it still justify the stop where there is evidence that flight was provoked by the threatening or startling actions of the police officers? 4) Did the hearing judge correctly rule that police violated Petitioner’s Fourth Amendment rights where the only observation officers made regarding Petitioner before tackling him was that he immediately ran upon noticing the six bicycle-riding police officers riding towards him?

Attorney for Petitioner: Helki L. Phillipsen
Attorney for Respondent: Carrie J. Williams

No. 2 In Re: C. E.

Issues – Family Law – 1) Did the trial court err in holding that the waiver of reasonable efforts pursuant to Courts & Judicial Proceedings § 3-812 was constitutional and appropriate? 2) Did CSA err in holding that the ruling was not a final order and not appealable where the issue was not raised in any brief or argument?

Attorney for Petitioner: Thomas A. Appel
Attorneys for Respondent: Joan Friedrun Little and Janet R. Hartge

AG No. 14 (2016 T.) Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Lance Butler, III

Attorney for Petitioner: Lydia E. Lawless
Attorney for Respondent: Lance Butler, III

No. 5 In re: J. J. and T. S.

Issues – Family Law – 1) Under Criminal Procedure § 11-304, Maryland’s tender years statute, in a CINA case, where a child victim does not testify and the court declines to examine the child in chambers, must the court find that the child is competent before admitting her audiotaped ex parte statement into evidence at an adjudication hearing for the truth of the matter asserted therein? 2) Did the facts in this case establish that the child victim was competent, where the child did not testify in court and the court did not examine the child because it found that the audio recording of the child’s statement made an examination of the child unnecessary, although the audio recording contained no indication that the child was aware of the difference between the truth and a lie, and the child previously had fabricated an allegation of sexual abuse? 3) Did J.J.’s hearsay statement have particularized guarantees of trustworthiness to be allowed into evidence?

Attorneys for Petitioner: Nenutzka M. Villamar and Deborah A.M. Ullmann
Attorneys for Respondent: Leslie K. Ridgway and David C. Wright

No. 4 John W. Green, III v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Procedure – 1) Does Md. Rule 4-263(d)(7)(B), which requires the State to disclose “[a]ll relevant material or information regarding…pretrial identification of the defendant by a State’s witness,” require the State to disclose all relevant material or information regarding pretrial identification of a co-defendant by a State’s witness? 2) Where Petitioner and co-defendant were both present at the scene of the crime and the eyewitness identification of the co-defendant as the non-shooter implicated Petitioner as the person who shot and killed the victim, did CSA err in holding that information regarding the identification of co-defendant did not fall within the scope of “relevant material or information regarding…pretrial identification of the defendant by a State’s witness,” under Rule 4-263(d)(7)(B)?

Attorney for Petitioner: Jeffrey M. Ross
Attorney for Respondent: Carrie J. Williams

AG No. 47 (2016 T.) Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Louisa Content McLaughlin

Attorney for Petitioner: Amy S, Paulick
Attorney for Respondent: Louisa Content McLaughlin

No. 7 Monarch Academy Baltimore Campus, Inc. et al. v. Baltimore City Board of School Commissioners

Issues – Administrative Law – 1) Is a trial court’s issuance of an indefinite stay of plaintiffs’ action, requiring “administrative review of the parties’ dispute,” an appealable order where it imposes a condition that (a) is beyond the control of the plaintiffs to satisfy and (b) requires that plaintiffs undertake actions that even if satisfied would substantively impair plaintiffs’ substantive and procedural rights? 2) Did the trial court err in determining that the State Board of Education has “primary jurisdiction” over the Charter School Operators’ contract actions and, as a consequence, staying the proceedings “pending administrative review of the parties’ dispute by the State Board of Education?” 3) If Question (2) is answered in the negative, then what process is available to plaintiffs both at the State Board and then in court that would permit their claims to be fully heard and adjudicated, with relief granted, and that would not deprive Petitioners of their substantive rights?

Attorney for Petitioner: Francis W. DuBois
Attorney for Respondent: Steven F. Barley

AG No. 38 (2016 T.)   Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland v. Maurice Marnea Moody

Attorney for Petitioner: Amy S. Paulick
Attorney for Respondent: Maurice Marnea Moody

Misc. No. 1 Quanta Brownlee et al. v. Liberty Mutual Fire Insurance Co. et al.

Certified Question from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland

Question - Would application of Georgia's interpretation of the pollution exclusion contained in the insurance policy issued by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company to the Salvation Army as excluding coverage for bodily nijuries resulting form the ingestion of lead-based paint violate Maryland public policy?

Attorneys for Appellant: Brian S. Brown and Christopher T. Casiano
Attorneys for Appellee: Robert L. Hoegle and Jeaneen J. Johnson

No. 6 Martaz Johnson v. State of Maryland

Issues – Criminal Law – 1) Does CSA’s opinion in Gross v. State, 229 Md.App. 24 (2016), holding that expert testimony is not necessary for the admission of GPS-derived location evidence, conflict with this Court’s opinion in State v. Payne, 440 Md. 680 (2014)? 2) As applied in this case, did the trial court err under Payne in permitting a State’s witness to read a cell phone’s GPS location record to the jury and permitting that witness to interpret those records, when the witness admitted that he did not understand how the technology worked or how it produced the record at issue? 3) Was this question properly preserved for appellate review?

Attorneys for Petitioner: Kiran Iyer and Mark Colvin
Attorney for Respondent: Robert K. Taylor, Jr.