If you missed the SL DA's search warrant training you can now view it online.

The training videos and materials for the Search Warrant Training on July 1, 2015 can be viewed by going to this link https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMtaYSh3Bcv4smUejkKweZ6tVAdH0sj10.  After you are on the landing page click on one of the videos and look for this message under the uploaded on July 27, 2015 message “supplementary information and documentation can be uploaded here” Click on this message and another window will open that displays the power points that go with the videos. You will need to have both windows open to view the entire presentation.  Thanks Rich Hamp rhamp@slco.org

Op Ed Piece Written by Donna Kelly

Donna has written a thoughtful and insightful Op Ed piece from a prosecutor's perspective concerning officers and what they go through on a day to day basis.  It will appear in Sunday's Deseret News.  Attorney General Sean Reyes has joined Donna and will offer his perspective as well.

Our hope is to get it published as widely as possible.  Her desire to write it obviously originated with recent officer involved shootings but it deals with much more than those isolated incidents.  Please take a minute to read it and share it with your officers and others who you feel would be interested.

The national debate on officer-involved shootings lingers in our air like smoke at a crime scene. It is a subject that has been on my mind for more than two decades.

As a new prosecutor I was assigned my first murder case. It was the case no prosecutor ever wants to have: the murder of an infant by his own biological father.

I sat in stunned silence reading the reports when a detective came into my office. “The autopsy is scheduled. Who should go?” Having the luxury of making that call, I opted out and asked him to go.

A week later, I walked into a meeting about the case and there he sat, head in hands, speechless. His necessary attendance had taken its inevitable toll.

Since that time I have observed the occupational damage inflicted on law enforcement officers on an almost daily basis.  “Part of the job description,” they shrug if asked about the personal toll the work takes on their bodies and souls.

At this stage of my career, I do training on the debilitating effects of trauma on victims, who experience the devastation of criminal behavior mostly only rarely in their lives. For officers, trauma is not a rarity but a steady daily diet. We pay officers to be professional trauma victims on every single shift and we have the luxury of standing by complacently as they reel from the blows, figurative but occasionally literal, that are inflicted inevitably while they are just doing their jobs.

How many of us accept as just another part of our jobs screaming, verbal attacks, being spit on, being shoved, being smacked? And how many of us have in the back of our minds as we try to do our jobs every minute of every day the thought that we might be violently assaulted, stabbed or shot?

When I go to lunch with officers, they invariably choose the table at the back and sit with their backs against the wall, just in case. Officers always drive their vehicles separately to meetings, just in case. At normal boring meetings when officers attend they attend with their weapons on their hips, just in case. Many times officers will look at their cell phones (formerly, they listened to their radios) and run out of the room without any explanation. No explanation is needed. I know why they are running.

As I have watched in horror the recent officer-involved shooting events so prominent in the media, I am deeply saddened by the pain and the loss of the families of both officers and citizens. There are no winners in officer-involved shootings. There is only tragedy in abundance.

The national conversation that is taking place about use of force by officers is a painful and necessary one, but cannot and should not take place in ignorance or outright denial. It must take place within the context of the toll that the job takes on officers. They are human, and therefore imperfect, but with very few exceptions those who wear badges are good and decent men and women struggling to manage a Herculean task: to serve and protect while adding no harm.

The national conversation should not be based on distorted “Hollywood” versions of events, on myths about police. And those myths are too often based in a fiction that fails to acknowledge the limits of human ability. Every conversation should take place in the context of knowledge, science and reality.

Less than one half of one per cent of officer calls result in any force whatsoever being used by police. This means that the most common tactic of police in dangerous encounters is “talking down” the suspect. In every situation it is the offender who controls the narrative, not the officer. The officer is trained to react to the given unique situation.

Officers typically have less than 1/4 of one second to make a decision when their lives are threatened. The stakes are high and those decisions have profound impacts, but we must evaluate those decisions in light of the difficulty and enormity of the task.

Our society continues to ask more and more of officers and while giving fewer and fewer resources. We expect officers to deal with the most dangerous, most unpredictable, most harrowing incidents that can be imagined. We not only demand that they do so, but we make those demands while providing too little training and assistance, not to mention too few resources for the secondary trauma they experience on every shift.

In the many years I have worked with officers, I have had the opportunity to observe hundreds of them doing their jobs. I have found them to be passionate, caring, courageous and dedicated individuals.

One officer I worked with had photos of victims he had helped over the years pinned to the walls of his cubicle. One day we had been working on a case involving the kidnapping of a young girl out of her front yard, and the subsequent rape and torture of the girl. “Why do you do this job?” I asked after staring at crime scene photos on his desk. He gestured at his walls. “How can I not?”

Donna Kelly has been a prosecutor for 24 years and currently serves as the Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Resource Prosecutor for the Utah Prosecution Council.

See Your UPC CLE Credits

If you have attended a UPC sponsored CLE since 2012 and are a member of UPC's webpage, you can now see all your UPC CLE credits.  Ron has done a great job putting this together.  He's working on creating a filter so you can look at your CLE for a specific time period as opposed to everything but for now, you see all your credits.

 

Click on the Members tab.  From the dropdown menu, select CLE and there it is - a complete record of all the UPC conferences you've attended and the number of CLE hours you've earned.

Thanks to Ron for putting this together!

John R. Justice Application Now Available On-line

This year's John R. Justice Application is now available in a fillable .pdf format on line at: http://upc.utah.gov/jrj/documents.html 

If you have problems filling it out, please let Ron Weight know at: rweight@utah.gov

I've received a couple questions about the W9.  I only need a W9 from those lenders whose loans are eligible for payment under the JRJ loan program.  Some lenders have never been asked for a W9 before.  Please explain that we need their Employer ID or Tax Identification Number in order to set up an account with state finance.  One lender asked if a 1098-E would suffice.  I think this will work.

One additional request, when you send me a .pdf version of your application, will you please send it as a NEW e-mail and not respond to the general e-mail notices I send out.  By sending an original e-mail, it will not get lost amongst everyone else's

Thanks.

John R. Justice Application Process Almost Open

This year's JRJ application is just about ready.  Ron is converting it into pdf format and will get it posted here in the next couple of days.  I'll be sending out a copy of the new application for you to look at and so you can get started gathering all the information. 

The deadline for applications to be submitted is 5:00 p.m. Monday, August 3, 2015.  The loan review committee will meet within a couple weeks after the deadline to review all applications.

Two new major requirements this year: 

1.  You must get a W9 from your lender.  There's an explanation for this requirement included in the application so please be sure to look at that. 

2.  In addition to submitting the original application, you must also submit a .pdf version of the application in this format:  LAST NAME First Name 2014-RJ-BX-0008 (i.e. DOE John 2014-RJ-BX-0008), obviously substituting your name for DOE John.  This will save hours of time copying each file.  Remember, you MUST submit the original application by the due date.

There are a couple changes, clarifications or additions to the application.  Those will be highlighted in the application.

I'm sorry to say that this year's award is barely above $30,000 but at least we received an award.

Let me know if you have any questions.
 

Functional Toolbox

We've got many of the links in the toolbox functioning now.  As you look at what we've got, please let us know what else we need to add, if any of the documents are outdated or if it could be better organized.  Please share with us your checklists, the cheat-sheets you've developed or anything that makes life easier.  We want this to be a go-to source and need your help to make it even better.

10 Tips For Prosecuting a Sovereign Citizen

Teresa L. Todd, County Attorney, Jeff Davis County Texas
The Texas Prosecutor Journal, September - October 2014

I was recently reading in The Texas Prosecutor Journal and came across this article giving prosecutors tips on prosecuting sovereign citizens.  Since I’ve dealt with a few during my career I decided to share to share some of Ms. Todd’s advice.

Tip 1.  “You can’t be lazy just because they’re crazy.”  As we know, sovereign citizens (SC) don’t play by the rules; either the rules of evidence or common decency.  They will say anything and do anything so you need to be ready for anything.  Prepare a SC case the way you would any other case.

Tip 2.  “Do your homework (just like Mama said).”  If your case ends up going before a jury, read up on the SC movement.  Know their issues, their buzzwords and be prepared to conduct voir dire on the SC movement.  Ask jurors about their feelings on anti-government extremists and jury nullification.  You want to discover any SC sympathizers who are challengeable for cause.

Tip 3.  “The best defense is a good offense.”  If the SC defendant takes the stand, utilize your homework and go on the defensive.  Quiz him on SC buzzwords and beliefs.  You will let him know that you have “infiltrated his insane little world” and can speak his language.  Challenge him on the inconsistencies in his beliefs.  He’ll most likely embrace tax evasion or an unwillingness to pay government fees but be more than happy to accept the government’s benefits, i.e. driving, owning businesses, etc.

Tip 4.  “When things go wrong, expect the worst.”  Be ready for the deluge of unintelligible, lengthy diatribes labeled as Motions.  Look for “creative” descriptions of you, your jurisdiction and judge (“the devil,” member of the Gadianton robbers,” “f***ing idiot,” etc.)  Be sure to save them to show family and friends. Have your oath of office handy or readily available to refute the claim you lack jurisdiction.  Don’t let him turn your court into a common law or admiralty court.  “A toddler behaves like a toddler, after all, and we can’t expect an SC to behave like anything other than an SC.”

Tip 5.  “Keep calm and prosecute on.”  SC’s love to get you and the court riled up.  They love to get everyone off track.  “[C]onfuse and distract is their motto!”  Take a deep breath, stay calm and focused on the unlawful charged conduct.  Make sure the jurors see you in stark contrast to the SC.  You are the voice of reason, respect and authority.  You are the calm in the SC storm.  Exude confidence regardless of how you may feel inside.

Tip 6.  “Call for backup.”  If you’ve never prosecuted a SC, find someone who has and pick their brain for ideas.  You’re not alone so don’t go it alone.

Tip 7.  “Don’t be intimidated.”  If you’ve done your homework and are prepared you’ll be fine.  Don’t let them bully you.  Stand your ground and hold your course.  More than anything they may simply be trying to wear you down to the point you think the case is not worth pursuing.

Tip 8.  “Order in the court.”  SC’s can be disruptive, whether its through behavior or their endless Motions.  Ask the court to impose reasonable time limits and hold fast to deadlines.  If necessary and appropriate ask for sanctions (requesting juror costs after continuing jury trial when defendant showed up with his 6-year old son in tow, sat him at defense table claiming he couldn’t find a babysitter).

Tip 9.  “God Bless America!”  You need to respect his First Amendment right to his opinions and his right to represent himself at trial.  Let him alienate himself from the jury by exercising his rights.  Of course object when appropriate and don’t roll over.

Tip 10.  “This too shall pass.”  Just like any storm, it will pass.  Your first go ‘round with a SC may feel like it will never end, but it will.  Next time it may be a new defendant but the issues will be the same or a variation on the same theme which means you’ll be a little better prepared to deal with the “crazies.”