By ROBERT GAVIN
Published 05:26 p.m., Thursday, June 23, 2011

ALBANY -- For the second time in three years, Danielle Nisselbeck has been convicted of felony assault for kicking an Albany police officer in the groin outside a Lark Street bar.

By DON LEHMAN--dlehman@poststar.com

The state's highest court has upheld the manslaughter conviction of a former Greenwich woman in the 2007 death of her infant son.

Court: Jurors should have had a lesser-charge option for woman accused of kicking cop

By ROBERT GAVIN Staff writer

ALBANY -- A woman convicted of kicking an Albany police officer in the groin has won the right to a new trial.

By ROBERT GAVIN Staff writer

Published 12:01 a.m., Wednesday, June 15, 2011

If you were on trial for manslaughter, would you be OK with a juror who had a crush on one of the prosecutors?

But lesser conviction reversed for woman whose baby was killed

By ROBERT GAVIN Staff writer
Updated 12:01 a.m., Friday, June 10, 2011

ALBANY -- The state's highest court has reversed the reckless endangerment conviction of a Glens Falls woman found guilty of causing her eight-month-old son's death in 2007.

BY ROBERT GAVIN Staff writer

Published 12:01 a.m., Wednesday, June 8, 2011

ALBANY -- A woman whose conviction of felony assault for kicking an Albany police officer in 2009 was overturned last week was released Tuesday on $30,000 bail.

The New York State Court of Appeals has granted leave to appeal in the case of People v. Alicia Lewie.  In November 2009, Matthew C. Hug, secured a reversal of one of two manslaughter in the second degree convictions before the New York State Appellate Division, Third Department.

March 24, 2009: Matthew C. Hug, argued the case of People v. Scott Weaver, before the New York State Court of Appeals (NY's highest court).

The issue: whether the government must get a warrant before tracking New Yorker's with a GPS tracking device secretely affixed to their motor vehicle. Given the import of this decision on the lives of all New Yorker's the Court of Appeals has posted the video of oral argument on their webpage.

The case was also widely reported in New York and as far away as the Seattle Post Intelligencer. A decision is expected soon.

February 19, 2009: Matthew C. Hug, secures a complete reversal of conviction for an individual convicted before an Albany County jury and thereafter sentenced to 50 years in prison.

Matthew C. Hug publishes a weekly blog highlighting an important or interesting decision from the appellate courts of the State of New York.

http://newyorkappeals.blogspot.com/

Notable Subjects:

Appellate Division Reverses Earlier Banking Law Decision

On March 27, 2007, Matthew C. Hug secured a major victory for all injured police officers in the State of New York by ensuring that they would continue to be entitled to Social Security Disability Benefits along with their statutorily mandated 207-c benefits.

Moving Violation: Traffic Ticket Blog

Current Topics

• Out-of-State Traffic Convictions and Your New York License
• Traffic Ticket Annotated
• North Greenbush Town Court

In 2009, Matthew C. Hug won the landmark case of People v. Weaver in which the New York State Court of Appeals held that GPS surveillance of the citizens of the State of New York without a warrant was unconstitutional.  Up until this decision, it was generally the law of the land that individuals had no privacy protection from the intrusion of the government into their comings and goings on public roads.  In Weaver, the police had attached, without a warrant, a small "Q-ball" GPS monitoring device.  This device was able to track with extreme accuracy, every movement of Mr. Weaver's vehicle for a period of over 60 days.  The government argued that citizens of the State of New York had no interest in privacy in their comings and goings and that the government could essentially place these devices on anyone's car without any oversight and indeed without any suspicion that the individual was engaged in illegal behavior.

The Court's decision was, by no means, a foregone conclusion.  In fact, the NY Court of Appeals was the first highly nationally respected court to hear this case.  This great victory was not achieved by Mr. Hug, alone.  Rather, along with the efforts of Mr. Trey Smith, Esq., the National Association of Criminal Law Defenders, the NYCLU and a host of other civil liberties organizations the case was won.

This victory was no small feat, as it required us to convince the Court of Appeals to break with federal appellate courts that had consistently found that Americans do not have an interest in keeping their comings and goings private and away from the government.  Further, the Court of Appeals in People v. Weaver, held for requiring a warrant by the slimmest of margins -- (4-3 decision).

Since People v. Weaver, was decided, the highest court of Massachusetts has followed suit and also found a reasonable expectation of privacy to ones comings and goings and mandated that a search warrant be procured before GPS tracking devices can be affixed to a citizen's motor vehicle.  At this point, courts across the nation are divided in this issue.  With that said, as a result of the decision in Weaver, New Yorkers are protected regardless of how the US Supreme Court ultimately decides.