Ohio Criminal Appeals Lawyer Blog

So said Ohio's Second District Court of Appeals.  Police collected drugs and drug paraphernalia in a dorm room after Resident Assistants discovered marijuana after a search they were conducting before Homecoming.  While the search by the Resident Assistants did not implicate the Fourth Amendment (since they were acting solely as private citizens), the police violated the Fourth Amendment when they entered the dorm room without a warrant to retrieve the contraband the Resident Assistants collected.  Upon remand, the charges were dismissed by the State.  You can see the decision by clicking here.

Ohio's Second District Court of Appeals reduced a burglary conviction from a second degree felony under Ohio Revised Code Section 2911.12(A)(2) to a third degree felony under (A)(3) which essentially took three years off the defendant's sentence (the defendant had been sentenced to the maximum for the burglary).  The defendant would be released three years earlier after his win on appeal because the State failed to prove that anyone was "present or likely to be present" during the burglary as required by section (A)(2).  Read the full opinion by the Second District Court of Appeals, Clark County (county court located in Springfield, Ohio), here.