On June 6, 2023, the New Jersey Appellate Division issued State v. Johnson, a valuable published opinion that clarifies the procedures that must be followed under the “vehicle registration search” exception to the warrant requirement. The vehicle registration search exception the warrant requirement authorizes police to enter a lawfully stopped vehicle to conduct a [...]
Law enforcement and intelligence agencies around the world use facial recognition technology and other AI in investigations to track targets’ movements and as evidence in prosecutions. While books and movies often portray this technology as highly advanced and foolproof, reality can be quite different. Recent cases have demonstrated that facial recognition technology is far [...]
On June 23, 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States issued a decision that dramatically altered a citizen’s ability to carry a firearm outside one’s home. New York State Rifle & Pistol Assoc. v. Bruen, No. 20-843, was a challenge to New York State’s Law requiring justifiable need and good cause for an [...]
Cybercrimes – hacking, phishing, ransomware and the like - are well-known to every user of the internet. We are bombarded weekly with emails and texts claiming that we need to update our passwords, personal profile, and the like. Now comes the rise of what has been called “romance scams”. The typical scheme starts with [...]
In response to a dramatic surge in car thefts across New Jersey, State Attorney General Matt Platkin announced today that he is reversing a policy that prevented police officers from pursuing stolen cars. In late 2021, Platkin effected a statewide policy that prohibited police from chasing a stolen car unless they suspected it had been used [...]
It’s 6 a.m. or 8 p.m., your doorbell rings and two people are standing outside holding up their badges and credentials. They say they are Special Agents with the FBI or IRS and would like to talk with you for just a few minutes about something important. They ask if they could come in [...]
Gurbir Grewal, the New Jersey State Attorney General, recently announced a new policy that will affect the State’s more than 38,000 police officers beginning on December 31, 2021. The change comes after two years of study into racial disparities and other issues involving the use of force in New Jersey. The new rules, which will limit the use of force, ban using police dogs on suspects who are simply resisting arrest and require departments to review every incident where force was used, are focused on protecting the “sanctity of human life.”
At airports throughout the United States, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) officers are seizing travelers’ cash when coming into and leaving the country for failure to report the cash. Regular international travelers may be familiar with the Customs forms airlines hand out just prior to arrival in the United States. On the form you must declare goods purchased during your international travel, as well as any cash in excess of $10,000. Most people do not realize, however, that you must also declare any cash in excess of $10,000 before you leave the United States, as well.
Press reports of late have revealed that former Army Lieutenant-General and National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and former Trump Foreign Policy Advisor George Papadopoulos pled guilty to making false statements to government agents. Federal statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1001, prohibits a person “in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch” of the federal government from “knowingly and willfully” (1) falsifying, concealing or covering up “by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;” (2) making any materially “false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation;” or (3) making or using “any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry …”.
You are driving on the roads of New Jersey, paying attention to the speed limit, road conditions, and other drivers, when you glance in your rearview mirror and see the flashing strobe lights of a police car. You carefully reduce speed and pull to the side of the road to let the officer pass, but you realize he is pulling you over. What do you do, and what are your rights?