SORNA IN WISCONSIN: AS THE LAW COMES INTO FOCUS FOR STATES, CLEAR ADVICE FOR PRACTITIONERS REMAINS ELUSIVE. By Marcus J Berghahn

Marcus J. Berghahn

Introduction.

Federal sex offender registration requirements apply to those

convicted of sex offenses, regardless whether those convictions were entered by state or federal courts. Understanding the federal sex offender registration scheme is important because the failure to register will expose clients to federal criminal prosecution and significant prison sentences. And an obligation to register as a sex offender under federal law may exist even if the client is not required to similarly register under Wisconsin law.

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BEST IN SHOW: ADMISSIBILITY OF POLICE DOG EVIDENCE By Stephen P. Hurley & Marcus J. Berghahn

I.         Introduction.


A few years ago, we undertook the defense of a "cold case" and, in the course of that case, had to learn about dogs and their olfactory abilities.  Our client was accused of killing his former spouse thirty years prior; the former spouse had gone missing around the time of her divorce from our client and her body had never been found.  The state's case was built, in part, on the testimony of human-remains-detection-dog handlers who would testify to the reaction of their dogs at various locations associated with our client.  While a homicide case can be prosecuted without a body, this was a novel theory of prosecution.  Here, the state was attempting to prove the element of death through the scent of a decaying body at locations tied to our client.  The following article reflects what we learned from the standpoint of the admissibility of dog-sniff evidence. 

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