Alaska Employment Law

Expert testimony:  U. S. District Judge John Sedwick has barred sentence hearing testimony from an expert on the absence of highs created by l-meth (as opposed to d-meth), holding  that such testimony would be relevant only if the defendant (who pleaded guilty to distribution) intended to distribute l-meth to purchasers who actually wanted to buy the weaker drug.   Sedwick said:

if, as the court believes the case to be, the only reason Lewis possessed l-methamphetamine to distribute to others was that the manufacturing process had been inadvertently botched, there is no logical reason to consider the difference between the two chemicals and no reason to hear from Dr. Jambor.

U. S. v. Lewis, 2009 WL 3757516 (D.Alaska Nov. 10, 2009) 

Kimberly Sayers-Fay, AUSA, and M. J. Haden, Ass’t Federal Public Defender, both of Anchorage, represent the parties.

Pretrial publicity:  Judge Sedwick has also denied a motion to transfer a criminal case to another district.  The case involved conspiracy to distribute, and distribution of cocaine charges.  It resulted in publicity in both the Anchorage Daily News and the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner because of the defendants’ alleged connections (via a necklace supposedly worth $100,000) to Rapper Sean P.   Sedwick held that “Celestine’s motion borders on the frivolous,” given the “largely factual” nature of the new articles, absence of editorials or cartoons, and availability of voir dire. 

U. S. v. Celestine, 2009 WL 3676497 (D.Alaska Nov. 2, 2009) 

Stephan Collins, AUSA, and Allen Dayan, private attorney, both of Anchorage, represent the parties.