The Utah Supreme Court reinstated further appellate review of a failure-to-stop conviction, holding that evidence supported a finding that a kayaker acted to avoid arrest.
The Utah Court of Appeals reversed a DUI conviction because a late-night deadlock instruction coercively pressured minority jurors and defense counsel was ineffective for failing to object.
On remand, the Utah Court of Appeals held that Utah’s single-criminal-episode statute barred retrial and ordered dismissal on double-jeopardy grounds.
The Utah Court of Appeals rejected constitutional and discovery challenges to convictions based on an uncle’s position of special trust.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed negligent homicide, holding that speculative fear of a pursuing driver did not require acceptance of a compulsion defense.
The Utah Court of Appeals rejected four ineffective-assistance claims and held that body-camera footage of a victim’s post-disclosure demeanor was properly admitted.
The Utah Supreme Court held that compulsion is an excuse, not a legal justification, and therefore cannot support the murder statute’s special-mitigation defense.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed an aggravated-murder conviction, rejecting challenges to voir dire, graphic evidence, intent testimony, jury instructions, and trial counsel’s performance.
The Utah Court of Appeals vacated three credit-card convictions under merger doctrine and required an on-record resolution of presentence-report objections, while affirming consecutive sentences.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed a murder conviction, finding overwhelming evidence that thirteen shots were retaliatory rather than justified defense.
The Utah Court of Appeals vacated an aggravated-assault conviction for insufficient evidence but affirmed sexual-abuse and object-rape convictions.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed child-sex-abuse convictions while a concurrence criticized an unbalanced verdict-urging instruction.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed rape and forcible-sodomy convictions, holding that an ambiguous reference to counsel did not end police questioning.
The Utah Court of Appeals held that sufficient evidence supported a fatal negligent-driving conviction and that any speeding-instruction error was harmless.
The Utah Court of Appeals declined to overrule State v. Heath and affirmed object-rape and sexual-abuse convictions against evidentiary and due-process challenges.
The Utah Supreme Court affirmed child-sex-abuse convictions after finding waiver, inadequate preservation, and no deficient performance across multiple trial challenges.
The Utah Supreme Court reaffirmed that amended post-conviction claims must satisfy rule 15(c)’s relation-back standard and upheld the PCRA’s one-year deadline.
The Utah Supreme Court held that a DUI defendant properly invoked extraordinary-writ review but denied relief because the requested constitutional ruling was unlikely to change his prosecution.
The Utah Court of Appeals held that negligent charging delay did not violate the Sixth Amendment where claimed parole and plea consequences were speculative.
The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed child-sex-abuse and witness-tampering convictions, finding no material Brady violation or prejudicial attorney error.
The Utah Court of Appeals held that retaining stolen property can continue until possession ends, making the prosecution of a stolen skid steer timely.
A divided Utah Supreme Court held that a prosecutor may file a delinquency petition after an ineligible minor received a nonjudicial adjustment from probation.
The Utah Supreme Court held that violating the rule governing nighttime warrant service does not itself require suppression without a constitutional violation, bad faith, or prejudice.
The Utah Court of Appeals vacated a DUI conviction and remanded for a new trial, holding that trial counsel was constitutionally ineffective for failing to move to suppress a breath test after bodycam footage showed the defendant biting his fingernails continuously for over two minutes during the Baker pre-test observation period — a question of first impression establishing that fingernail contact constitutes introduction of a foreign object requiring the Baker clock to restart.