The proper standard of review under the Family Law Arbitration Act is the clearly erroneous standard prescribed by Trial Rule 52(A).
Supreme
Tiplick v. State, No. 49S04-1505-CR-287, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind., Oct. 7, 2015).
Synthetic-drug (aka “spice”) and “look-alike drug” statutes are not unconstitutional for vagueness or delegating legislative authority to administrative agency. But synthetic-drug charging informations were insufficient, requiring dismissal without prejudice, for failing to reference the emergency administrative rule criminalizing the “XLR11” drug on which the charges were based.
Gibson v. State, No. 22S00-1206-DP-359, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind. Sept. 24, 2015).
Six prospective jurors’ exposure to information that defendant was separately charged with two other murders did not warrant striking entire venire or declaring mistrial; trial court’s extensive small-group and individual voir dire identified the affected jurors, and all were immediately dismissed for cause.
Helsley v. State, No. 63S00-1406-LW-440, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind. Sept. 24, 2015).
Role of defendant’s alleged mental illness in double-murder was not so “exceptional and extraordinary” as to warrant appellate revision of LWOP sentence. Jury’s weighing of LWOP aggravators and mitigators is not subject to appellate review.
Layman v. State, No. 20S04-1509-CR-548, ___ N.E.3d ___ (Ind., Sept. 18, 2015).
Evidence was insufficient to convict defendants of felony murder in the course of burglarizing a home they thought was unoccupied; none were armed or engaged in any “dangerously violent or threatening conduct” that was “clearly the mediate or immediate cause” of their co-perpetrator’s death.