May 22, 2026 Case Summaries

A person can commit the crime of attempting to influence a public service by engaging a third party to commit deceptive acts on their behalf. And here, the evidence that Hupke convinced his mother to lie to his parole officer was sufficient to affirm his conviction.

For the purposes of aggravated robbery under section 18-4-302(1)(d), a person represents that they are “armed” when they state they have a weapon in a place that is “easily accessible and readily available for use.” As such, the PH court erred by dismissing the aggravated robbery charge where the prosecution presented evidence that Ambrose said he had a gun in the car, while standing outside the car, as the manager of a convenience store tried to stop him from stealing five cases of Red Bull.

The prosecution did not present sufficient evidence to establish that Frazier was able to pay $56K in restitution before the court revoked his deferred judgment and sentence.

After finding that Nakai’s pro se motion complied with Crim. P. 35(c)(3)(IV) and warranted the appointment of counsel, the postconviction court erred by summarily denying the motion without sending a complete copy of the motion to the public defender.

Per curiam decision dismissing petition as improvidently granted. (DIG). The issue was “Whether and how courts may consider the cumulative effect of multiple IQ scores in assessing an Atkins claim.” (Atkins was the opinion declaring that it violates the 8th Amendment for a State to kill a person who has an intellectual disability.) Interesting, but with a DIG order, there would normally be little to talk about. I provided a summary to point out the 60+ pages of opinions that might interest you, and to explain this was likely a five vote DIG order – which is unusual and may be cause for some concern.