Matthew T Mangino

May 09, 2019 | The Legal Intelligencer

The court found that Eric Frein ambushed Cpl. Bryon K. Dickson II with "malice and the specific intent to kill," and his conduct warranted the death penalty. Now Frein will go to Pennsylvania's death row with little chance of ever being executed.

By Matthew T. Mangino

6 minute read

February 28, 2019 | The Legal Intelligencer

Opponents of civil asset forfeiture laws recently scored a big victory before the U.S. Supreme Court.

By Matthew T. Mangino

6 minute read

January 10, 2019 | The Legal Intelligencer

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that a mother who used opioids and marijuana during her pregnancy cannot commit child abuse under the Child Protective Service Act (CPSL).

By Matthew T. Mangino

6 minute read

September 13, 2018 | The Legal Intelligencer

Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro's bombshell grand jury report on sex abuse of children by priests in six Pennsylvania dioceses has been met with universal derision and unrelenting criticism of the Catholic Church.

By Matthew T. Mangino

7 minute read

July 19, 2018 | The Legal Intelligencer

Did the commonwealth of Pennsylvania need a report, six and a half years in the making, to acknowledge that the state's death penalty has some problems?

By Matthew T. Mangino

1 minute read

May 17, 2018 | The Legal Intelligencer

The criminal preliminary hearing in Pennsylvania, at least for the time being, is of no practical use nor does it provide any meaningful protection to a defendant.

By Matthew T. Mangino

8 minute read

March 01, 2018 | The Legal Intelligencer

On June 15, 2010, Michael Toll called 9-1-1 and reported he had been shot on a street corner in Philadelphia. A police officer responded and found Toll in his vehicle.

By Matthew T. Mangino

7 minute read

August 03, 2017 | The Legal Intelligencer

Qu'eed Batts will soon be scheduled for his third sentencing hearing. His long and torturous journey through the criminal justice system has placed him right smack in the middle of a judicially driven realignment of juvenile punishment.

By Matthew T. Mangino

9 minute read

May 11, 2017 | The Legal Intelligencer

Violence and trickery distinguish plunder from the voluntary, and mutually beneficial, exchange of wealth. There are two types of plunder—"illegal plunder" undertaken by thieves and robbers, and "legal plunder," usually undertaken by the government and officials "legally" exempt from the usual prohibitions against taking other people's property by force.

By Matthew T. Mangino

11 minute read

March 23, 2017 | The Legal Intelligencer

An age-old Pennsylvania legal tradition—the inability to upset a jury verdict regardless of the content or subject matter of a jury's internal deliberations—has been overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

By Matthew T. Mangino

11 minute read