Criminal Law and Procedure in Guam
The Criminal Law and Procedure section tests Guam's criminal code and constitutional criminal procedure: elements, defenses, accomplice and conspiracy liability, searches and seizures, interrogation, right to counsel, and trial rights. Guam's code is in Title 9 of the Guam Code Annotated, and its criminal procedure rules track the federal rules.
Substantive law
- Guam's criminal code defines offenses; many provisions track California, but Guam has its own enhancements and local offenses.
- Mens rea: purposeful, knowing, reckless, and negligent; strict-liability offenses are disfavored.
- Defenses: self-defense (reasonable belief, proportionality, no initial aggressor), necessity, duress, insanity under Guam's statutory test, and entrapment.
- Accomplice liability and conspiracy; withdrawal requires communication and neutralization of aid.
Procedure
- The Fourth Amendment applies to Guam through the Organic Act: warrants, exceptions for search incident to arrest, automobiles, consent, exigency, and plain view.
- Miranda applies to custodial interrogation; invocation must be unambiguous; the right to counsel attaches at critical stages.
- The Guam Rules of Criminal Procedure govern arrest, preliminary hearings, arraignment, discovery, and trial.
- The exclusionary rule and fruit-of-the-poisonous-tree doctrine apply.
Worked example
Police stop a driver for a cracked windshield. The stop is valid because it is based on an observed traffic violation. The officer asks for license and registration, then orders the driver out and searches the passenger compartment without consent. Under Arizona v. Gant, a vehicle search incident to arrest is allowed only if the arrestee is within reaching distance of the passenger compartment or the officer reasonably believes evidence of the offense of arrest is there. A cracked windshield is not an offense for which evidence would be in the car. The search is invalid, and drugs found are suppressed unless another exception applies. If the driver was arrested on an outstanding warrant, Gant still limits the search.
Traps
- Assuming federal law is the ceiling; Guam courts may interpret Organic Act protections more broadly.
- Confusing custody with a brief detention for Miranda purposes.
- Forgetting that a traffic stop is a seizure.
- Overlooking Guam-specific offenses, enhancements, and sentencing rules.
A strong answer identifies the seizure or interrogation event, states the governing rule, and applies the exception precisely.