State Blakely stories in the newspapers

Though, as detailed here and here, I have given up tracking comprehensively Blakely decisions coming from lower state courts, the newspapers help spotlighting interesting state Blakely developments:

• This article from Metropolitan News-Enterprise discusses a noteworthy recent Blakely ruling, People v. Vu, from California’s Fourth District Court of Appeal.  Though I am not sure Vu breaks new ground, the article details how “messy” Blakely issues are in California (a point also highlighted in the California-centric Blakely coverage by the FDAP and ADI).

• This article from the Yuma Sun discusses at length an Arizona case in which the litigants and courts are dickering over the status of a plea deal in the wake of Blakely.  According to the article, in a case involving a Marine accused in the stabbing death of an elderly man, the “Arizona Court of Appeals ruled that the Yuma County Attorney’s Office may not withdraw from a plea agreement in it previously made.”   The article also reports that the court held that “the Blakely decision required a jury to determine aggravating factors, and that the [sentencing] judge could empanel a jury for that limited purpose.”