Free CCTL Practice Questions

Question 1

An officer completes a lawful traffic stop, returns the driver's documents, and issues a warning. Without consent or any additional reasonable suspicion, the officer orders the driver to remain for six more minutes while a drug-detection dog arrives. The dog alerts, and a vehicle search uncovers cocaine. In the resulting federal prosecution, the government emphasizes that an exterior dog sniff is not itself a search. How does that argument affect the legality of the additional detention?

Accepted Answer

The added detention is unlawful because it lacks an independent justification.

Answer

The detention remains lawful because a procedure that is not a search cannot unlawfully extend a traffic stop.

Answer

The detention remains lawful because six minutes is a minimal intrusion beyond the completed traffic investigation.

Answer

The detention is unlawful because an exterior drug-dog sniff requires probable cause even during a lawful traffic stop.

Question 2

Counsel in a capital murder case believes that admitting guilt offers the only realistic chance of avoiding a death sentence. After discussing that assessment, the competent client insists, 'I did not commit the killing. Do not tell the jury that I did.' Counsel proposes conceding guilt in the opening statement while retaining a not-guilty plea. What limit governs counsel's authority?

Accepted Answer

Counsel must respect the client's decision to maintain innocence, even if a concession offers the best chance to avoid execution.

Answer

Counsel controls the concession because it changes trial tactics rather than the client's formal plea.

Answer

Counsel may not concede unless the judge authorizes the strategy outside the jury's presence.

Answer

Counsel may concede guilt if counsel continues to oppose the death sentence.

Question 3

A DNA analyst reports a likelihood ratio of 1,800 for a mixture recovered from a glove. The numerator assumes that the contributors were the accused and the complainant; the denominator assumes that they were an unrelated unknown person and the complainant. The calculations and stated assumptions are not challenged. Which testimony accurately communicates the reported statistic?

Accepted Answer

The observed DNA results are 1,800 times as probable under the numerator's source proposition as under the denominator's.

Answer

The probability that an unrelated person, rather than the accused, contributed the DNA is one chance in 1,800.

Answer

The accused is 1,800 times more likely to have committed the charged offense than an unrelated person who was not tested.

Answer

The laboratory should incorrectly identify no more than one contributor in every 1,800 comparable examinations of mixed DNA samples.

Question 4

A jury finds beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant distributed a 300-gram mixture containing methamphetamine at 25% purity by weight. He has no qualifying prior convictions, no death or serious bodily injury resulted, and no statutory basis for sentencing below an applicable minimum is available. Which calculation identifies the controlling mandatory minimum under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)?

Accepted Answer

Ten years: the mixture contains 75 grams of actual methamphetamine.

Answer

Five years, based only on the 300-gram mixture.

Answer

Five years: 25% purity establishes 25 grams of actual methamphetamine.

Answer

Ten years, because a mixture weighing more than 50 grams triggers that minimum.

Question 5

A witness testifies before a federal grand jury under an order granting use and derivative-use immunity. He is later indicted for the fraud described in that testimony. At a pretrial hearing, the government carries its burden of establishing that all evidence it proposes to use, and the leads producing that evidence, came from sources wholly independent of the compelled testimony. The witness argues that the immunity order nevertheless bars this prosecution. What follows from the order's scope?

Accepted Answer

The prosecution may proceed on the independent evidence.

Answer

Immunity requires dismissal of charges based on the transactions described.

Answer

The witness must waive immunity before prosecution for the fraud may proceed.

Answer

The government must first establish perjury before prosecuting the underlying fraud.

Question 6

A warehouse supervisor wrote a departing van's license plate in a personal notebook immediately after seeing it. At a federal robbery trial, reviewing the entry does not restore her memory of the plate. She does remember checking the entry when she made it and testifies that it accurately recorded what she had seen. The prosecutor asks to read the entry into evidence and admit the notebook as an exhibit. The defense does not offer the notebook. Under the recorded-recollection exception, how should the court treat those requests?

Accepted Answer

Read the entry into evidence, but receive the notebook as an exhibit only if the defense offers it.

Answer

Reject both requests because the witness still cannot remember the plate.

Answer

Grant both requests because the witness verified the entry's accuracy.

Answer

Require the prosecutor first to establish the witness's Rule 804 unavailability.

Question 7

A defendant awaiting trial for setting fire to a federal building has a documented history of severe psychosis during the period of the alleged offense. Following treatment, he understands the judge's and counsel's roles, rationally discusses possible defenses, and helps counsel evaluate witness accounts. A psychiatrist confirms these present abilities but has not evaluated his condition when the fire occurred. Counsel is considering both competency and the federal insanity defense. Which assessment keeps the two inquiries distinct?

Accepted Answer

The current findings support competency; they do not resolve insanity at the time of the fire.

Answer

The past psychosis requires a current finding of incompetency.

Answer

Restored competency defeats an insanity defense unless the defendant is shown to remain psychotic when trial begins.

Answer

The government must disprove insanity beyond a reasonable doubt before the defendant may be tried.

Question 8

During direct examination in a federal fraud trial, the government's essential witness denies receiving any promise of leniency. The trial prosecutor knows that another prosecutor in the same office promised to dismiss the witness's pending charge in exchange for truthful testimony. Neither the promise nor its terms have been disclosed to the defense. Which response satisfies the trial prosecutor's obligations?

Accepted Answer

Correct the false denial and disclose the promised benefit to the defense.

Answer

Leave the denial uncorrected and let defense counsel decide whether to explore possible bias.

Answer

Produce the agreement after direct examination only if defense counsel requests the witness's statements.

Answer

Treat the denial as accurate because the promised benefit remains conditional on truthful testimony.

Question 9

At a federal fraud trial, an agent recounts an unrecorded interview: 'The defendant told me, “I authorized the transfer.”' The agent's contemporaneous notes establish that the complete sentence was, 'I authorized the transfer only after the bank told me the account holder had approved it.' The judge finds the omitted qualification necessary to correct the misleading impression. The prosecutor objects that the qualification is the defendant's own exculpatory hearsay and that no recording exists. What should defense counsel request under Rule 106?

Accepted Answer

Require the qualification to be introduced now, even over the hearsay objection.

Answer

Require the defendant to testify before the qualification may be heard.

Answer

Wait for the defense case and offer the qualification as an opposing-party statement.

Answer

Establish an independent hearsay exception because the interview was not recorded.

Question 10

Minutes before a scheduled work shift, a client tells his defense lawyer that he is waiting outside his former partner's workplace with a gun and intends to kill her when she arrives. The lawyer reasonably believes the threat is real and imminent. Efforts to dissuade the client fail; he refuses consent to disclosure and ends the call. What disclosure does ABA Model Rule 1.6 permit at this point?

Accepted Answer

Alert emergency services with information reasonably necessary to avert the threatened killing.

Answer

Release the client's complete case file to police so officers can assess every possible connection to his criminal history.

Answer

Disclose the threat only after obtaining an emergency court order authorizing identification of the client and intended victim.

Answer

Disclose nothing without consent because the threatened act does not involve misuse of the lawyer's services.

Free CCTL Practice Questions

Domain 1: Professional Responsibility

Question 1

Question 2

Domain 2: Evaluation and Defenses

Question 3

Question 4

Domain 3: Jurisdiction and Venue

Question 5

Domain 4: Practice and Procedures

Question 6

Question 7

Domain 5: Present and Object to Evidence

Question 8

Question 9

Domain 6: Hearsay/Exceptions/Exemptions (Non-Hearsay)

Question 10

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