Digital Commons Network^™

World War I And The Armenian Genocide: Laying The Groundwork For Crimes Against Humanity, Julia Koch

Pace International Law Review

For all of its advancements in international law, including delivering justice to the war criminals of the Second World War, the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg has long been tainted with accusations of victors’ justice and criticized for violating the principle of nullem crimen sine lege. Such is the case for crimes against humanity, a crime that did not exist in positive international law until the 1945-46 legal proceedings in Nuremberg. But the historiography of the First World War—an era where punishment for war crimes is generally viewed as a wholesale failure—provides an additional, indeed novel, basis for understanding …

Cruel And Unusual Punishment: The Eighth Amendment And Ice Detainees In The Covid-19 Crisis, Nechelle Nicholas

Pace Law Review

No abstract provided.

Justice Delayed, Justice Denied? The Search For Accountability For Alleged Wartime Atrocities Committed In Sri Lanka, Aloka Wanigasuriya

Pace International Law Review

During the final stages of its nearly three-decades-long civil war in 2009, Sri Lanka attracted considerable international attention due to the allegations of international crimes that were said to have been committed both by the Sri Lankan government Armed Forces, the Guerilla Force, and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). According to United Nations (UN) experts, an estimated 40,000 civilians were killed during the final offensive, which lasted from January to May 2009. However, the Sri Lankan government has set this figure at 9,000 with no civilian casualties. Several UN bodies found credible allegations that international crimes were committed …

Enter At Your Own Risk: Criminalizing Asylum-Seekers, Thomas M. Mcdonnell, Vanessa H. Merton

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In nearly three years in office, President Donald J. Trump’s war against immigrants and the foreign-born seems only to have intensified. Through a series of Executive Branch actions and policies rather than legislation, the Trump Administration has targeted immigrants and visitors from Muslim-majority countries, imposed quotas on and drastically reduced the independence of Immigration Court Judges, cut the number of refugees admitted by more than 80%, cancelled DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), and stationed Immigration Customs and Enforcement (“ICE”) agents at state courtrooms to arrest unauthorized immigrants, intimidating them from participating as witnesses and litigants. Although initially saying that …

Federalism: Necessary Legal Foundation For The Central Middle Eastern States, Issa Al-Aweel

Pace International Law Review

The Central Middle East—comprising of Syria, Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and Jordan—is in need of a legal foundation defined by a constitutional umbrella that governs it as a whole. This is a proposed broad structure of such legal foundation that serves regional legal and economic needs and includes recognition of human rights.

The need for such restructuring is evident from the persistence of regional conflict and instability. Conflict and instability have been constants in the region in general and certainly in the listed five states. The issues include political instability, terrorism, continuous threats of fundamentalism, and pervasive disregard to human life …

Foreign Assistance Complicity, Alexander K.A. Greenawalt

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

When does a government’s provision of assistance to foreign armed groups cross the line from legitimate foreign policy to criminal aiding and abetting of those who use the aid to commit atrocities? The question presents one of the most difficult dilemmas in criminal justice, one that has deep normative implications and has provoked sharp splits among the U.S. federal courts and international tribunals that have faced it.

In 2013, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) sent shockwaves through international legal circles when it acquitted former Yugoslav Army chief Momčilo Perišić of aiding and …

Fleeing Cuba: A Comparative Piece Focused On Toro And The Options Victims Of Domestic Violence Have In Seeking Citizenship In The United States And Canada, Kiersten M. Schramek

Pace International Law Review

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit decided a case on February 4, 2013 that has undoubted international implications. Toro v. Sec’y dealt with the language of the Cuban Refugee Adjustment Act of 1966 (CAA) and the provisions of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA).

This article focuses on how and why the court reached its decision. It analyzes the conflict between the “plain language” of the CAA and its statutory construction to rebut the court’s assertion that the VAWA self-petition was irrelevant in this case, and ultimately, offer an alternative analysis to this case.

This article …

Babies Behind Bars: An Evaluation Of Prison Nurseries In American Female Prisons And Their Potential Constitutional Challenges, Seham Elmalak

Pace Law Review

This note opens the prison doors and delves into the United States female prison system, primarily focusing on the positive and negative impact of nursery programs on mothers and children, along with potential constitutional claims that can be brought against these programs. Part I provides a general background about the American prison system, and briefly touches on the constitutional standards of prisoners’ rights. It also discusses the history and development of female prisons and illustrates the rapid increase of female incarceration. Part II focuses on the prevalence of mothers within the female population in prisons. Part III introduces prison nursery …

Justice Or Peace? A Proposal For Resolving The Dilemma, Kenneth Williams

Pace International Law Review

This article will address the question of how the international community should respond when the pursuit of justice and the attainment of peace are incompatible. It begins with an overview of the international human rights movement prior to World War II, a period when there was almost no effort to hold human rights violators accountable. The article then discusses how Nuremberg transformed international human rights law and created the framework for holding individuals accountable for committing egregious human rights violations. In the next section there is a discussion of how, despite Nuremberg, there was an era of impunity as a …

The Exceptional Absence Of Human Rights As A Principle In American Law, Mugambi Jouet

Pace Law Review

Compared to other Western democracies, references to “human rights” are rare in domestic American law. A survey of landmark Supreme Court cases reveals that both conservative and liberal Justices made no mention of “human rights” when addressing fundamental questions: racial segregation, the death penalty, prisoners’ rights, women’s rights, children’s rights, gay rights, and indefinite detention at Guantanamo. This absence illustrates a broader societal trait. In the United States, “human rights” commonly evoke foreign problems like abuses in Third World dictatorships—not domestic problems. By contrast, human rights play a relatively important role as a domestic principle in Europe, Canada, Australia, and …

Brown V. Plata: The Struggle To Harmonize Human Dignity With The Constitution, Benjamin F. Krolikowski

Pace Law Review

In Plata, the Supreme Court, in an opinion authored by Justice Anthony Kennedy, held that prisoners alleging conditions of confinement claims retain some degree of human dignity despite their lawful incarceration. Accordingly, federal courts must enforce the constitutional rights of prisoners when they are violated, even if this culminates in the release of some individuals from captivity. This is in stark contrast to previous cases where the federal courts have simply deferred to the judgment of prison administrators. Plata emphatically affirms the judiciary’s role in protecting prisoners’ rights, noting that court inaction in the face of ongoing and persistent constitutional …

The European Union And The Abolition Of The Death Penalty, Christian Behrmann, Jon Yorke

Pace International Law Review Online Companion

The European Union has become a leading regional force in the progress towards a world free of state sanctioned judicial killing in the form of the death penalty. This article investigates how the EU has evolved its abolitionist position. It analyzes the development of the region’s internal policy beginning in the European Parliament, to the rejection of the punishment being mandated as a Treaty provision, which evolves into an integral component of the external human rights project. The EU has now formulated technical bilateral and multilateral initiatives to promote abolition worldwide. This is most clearly evidenced in the EU playing …

Beyond War: Bin Laden, Escobar, And The Justification Of Targeted Killing, Luis E. Chiesa, Alexander K.A. Greenawalt

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Using the May 2011 killing of Osama bin Laden as a case study, this Article contributes to the debate on targeted killing in two distinct ways, each of which has the result of downplaying the centrality of international humanitarian law (IHL) as the decisive source of justification for targeted killings.

First, we argue that the IHL rules governing the killing of combatants in wartime should be understood to apply more strictly in cases involving the targeting of single individuals, particularly when the targeting occurs against nonparadigmatic combatants outside the traditional battlefield. As applied to the bin Laden killing, we argue …

Support And Defend: Civil-Military Relations In The Age Of Obama, Mark R. Shulman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Part I discusses A More Perfect Military: How the Constitution Can Make Our Military Stronger by law professor Diane Mazur, a new book that examines recent civil-military relations in the United States. Her carefully constructed work maintains that since the Vietnam era, the United States Supreme Court has hewn the armed forces from general society in order to create a separate—and more socially conservative—sphere. Part II discusses The Decline and Fall of the American Republic by constitutional scholar Bruce Ackerman, a wise and wide-ranging book that argues that the nation’s polity is in decline and that the increasingly politicized armed …

The Ombudsman As A Monitor Of Human Rights In Canadian Federal Corrections, Howard Sapers, Ivan Zinger

Pace Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Truth Behind Gitmo, Scott Horton

Pace International Law Review Online Companion

No abstract provided.

“The Slow Creep Of Complacency”: Ongoing Challenges For Democracies Seeking To Detain Terrorism Suspects, Maureen T. Duffy

Pace International Law Review Online Companion

This article assesses shifting presumptions by three democracies -- the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom – all of whom appear to have permanently adopted some alterations to their detention practices for certain terrorism-related cases since the attacks of September 11, 2001 (hereinafter “9/11”). A review of executive, legislative and judicial outcomes in these three countries often reveals an ongoing tension between the judiciary and the other branches of government, with the judiciary frequently citing to traditional constitutional principles to reassert the primacy of individual liberties and fair trial guarantees. In spite of such rulings, however, the advance towards …

Islam & International Criminal Law: A Brief (In) Compatibility Study, Michael J. Kelly

Pace International Law Review Online Companion

This paper explores why that incompatibility between Islam and international criminal law persists and considers recommendations for mitigating that dynamic. Why is this important? Primarily because the Western-influenced international criminal law apparatus and the Muslim world are likely to collide more often in the future. If a war crimes tribunal is established in Afghanistan, or if the trial of Syrian agents for the assassination of Lebanon’s former prime minister goes forward, it is imperative that Islamic societies touched by those processes feel a sense of “buy-in” or participation that is meaningful for them. Otherwise, it becomes the same old story …

Equal By Law, Unequal By Caste: The "Untouchable" Condition In Critical Race Perspective, Smita Narula

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Caste-based oppression in India lives today in an environment seemingly hostile to its presence: a nation-state that has long been labeled the “world's largest democracy;” a progressive and protective constitution; a system of laws designed to proscribe and punish acts of discrimination on the basis of caste; broad-based programs of affirmative action that include constitutionally mandated reservations or quotas for Dalits, or so-called “untouchables;” a plethora of caste-conscious measures designed to ensure the economic “upliftment” of Dalits; and an aggressive economic liberalization campaign to fuel India's economic growth.

This Article seeks to answer the question of how and why this …

Head Of State Criminal Responsibility For Environmental War Crimes: Case Study: The Arabian Gulf Armed Conflict 1990-1991, Meshari K. Eifan

Dissertations & Theses

This paper aims to provide a comparative study of the existing international criminal law framework and its relation to environmental protection during armed conflict. To approach this objective, the study will review the environmental crisis that occurred during the armed conflict in the Arabian Gulf in 1990-1991 as a case study for determining whether the international community adequately responds to these events.

Thus, this study is divided into five main parts. Part I assesses the justifications for a remedy, the criminal remedy, that is more adequate than the United Nations remedy taken toward Saddam Hussein’s actions against the environment, a …

The International Human Rights Committee: The Global Influence Of The City Bar, Mark R. Shulman

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

International Humanitarian Law From Nuremberg To Rome: The Weighty Precedents Of The International Criminal Tribunal For Rwanda, Kingsley Chiedu Moghalu

Pace International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Justice Denied? The Adjudication Of Extradition Applications, Ann Powers

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article was prompted when a well-regarded LL.M. candidate at Pace Law School's Center for Environmental Legal Studies was arrested and subjected to extradition proceedings. Faculty, staff, and students became embroiled in efforts, ultimately successful, to challenge the extradition request. In doing so, they confronted the substantive and procedural barriers faced by an accused in current extradition processes and the significant potential for human rights abuses. Thus, this article, which analyzes current extradition law, updates what has been a slowly developing area of the law and proposes changes to address some of the shortfalls. Part II presents a brief history …