Law Commons^™

Border Enforcement As State-Created Danger, Jenny-Brooke Condon, Lori A. Nessel

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

A woman seeks refuge at the U.S. border, but U.S. officials force her to wait for her asylum hearing in Mexico where a police officer later stalks and rapes her. A father and child suffer unbearable trauma after U.S. officials separate them under a policy aimed at deterring migration. A formerly healthy family loses a loved one to the coronavirus while forced to wait at an unsanitary, makeshift tent city in Mexico after fleeing for safety to the United States. For the people impacted by U.S. border policies, the southern border is a dangerous place—it is the site of …

Cost-Benefit Analysis And Human Rights, William J. Aceves

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Article considers whether cost-benefit analysis can provide the human rights movement with the answers it seeks. It offers an instrumentalist and empirical approach to complement the normative arguments that are most often used by the human rights movement. If human rights could be fully monetized, states could consider the full range of benefits that arise from protecting rights and the costs that occur when rights are violated. This approach could provide states with a more accurate methodology for making decisions that affect human rights. In fact, protecting human rights may prove to be costeffective, particularly when second order …

A Human Rights Code Of Conduct: Ambitious Moral Aspiration For A Public Interest Law Office Or Law Clinic, Lauren E. Bartlett

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

Part I of this Article argues that the lack of moral aspiration in legal ethics rules helps contribute to unhappy and unhealthy law students and lawyers, undermining the legal profession. Part II reviews the existing rules and standards that guide the ethical behavior of lawyers in the United States, arguing that all too often the binding rules focus on providing guide posts, signaling where behavior is unacceptable and disciplinary action is possible, instead of providing moral aspiration and options or next steps to describe what a lawyer should do to deal with an ethical dilemma.

Part III of this …

Extraterritorial Human Trafficking Prosecutions: Eliminating Zones Of Impunity Within The Limits Of International Law And Due Process, Caroline A. Fish

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Note argues that the Baston court was incorrect both in finding the Amendment consistent with the protective principle and in its analysis of the defendant’s nexus with the United States. This Note asserts, instead, that (1) the Amendment is not valid under any traditional bases of prescriptive jurisdiction but is consistent with the United States’ international obligations to “extradite or prosecute,” and (2) the Amendment may be applied under the international anti-trafficking conventions to foreign defendants present in the United States, regardless of nexus, without violating due process.

Part I of this Note describes the complex nature of …

The Save Act Of 2015: Congress' Attempt To Reprioritize Online Child Sex Trafficking, Ashley A. Cardenas

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Note argues that the SAVE Act will not achieve Congress’ goal of prosecuting website operators and stopping the influx of online child sex trafficking advertisements. However, the potential pitfalls of this legislation does not mean the Act should be thrown out in its entirety. Instead, the Act should be rewritten to include well-crafted, yet informative definitions of online child sex trafficking, while also lowering the mens rea requirement and requiring website operators to engage in more due diligence.

Part I outlines the background of Internet sex trafficking in general. Section A discusses the parties involved in online child …

Unpacking The Deterrent Effect Of The International Criminal Court: Lessons From Kenya, Yvonne M. Dutton, Tessa Alleblas

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Article proceeds as follows. Part I begins by explaining deterrence theory in more detail. It follows with an overview of the debate surrounding the ability of international criminal tribunals and the ICC to produce a deterrent effect.

In Part II, we advance our argument regarding the need to reframe the debate about the ICC’s potential to deter. We explain the reasons why the ICC’s deterrent effect must be unpacked and, in doing so, we describe several factors that influence whether and under what conditions the ICC should or should not be able to deter. In Part III, we …

How To Read International Criminal Law: Strict Construction And The Rome Statute Of The International Criminal Court, Caroline Davidson

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

The Article proceeds in four parts. Part I introduces the Rome Statute’s provision on nullum crimen sine lege, focusing in particular on its requirements that judges strictly construe crime definitions, construe ambiguous provisions in favor of defendants, and avoid crime creation by analogy. It offers working definitions for relevant concepts and describes some of the difficulties in applying them, particularly in light of the Rome Statute’s provision setting out the sources of law the court is to consider. Part II asks whether strict construction makes sense in the context of international crimes. It assesses the values that undergird the …

Islamic Commercial Law And Social Justice: Shari'ah-Compliant Companies, Workers' Rights, And The Living Wage, Susan C. Hascall

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

The purpose of this Article is to examine workers' rights under Islamic law. Companies claiming to be in compliance with the Islamic Shari'ah must look beyond the forms of the transactions and the content of the products they sell. The companies and their Shari'ah advisors must also examine the treatment of the workers employed by the companies. If the workers are not being treated fairly, in accordance with Islamic law, the owners of these companies and their Shari'ah advisors should not claim that the companies and their products are Shari'ah-compliant. As this Article shows, the fair treatment of …

Single, Young Female - Seeking Asylum: The Struggles Victims Of Sex Trafficking Face Under Current United States Refugee Law, Diana Squillante

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

This Note argues that the IJ, the BIA, and the circuit courts got it wrong. The courts reject creating a category representing young women in fear of being forced into prostitution because they feel it is too broad and does not establish a common characteristic. However, due to the courts' analyses' inconsistencies with the initiatives of the United Nations ("UN") and the United States to prevent and put an end to sex trafficking, a new analysis should be conducted to fulfill this goal.