Law Commons^™

Youth Matters: Miller V. Alabama And The Future Of Juvenile Sentencing, John F. Stinneford

John F. Stinneford

In the Supreme Court's latest Eighth Amendment decision, Miller v. Alabama, the Court held that statutes authorizing mandatory sentences of life in prison with no possibility of parole are unconstitutional as applied to offenders who were under eighteen when they committed their crimes. This short essay examines several themes presented in Miller, including the constitutional significance of youth and science, the legitimacy of mandatory life sentences and juvenile transfer statutes, and the conflict between “evolving standards of decency” and the Supreme Court’s “independent judgment.” This essay also introduces important articles by Richard Frase, Carol Steiker and Jordan Steiker, Franklin Zimring …

Reforma A La Justicia Penal Juvenil Y Adolescentes Privados De Libertad En Chile: Aportes Empíricos Para El Debate, Ricardo Lillo, Maximo Langer

Ricardo Lillo

Este artículo tiene por objeto brindar y analizar algunos datos empíricos sobre el funcionamiento de la Justicia Penal Adolescente luego de siete años de la entrada en vigencia de la Ley N° 20.084. Uno de los objetivos de esta reforma fue adecuar la legislación en la materia a los estándares del Derecho Internacional de los Derechos Humanos, entre los cuales se encuentran el criterio de intervención penal especial reducida o moderada y la utilización de la privación de libertad como medida de ultima ratio. Nuestros datos indican que con posterioridad a su entrada en vigencia han aumentado tanto el número …

The Undue Burden: Parental Notification Requirements For Publicly Funded Contraception, Stephanie Bornstein

Stephanie Bornstein

This article analyzes the legal impact of legislative proposals in 1998 and 1999 to require parental notification for minors seeking publicly funded contraception. Part I explores the history of Title X and some of its amendments, the HHS interpretive “squeal rule,” and the federal courts' rejection of the HHS rule based on the congressional intent behind Title X. Part II focuses on the Parental Notification Act of 1998 and its likelihood for success against a constitutional challenge, based on an analysis of precedent on parental consent requirements for contraception and abortion. Part III discusses the change in the legislative and …

Protecting Students From Abuse: Public School District Liability For Student Sexual Abuse Under State Child Abuse Reporting Laws, Jason P. Nance, Philip T.K. Daniel

Jason P. Nance

Virtually all courts recognize that a child abuse reporting statute creates a duty to children, the breach of which is the basis of a civil suit for damages. Normally, courts recognize a duty only to the minor child about whom school officials have received the abuse reports. In 2004, the Supreme Court of Ohio extended this duty to third party student victims. Thus, causes of action may now be brought against school districts when a school employee abuses one student, school officials fail to report the abuse, and the same employee abuses a different student. Public school students who are …

Alone And Unrepresented: A Call To Congress To Provide Counsel For Unaccompanied Minors, Shani M. King

Shani M. King

The legal rights of children who enter a country without their parents or other guardians, including the right to legal representation in immigration proceedings, differ vastly across the globe. This Article is the first to show that unaccompanied minors lie at the nexus of international and regional human rights standards governing the treatment of immigrants, children, and civil counsel and to show how the development of human rights standards in these three areas underscores the importance of and the need for counsel for unaccompanied minors. Part I illustrates why unaccompanied minors in the United States need legal representation by focusing …

School Discipline 101: Students' Due Process Rights In Expulsion Hearings, Melissa Frydman, Shani M. King

Shani M. King

Upholding the principle that school districts, as state actors, shall not deprive a student of liberty or property without due process of law, courts have expanded for more than four decades the Fourteenth Amendment's due process protection of public school students. Understanding this principle is essential to representing children in school discipline proceedings. Before presenting a practical guide to representing students in these proceedings, we offer a brief history of due process protection for children.

Foreword - A Dedication To Barbara Bennett Woodhouse, Nancy E. Dowd

Nancy Dowd

Families and family law are at the cutting edge of social policy. As we navigate through difficult times, we are reminded not only of the importance of families, but also of their vulnerability. The challenge for family law and policy is to remain responsive and relevant. This requires that we confront the realities of families, their needs and issues. We live in times of enormous diversity in family forms. That reality is frightening and worrisome to some, but reminds us that it is how families function, rather than what they look like, that is most important. Embracing function over form …

Boys, Masculinities And Juvenile Justice, Nancy E. Dowd

Nancy Dowd

Culture and tradition are part of the macrosystem of ideas and beliefs that have a dramatic effect on children and families. One aspect of culture is gender beliefs, values and roles. Feminist analysis has explored the incorporation of gender in a wide range of structures, challenging gender bias and advocating reform of a range of laws, structural systems, and social practices. Masculinities analysis, an outgrowth of feminist analysis that focuses on men as gendered subjects, provides a perspective to consider those areas in which men are disproportionately present either in positions of power and privilege, or in positions of disadvantage. …

Ethical Issues In The Legal Representation Of Children In Illinois: Roles, Rules And Reforms, Diane Geraghty

Diane C. Geraghty

No abstract provided.

5. American Professional Society On The Abuse Of Children In Support Of Petitioner, Ohio V. Clark (Merits), Thomas D. Lyon

Thomas D. Lyon

No abstract provided.

Keynote Speaker Presentations: 5th Annual Umass Center For Clinical And Translational Research Retreat (Video), Robert H. Brown Jr., Thomas Grisso

Thomas Grisso

This video features the full keynote presentations from the 5th Annual UMass Center for Clinical and Translational Science Research Retreat at the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS) in Worcester, MA, on May 20, 2014.

Beginning at 12:40

1st Keynote Speaker: Robert H. Brown, Jr., MD, D.Phil, Chair, Department of Neurology, UMMS. “Lou Gehrig Disease: From Mapping to Medicines”

Beginning at 1:22:19

2nd Keynote Speaker: Thomas Grisso, PhD, Director, Law and Psychiatry Program and Professor, Department of Psychiatry, UMMS. Recipient, Chancellor’s Medal for Distinguished Scholarship. “Translational Research in Law and Psychiatry”

Also included is a brief introductory presentation with updates …

Ban Harms Georgia Kids, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Emerging Limitations On The Rights Of The Child: The U.N. Convention On The Rights Of The Child And Its Early Case Law, Jonathan Todres

Jonathan Todres

No abstract provided.

Mainstreaming Children's Rights In Post-Disaster Settings, Jonathan Todres

Jonathan Todres

In recent years, major natural disasters — ranging from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami to the 2010 Haiti earthquake — have challenged the global community to ensure the survival and well-being of millions of individuals under the most difficult circumstances. Each of these natural disasters has created crisis spots with huge numbers of displaced individuals, including many children. The international community has struggled to deliver the resources needed to ensure a prompt and full recovery. In these settings, the challenges confronting children are particularly acute. Yet frequently children are marginalized and underserved by disaster response and reconstruction efforts. This symposium …

Rights Relationships And The Experience Of Children Orphaned By Aids, Jonathan Todres

Jonathan Todres

The global AIDS pandemic has left more than fifteen million children orphaned. These children constitute one of the most vulnerable populations, yet their situation has received relatively little scrutiny from legal scholars. This Article intends to fill that void by explicating the experience of children orphaned by AIDS, situating it in the broader context of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, and evaluating protections available under international human rights law. Analyzing human rights law as applied to children orphaned by AIDS exposes the extent to which rights are interrelated, particularly for marginalized populations. In current scholarship, the interrelationship among rights, for the most …

The U.S. View Of The Convention On The Rights Of The Child - Time For Reconsideration, Jonathan Todres, Howard Davidson

Jonathan Todres

No abstract provided.

Is There No Redemption For Children?, Jonathan Todres

Jonathan Todres

No abstract provided.

A Person's A Person: Children's Rights In Children's Literature, Jonathan Todres, Sarah Higinbotham

Jonathan Todres

Although the Convention on the Rights of the Child is the most widely ratified human rights treaty in history, children’s rights are still seen in many circles as novel and quaint ideas but not serious legal theory. The reality, however, is that the realization of children’s rights is vital not only for childhood but for individuals’ entire lives. Similarly, although the books children read and have read to them are a central part of their childhood experience, so too has children’s literature been ignored as a rights-bearing discourse and a means of civic socialization. We argue that children’s literature, like …

Throwing Black Babies Out With The Bathwater: A Child-Centered Challenge To Same-Sex Adoption Bans, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Once Born, Twice Orphaned: Children's Constitutional Case Against Same-Sex Adoption Bans, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Loving Grutter: Recognizing Race In Transracial Adoptions, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Suffer Not The Little Children: Prioritizing Children's Rights In Constitutional Challenges To "Same-Sex Adoption Bans", Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Amicus Brief In United States V. Windsor By Scholars For The Recognition Of Children's Constitutional Rights, Tanya Washington, Catherine Smith, Susannah Pollvogt

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

What About The Children? Child-Centered Challenges To Same-Sex Marriage Bans, Tanya Washington

Tanya Monique Washington

No abstract provided.

Punitive Injunctions, Nirej S. Sekhon

Nirej Sekhon

No abstract provided.

The Effects Of Mediation In A Juvenile Incarceration Facility: Reduction Of Violence Through Transformation, Linda Morton, Floralynn Einesman

Floralynn Einesman

The use of mediation techniques to resolve conflicts among American youth has grown in popularity over the past two decades; Conflict resolution programs have blossomed in school systems, but there has been a dearth of mediation programs for one of our most violent youth groups: incarcerated juveniles. In this article, we describe and analyze the effects and the potential success of our program through the data we have collected. Our article will first describe the objectives and content of our mediation program in Juvenile Hall in San Diego. Relying on sociological and psychological theory in our second section, we will …

Juvenile Offenders: Life Without Parole (Lwop), Term Of Years And A Reasonable Opportunity For Release, Robert Sanger

Robert M. Sanger

A juvenile offender (a person who committed an offense before the age of 18 years) can be tried as an adult and will be subject to adult punishments, with some restrictions. Juveniles cannot be executed and they cannot be mandatorily confined to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Justice Kagen of the United States Supreme Court stated for a majority of the Court in Miller v. Alabama, that a mandatory life sentence for a juvenile violates the 8th and 14th Amendments to the United States Constitution. In other words, life without hope should be unconstitutional for juveniles.

Prosecutors have …

Preface, Diane Geraghty

Diane C. Geraghty

No abstract provided.

Discipline And The Pipeline To The 'Pen': A Proposal For Change, Sharlette A. Kellum-Gilbert Ph.D.

Dr. Sharlette A. Kellum-Gilbert

Consciously or subconsciously, educators are funneling our children from schools to prisons. Moreover, they’re uploading African American and Hispanic children into the system at a number that is measurably out of proportion to their White counterparts. Ticketing students for minor behavior infractions and labeling them as “alternative” often causes them to act out alternatively. Becker (1963) believes that those who create rules and labels for others that do not follow those rules are actually responsible for creating deviance. Ultimately, when students are hastily ticketed and charged when they act out, it’s much easier for them to drop out of school …

Born Native, Raised White: The Divide Between Federal And Tribal Jurisdiction With Extra-Tribal Native American Adoption, Christina Lewis

Christina Lewis

No abstract provided.