Law Commons^™

Reimagining Criminal Justice: Open Source Data Key To Addressing Mental Health Crises, Brennan Gamwell

Reimagining Criminal Justice

A transparent, cross-functional approach to data sharing and analysis focused on reliability and completeness can help to improve San Francisco's response to the mental health crisis, says Brennan Gamwell, a 2022 JD candidate at the Golden Gate University School of Law.

Reimagining Criminal Justice: How We Traded Out Asylums For Prisons, Zaynah Zaman

Reimagining Criminal Justice

The criminal justice system fails to adopt alternative mental health reforms better equipped to handle mental health crises rather than placing the mentally ill in institutions that have proven to worsen their illness. The criminalization of mental illness must end, says Zaynah Zaman, a student at Golden Gate University School of Law.

Reimagining Criminal Justice: In Defense Of Self-Defense, Jude Diebold

Reimagining Criminal Justice

Since the Louisville, Kentucky police killed Breonna Taylor in the middle of the night in her own apartment, the United States has seen an uptick in protests against racially motivated police violence. However, the officers responsible for her death have not been criminally charged, in part because her boyfriend, unaware that police were entering the apartment in the middle of the night, shot one of the officer’s in the leg, “justifying” the next six rounds that were shot by the police and ultimately killed an innocent woman during the botched police raid.

As if this was not outrageous enough, in …

Reimagining Criminal Justice: What Good Has Come From The 'Good' Faith Exception?, Yasamin Elahi-Shirazi

Reimagining Criminal Justice

On March 13, 2020, Breonna Taylor settled into bed with her boyfriend Kenneth Walker after she finished working back-to-back shifts as an emergency room technician in Louisville, Kentucky. At around 12:30 a.m., the couple heard banging coming from their front door, they asked who was at the door. They heard no response. Suddenly, the front door “flies off its hinges” and armed men began to enter their apartment. Walker, a licensed gun owner, fired at the intruders, shooting one in the leg, to protect himself and Ms. Taylor from unknown intruders.

The intruders returned fire, with around thirty rounds, killing …

Reimagining Criminal Justice: The Disparate Impact Ofthe 'Castle' Doctrine, Carmen Wierenga

Reimagining Criminal Justice

On October 12, a mobile phone video showed a Black man being followed and harassed by a white man in Las Vegas. As the Black man is walking away, a voice on the recording says “why can’t you handle it like a … man?” The white man then throws a punch, and the Black man turns and shoots the white man. The white man survived, according to the sparse news coverage I found online. As of October 12, the shooter had not been found. The video spurred discussion, though: would the Black shooter succeed on a stand-your-ground claim? The answer …

Reimagining Criminal Justice: A New System Is Required For Police Accountability, Thomas Johnson

Reimagining Criminal Justice

In 1997 Daniel Mendoza was shot by an off-duty Las Vegas Metro police offcer. The offcer who pulled the trigger had been drinking heavily and wanted to “harass dopers and bangers.” The offcer in question fired into a group of people from the passenger side of a vehicle. This offcer was tried and convicted, which sounds like a success.

However, when an offcer is not stopped before killing a citizen without regard to whether there was a suspected crime, it highlights a problem of accountability.

Reimagining Criminal Justice: Black And Brown Youthin Gang Database Are Guilty Until Proven Innocent, Irish Tapia

Reimagining Criminal Justice

Young men of color growing up across this nation face a hurdle most of us will never have to imagine. If a student of color is not diverted to the criminal justice system, suspended or expelled, they might nonetheless be labeled and marked as having gang affliations, based solely on the discretion of local law enforcement.This ‘identity’ has significant long-term consequences. The “shared gang database” is real. Individuals named in the database do not have to agree to be listed, and they also do not have control over getting off it. A young man of color in a public school, …

Reimagining Criminal Justice: The Violence Of Incarceration In The Midst Of The Covid-19 Pandemic, Tammy Henson

Reimagining Criminal Justice

Six years after the infamous and disturbing elevator video of former NFL player Ray Rice punching his fiancée Janay Palmer in the face, knocking her unconscious and then dragging her out of the elevator, Rice and Palmer remain happily married, both speaking out against domestic violence. Contrast Rice’s story to that of Samuel Lee Scott, a husband charged with murdering his wife hours after a nonprofit group posted his bail in a domestic violence case. The difference in these cases: Rice was given domestic violence counseling in lieu of jail, Scott was incarcerated. Research shows that incarceration actually increases future …

Reimagining Criminal Justice: The Lasting Effects Of The 3 Strikes Law And Proposition 20, Markie Flores

Reimagining Criminal Justice

Despite many people calling for cuts to police budgets this year, police unions have contributed more than half of the nearly $4 million raised for Proposition 20’s campaign deemed the “Reducing Crime and Keeping California Safe Act.” The proposition would erode the impact of Proposition 36 and 57 and expand the list of crimes for which early release is not an option. Proposition 20 wishes to define 51 crimes and sentence enhancements as violent. Listing them as violent will ensure they are excluded from the early release program Proposition 57 enacted in 2016.