Law Commons^™

The Incredible Shrinking Confrontation Clause, Jeffrey Bellin

Faculty Publications

Sharp turns in the Supreme Court’s recent Confrontation Clause jurisprudence have left scholars reeling from conflicting emotions: exhilaration, despair, denial, and soon, perhaps, cynical acceptance. While most commentators celebrated the demise of the incoherent Ohio v. Roberts framework, their excitement largely faded as the Court’s decisions in Davis v. Washington and Bryant v. Michigan revealed nascent flaws in the evolving doctrine and sharply curtailed the newly revitalized confrontation right.

Recent scholarship strives to reanimate the jurisprudence by expanding the doctrinal definition of “testimonial” statements – the sole form of evidence that the Court now recognizes as implicating the Confrontation Clause. …

Applying Crawford's Confrontation Right In A Digital Age, Jeffrey Bellin

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Professionalism And Advocacy At Trial – Real Jurors Speak In Detail About The Performance Of Their Advocates, Mitchell J. Frank, Osvaldo F. Morera

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Bargained Justice: Plea Bargaining's Innocence Problem And The Brady Safety-Valve, Lucian E. Dervan

Law Faculty Scholarship

If any number of attorneys were asked in 2004 whether Lea Fastow’s plea bargain in the Enron case was constitutional, the majority would respond with a simple word – Brady. Yet while the 1970 Supreme Court decision Brady v. United States authorized plea bargaining as a form of American justice, the case also contained a vital caveat that has been largely overlooked by scholars, practitioners, and courts for almost forty years. Brady contains a safety-valve that caps the amount of pressure that may be asserted against defendants by prohibiting prosecutors from offering incentives in return for guilty pleas that are …

Session One: Using Forensic Medical Evidence In Court, Juan E. Mendez

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

"Bad Juror" Lists And The Prosecutor's Duty To Disclose, Ira Robbins

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Prosecutors sometimes use what are known as "bad juror" lists to exclude particular citizens from jury service. Not only does this practice interfere with an open and fair jury-selection process, thus implicating a defendant's right to be tried by a jury of his or her peers, but it also violates potential jurors' rights to serve in this important capacity. But who is on these lists? And is a prosecutor required to disclose the lists to defense counsel? These questions have largely gone unnoticed by legal analysts. This Article addresses the prosecutor's duty to disclose bad-juror lists. It reviews the federal …

Indecent Exposure: Do Warrantless Searches Of Cell Phones Violate The Fourth Amendment?, Amy Vorenberg

Law Faculty Scholarship

This article argues that searches of student’s cell phone should require a warrant in most circumstances. The amount and personal nature of information on a smart phone warrants special Fourth Amendment protection. This issue is particularly relevant in the public school setting where administrators routinely confiscate phones from students caught using them in school. With more frequency, administrators are looking at the phones, scrolling through text messages and photos, and on some occasions, responding to text messages.

The U.S. Supreme Court in Safford v. Redding, acknowledges the special considerations that school children should be afforded in part because of the …

Is Texas Tough On Crime But Soft On Criminal Procedure?, Adam M. Gershowitz

Faculty Publications

Although Texas is well known for imposing tough punishments on convicted defendants, it is surprisingly generous in affording criminal procedure protections. In a variety of areas, including search and seizure rules, confession requirements, the availability of bail, prosecutorial discovery obligations, and jury trial guarantees, Texas affords protections vastly in excess of what is required by the United States Constitution. Even more shocking, these criminal procedure guarantees come almost entirely from Texas statutes approved by the legislature, not activist rules imposed by judges. This Article explores Texas's reputation as a tough-on-crime state and the seeming inconsistency between Texas being tough on …

Electronic Evidence In Canada, Robert Currie, Steve Coughlan

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

This chapter discusses the issues surrounding electronic evidence in Canada. Topics discussed include the best evidence rule, electronic signatures, web-based evidence, and video-tape and security camera evidence. In addition rules around protection of privacy, discovery, and confidentiality are pursued. Finally the chapter also considers the many issues which arise around gathering electronic evidence in the criminal context, including wiretaps, general warrants, and searches of computers and cell phones.