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Full-Text Articles in Law
Fetal Protection Laws And The "Personhood" Problem: Toward A Relational Theory Of Fetal Life And Reproductive Responsibility, Amanda Gvozden
Fetal Protection Laws And The "Personhood" Problem: Toward A Relational Theory Of Fetal Life And Reproductive Responsibility, Amanda Gvozden
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
Fetal Protection Laws (FPLs) are laws that define and provide punishments for any number of crimes, including homicide, committed “against a fetus.” Previous literature has suggested that FPLs need to be explicit about who the intended target of this legislation is. Specifically, comments concerned about the use of FPLs against pregnant women in relation to their own pregnancies suggested that states include language in their FPLs that make it clear that the law ought not be applied to women for harm to their own fetuses. Indeed, some states like California have taken measures to curtail the application of FPLs to …
Paying For A Clean Record, Amy F. Kimpel
Paying For A Clean Record, Amy F. Kimpel
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
Prosecutors and courts often charge a premium for the ability to avoid or erase a criminal conviction. Defendants with means, who tend to be predominantly White, can often pay for a clean record. But the indigent who are unable to pay, and are disproportionately Black and Brown, are saddled with the stigma of a criminal record. Diversion and expungement are two popular reforms that were promulgated as ways to reduce the scale of the criminal legal system and mitigate the impact of mass criminalization. Diversion allows a defendant to earn dismissal of a charge by satisfying conditions set by the …
How Culture Impacts Courtrooms: An Empirical Study Of Alienation And Detachment In The Cook County Court System, Maria Hawilo, Kat Albrecht, Meredith Martin Rountree, Thomas Geraghty
How Culture Impacts Courtrooms: An Empirical Study Of Alienation And Detachment In The Cook County Court System, Maria Hawilo, Kat Albrecht, Meredith Martin Rountree, Thomas Geraghty
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
Courtrooms operate as unique microcosms—inhabited by courtroom personnel, legal actors, defendants, witnesses, family members, and community residents who necessarily interact with each other to conduct the day-to-day functions of justice. This Article argues that these interactions create a nuanced and salient courtroom culture that separates courtroom insiders from courtroom outsiders. The authors use the Cook County courts, specifically the George N. Leighton Courthouse at 2650 S California Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, to investigate courtroom culture and construct a thematic portrait of one of the largest criminal court systems in the United States. Using this newly constructed data source of rich …
Risk-Based Sentencing And The Principles Of Punishment, Christopher Lewis
Risk-Based Sentencing And The Principles Of Punishment, Christopher Lewis
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
Risk-based sentencing regimes use an offender’s statistical likelihood of returning to crime in the future to determine the amount of time he or she spends in prison. Many criminal justice reformers see this as a fair and efficient way to shrink the size of the incarcerated population, while minimizing sacrifices to public safety. But risk-based sentencing is indefensible even (and perhaps especially) by the lights of the theory that supposedly justifies it. Instead of trying to cut time in prison for those who are least likely to reoffend, officials should focus sentencing reform on the least advantaged who tend to …
Protecting The Substantive Due Process Rights Of Immigrant Detainees: Using Covid-19 To Create A New Analogy, Liamarie Quinde
Protecting The Substantive Due Process Rights Of Immigrant Detainees: Using Covid-19 To Create A New Analogy, Liamarie Quinde
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
While the Supreme Court has defined certain constitutional protections for incarcerated individuals, the Court has never clearly defined the due process rights of immigrant detainees in the United States. Instead, the Supreme Court defers to the due process protections set by Congress when enacting U.S. immigration law. Increasingly, the federal courts defer to Congress and the Executive’s plenary power over immigration law and enforcement. This has resulted in little intervention in immigration matters by the federal courts, causing the difference between immigration detention and criminal incarceration to diminish in both organization and appearance. Immigration detention, however, is a form of …
Getting Out Of Traffic: Applying White Collar Investigative Tactics To Increase Detection Of Sex Trafficking Cases, Evan Binder
Getting Out Of Traffic: Applying White Collar Investigative Tactics To Increase Detection Of Sex Trafficking Cases, Evan Binder
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
When federal authorities investigate sex trafficking, three realities are consistently present. First, most sex trafficking investigations begin in response to an individual affirmatively bringing evidence to investigators. Second, the elements required to prove a someone guilty of sex trafficking under federal sex trafficking laws incentivize prosecutors to rely on victim testimony and their cooperation throughout the life of the investigation. This can be, and often is, psychologically traumatizing for the victim. Third, most cases are viewed through a traditional tripartite structure, involving the trafficker, the victim(s), and the purchasers of the sex act (johns). However, recent high-profile sex trafficking indictments …
Rethinking Prison For Non-Violent Gun Possession, Robert Weiss
Rethinking Prison For Non-Violent Gun Possession, Robert Weiss
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
Whatever the wisdom or folly of the belief, Americans who live in violence-affected neighborhoods often believe they need a gun for self-defense. Yet many are, due to age or criminal record, unable to legally possess a firearm. The result is a Catch-22 they describe as either being “caught with a gun . . . [or] dead without one.” Indeed, Chicago, Philadelphia, and other cities imprison thousands of mostly young, Black men each year for non-violent gun offenses. These offenses do not involve firing or wielding a gun, but simply being found in possession of one—commonly, during a routine traffic stop …