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Submission Of Amicus Curiae Observations In The Case Of The Prosecutor V. Dominic Ongwen, Erin Baines, Kamari M. Clarke, Mark A. Drumbl

Scholarly Articles

The important questions laid out by the Appeals Chamber in this case highlight the need for the proper delineation and interplay between mental illness and criminal responsibility under international law. Specifically, this case represents a watershed moment for the Appeals Chamber to set a framework for adjudicating mental illness in the context of collectivized child abuse and trauma. This is especially true for former child soldiers who occupy both a victim and alleged perpetrator status.

Challenging Solitary Confinement Through State Constitutions, Alison Gordon

University of Cincinnati Law Review

Eighth Amendment jurisprudence has resulted in limited scrutiny of solitary confinement despite the known harms associated with the practice. The two-part test established by the federal courts to evaluate Eighth Amendment claims and limitations on challenging prison conditions under the Prison Litigation Reform Act can make it difficult to establish that solitary confinement is cruel and unusual punishment.

State constitutional challenges to solitary confinement are underexplored. Nearly all state constitutions contain an equivalent provision to the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. State courts need not be bound by federal jurisprudence in interpreting the scope of the state …

Life Without Parole Is Replacing The Death Penalty -- But For Those Who Don’T Have The Possibility Of Parole, Their Future Is Bleak., Jessica Lerner

Capstones

Across the country, life sentences are increasingly being used to replace the death penalty, according to a recent study by The Sentencing Project. Nearly 162,000 people are serving life sentences – one out of every nine in prison, the study found – and for those like Darrell Powell, who don’t have the possibility of parole, their future is bleak.

https://jlerner.exposure.co/life-without-parole-is-replacing-the-death-penalty?source=share-jlerner

Qualitative Leveraging Natural Language Processing To Establish Judge Incrimination Statistics To Educate Voters In Re-Elections, Aurian Ghaemmaghami, Paul Huggins, Grace Lang, Julia Layne, Robert Slater

SMU Data Science Review

The prevalence of data has given consumers the power to make informed choices based off reviews, ratings, and descriptive statistics. However, when a local judge is coming up for re-election there is not any available data that aids voters in making data-driven decision on their vote. Currently court docket data is stored in text or PDFs with very little uniformity. Scaling the collection of this information could prove to be complicated and tiresome. There is a demand for an automated, intelligent system that can extract and organize useful information from the datasets. This paper covers the process of web scraping …

Prosecuting The Phone Scammer When Extradition Fails And Concurrent Jurisdiction Exists, Michelle Lepkofker

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

Advancements in technology allow people to place phone calls half a world away via the internet. This technology has made it easier and cheaper for consumers to communicate, but it has also made it easier for scammers to reach more unsuspecting victims. In 2020, TrueCaller, an app designed to block scam phone calls, successfully blocked, and identified 31.3 billion spam calls in 20 countries. In the same year, Americans alone lost a total of USD $ 29.8 billion to scam calls. This Note argues that phone scams continue to be lucrative, in part, because criminal prosecutions of transnational crimes are …

Constitutional Rights In The Time Of Covid-19: Sf Public Defender Sues Sf Superior Court, Alleging Violations Of Detainees’ Sixth Amendment Rights, Golden Gate University School Of Law

GGU Law Review Blog

“One of the most oppressive things a state can do is to take away your freedom and then deny you what’s necessary to win it back,” said Manojar Raju, San Francisco Public Defender, during a rally held on the front steps of San Francisco’s Hall of Justice.

On September 14, 2021, Raju filed a lawsuit against the Superior Court of California and the city of San Francisco. The lawsuit alleges that the San Francisco Superior Court has been routinely violating citizens’ Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial.

In fact, as of August 30, 2021, there are about 429 people …

Foreword, Joseph Giarratano

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Criminal Law And Procedure, Brittany A. Dunn-Pirio, Timothy J. Huffstutter, Mason D. Williams

University of Richmond Law Review

This Article surveys recent developments in criminal procedure and law in Virginia. Because of space limitations, the authors have limited their discussion to the most significant published appellate decisions and legislation.

Disrupting Death: How Specialized Capital Defenders Ground Virginia’S Machinery Of Death To A Halt, Corinna Barrett Lain, Douglas A. Ramseur

University of Richmond Law Review

Virginia’s repeal of capital punishment in 2021 is arguably the most momentous abolitionist event since 1972, when the United States Supreme Court invalidated capital punishment statutes nationwide. In part, Virginia’s repeal is momentous because it marks the first time a Southern state abolished the death penalty. In part, it is momentous because even among Southern states, Virginia was exceptional in its zeal for capital punishment. No state executed faster once a death sentence was handed down. And no state was more successful in defending death sentences, allowing Virginia to convert death sentences into executions at a higher rate than any …

Case Study: The International Criminal Tribunal For The Former Yugoslavia’S Court Transcripts In Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian—Part 1: Needs, Feasibility, And Output Assessment, Besmir Fidahić

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) remains the most important organization for the past, the present, and the future of the former Yugoslavia. Faced with a country that always lived under totalitarian regimes with very little insight into actions of the groups and individuals who reaped unthinkable havoc on each other at the end of the twentieth century, the ICTY set undisputable historical record about events that took place during the 1991–1999 wars and put the country on an excellent track towards transformation for the better. But even 28 years since the establishment of the ICTY, the former …

Reforming State Bail Reform, Shima Baughman, Lauren Boone, Nathan H. Jackson

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

We are waist-deep in the third wave of bail reform. Scholars, policy makers, and the public have realized that the short period of detention before trial creates ripple effects on a defendant’s judicial fate and has lasting impacts on our system of mass incarceration. Over 200 proposed bail bills are pending throughout the states. This is not the first period of bail reform in America—two previous waves of bail reform in the 1960s and 1980s have both ended in increased pretrial detention for defendants. Some of the recent efforts in the third wave of bail reform have also increased detention …

Parental Incarceration And The Costly Effects On Their Children, Briana Rae Zocher

Master of Arts in Criminal Justice Leadership

The purpose of this project is to bring awareness to the silent victims associated with parental incarceration – their children. Throughout this project, the focus will be aimed towards promoting the education of the effects of parental incarceration and the impact it has on their children in a variety of compacities and how those settings influence incarceration amongst children of incarcerated parents. In addition, this paper will discuss parental incarceration in three different lens views: administrative, ethical, and legal. First, the administrative lens pertaining to leadership and evolution to successful leadership, especially the critical component of crisis communication strategy. Second, …

After The Crime: Rewarding Offenders’ Positive Post-Offense Conduct, Paul H. Robinson, Muhammad Sarahne

All Faculty Scholarship

While an offender’s conduct before and during the crime is the traditional focus of criminal law and sentencing rules, an examination of post-offense conduct can also be important in promoting criminal justice goals. After the crime, different offenders make different choices and have different experiences, and those differences can suggest appropriately different treatment by judges, correctional officials, probation and parole supervisors, and other decision-makers in the criminal justice system.

Positive post-offense conduct ought to be acknowledged and rewarded, not only to encourage it but also as a matter of fair and just treatment. This essay describes four kinds of positive …

Session 1: Access To Legal Services - The Role Of Innovation And Technology, Steven Bender, Stacy Butler, Anna Carpenter, Michael Cherry, Sands Mckinley, Kimball Dean Parker, Miguel Willis

SITIE Symposiums

This expert panel is addressing access to justice problems. People without access to lawyers and legal services suffer in many ways not limited to divorce, domestic violence, and educational roadblocks. This panel will ask what lawyers can do to help, in what ways can technology help or replace lawyers in the delivery of legal and non-legal services. It will also explore different legal services being offered by individuals who do not have a JD, online firms, and developing technology in a law firm owed subsidiary. There are six panelists who are broken into two categories: (1) the innovation and delivery …

How The Rational Basis Test Protects Policing For Profit, William R. Maurer

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Since the police shooting of Michael Brown in 2014 and the civil unrest that followed, numerous lawsuits have challenged laws that use the government’s ability to impose fines and fees for reasons other than the protection of the public. These challenges have usually raised equal protection challenges to these laws—that is, that the laws punish the poor more harshly than others. The challenges have been unsuccessful, largely because courts examine these laws using “rational basis review,” a standard that is highly deferential to the government and one in which the courts themselves are often required to actively advocate for the …

Benevolent Exclusion, Anna Offit

Washington Law Review

The American jury system holds the promise of bringing common sense ideas about justice to the enforcement of the law. But its democratizing effect cannot be realized if a segment of the population faces systematic exclusion based on income or wealth. The problem of unequal access to jury service based on socio-economic disparities is a longstanding yet under-studied problem—and one which the uneven fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic only exacerbated. Like race- and sex-based jury discrimination during the peremptory challenge phase of jury selection, the routine dismissal of citizens who face economic hardship excludes not only people but also the …

Talking Back In Court, M. Eve Hanan

Washington Law Review

People charged with crimes often speak directly to the judge presiding over their case. Yet, what can be seen in courtrooms across the U.S. is that defendants rarely “talk back” in court, meaning that they rarely challenge authority’s view of the law, the crime, the defendant, the court’s procedure, or the fairness of the proposed sentence.

With few exceptions, legal scholars have treated the occasions when defendants speak directly to the court as a problem to be solved by appointing more lawyers and better lawyers. While effective representation is crucial, this Article starts from the premise that defendants have important …

Debt To Society: The Role Of Fines & Fees Reform In Dismantling The Carceral State, Wesley Dozier, Daniel Kiel

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

Fines and fees that result from contact with the criminal legal system serve as a suffocating debt for those against whom they are assessed. Many states have countless laws that require taxes, fines, and fees to be assessed against individuals involved in the criminal legal system at various stages of the criminal legal process, and they have the effect of permanently trapping individuals within the system. In Tennessee, for example, these debts, which can accumulate to over $10,000 in a single criminal case, stand in the way of individuals getting their criminal records expunged, keeping valid driver’s licenses, and restoring …

Victim Impact: The Manson Murders And The Rise Of The Victims’ Rights Movement, Merrill W. Steeg

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Getting Away With Murder: How California State Law Determined Recovery In First Roundup Cancer Case Johnson V. Monsato Co., Eliza L. Quattlebaum

Villanova Environmental Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind: Analyzing Inhumane Practices In Mississippi’S Correctional Institutions Due To Overcrowding, Understaffing, And Diminished Funding, Ariel A. Williams

Honors Theses

The purpose of this research is to examine the political, social, and economic factors which have led to inhumane conditions in Mississippi’s correctional facilities. Several methods were employed, including a comparison of the historical and current methods of funding, staffing, and rehabilitating prisoners based on literature reviews. State-sponsored reports from various departments and the legislature were analyzed to provide insight into budgetary restrictions and political will to allocate funds. Statistical surveys and data were reviewed to determine how overcrowding and understaffing negatively affect administrative capacity and prisoners’ mental and physical well-being. Ultimately, it may be concluded that Mississippi has high …

To What Extent Are Appropriate Resources Provided To Veterans With Mental Illness To Prevent Contact With The Criminal Justice System?, Riley Christine Doyle

Master’s Theses and Projects

United States military veterans are a special population of men and women that have willingly sacrificed their lives to serve their country. They are perceived to be patriotic, honorable, strong, and disciplined people. Unfortunately, veterans are not exempt from committing criminal acts that land them in the criminal justice system. In fact, veterans are highly susceptible to developing mental illnesses and substance use disorders which can ultimately lead to criminal behavior. The purpose of this study was to examine to what extent available resources are provided to veterans to help them prevent contact with the criminal justice system. This study …

The Veil (Or Helmet) Of Ignorance: A Rawlsian Thought Experiment About A Military’S Criminal Law, Dan Maurer

University of Richmond Law Review

This Article loosely adapts political philosopher John Rawls’s famous social contract thought experiment to interrogate a corner of law that receives too little theoretical attention: the separate federal code at the intersection of criminal law and national security that regulates both martial and non-martial conduct of millions of citizens, invests judicial responsibility and prosecutorial authority in nonlawyer commanding officers, operates with no territorial limitations, and pulls even certain retirees within its jurisdiction: the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Employing the perspectives of four “idealized” actors—Congress, a president, a Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a potential recruit—this “experiment” …

A Comparison Of Public Defenders Vs. Private Attorneys, Tiffany Costello

Honors Senior Capstone Projects

This study seeks to determine whether there are any differences in conviction rates or client satisfaction between public defenders and private attorneys in state or federal courts. Although researchers have spent time examining differences between attorney type and client satisfaction or conviction rates, little information exists on the assessment of attorney type in the federal system. The study will consist of a two-part survey with approximately twenty-seven closed-ended questions about client satisfaction, conviction, court, and attorney type. The target population will be any criminal defendant in federal or state court with an attorney. In this study, the sampling method will …

Prosecuting The Police: How America’S Criminal Justice System Has Failed Breonna Taylor And Other People Of Color, Dayna Vadala

Senior Theses and Projects

Using the Breonna Taylor case as an example, this thesis will investigate the ways that certain practices and policies in America’s criminal justice system have allowed discriminatory policing to flourish. People of color in America disproportionately experience acts of violence from police officers, and more often than not, there is no justice for these victims. The practices and policies that have been put into place to combat racial injustices in America have been ineffective because of the principles that govern our system. The way that America’s criminal justice system operates is inherently discriminatory and the need for reform is urgent.

The Moral Ambiguity Of Public Prosecution, Gabriel S. Mendlow

Articles

Classic crimes like theft and assault are in the first instance wrongs against individuals, not against the state or the polity that it represents. Yet our legal system denies crime victims the right to initiate or intervene in the criminal process, relegating them to the roles of witness or bystander—even as the system treats prosecution as an institutional analog of the interpersonal processes of moral blame and accountability, which give pride of place to those most directly wronged. Public prosecution reigns supreme, with the state claiming primary and exclusive moral standing to call offenders to account for their wrongs. Although …

When Mental Health Meets “The One-Armed Man” Defense: How Courts Should Deal With Mccoy Defendants, Farid Seyyedi

St. Mary's Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics

The Supreme Court’s opinion in McCoy v. Louisiana held that a defendant has a constitutional right to insist their attorney not concede guilt as to any element of an offense, even if doing so is the only reasonable trial strategy to give the defendant a chance at life imprisonment instead of the death penalty. Under McCoy’s holding, a defendant can insist on maintaining their innocence—even in the face of overwhelming evidence—and force their attorney to pursue a defense that will land them on death row. The Supreme Court’s holding makes clear that a strategic concession of guilt at trial—over …

Law School News: Professor Gonzalez Is 2020 Rhode Island Lawyer Of The Year 01/11/21, Barry Bridges, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Prohibiting The Punishment Of Poverty: The Abolition Of Wealth-Based Criminal Disenfranchisement, Amy Ciardiello

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The majority of U.S. states disenfranchise formerly incarcerated individuals because of their poverty by conditioning re-enfranchisement on the full payment of legal financial obligations. This Note discusses the practice of wealth-based criminal disenfranchisement where the inability to pay legal financial obligations, including fines, fees, restitution, interest payments, court debts, and other economic penalties, prohibits low-income, formerly incarcerated individuals from voting. This Note argues this issue has not been adequately addressed due to unsuccessful legislative reforms and failed legal challenges. An examination of state policies, federal and state legislative reforms, and litigation shows that a more drastic state legislative solution is …

The Disruption Of Covid-19: How A Virtual World Creates Opportunity For Improvement In The Criminal Justice System’S Treatment Of Complainants Of Sexual Violence, Leah Roberston

Law in a Post-Pandemic World

This paper argues that the COVID-19 pandemic has normalized video conferencing within the legal system such that survivors ought to be able to routinely testify outside of the court environment. Though there have always been high rates of sexualized violence, the onset of the pandemic has led to increased rates of sexualized violence, which could lead to greater numbers of trials prosecuting perpetrators. However, only a small amount of complainants turn to the court as a form of justice. This is likely due to the inhumane conditions inflicted on complainants during the trial process. The pandemic has revealed that the …