Criminal Law Commons^™

Admitting Guilt By Professing Innocence: When Sentence Enhancements Bases On "Alford" Pleas Are Unconstitutional, Anne D. Gooch

Vanderbilt Law Review

A few days before Christmas in 1994, in Vineland, New Jersey, Charles Apprendi, Jr. was drunk. At 2:04 a.m., he fired several shots from a .22 caliber gun into the home of an African-American family in his neighborhood. By 3:05 a.m., he had been arrested and had admitted that he was the shooter. Apprendi was interrogated for several hours after these events. At 6:04 a.m., he apparently stated that he committed the crime because the victims were black, but he later retracted this statement. Apprendi was indicted on twenty-three counts in connection with the shooting, and eventually pleaded guilty to …

Taking A Closer Look At Prosecutorial Misconduct: The Ninth Circuit's Materiality Analysis In Hayes V. Brown And Its Implications For Wrongful Convictions, Lynn Damiano

Golden Gate University Law Review

This note argues that the Ninth Circuit's meaningful factual analysis in applying the materiality standard led to its reversal of Mr. Hayes's conviction. The Court's willingness to look beyond the Government's assertions and to take into account every way in which the prosecutor's duplicitous conduct might have affected the jury's verdict allowed it to reach a different decision than prior reviewing courts. Moreover, the Court did so while adhering to established Supreme Court precedent and remaining within the confines of modern federal habeas review. The Ninth Circuit's analysis under this standard can help prevent wrongful convictions by deterring prosecutorial misconduct …

The Time Has Come For Law Enforcement Recordings Of Custodial Interviews, Start To Finish, Thomas P. Sullivan

Golden Gate University Law Review

Throughout the United States, more and more law enforcement officials are coming to realize the tremendous benefits they receive when the questioning of suspects in police facilities is recorded from beginning to end, starting with the Miranda warnings and continuing until the interview is completely finished. Recordings put an end to a host of problems for detectives: having to scribble notes during interviews and later type reports; straining on the witness stand weeks and months later, trying to describe what happened behind closed doors at the station; becoming embroiled in courtroom disputes about what was said and done during custodial …

Exoneration And Wrongful Condemnations: Expanding The Zone Of Perceived Injustice In Death Penalty Cases, Craig Haney

Golden Gate University Law Review

In this article I argue that despite the very serious nature and surprisingly large number of these kinds of exonerations, revelations about factually innocent death-sentenced prisoners represent only the most dramatic, visible tip of a much larger problem that is submerged throughout our nation's system of death sentencing. That is, many of the very same flaws and factors that have given rise to these highly publicized wrongful convictions also produce a more common kind of miscarriage of justice in capital cases. I refer to death sentences that are meted out to defendants who, although they may be factually guilty of …

Beyond Unreliable: How Snitches Contribute To Wrongful Convictions, Alexandra Natapoff

Golden Gate University Law Review

This Comment briefly surveys in Part I some of the data on snitch-generated wrongful convictions. In Part II, it describes in more detail the institutional relationships among snitches, police, and prosecutors that make snitch falsehoods so pervasive and difficult to discern using the traditional tools of the adversarial process. Part III concludes with a litigation suggestion for a judicial check on the use of informant witnesses, namely, a Daubert-style pre-trial reliability hearing. The Appendix in Part IV contains a sample motion requesting and justifying such a hearing.

Anatomy Of A Miscarriage Of Justice: The Wrongful Conviction Of Peter J. Rose, Susan Rutberg

Golden Gate University Law Review

This Article examines one case in which students and lawyers from Golden Gate University's Innocence Project won the exoneration of Peter J. Rose, a man who served nearly ten years of a twenty-seven year State Prison sentence for the rape and kidnap of a child before DNA proved his innocence. The analysis of this case focuses on how the conduct of two police detectives, the prosecutor and the defense attorney contributed to this miscarriage of justice.

Innocence Lost ... And Found: An Introduction To The Faces Of Wrongful Conviction Symposium Issue, Daniel S. Medwed

Golden Gate University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dangerous Balance: The Ninth Circuit's Validation Of Expansive Dna Testing Of Federal Parolees, Claire S. Hulse

Golden Gate University Law Review

Part I provides a background of federal DNA testing legislation, the Fourth Amendment implications of DNA testing and two DNA testing cases leading up to the U.S. v. Kincade decision. Part II analyzes the plurality and dissenting opinions of the U.S. v. Kincade decision. Part III argues that the plurality's balancing test has a potential for inappropriate application. Finally, Part IV concludes that the Kincade balancing test should be narrowly applied as precedent after a meaningful balancing of interests, and not as a facade for ever-expanding government interests.

Sex And The Supremes: Towards A Legal Theory Of Sexuality, Elaine Craig

PhD Dissertations

This thesis examines how the Supreme Court of Canada, across legal contexts, has tended to conceptualize sexuality. It focuses primarily on areas of public law including sexual assault law, equality for sexual minorities, sexual harassment and obscenity and indecency laws. There were a number of trends revealed upon reviewing the jurisprudence in this area. First, the Court’s decisions across legal contexts reveal a tendency to conceptualize sexuality as innate, as a pre-social naturally occurring phenomenon and as an essential element of who we are as individuals. This is true whether one is speaking of the approach to gay and lesbian …

A Tale Of Prosecutorial Indiscretion: Ramsey Clark And The Selective Non-Prosecution Of Stokely Carmichael, Lonnie T. Brown

Scholarly Works

During the height of the Vietnam War and one of the most volatile periods of the civil rights movement, then-Attorney General Ramsey Clark controversially resisted intense political pressure to prosecute Black Power originator and antiwar activist Stokely Carmichael. Taken in isolation, this decision may seem courageous and praiseworthy, but when considered against the backdrop of Clark’s contemporaneous prosecution of an all-white group of similarly situated anti-draft leaders (the so-called Boston Five), his exercise of prosecutorial discretion becomes suspect. Specifically, the Boston Five were prosecuted in 1968 for conspiracy to aid and abet draft evasion, a charge for which the evidence …

Throw A Dog A Suspect: When Using Police Dogs Becomes An Unreasonable Use Of Force Under The Fourth Amendment, Lisa K. Sloman

Golden Gate University Law Review

This Note contends that a dog bite lasting up to a minute is excessive force under these circumstances and violated Miller's Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable seizures. Part I of this Note provides a general synthesis of current Fourth Amendment seizure law as it applies to using police dogs. Part II discusses the facts of Miller and the court's application of current case law to those facts. Finally, Part III argues that the court failed to properly apply existing Fourth Amendment seizure law to the facts in Miller, and therefore, the force used was unreasonable.

Do Judges Vary In Their Treatment Of Race?, David S. Abrams, Marianne Bertrand, Sendhil Mullainathan

All Faculty Scholarship

Are minorities treated differently by the legal system? Systematic racial differences in case characteristics, many unobservable, make this a difficult question to answer directly. In this paper, we estimate whether judges differ from each other in how they sentence minorities, avoiding potential bias from unobservable case characteristics by exploiting the random assignment of cases to judges. We measure the between-judge variation in the difference in incarceration rates and sentence lengths between African-American and White defendants. We perform a Monte Carlo simulation in order to explicitly construct the appropriate counterfactual, where race does not influence judicial sentencing. In our data set, …

Housing Our Criminals: Finding Housing For The Ex-Offender In The Twenty-First Century, Heidi Lee Cain

Golden Gate University Law Review

This Comment examines the United States Supreme Court's statement in The Department of Housing and Urban Development v. Rucker that a strict liability clause would be enforceable in private leases. The Court accordingly infers that ex-offenders and suspected offenders would encounter obstacles in their attempt to receive and maintain housing leases, both public and private. Part II discusses the "One Strike and You're Out" housing act and the Court's decision in Rucker. The Court upheld the federally mandated public housing strict liability clause in part because the tenant would be treated the same in a private lease. This Comment thus …

California's Antistalking Statute: The Pivotal Role Of Intent, Christine B. Gregson

Golden Gate University Law Review

Since 1990, prosecutors have learned that in order to effectively protect victims, antistalking laws must be broad in scope, carry substantial penalties, and pass constitutional muster. Convicted stalkers have repeatedly attacked the law as unconstitutional. All such challenges have failed. However, the California legislature has clarified and strengthened the antistalking law through a series of revisions over the past eight years.s Today, the antis talking law is broad in scope and has repeatedly passed constitutional scrutiny. However, the level of intent that the antistalking statute currently requires could pose problems for prosecutors by allowing accused stalkers to escape liability by …

The Dilemma Of Difference: Race As A Sentencing Factor, Palcido G. Gomez

Golden Gate University Law Review

This paper addresses the dilemma of difference, specifically that associated with the race of an offender, as it affects criminal sentencing under the federal sentencing guidelines mandated by the Sentencing Reform Act. I argue that federal judges should continue to consider an offender's race as a mitigating factor when imposing criminal sentences, despite language to the contrary in the guidelines and the enabling statute.

Probabilities In Probable Cause And Beyond: Statistical Versus Concrete Harms, Sherry F. Colb

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Australia’S Homeless Act, James Farrell, Caris Cadd

James Farrell

The Federal Government’s White Paper on Homelessness, The Road Home: A National Approach to Reducing Homelessness (White Paper) proposed the introduction of new legislation that would ‘underpin the national response to homelessness, setting standards to deliver the best quality services possible’.This article outlines the significance of this recommendation to Australians experiencing homelessness and focuses on why the problem of homelessness should be situated within a human rights framework.

False Imprisonment As A Tort In India, Hari Priya

Hari Priya

The tort of false imprisonment is one of the most severe forms of human rights violation, and this paper aims to define and to understand the concept of false imprisonment as a tort in India. It also seeks to know about the evolution of the notion of false imprisonment as a tort, with reference to Indian and foreign cases, and understand who and when can one be held liable for the tort of false imprisonment. It further deals with the remedies available for the said tort.

Religious Freedom And Controlled Substances: A Legal Analysis, Howard M. Henderson

Howard M Henderson

No abstract provided.

Let My People Go: Ethnic In-Group Bias In Judicial Decisions – Evidence From A Randomized Natural Experiment, Oren Gazal-Ayal, Raanan Sulitzeanu-Kenan

Oren Gazal-Ayal

Does ethnic identity affect judicial decisions? We provide new evidence on ethnic biases in judicial behavior, by examining the decisions of Arab and Jewish judges in first bail hearings of Arab and Jewish suspects in Israeli courts. Our setting avoids the potential bias from unobservable case characteristics by exploiting the random assignment of judges to cases during weekends, and by focusing on the difference in ethnic disparity between Arab and Jewish judges. The study concentrates on the early-stage decisions in the judicial criminal process, controlling for the state's position, and excluding agreements, thereby allowing us to distinguish judicial bias from …

Customary International Law In The 21st Century: Old Challenges And New Debates, Roozbeh (Rudy) B. Baker

Roozbeh (Rudy) B. Baker

This Article will survey the new scholarship that has emerged in international law to challenge the two traditional sources of customary norms, state practice and opinio juris. With the recent growth, in the international system, of self-contained international criminal tribunals, new challenges facing international law have emerged. Institutionally structured as self-contained legal regimes, international legal tribunals such as the ICTY, ICTR, and now the ICC have nevertheless contributed to a new paradigm within international law. The jurisprudence of these international criminal tribunals, on a wide range of international legal questions, has slowly begun to be elevated into norms of customary …

The Right To Arms In The Living Constitution, David B. Kopel

David B Kopel

This Article presents a brief history of the Second Amendment as part of the living Constitution. From the Early Republic through the present, the American public has always understood the Second Amendment as guaranteeing a right to own firearms for self-defense. That view has been in accordance with élite legal opinion, except for a period in part of the twentieth century.

"Living constitutionalism" should be distinguished from "dead constitutionalism." Under the former, courts looks to objective referents of shared public understanding of constitutional values. Examples of objective referents include state constitutions, as well as federal or state laws to protect …

State Court Standards Of Review For The Right To Keep And Bear Arms, David B. Kopel, Clayton Cramer

David B Kopel

Cases on the right to arms in state constitutions can provide useful guidance for courts addressing Second Amendment issues. Although some people have claimed that state courts always use a highly deferential version of "reasonableness," this article shows that many courts have employed rigorous standards, including the tools of strict scrutiny, such as overbreadth, narrow tailoring, and less restrictive means. Courts have also used categoricalism (deciding whether something is inside or outside the right) and narrow construction (to prevent criminal laws from conflicting with the right to arms). Even when formally applying "reasonableness," many courts have used reasonableness as a …

Tribal Land Laws In Andhra Pradesh, Hari Priya

Hari Priya

No abstract provided.

Section 4 Of The Hindu Succession Act Of 1956, Hari Priya

Hari Priya

A brief write up in the form of a comprehensive article aiming to critically evaluate the Section 4 of the Hindu Succession Act of 1956. The law, as it stands amended, has not only brought about changes in the succession laws of Hindus, but has also paved the way for some positive modifications in the law of partition, alienation of property, inheritance and adoption, and the paper is an effort to evaluate this provision of the law.

Book Interview: The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration In The Age Of Colorblindness, Richael Faithful

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Volume 6 Issue 2

The Modern American

No abstract provided.

Gimme Some More: Centering Gender And Inequality In Criminal Justice And Discretion Discourse, Shaun Ossei-Owusu

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Procedures For Public Law Remediation In School-To-Prison Pipeline Litigation: Lessons Learned From Antoine V. Winner School District, Catherine Y. Kim

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Controlling Partners: When Law Enforcement Meets Discipline In Public Schools, Lisa H. Thurau, Johanna Wald

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.