Criminal Law Commons^™

Criminal Law And Procedure, Brittany A. Dunn-Pirio, Timothy J. Huffstutter, Mason D. Williams, Robin M. Nagel, Tanner M. Russo

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.

My Three Criminal Justice Careers, Brisa Sanchez

Undergraduate Scholarly Works

This undergrad research paper is about the basics of the three components of criminal justice careers and the careers and salaries they do for a living.

Criminal Court System Failures During Covid-19: An Empirical Study, Cynthia Alkon

Faculty Scholarship

How did the criminal legal system respond to the early months of pandemic in 2020? This article reports the results of a unique national survey of judges, defense lawyers, and prosecutors that gives a snapshot of how the criminal legal system responded to the COVID-19 in the first five chaotic months. Criminal courts in the United States rely on in-person proceedings and formal and informal in-person communications to manage caseloads. The survey results detail, in ways not previously fully understood, how crucial these in-person communications are and how ill-prepared the criminal courts and legal professionals were to deal with the …

Innocent Until Proven Arrested: How Pretrial Juvenile Detention For Nonviolent Offenders In Ohio Inflicts Constitutional Violations, Taryn Schoenfeld

Et Cetera

When a juvenile is accused of committing a crime in Ohio, juvenile court judges must determine whether to detain the child pretrial in a juvenile jail or permit the child to go home to await trial. Whereas alleged adult offenders have the right to pay a monetary bond to be released from jail pretrial, juveniles have no such right. Thus, once a judge makes the decision to detain a juvenile pretrial—prior to being adjudicated delinquent of any crime—it is difficult for that decision to be undone. While incarcerated, juveniles suffer irreversible psychological, emotional, mental, and social harms, despite juvenile courts …

Consider Collateral Consequences: The Inherent Hypocrisy Of Veterans Treatment Courts’ Failure To Dismiss Criminal Charges, Julia W. Williams

Journal of Law and Policy

American veterans are often plagued by psychological and physical injuries, among other hardships, which, when unaddressed, can lead to substance abuse, criminal behavior, and suicide. As public awareness of the difficulties that American veterans face was growing, the problem-solving court movement was also gaining momentum. Largely inspired by therapeutic jurisprudence, an interdisciplinary framework that sees the law as a way to reach therapeutic outcomes, problem-solving courts seek to identify the root causes of criminal behavior and address those causes in ways that promote rehabilitation and reduce recidivism. Veterans Treatment Courts (“VTCs”) emerged when veterans advocacy intersected with the problem-solving court …

United States V. Donziger: How The Mere Appearance Of Judicial Impropriety Harms Us All, Jackie Kushner

Journal of Law and Policy

In 2011, environmentalist lawyer Steven Donziger was sued in a retaliatory lawsuit by the oil company Chevron, following his securement of a multibillion-dollar award against the company for its environmental harms in Ecuador. In a case rife with judicial impropriety, Donziger was ultimately charged with criminal contempt of court and his charges were prosecuted by a private attorney. These suits exemplify the growing problem of powerful corporations using legal tactics to retaliate against activists and undermine the legitimacy of the legal system. Federal judges contribute to the problem by misusing the extensive power they hold in distinguishing criminal from civil …

How Technology Is Changing Justice In China, Shitong Qiao, Zhiyu Li, Benjamin Chen

Judicature International

No abstract provided.

What Are Victim Impact Statements For?, Susan A. Bandes

Brooklyn Law Review

In Payne v. Tennessee, the US Supreme Court upheld the admission of victim impact statements (VIS) on the ground that they provide valuable information to the sentencer. In the three decades since, two additional rationales for VIS have become ascendant: most prominently, a therapeutic rationale, and more recently, a public education rationale. In this article, I expand upon my critiques of the informational and therapeutic rationales in light of a growing body of empirical evidence about how VIS affect both sentencers and crime victims. Focusing on the powerful and viral VIS delivered at the Larry Nassar guilty plea hearings and …

Warrant Nullification, L. Joe Dunman

West Virginia Law Review

Police officers execute thousands of search warrants in the United States every year, often looking for drugs in people's homes. Many search warrants are executed by militarized "dynamic entry" teams who violently conduct raids late at night with little or no warning, guns drawn. These raids have killed and injured hundreds of people nationwide-not just suspects but also officers and bystanders. Protests erupt in response, the community divides, and trust in institutions crumbles.

Legislative and executive policy can reduce the violence of search warrant executions, but could there also be a judicial option? This Article explores one such option: nullification. …

Champions For Justice 8th Annual, May 6, 2022, Roger Williams University School Of Law

School of Law Conferences, Lectures & Events

No abstract provided.

Pretextual Stops: The Rest Of The Story, J.E.B. Stuart Vi

University of Richmond Law Review

Pretextual stops made by law enforcement officers—stops aimed at serving some purpose other than the official reason for the stop—have received renewed attention in the public discourse following several high-profile law enforcement confrontations with people of color. Naturally, the conversations about pretextual stops have centered around their most horrid iteration: discriminatory stops made by bad cops. These stops are damaging to both motorists and officers, and conversations about them are undeniably important. But there is more to pretextual stops than the nefarious purposes attributed to them.

As a former police officer who regularly made pretextual stops for reasons entirely unrelated …

Completing Expungement, Brian M. Murray

University of Richmond Law Review

The limits of expungement are where the hope for real reentry meet the desire for criminal justice transparency. That a criminal record, ordered expunged by a judge after a long and arduous process, continues to exist in the world of private actors is a cold, harsh reality for those attempting to reenter civil society. It is also reassurance for parents hiring a babysitter, school districts seeking new employees, and employers concerned about workplace liability. Not to mention, the thought that all records of criminal justice adjudication could be purged forever intuitively sounds Orwellian, even in an age where surveillance, whether …

Humanize, Don't Paternalize: Victim-Offender Mediation After Intimate Partner Violence, Ren Warden

University of Richmond Law Review

Retributive legal systems fail survivors of intimate partner violence. In criminal cases, when the government and the offender are the parties to the matter, the legal status of a survivor is reduced to that of a mere witness. Survivors then must surrender their agency in the fight against their own trauma. Survivors of intimate partner violence (“IPV”) who turn to civil litigation to recover after their experiences may experience further trauma as a result of time-consuming, extensive, and often invasive contact with the legal system. Even restitution, a largely restorative remedy, lacks the agency, finality, and emotive opportunities that IPV …

The Future Of The Allen Charge In The New Millennium, Caleb Epperson

Arkansas Law Review

"In matters of truth and justice, there is no difference between large and small problems, for issues concerning the treatment of people are all the same." Following the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, social and political movements grew rapidly nationwide to combat the prevalence of police brutality against African-American communities. The impact of the ongoing Black Lives Matter movement has been observed in both cities across the United States and in related movements internationally. This movement highlights the necessity for police reform and catalyzes the public’s growing call for greater criminal justice reform. To achieve the goals …

Keeping Guns In The Hands Of Abusive Partners: Prosecutorial And Judicial Subversion Of Federal Firearms Laws, Bonnie Carlson

Brooklyn Law Review

State actors are imbued with the power of the government to enforce and apply the law. When they use that power to instead inhibit a law’s enforcement, they are engaging in subversion. Subversion is problematic on its face: it frustrates legislative intent, creates confusion, and destabilizes the separation of powers foundational to our democracy. But subversion is particularly insidious when it is done to the detriment of vulnerable individuals. That is the case when state prosecutors and judges purposefully undermine federal law intended to keep firearms out of the hands of abusive partners. Guns and domestic violence can be a …

Minimum Sentences, Maximum Suffering: A Proposal To Reform Mandatory Minimum Sentencing, Jordan Ramsey

Helm's School of Government Conference - American Revival: Citizenship & Virtue

This paper offers several proposals to reform mandatory minimum sentencing laws and asks how we can best uphold Freedom and the Rule of Law within sentencing law.

What’S The Deference? Interpreting The U.S. Sentencing Guidelines After Kisor, Liam Murphy

Vanderbilt Law Review

For more than three decades, the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines have constrained the punishment doled out by federal judges, limiting discretion that was once nearly unlimited and bringing standardization to the penological decisionmaking process. For twice as long, the Supreme Court has constrained judges in a different way—by requiring that administrative agencies receive deference when they interpret the meaning of their own regulations. At the convergence of these two domains sits “commentary,” or interpretive notes the U.S. Sentencing Commission appends to the otherwise congressionally approved Guidelines. In Stinson v. United States, the Court made clear that commentary should be reviewed and …

Location, Location, Location: The Federal Sentencing Guidelines' Abduction Enhancement And The Meaning Of "Different Location", Sabrina Jemail

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

Trauma: Community Of Color Exposure To The Criminal Justice System As An Adverse Childhood Experience, André Douglas Pond Cummings, Todd J. Clark, Caleb Gregory Conrad, Amy Dunn Johnson

University of Cincinnati Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Dignitary Confrontation Clause, Erin Sheley

Washington Law Review

For seventeen years, the Supreme Court’s Confrontation Clause jurisprudence has been confused and confusing. In Crawford v. Washington (2004), the Court overruled prior precedent and held that “testimonial” out-of-court statements could not be admitted at trial unless the defendant had an opportunity to cross-examine the declarant, even when the statement would be otherwise admissible as particularly reliable under an exception to the rule against hearsay. In a series of contradictory opinions over the next several years, the Court proceeded to expand and then seemingly roll back this holding, leading to widespread chaos in common types of cases, particularly those involving …

Race And Washington’S Criminal Justice System: 2021 Report To The Washington Supreme Court, Task Force 2.0

Washington Law Review

RACE & WASHINGTON’S CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM:

EDITOR’S NOTE

As Editors-in-Chief of the Washington Law Review, Gonzaga Law Review, and Seattle University Law Review, we represent the flagship legal academic publications of each law school in Washington State. Our publications last joined together to publish the findings of the first Task Force on Race and the Criminal Justice System in 2011/12. A decade later, we are honored to join once again to present the findings of Task Force 2.0. Law journals have enabled generations of legal professionals to introduce, vet, and distribute new ideas, critiques of existing legal structures, and reflections …

Underprosecution Too, Michal Buchhandler-Raphael

University of Richmond Law Review

This Article makes two main contributions to existing literature. First, it asserts that in deciding whether to pursue sexual assault charges, prosecutors should not rely on the convictability standard. Assessing evidentiary sufficiency in sexual assault cases through the lens of a hypothetical jury is misguided because it incorporates a myriad of jurors’ extralegal considerations of victims’ behaviors, consisting of racialized, gendered, class, status and other prejudices and biases against victims.35 Declining to prosecute sexual assault based on the convictability standard not only perpetuates unwarranted misconceptions about certain victims, but also reinforces their marginalization by exacerbating the legal system’s unequal and …

Monasky’S Totality Of Circumstances Is Vague – The Child’S Perspective Should Be The Main Test, Sabrina Salvi

Touro Law Review

After decades of confusion, the Supreme Court ruled on child custody in an international setting in Monasky v. Taglieri, by attempting to establish the definition of a child’s “habitual residence.” The Court held that a child’s “residence in a particular country can be deemed ‘habitual, however, only when her residence there is more than transitory.’” Further, the Court stated that, ‘“[h]abitual’ implies customary, usual, of the nature of a habit.”’ However, the Supreme Court’s ruling remains unclear. The 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction (“HCCAICA” or “The Hague Convention”), which is adopted in ninety-eight …

This Is Your Captain Speaking, Please Remain Physically Restrained While The Robbery Is In Progress, Conner J. Purcell

Touro Law Review

This note analyzes the current circuit split over the application of the “Physical Restraint” sentence enhancement as applied to the crime of robbery. In the first camp, the circuit courts apply a broad or constructive meaning of physical restraint: allowing words or demands with the use of a firearm to trigger the enhancement. In many cases, the courts focus on the victim’s reaction to the perpetrator rather than the perpetrator’s actual conduct, suggesting psychological restraint rather than physical restraint. In the second camp, the circuit courts apply a plain meaning interpretation of physical restraint. These cases routinely find that the …

Changemakers: Master Of Studies In Law: 'Law Isn't A Foreign Language Anymore', Roger Williams University School O Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

“I Was Just A Kid”: Addressing The Collateral Consequences Of A Juvenile Record On Employment, Lauren Wray

Touro Law Review

There is a common myth that juvenile records are confidential, when in fact only nine states fully prohibit public access to juvenile records. Landlords, employers, and educators in a majority of states may ask questions about a juvenile’s record. Studies have shown that employers are less likely to hire an applicant who has a juvenile delinquency, and that many employers may not be able to differentiate between a juvenile and adult record. This Note reviews the intersectional flaws of the New York juvenile justice system and the New York labor laws. Specifically, it evaluates policies New York has implemented with …

State V. Hampton-Boyd, 253 A.3d 418 (R.I. 2021, Brian W. Murphy

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Long Shadow Of United States V. Rosenberg: A Biographical Perspective On The Hon. Irving Robert Kaufman, Rodger D. Citron

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.