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Full-Text Articles in Human Rights Law

Merchants And Thieves, Hungry For Power: Prosecutorial Misconduct And Passive Judicial Complicity In Death Penalty Trials Of Defendants With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin Jan 2016

Merchants And Thieves, Hungry For Power: Prosecutorial Misconduct And Passive Judicial Complicity In Death Penalty Trials Of Defendants With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In spite of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Ford v. Wainwright (1986), Atkins v. Virginia (2002), and Hall v. Florida (2014), persons with severe psychosocial and intellectual disabilities continue to be given death sentences, in some cases leading to actual execution. Although the courts have been aware of this for decades -- dating back at least to the infamous Ricky Rector case in Arkansas -- these base miscarriages of justice continue and show no sign of abating. Scholars have written clearly and pointedly on this issue (certainly, more frequently since the Atkins decision in 2002), but little has changed.

I …


Reinvigorating First Year Criminal Law: Integrating Mental Disability Issues Into The Criminal Law Course, Linda C. Fentiman Dec 2005

Reinvigorating First Year Criminal Law: Integrating Mental Disability Issues Into The Criminal Law Course, Linda C. Fentiman

ExpressO

This article explores how mental disability issues can be incorporated into a traditional criminal law class, in order to enrich student understanding of both mental disability law and criminal law doctrine. The intersection of mental disability with the doctrinal aspects of criminal law can be broken into five major categories: 1) the justifications for punishment; 2) the definition of crime in general, e.g., the requirements of a voluntary act, mens rea, and causation; 3) the definition of particular crimes, such as murder, manslaughter, rape, and burglary; 4) defenses to crime, including mistake of law and of fact, as well as …