Jurisprudence Commons^™

Temporary Insanity: The Strange Life And Times Of The Perfect Defense, Russell D. Covey

Russell D. Covey

The temporary insanity defense has a prominent place in the mythology of criminal law. Because it seems to permit factually guilty defendants to escape both punishment and institutionalization, some imagine it as the “perfect defense.” In fact, the defense has been invoked in a dizzying variety of contexts and, at times, has proven highly successful. Successful or not, the temporary insanity defense has always been accompanied by a storm of controversy, in part because it is often most successful in cases where the defendant’s basic claim is that honor, revenge, or tragic circumstance – not mental illness in its more …

Dividing Crime, Multiplying Punishments, John F. Stinneford

John F. Stinneford

When the government wants to impose exceptionally harsh punishment on a criminal defendant, one of the ways it accomplishes this goal is to divide the defendant’s single course of conduct into multiple offenses that give rise to multiple punishments. The Supreme Court has rendered the Double Jeopardy Clause, the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause, and the rule of lenity incapable of handling this problem by emptying them of substantive content and transforming them into mere instruments for effectuation of legislative will. This Article demonstrates that all three doctrines originally reflected a substantive legal preference for life and liberty, and a …

The Corporate Conspiracy Vacuum (Formerly "Corporate Conspiracy: How Not Calling A Conspiracy A Conspiracy Is Warping The Law On Corporate Wrongdoing"), J.S. Nelson

J.S. Nelson

The Clear Initiative And Mental States: 1½ Problems Solved, 41 J. Marshall L. Rev. 701 (2008), Timothy P. O'Neill

Timothy P. O'Neill

No abstract provided.

New Law, Old Cases, Fair Outcomes: Why The Illinois Supreme Court Must Overrule People V Flowers, 43 Loy. U. Chi. L.J. 727 (2012), Timothy P. O'Neill

Timothy P. O'Neill

No abstract provided.

Shredded Fish Redux, Robert Sanger

Robert M. Sanger

The Yates case, in which certiorari had been granted to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit had been discussed in a previous column of Criminal Justice. The article was entitled “Shredded Fish” because the sea captain in Yates was prosecuted under the document shredding provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 for destroying fish. That case has now been decided by the United States Supreme Court in Yates v. United States, on February 25, 2015. The case involves the rule of lenity as well as a discussion of overcriminalization.

The International Criminal Court And Proximity To The Scene Of The Crime: Does The Rome Statute Permit All Of The Icc's Trials To Take Place At Local Or Regional Chambers?, 43 J. Marshall L. Rev. 715 (2010), Stuart K. Ford

Stuart Ford

No abstract provided.

Science Is Not Waiting For The Courts, Robert Sanger

Robert M. Sanger

The Forensic Science Community and the federal government are moving far beyond the courts in an effort to improve the quality of scientific evidence and expert testimony in the courts. Major events in forensics have caused a top to bottom reconsideration of what should count as expert testimony. Last month, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) convened the first set of meetings of the Organization of Scientific Area Committees (OSAC). This is a forward-looking approach to forensic science.

The first OSAC meetings were held on February 16 and 17, 2015, at …

To Furman Or Not To Furman, Robert M. Sanger

Robert M. Sanger

In capital litigation, the United States Supreme Court in Furman v. Georgia and following cases required capital punishment systems to have a form of "narrowing" so that the death penalty was imposed only on the worst of the worst. The death penalty states have failed to successfully implement this concept. As a result, "narrowing" is currently raised in all capital cases by competent defense counsel both at trial and in post conviction litigation. It is raised in addition to all other issues, including issues related to the questions of whether exclusion from the death penalty should be expanded and whether …

A Judicial Cure For The Disease Of Overcriminalization, Stephen F. Smith

Stephen F. Smith

No abstract provided.

Decisions Rules And Conduct Rules: On Acoustic Separation In Criminal Law, Meir Dan-Cohen

Meir Dan-Cohen

No abstract provided.

Believe It Or Not: Mitigating The Negative Effects Personal Belief And Bias Have On The Criminal Justice System, Sarah Mourer

Sarah Mourer

This article examines the prosecutor’s and defense attorney’s personal pre-trial beliefs regarding the accused’s guilt or innocence. This analysis suggests that when an attorney does hold pretrial beliefs, such beliefs lead to avoidable bias and errors. These biases may alter the findings throughout all stages of the case. The procedure asking that the prosecution seek justice while having nothing more than probable cause results in the prosecutor’s need to have a belief in guilt before proceeding to trial. While this belief is intended to foster integrity and fairness in the criminal justice system, to the contrary, it actually contributes to …

Dualism And Doctrine, Alex Stein, Dov Fox

Alex Stein

What kinds of harm among those that tortfeasors inflict are worthy of compensation? Which forms of self-incriminating evidence are privileged against government compulsion? What sorts of facts constitute a criminal defendant’s intent? Existing doctrine pins the answer to all of these questions on whether the injury, facts, or evidence at stake are “mental” or “physical.” The assumption that operations of the mind are meaningfully distinct from those of the body animates fundamental rules in our law.

A tort victim cannot recover for mental harm on its own because the law presumes that he is able to unfeel any suffering arising …

Bubbles (Or, Some Reflections On The Basic Laws Of Human Relations), Donald J. Kochan

Donald J. Kochan

Cruelty In Criminal Law: Four Conceptions, Paulo Barrozo

Paulo Barrozo

This Article defines four distinct conceptions of cruelty found in underdeveloped form in domestic and international criminal law sources. The definition is analytical, focusing on the types of agency, victimization, causality, and values in each conception of cruelty. But no definition of cruelty will do justice to its object until complemented by the kind of understanding practical reason provides of the implications of the phenomenon of cruelty. No one should be neutral in relation to cruelty. Eminently, cruelty in criminal law, a human-created phenomenon, vigorously calls for responses in the form of preventive and corrective action on the part of …