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Full-Text Articles in Jurisprudence

30 = 20: ‘Understanding’ Maximum Sentence Enhancements, Frank R. Herrmann S.J. Nov 2011

30 = 20: ‘Understanding’ Maximum Sentence Enhancements, Frank R. Herrmann S.J.

Frank R. Herrmann, S.J.

In this article, Professor Herrmann argues that the due process protections of a criminal trial should apply to aggravating factors that under current “maximum-enhancing statutes” allow judges to impose lengthier punishments in the sentencing phase. Part I considers the Supreme Court's rationale for refusing to apply full due process safeguards to all types of sentencing schemes. This background will reveal the unique quality of maximum-enhancing statutes and establish why the due process protections of a criminal trial should apply to sentencing under maximum-enhancing statutes. Part I, therefore, undertakes to explain courts' rationales to deny criminal defendants full criminal due process …


Public Wrongs And The ‘Criminal Law’S Business’: When Victims Won’T Share, Michelle Madden Dempsey Aug 2011

Public Wrongs And The ‘Criminal Law’S Business’: When Victims Won’T Share, Michelle Madden Dempsey

Working Paper Series

Amongst the many valuable contributions that Professor Antony Duff has made to criminal law theory is his account of what it means for a wrong to be public in character. In this chapter, I sketch an alternative way of thinking about criminalization, one which attempts to remain true to the important insights that illuminate Duff’s account, while providing (it is hoped) a more satisfying explanation of cases involving victims who reject the criminal law’s intervention.


Psychopathy And Culpability: How Responsible Is The Psychopath For Criminal Wrongdoing?, Reid G. Fontaine Jd, Phd Jan 2011

Psychopathy And Culpability: How Responsible Is The Psychopath For Criminal Wrongdoing?, Reid G. Fontaine Jd, Phd

Reid G. Fontaine

Recent research into the psychological and neurobiological underpinnings of psychopathy has raised the question of whether, or to what degree, psychopaths should be considered morally and criminally responsible for their actions. In this article we review the current empirical literature on psychopathy, focusing particularly on deficits in moral reasoning, and consider several potential conclusions that could be drawn based on this evidence. Our analysis of the empirical evidence on psychopathy suggests that while psychopaths do not meet the criteria for full criminal responsibility, they nonetheless retain some criminal responsibility. We conclude, by introducing the notion of rights as correlative, that …


The Myth Of The Fully Informed Rational Actor, Stephanos Bibas Jan 2011

The Myth Of The Fully Informed Rational Actor, Stephanos Bibas

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Punishment As Contract, Claire Oakes Finkelstein Jan 2011

Punishment As Contract, Claire Oakes Finkelstein

All Faculty Scholarship

This paper provides a sketch of a contractarian approach to punishment, according to a version of contractarianism one might call “rational contractarianism,” by contrast with the normative contractarianism of John Rawls. Rational contractarianism suggests a model according to which rational agents, with maximal, rather than minimal, knowledge of their life circumstances, would agree to the outlines of a particular social institution or set of social institutions because they view themselves as faring best in such a society governed by such institutions, as compared with a society governed by different institutional schemes available for adoption. Applied to the institution of punishment, …


Two Cheers, Not Three For Sixth Amendment Originalism, Stephanos Bibas Jan 2011

Two Cheers, Not Three For Sixth Amendment Originalism, Stephanos Bibas

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.