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- Statutory interpretation; experimental jurisprudence; textualism; purposivism; surveys; corpus linguistics; Drax; faithful agency (1)
- Victims’ Rights; Victimology; Criminal Procedure; Criminal Law; Evidence; Restorative Justice; Law and Psychology; Judicial Decision-Making; Jury Decision-Making; criminal law; criminal justice system; criminal legal system (1)
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Law and Psychology
What Are Victim Impact Statements For?, Susan A. Bandes
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 …
Mechanical Turk Jurisprudence, Shlomo Klapper
Mechanical Turk Jurisprudence, Shlomo Klapper
Brooklyn Law Review
This paper argues that data-driven interpretation creates a “Mechanical Turk” jurisprudence: a jurisprudence that appears mechanical but in fact is thoroughly human. Its contribution to the literature is twofold. First, it articulates an intellectual history of data-driven interpretation: data-driven tools have been adopted because society associates quantification with a mechanical objectivity and because objectivity is at the center of debates over statutory interpretation. Second, it criticizes surveys as an interpretative tool: in addition to a host of practical execution problems, surveys misunderstand the concept of “ordinary meaning” and threaten to undermine the value of faithful agency.