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Articles 1 - 4 of 4
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Delinquent By Reason Of Poverty, Tamar R. Birckhead
Delinquent By Reason Of Poverty, Tamar R. Birckhead
Tamar R Birckhead
This Article, written for the 12th Annual Access to Equal Justice Colloquium, explores the disproportionate representation of low-income children in the United States juvenile justice system. It examines the structural and institutional causes of this development, beginning with the most common points of entry into delinquency court—the child welfare system, public schools, retail stores, and neighborhood police presence. It introduces the concept of needs-based delinquency, a theory that challenges basic presuppositions about the method by which children are adjudicated delinquent. It argues that at each stage of the process—from intake through adjudication to disposition and probation—the court gives as much …
Good Guys, Bad Guys -- And Miranda, Tamar R. Birckhead
Good Guys, Bad Guys -- And Miranda, Tamar R. Birckhead
Tamar R Birckhead
This op-ed argues that we as a society must get beyond our single-minded focus on the Miranda warnings and find a better way to elicit accurate information from suspects while lowering the risk of false confessions.
Graham V. Florida: Justice Kennedy's Vision Of Childhood And The Role Of Judges, Tamar R. Birckhead
Graham V. Florida: Justice Kennedy's Vision Of Childhood And The Role Of Judges, Tamar R. Birckhead
Tamar R Birckhead
This short essay examines Graham v. Florida, the United States Supreme Court decision holding that the Eighth Amendment’s Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause does not permit a juvenile offender to be sentenced to life in prison without parole for a nonhomicide crime. This essay argues that Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion is grounded not only in Roper v. Simmons, which invalidated the death penalty for juvenile offenders on Eighth Amendment grounds, and Kennedy v. Louisiana, which held that the Eighth Amendment prohibited the death penalty for the offense of rape of a child, but also in Establishment Clause cases set …
Toward A Theory Of Procedural Justice For Juveniles, Tamar R. Birckhead
Toward A Theory Of Procedural Justice For Juveniles, Tamar R. Birckhead
Tamar R Birckhead
Courts and legislatures have long been reluctant to make use of the data, findings, and recommendations generated by other disciplines when determining questions of legal procedure affecting juveniles, particularly when the research has been produced by social scientists. However, given the United States Supreme Court’s recent invocation of developmental psychology in Roper v. Simmons, which invalidated the juvenile death penalty, there is reason to believe that such resistance is waning. In 2005 the Simmons Court found, inter alia, that based on research on adolescent development, juveniles are not as culpable as adults and, therefore, cannot be classified among the “worst …