Digital Commons Network^™

Preventing Sexual Violence: Alternatives To Worrying About Recidivism, Eric S. Janus

Faculty Scholarship

How can it be that in the era in which almost one million Americans are on sex offender registries—most of whom are publicly stigmatized on websites, banished from their homes, shunned from their jobs, prevented from uniting with their families and traveling internationally, forced into homelessness, all of which increases their risk for suicide, and shames their spouses and children, even if their offenses occurred long in the past—that the #MeToo movement would explode, revealing widespread sexual misconduct against women, by powerful men, protected by iconic institutions? How can we have had three decades of the most aggressive, “spare-no-expense” laws …

The New York Prosecutorial Conduct Commission And The Dawn Of A New Era Of Reform For Prosecutors, Clyde Rastetter

Cardozo Law Review de•novo

This Note discusses the history of the national dialogue regarding prosecutorial misconduct, analyzes recent state reforms, and proposes that New York's standing Brady orders and prosecutorial conduct commission provide the blueprint for ushering in a new era of prosecutorial accountability.

Replacing Death With Life? The Rise Of Lwop In The Context Of Abolitionist Campaigns In The United States, Michelle Miao

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

On the basis of fifty-four elite interviews[1] with legislators, judges, attorneys, and civil society advocates as well as a state-by-state data survey, this Article examines the complex linkage between the two major penal trends in American society during the past decades: a declining use of capital punishment across the United States and a growing population of prisoners serving “life without the possibility of parole” or “LWOP” sentences. The main contribution of the research is threefold. First, the research proposes to redefine the boundary between life and death in relation to penal discourses regarding the death penalty and LWOP. LWOP …

Violence Risk Assessment: Current Status And Contemporary Issues, Sarah L. Desmarais, Samantha A. Zottola

Marquette Law Review

Despite the increased use of violence risk assessment instruments in the criminal justice system, they remain the topic of continued discussion and debate. This Article will discuss the state of science and practice as it relates to assessing risk for violent recidivism, highlighting current issues of concern and empirical investigation. We first provide an overview of violence risk assessment and describe the role of violence risk assessments instruments in this process. We then discuss their current status in science and practice, including the accuracy with which violence risk assessment instruments forecast violent recidivism, their impact on criminal justice decisions, and …

"Inciting A Riot": Silent Sentinels, Group Protests, And Prisoners' Petition And Associational Rights, Nicole B. Godfrey

Seattle University Law Review

This Article argues for increased legal protections for prisoners who choose to engage in group protest to shed light on the conditions of their incarceration. A companion piece to a similar article that focused on prisoner free speech rights, this Article uses the acts of protest utilized by the Silent Sentinels to examine why prisoners’ rights to petition and association should be strengthened. By strengthening these rights, the Article argues that we will advance the values enshrined by the First Amendment’s Petition Clause while simultaneously advancing the rights of the incarcerated millions with little to no political power.

The Article …

Does The Woman Suffrage Amendment Protect The Voting Rights Of Men?, Steve Kolbert

Seattle University Law Review

This Article—part of the Seattle University Law Review’s symposium on the centennial of the ratification of the Woman Suffrage Amendment—examines that open possibility. Concluding that the Nineteenth Amendment does protect men’s voting rights, this Article explores why and how that protection empowers Congress to address felon disenfranchisement and military voting. This Article also examines the advantages of using Nineteenth Amendment enforcement legislation compared to legislation enacted under other constitutional provisions.

Part I discusses the unique barriers to voting faced by voters with criminal convictions (Section I.A) and voters in the armed forces (Section I.B). This Part also explains how existing …

The Internet Never Forgets: A Federal Solution To The Dissemination Of Nonconsensual Pornography, Alexis Santiago

Seattle University Law Review

As technology evolves, new outlets for interpersonal conflict and crime evolve with it. The law is notorious for its inability to keep pace with this evolution. This Comment focuses on one area that the law urgently needs to regulate—the dissemination of “revenge porn,” otherwise known as nonconsensual pornography. Currently, no federal law exists in the U.S. that criminalizes the dissemination of nonconsensual pornography. Most U.S. states have criminalized the offense, but with vastly different degrees of severity, resulting in legal inconsistencies and jurisdictional conflicts. This Comment proposes a federal solution to the dissemination of nonconsensual pornography that carefully balances the …

State V. Thomas: An Improper Extension Of Involuntary Manslaughter To Combat The Opioid Epidemic, Daniel P. Mooney

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Stepping Into The Shoes Of The Department Of Justice: The Unusual, Necessary, And Hopeful Path The Illinois Attorney General Took To Require Police Reform In Chicago, Lisa Madigan, Cara Hendrickson, Karyn L. Bass Ehler

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

No abstract provided.

Eighteen Is Not A Magic Number: Why The Eighth Amendment Requires Protection For Youth Aged Eighteen To Twenty-Five, Tirza A. Mullin

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The Eighth Amendment protects a criminal defendant’s right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. This Note argues that any punishment of eighteen- to twenty-five-year-olds is cruel and unusual without considering their youthfulness at every stage of the criminal process, and that it is unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment for these youths to be automatically treated as fully-developed adults. This Note will explore in depth how juveniles differ from adults, both socially and scientifically, and how the criminal justice system fails every youth aged eighteen- to twenty-five by subjecting them to criminal, rather than juvenile, court without considering their …

Invisible Prisons, M. Eve Hanan

Scholarly Works

Modern punishment theory is based on an inadequate conceptualization of the severity of incarceration. While the severity of a prison sentence is measured solely in terms of the length of time, the actual experience of imprisonment is often more punishing and more destructive than a simple loss of liberty. Yet, lawmakers and judges evince a surprising lack of institutional interest in understanding the experience of imprisonment and applying this knowledge to sentencing. This lack of official attention to how prison is experienced by incarcerated people is one of the drivers of mass incarceration.

This Article is the first scholarly work …

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Government Misconduct And Convicting The Innocent: The Role Of Prosecutors, Police And Other Law Enforcement, Samuel R. Gross, Maurice J. Possley, Kaitlin Jackson Roll, Klara Huber Stephens

Other Publications

This is a report about the role of official misconduct in the conviction of innocent people. We discuss cases that are listed in the National Registry of Exonerations, an ongoing online archive that includes all known exonerations in the United States since 1989, 2,663 as of this writing. This Report describes official misconduct in the first 2,400 exonerations in the Registry, those posted by February 27, 2019.

In general, we classify a case as an “exoneration” if a person who was convicted of a crime is officially and completely cleared based on new evidence of innocence.

The Report is …

Felon Voting: The Call For An Australian Compromise, Kevin Lineberger

Mitchell Hamline Law Journal of Public Policy and Practice

No abstract provided.

Political Wine In A Judicial Bottle: Justice Sotomayor's Surprising Concurrence In Aurelius, Christina D. Ponsa-Kraus

Faculty Scholarship

For seventy years, Puerto Ricans have been bitterly divided over how to decolonize the island, a U.S. territory. Many favor Puerto Rico’s admission into statehood. But many others support a different kind of relationship with the United States: they believe that in 1952, Puerto Rico entered into a “compact” with the United States that transformed it from a territory into a “commonwealth,” and they insist that “commonwealth” status made Puerto Rico a separate sovereign in permanent union with the United States. Statehood supporters argue that there is no compact, nor should there be: it is neither constitutionally possible, nor desirable …

Arguing The Algorithm: Pretrial Risk Assessment And The Zealous Defender, Julian Adler, Sarah Picard, Caitlin Flood

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

This article examines the growing use of algorithmic pretrial risk assessment tools in the United States as a response to the systemic inequities of cash bail and mass incarceration. While proponents argue that these tools offer objective, data-driven alternatives to judicial discretion, critics highlight their potential to reinforce racial and economic disparities. Amid this contentious debate, the authors call attention to the underexplored role of public defenders in mitigating the harms—and maximizing the decarcerative potential—of risk assessment algorithms. Drawing on examples from New York and New Jersey, the article outlines four key strategies for defenders: demanding transparency in algorithm design, …

Have Problem-Solving Courts Changed The Practice Of Law?, Cynthia Alkon

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

No abstract provided.

Title Ix & The Civil Rights Approach To Sexual Harassment In Education, Nancy Chi Cantalupo

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Challenging Moral And Policy Rationales For Charging Youth As Adults, Molly Lockwood

Pitzer Senior Theses

Does the practice of charging juveniles as adults serve the retributive and consequentialist goals of criminal justice policy? Proponents of limiting juvenile court jurisdiction argue that the rehabilitation-oriented remedies available therein are neither sufficient to hold adolescents accountable for wrongdoing, nor strong enough to deter future youth crime. The first chapter of this thesis examines the forward and backward looking premises underlying juvenile transfer to adult criminal court. I find that transfer policies are inconsistent with dominant theories of responsibility and punishment as applied to juveniles. I argue in Chapter One that transfer produces undesirable outcomes with respect to the …

Is Solitary Confinement A Punishment?, John F. Stinneford

UF Law Faculty Publications

The United States Constitution imposes a variety of constraints on the imposition of punishment, including the requirements that the punishment be authorized by a preexisting penal statute and ordered by a lawful judicial sentence. Today, prison administrators impose solitary confinement on thousands of prisoners despite the fact that neither of these requirements has been met. Is this imposition a “punishment without law,” or is it a mere exercise of administrative discretion? In an 1890 case called In re Medley, the Supreme Court held that solitary confinement is a separate punishment subject to constitutional restraints, but it has ignored this holding …

How The Race Of A Neighborhood Criminalizes The Citizens Living Within: A Focus On The Supreme Court And The "High Crime Neighborhood", Deandre' Augustus

St. Thomas Law Review

My whole life I was taught that all men are not created equal. This was beaten into my brain by my loving mother who just wanted me to be safe. You see, this message was part of what most young Black men hear when given “the talk.” I remember multiple variations of the talk given to me throughout my early childhood. However, a variation of the talk was most vividly remembered while taking our dog for a walk around my neighborhood with my mother. At the time, we lived in a suburban area, in a predominantly White neighborhood of Baton …

Revenge Porn And The Aclu’S Inconsistent Approach, Elena Lentz

Indiana Journal of Law and Social Equality

No abstract provided.

Boots And Bail On The Ground: Assessing The Implementation Of Misdemeanor Bail Reforms In Georgia, Andrea Woods, Sandra G. Mayson, Lauren Sudeall, Guthrie Armstrong, Anthony Potts

Faculty Publications By Year

This Article presents a mixed-methods study of misdemeanor bail practice across Georgia in the wake of reform. We observed bail hearings and interviewed system actors in a representative sample of fifty-five counties to assess the extent to which pretrial practice conforms to legal standards clarified in Senate Bill 407 and Walker v. Calhoun. We also analyzed jail population data published by county jails and by the Georgia Department of Community Affairs. We found that a handful of counties have made promising headway in adhering to law and best practices, but that the majority have some distance to go. Most …

Victim Impact Statements At Canadian Corporate Sentencing, Erin L. Sheley

Faculty Scholarship

The recent SNC-Lavalin scandal and its political fallout have drawn
public attention to an existing culture of impunity enjoyed by corporate
criminal wrongdoers, despite the 2004 changes to the Criminal Code of
Canada that intended to make corporate prosecutions easier. In this article,
I argue that the conceptual problems with corporate criminal liability may
lie in the criminal justice system’s general misapprehension of the nature of
corporate crime; especially of the distinct nature of the harm experienced
by white collar victims. I further argue that, therefore, part of the solution
to under-enforcement may be evidentiary: the Crown and courts should, …

Individualized Proportionality And The Experience Of Punishment: An Emergent Paradigm For Canadian Sentencing?, Benjamin Berger

All Papers

Drawn from a case in which the Supreme Court of Canada grappled with the signal societal trauma wrought by the operation of the criminal justice system — the travesty of Indigenous over-representation in Canadian prisons — the epigraph to this chapter points to the ethical heart of a distinctive and important development in Canadian sentencing law. It involves an approach that has already disrupted certain elements of contemporary sentencing practice, and it is one that, depending on how sentencing judges embrace it, may open up new futures in Canadian sentencing. This development is the emergence of individualized proportionality as the …

From The Legal Literature: Disentangling Prison And Punishment, Francesca Laguardia

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

No abstract provided.

The Defender General, Daniel Epps, William Ortman

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Criminal Law, John A. Regan

Mercer Law Review

This Article reviews some of the most important opinions impacting the practice of criminal law delivered by the Supreme Court of the United States and the Georgia Supreme Court covering the period of June 1, 2018 up until May 31, 2019, as well as legislation adopted by the Georgia General Assembly during the 2019 Session.1 This Article is designed to be a mere overview to both prosecutors and defense attorneys of decisions and new statutes and serves as a broad guideline to how these decisions will affect their practices.

Sexual Assault And Intoxication: Defining (In)Capacity To Consent, Elaine Craig

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

This article considers how the law of sexual assault in Canada addresses cases involving intoxicated complainants. There are two main aspects to the law of capacity to consent to sexual touching in the context of intoxicated women. The first involves the evidence of intoxication courts typically require in order to prove lack of capacity. The second pertains to the legal standard to which that evidence is applied. The nature of the evidence required to establish incapacity turns on the level of capacity the law requires. A comprehensive review of Canadian caselaw involving intoxicated complainants reveals a legal standard that is …

Supervised Release Is Not Parole, Jacob Schuman

Faculty Scholarship

The United States has the largest prison population in the developed world. Yet outside prisons, there are almost twice as many people serving terms of criminal supervision in the community— probation, parole, and supervised release. At the federal level, this “mass supervision” of convicted offenders began with the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, which abolished parole and created a harsher and more expansive system called supervised release. Last term in United States v. Haymond, the Supreme Court took a small step against mass supervision by striking down one provision of the supervised release statute as violating the right to …