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What's Said In The Booth Never Stays In The Booth: A Comparative Analysis Of The Use Of Rap Lyrics In American And English Criminal Trials, Yekaterina Shrayber

Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

Garrity Immunity And The U.S. Armed Forces, Bretton H. Laudeman, Gabriel J. Chin

BYU Law Review

The U.S. military is one of the nation’s largest and most important public employers. Given the unique nature of military service, the service branches have a strong interest in ensuring the integrity of their ranks. Yet the military lacks a critical force-management tool used by every other public employer to investigate workplace misconduct: the ability to demand answers to potentially incriminating questions under Garrity v. New Jersey, 385 U.S. 493 (1967). The Garrity solution, known as “Garrity immunity,” strikes a critical balance between the government’s interests in workplace oversight and accountability with the employee’s Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination by …

The Automated Fourth Amendment, Maneka Sinha

Faculty Scholarship

Courts routinely defer to police officer judgments in reasonable suspicion and probable cause determinations. Increasingly, though, police officers outsource these threshold judgments to new forms of technology that purport to predict and detect crime and identify those responsible. These policing technologies automate core police determinations about whether crime is occurring and who is responsible. Criminal procedure doctrine has failed to insist on some level of scrutiny of—or skepticism about—the reliability of this technology. Through an original study analyzing numerous state and federal court opinions, this Article exposes the implications of law enforcement’s reliance on these practices given the weighty interests …

Same Crime, Different Time: Sentencing Disparities In The Deep South & A Path Forward Under The Fourteenth Amendment, Hailey M. Donovan

Seattle University Law Review

The United States has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world. The American obsession with crime and punishment can be tracked over the last half-century, as the nation’s incarceration rate has risen astronomically. Since 1970, the number of incarcerated people in the United States has increased more than sevenfold to over 2.3 million, outpacing both crime and population growth considerably. While the rise itself is undoubtedly bleak, a more troubling truth lies just below the surface. Not all states contribute equally to American mass incarceration. Rather, states have vastly different incarceration rates. Unlike at the federal level, …

The Marijuana Insurgency: Federalism And Social Reframing In Policy Reform, Matthew P. Cavedon

Seattle University Law Review

After fifty years of federal prohibition, marijuana reform efforts have won political and legal success. These victories hold lessons for anyone seeking to resist federal law without being able to directly affect it.

Victory can come from reframing an issue. For marijuana reform, social reframing—not formal legal analysis or material factors—provides the best explanation for how advocates achieved change. Their unconventional political tactics, akin to those used by insurgents in wartime, undercut federal prohibition by winning hearts and minds.

This is an analysis of the sociology of legal change. It is also the story of how ordinary Americans retook personal …

Verses Turned To Verdicts: Ysl Rico Case Sets A High-Watermark For The Legal Pseudo-Censorship Of Rap Music, Nabil Yousfi

Seattle University Law Review

Whichever way you spin the record, rap music and courtrooms don’t mix. On one side, rap records are well known for their unapologetic lyrical composition, often expressing a blatant disregard for legal institutions and authorities. On the other, court records reflect a Van Gogh’s ear for rap music, frequently allowing rap lyrics—but not similar lyrics from other genres—to be used as criminal evidence against the defendants who authored them. Over the last thirty years, this immiscibility has engendered a legal landscape where prosecutors wield rap lyrics as potent instruments for criminal prosecution. In such cases, color-blind courts neglect that rap …

Judging Firearms Evidence, Brandon L. Garrett, Eric Tucker, Nicholas Scurich

Faculty Scholarship

Firearms violence results in hundreds of thousands of criminal investigations each year. To try to identify a culprit, firearms examiners seek to link fired shell casings or bullets from crime scene evidence to a particular firearm. The underlying assumption is that firearms impart unique marks on bullets and cartridge cases, and that trained examiners can identify these marks to determine which were fired by the same gun. For over a hundred years, firearms examiners have testified that they can conclusively identify the source of a bullet or cartridge case. In recent years, however, research scientists have called into question the …

Non-Judicial Recusals In Rhode Island: Empirical Evidence And Suggestions For Reform, Ross E. Cheit, Rose Lang-Maso

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Correcting Federal Rule Of Evidence 404 To Clarify The Inadmissibility Of Character Evidence, Hillel J. Bavli

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

Courts misinterpret Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b)(2) as an exception to Rule 404(b)(1)’s prohibition on character evidence rather than a mere clarification that emphasizes the permissibility of other-acts evidence whose relevance does not rely on propensity reasoning. This misinterpretation turns the rule against character evidence on its head by effectively replacing Rule 404 with a Rule 403 balancing—and one that incorrectly treats character inferences as probative rather than prejudicial, thereby favoring admissibility rather than exclusion. Consequently, as currently interpreted, Rule 404(b)(2) generates substantial unpredictability and verdicts based on conduct not at issue in a case.

I therefore propose that the …

“Facet” Or “Facets” Of Executive Privilege In Oklahoma? Vandelay’S Unclear Outcome, Nick Candido

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Forfeiture By Wrongdoing In Domestic Homicide Cases: Where Are We Now?, Caren Myers Morrison

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

One of the few common law exceptions to the rule that every criminal defendant enjoys the right to “be confronted with the witnesses against him” is if the defendant has deliberately caused a witness’s unavailability. That a defendant could forfeit his confrontation rights through his own wrongdoing developed from the equitable concept that “no man shall profit from his wrong.” When the Supreme Court narrowed the common law doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing in Giles v. California, it seemed like it had dealt a serious blow to the prosecution of domestic homicide cases. Rather than being able to introduce …

Confrontation, The Legacy Of Crawford, And Important Unanswered Questions, Paul F. Rothstein, Ronald J. Coleman

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

The right to confront has a long history. In the United States, the Confrontation Clause provides: “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right… to be confronted with the witnesses against him[.]” One of the most troublesome areas of Confrontation Clause jurisprudence has been the Clause’s application to “hearsay statements offered against a criminal defendant pursuant to a hearsay exception or exemption[.]” The Supreme Court’s confrontation analysis in this situation once hinged on the statement’s reliability, with the traditional hearsay rule and its exceptions and exemptions as a guide. But in Crawford v. Washington, the Court considered …

Failing To Close Pandora's Box: Why Motions To Suppress Are Inadequate As A Remedy For False Confessions, Christina G. Leung

University of San Francisco Law Review

No abstract provided.

False Accuracy In Criminal Trials: The Limits And Costs Of Cross Examination, Lisa Kern Griffin

Faculty Scholarship

According to the popular culture of criminal trials, skillful cross-examination can reveal the whole “truth” of what happened. In a climactic scene, defense counsel will expose a lying accuser, clear up the statements of a confused eyewitness, or surface the incentives and biases in testimony. Constitutional precedents, evidence theory, and trial procedures all reflect a similar aspiration—that cross-examination performs lie detection and thereby helps to produce accurate outcomes. Although conceptualized as a protection for defendants, cross-examination imposes some unexplored costs on them. Because it focuses on the physical presence of a witness, the current law of confrontation suggests that an …

Artificial Intelligence In The Courtroom: Forensic Machines, Expert Witnesses, And The Confrontation Clause, Ian Maddox

Journal of Law, Technology, & the Internet

From traditional methods like ballistics and fingerprinting, to the probabilistic genotyping models of the twenty-first century, the forensic laboratory has evolved into a cutting-edge area of scientific exploration. This rapid growth in forensic technologies will not stop here. Considering recent developments in artificial intelligence (“AI”), future forensic tools will likely become increasingly sophisticated. To be sure, AI-enabled forensic tools are far from theoretical; AI applications in the forensic sciences have already emerged in practice. Machine learning-enabled acoustic gunshot detectors, facial recognition software, and a variety of pattern recognition learning models are already disrupting law enforcement operations across the country. Soon, …

Correcting Federal Rule Of Evidence 404 To Clarify The Inadmissibility Of Character Evidence, Hillel J. Bavli

Fordham Law Review

Courts misinterpret Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b)(2) as an exception to Rule 404(b)(1)’s prohibition on character evidence rather than a mere clarification that emphasizes the permissibility of other-acts evidence whose relevance does not rely on propensity reasoning. This misinterpretation turns the rule against character evidence on its head by effectively replacing Rule 404 with a Rule 403 balancing—and one that incorrectly treats character inferences as probative rather than prejudicial, thereby favoring admissibility rather than exclusion. Consequently, as currently interpreted, Rule 404(b)(2) generates substantial unpredictability and verdicts based on conduct not at issue in a case.

I therefore propose that the …

Eliminating Rule 609 To Provide A Fair Opportunity To Defend Against Criminal Charges: A Proposal To The Advisory Committee On The Federal Rules Of Evidence, Jeffrey Bellin

Fordham Law Review

Federal Rule of Evidence 609 authorizes the admission of prior convictions to impeach criminal defendants who testify. And in this important and uniquely damaging application, the [r]ule’s logic fails, distorting American trials and depriving defendants of a fair opportunity to defend against the charges. The Advisory Committee [on Evidence Rules (the “Advisory Committee”)] should propose the elimination of Rule 609 and prohibit cross-examination with specific instances of a criminal defendant’s past conduct when those instances are unrelated to the defendant’s testimony and unconnected to the case.

This short essay begins by setting out the proposed rule change alongside a proposed …

Ai-Based Evidence In Criminal Trials?, Sabine Gless, Fredric I. Lederer, Thomas Weigend

Faculty Publications

Smart devices are increasingly the origin of critical criminal case data. The importance of such data, especially data generated when using modern automobiles, is likely to become even more important as increasingly complex methods of machine learning lead to AI-based evidence being autonomously generated by devices. This article reviews the admissibility of such evidence from both American and German perspectives. As a result of this comparative approach, the authors conclude that American evidence law could be improved by borrowing aspects of the expert testimony approaches used in Germany’s “inquisitorial” court system.

The Future Scope Of The Character Evidence Prohibition: The Contextual Statutory Construction Argument That Could Finally Force The Policy Discussion, Paul F. Rothstein, Edward J. Imwinkelried

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The general prohibition of character evidence is one of the most important doctrines in American Evidence law. Since the Supreme Court has held that the Eighth Amendment forbids status offenses in adult prosecutions, the doctrine has constitutional overtones. Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) applies the prohibition to evidence of an accused’s other crimes and wrongs. Since such evidence can be inflammatory and the Rule’s limits sometimes confusing, Rule 404(b) generates more published opinions than any other provision of the Federal Rules of Evidence. Although the prohibition extends beyond other crimes, most of the controversy swirls around the Rule’s application to …

Reimagining Youngblood's Bad Faith Requirement: Safeguarding Criminal Defendants' Due Process Rights Through A Burden-Shifting Framework, Rita Elfarissi

Michigan Law Review

Criminal defendants face an uphill battle when attempting to prove that the government’s loss or destruction of evidence that could have played a significant role in their defense deprived them of their constitutional due process rights. To make this showing, the defendant must prove that the government lost or destroyed the evidence in bad faith. This requirement is problematic because direct evidence illustrating the subjective intent of the government officials who lost or destroyed the evidence is unlikely to exist, and in the off chance it does, the prosecution is unlikely to freely hand it over to the defendant. Thus, …

Prejudice Standards In Washington’S Appellate Courts, Andrew B. Van Winkle

Seattle University Law Review

When an appellate court finds an error to have occurred during a proceeding, the error is not yet subject to correction. In order to merit a remedy, the error must have been sufficiently prejudicial to the aggrieved party’s case. Drawing the line between correctable and non-correctable errors is not an easy task, for it often requires guessing at what was in the minds of jurors and trial judges. To cope with this task, courts have devised various rules and tests for deciding whether an error was likely prejudicial or not. These standards often go by names such as “harmless error,” …

The Brady Database, Brandon L. Garrett, Adam M. Gershowitz, Jennifer Teitcher

Faculty Scholarship

The Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Brady v. Maryland turns sixty this year. The Brady doctrine, which requires the government to disclose favorable and material evidence to the defendant, is one of the most frequently litigated criminal procedure issues. Yet, despite decades of Brady cases in federal and state courts, we still know relatively little about how Brady claims are litigated, adjudicated, and what such claims can tell us about the criminal justice system writ large. Scholars are in the dark about how often Brady violations occur, whether it is primarily the fault of prosecutors or the police, whether violations …

Neglected Discovery, Jenia I. Turner, Ronald F. Wright, Michael Braun

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

In recent decades, many states have expanded discovery in criminal cases. These reforms were designed to make the criminal process fairer and more efficient. The success of these changes, however, depends on whether defense attorneys actually use the new discovery opportunities to represent their clients more effectively. Records from digital evidence platforms reveal that defense attorneys sometimes fail to carry out their professional duty to review discovery. Analyzing a novel dataset we obtained from digital evidence platforms used in Texas, we found that defense attorneys never accessed any available electronic discovery in a substantial number of felony cases between 2018 …

Recent Reads, Jolie Zangari

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Sentencing In An Era Of Plea Bargains, Jeffrey Bellin, Jeenia I. Turner

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

The literature offers inconsistent answers to a question that is foundational to criminal law: Who imposes sentences? Traditional narratives place sentencing responsibility in the hands of the judge. Yet, in a country where 95% of criminal convictions come from guilty pleas (not trials), modern American scholars center prosecutors who control plea terms as the deciders of punishment. This Article highlights and seeks to resolve the tension between these conflicting narratives by charting the pathways by which sentences are determined in a system dominated by plea bargains. After reviewing the empirical literature on sentence variation, examining state and federal plea-bargaining rules …

Clemency: A Tool For Extreme And Discriminatory Sentences, Benjamin N. Cardozo School Of Law

Cardozo News 2023

This article appeared in the 2023 edition of Cardozo Life magazine.

For Joaquin Winfield, April 7, 2023, will forever be a day to remember. That is when he was granted clemency by New York Gov. Kathy Hochul after serving 26 years in prison for possession of 4.6 ounces of crack. The disparity in sentences given to people from different races for similar crimes has been widely written about in recent years. Winfield was sentenced under the now-repealed Rockefeller Drug Laws of the 1970s and 1980s. He was sentenced to 37.5 years to life, one of the longest prison sentences in …

The Bharatiya Sakshya Bill, 2023: A New And Unimproved Evidence Act, Kunal Ambasta

Popular Media

The secrecy in drafting the bill to replace the Evidence Act is reminiscent of colonial legislation by committee. The lack of consultation has meant that the interpretative confusions in existing law remain unresolved.

Evidence Law’S Blind Spots, James Macleod

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

A New Baseline For Character Evidence, Julia Simon-Kerr

Vanderbilt Law Review

Perhaps no rules of evidence are as contested as the rules governing character evidence. To ward off the danger of a fact finder's mistaking evidence of character for evidence of action, the rules exclude much contextual information about the people at the center of the proceeding. This prohibition on character propensity evidence is a bedrock principle of American law. Yet despite its centrality, it is uncertain of both content and application. Contributing to this uncertainty is a definitional lacuna. Although a logical first question in thinking about character evidence is how to define it, the Federal Rules of Evidence have …

Models And Limits Of Federal Rule Of Evidence 609 Reform, Anna Roberts

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.