Digital Commons Network^™

Fairness To Informants And Cooperators Vs. Public Interest Protection -- A Comparative Analysis Of Legal Frameworks In The United States And Brazil, Luis Henrique Machado

International Law Journal

This Article offers a comparative analysis of the legal frameworks governing cooperation agreements in the United States and Brazil, focusing on how each system balances the competing imperatives of public interest protection and fairness to informants and cooperators. While both jurisdictions rely on the use of cooperating defendants to prosecute unlawful activities such as cybercrime, political corruption, narcotics offenses, and transnational organized crime, their institutional approaches diverge sharply. The United States—operating within an adversarial, prosecutor-centered tradition—grants prosecutors broad discretion in negotiating and enforcing cooperation agreements, with minimal judicial oversight. This discretion reflects a utilitarian logic that prioritizes prosecutorial efficiency and …

Minimal Success: The Consequences Of Mandatory Minimums In Youth Sentencing, Maya Chrobot

Fordham Law Review

In New York State, children as young as thirteen can be processed as adults and sentenced to mandatory minimum sentences. Mandatory minimum sentences require judges to sentence the defendant to a statutorily set minimum term of imprisonment. Practitioners, judges, and researchers question the efficacy of mandatory minimum sentences, finding that they are ineffective at deterring crime, decreasing bias in sentencing, and increasing community safety. Additionally, there is clear evidence about the damaging effects of incarceration on young adults. Instead of functioning as rehabilitative punishment, incarceration leads young adults to experience poor mental and physical health outcomes upon release, and they …

A Human Rights Approach To International Criminal Liability: From The Promises Of The 1990s Criminal Tribunals To Selective Impunity, Ilias Bantekas

UC Law SF International Law Review

Since the adoption of the UDHR in 1948, it has become clear that state responsibility for human rights violations ought to be complemented by perpetrators’ individual responsibility under criminal and civil law. The concept of individual responsibility suggests that criminal liability is the “natural” corollary of conduct considered to be a violation of human rights. Even if such criminal liability does not, for whatever reason, arise under national law, this is certainly the outcome under international law. The extent to which this concept is applicable to all violations of human rights involves an examination of the legal basis of human …

Guns, Guardians, & Guilt: Analyzing Family Liability In Mass Shooting Cases, Alex Robinson

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Code And Consequences: How Fraud Detection Algorithms Criminalize Welfare, Michele E. Gilman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article investigates the growing use of automated fraud detection systems in public benefits programs, focusing on how these technologies have intensified the surveillance and criminalization of low-income individuals. Across the globe, government agencies deploying fraud detection algorithms have wrongfully accused thousands of people of committing fraud, with devastating consequences, including bankruptcy, job loss, and psychological trauma. These algorithmic systems operate as opaque “black boxes,” fueled by historical biases against the poor and largely unaccountable to the individuals they affect. Meanwhile, the private vendors that develop the algorithms reap massive profits from unfulfilled promises of efficiency and cost savings.

The …

Gold & Blue Law Edition, Spring 2026, St. Mary's University - San Antonio, Texas

Gold & Blue Law Edition

This is the Spring 2026 edition of Gold & Blue Law Edition which is St. Mary's University's official School of Law publication.

Consent Absent Consensus: A Principles-Based Framework For Institutional Sexual Consent Policies, Tammi Walker

West Virginia Law Review

Title IX requires educational institutions to address sexual misconduct but provides no clear standard for defining consent. In the absence of federal guidance, colleges and universities operate in a regulatory vacuum, producing inconsistent definitions, legal uncertainty, and contested understandings of what consent requires. Without a structured framework, institutions struggle to balance survivor protection, due process, and practical implementation. This Article introduces a principles-based framework that supports clearer, more coherent consent policies. It identifies three interdependent elements of valid sexual consent: (1) Respect for Choices and Autonomy, which requires voluntary agreement free from coercion or pressure; (2) Informed Expectations and Transparency, …

The Living Architecture Of Law, Joseph R. Goodwin

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

A View Under The Hood: Duquesne Kline's Law And Computing Program, Wesley M. Oliver, Katherine L.W. Norton, Martin Mckown, David Horrigan

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

Artificial Intelligence And Machine Learning Improving The Livelihood Of Individuals With Disabilities In Various Capacities, Daveon Lilly

West Virginia Law Review

Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) and Machine Learning (“ML”) are swiftly reshaping accessibility for individuals with disabilities, offering fresh opportunities for inclusion in education, the workplace, and daily life. This Note explores the integration of AI and ML into assistive technologies and discusses how this integration bolsters access and independence for people with various disabilities. It also examines the legal frameworks, including the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (“Rehabilitation Act”), that govern the implementation of these technologies and address challenges such as algorithmic bias, data privacy, and the digital divide. While AI and ML have made …

Reconsidering The Take It Down Act, Cate Thorpe

Brigham Young University Prelaw Review

In the past decade, there has been an increase in digital forgeries leading to the phenomena many have called “revenge porn.” This form of Nonconsensual Intimate Imagery (NCII) has been facilitated by AI-models that allow users to create false images or videos of someone’s likeness, often referred to as deepfakes. In an attempt to combat the dissemination of such forged NCIIs, Congress enacted the TAKE IT DOWN Act. The Act institutes a notice-and-removal procedure for victims to request the removal of  NCIIs depicting their likeness on covered platforms. While the TAKE IT DOWN Act sufficiently addresses some concerns, certain aspects …

Harmless In Name Only: Prosecutorial Misconduct And The Right To A Fair Trial, Jennifer Brinkman

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

Prosecutorial misconduct during trial—particularly improper questioning of witnesses and improper argument—occurs in front of the jury and directly shapes its deliberations. Yet appellate courts routinely dismiss such misconduct as “harmless error,” allowing convictions to stand even when prosecutors violate defendants’ rights. This Article contends that the harmless error framework both underestimates the impact of misconduct on jurors and undermines the Constitutional guarantee of a fair trial. It proposes that certain instances of misconduct that occur during trial should be classified as structural error, requiring automatic reversal. This would protect defendants’ right to a fair trial and maintain the integrity of …

Before The Last Breath: How Alabama’S Nitrogen Execution Adoption Created A Procedural Crisis On Death Row, Caroline E. Penfield

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

In 2024 and 2025, Alabama executed eleven people. During this time and in the years leading up to it, the State botched multiple lethal injections. Seeking an ostensibly constitutional way to continue carrying out executions, Alabama introduced death by nitrogen gas suffocation. The problems with lethal injection are not unique to Alabama, but Alabama was the first to adopt and use the novel nitrogen gas method, despite concerns from medical professionals, the public, and inmates themselves. Alabama put little to no protocol in place for inmates to exercise their statutory right to elect this method, leading to confusion and harm. …

Reconsidering Life Without Parole: How Sb 672 Reshapes Extreme Sentencing For Youth Offenders, Karina Cardenas

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

Representation In Removal Proceedings, Emily Ryo, Ian Peacock, Weston Ley, Christopher Levesque

Indiana Law Journal

Millions of immigrants in the United States are facing threats of mass deportation under the second Trump Administration. At the same time, the Administration has sought to end federal programs aimed at providing basic information and guidance to immigrants in removal proceedings. In addition, large numbers of immigration judges have been fired from immigration courts that already face massive backlogs. Amidst these upheavals, deportation defense lawyers have come to occupy a more central role than ever in ensuring fairness and due process in immigration courts. Are certain groups of immigrants more likely to obtain legal representation than others? Among those …

People's Upr Written Record: Compiled By The International Human Rights Clinic At The University Of Illinois Chicago School Of Law And The Human Rights At Home Litigation Clinic At The Saint Louis University School Of Law, Sarah Dávila A., Lauren E. Bartlett

Faculty White Papers

This written record compiles the lived experiences of directly impacted persons. Directly impacted persons include people who have personally faced the conditions, policies, or practices documented in this written record in the United States and who have chosen to share their testimonies. The testimonies in this written record include those provided in-person, via video recording, which have been transcribed, or in writing. Testimonies are presented anonymously with ▊ sign as names and identifiable information has been redacted. Their accounts provide first-hand evidence of how these human rights issues operate in practice, offering essential context and depth that cannot be captured …

Occasional Originalism: How The Supreme Court Of North Carolina Discarded Centuries-Old Constitutional Law In State V. Singleton, William J. Etringer

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Racial Implications For Black Claimants At The Federal Arbitration Act's Centennial, Michael Z. Green

Faculty Scholarship

On February 12, 1925, when President Calvin Coolidge signed into law an Act to make arbitration agreements "valid, irrevocable, and enforceable," no person could have expected that this new statute would ever apply to claims by Black litigants. A century later, that law, now referred to as the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA), has evolved to encompass disputes involving a broad array of claimants and processes where businesses enforce pre-dispute agreements to arbitrate. In examining whether Black claimants (businesses, consumers, and importantly, workers) may benefit from using arbitration, this Article investigates how the FAA, as enacted, never intended to address their …

Uncomfortably Reminiscent: Odonnell V. Harris County In History And Memory, Kellen R. Funk

Faculty Scholarship

In ODonnell v. Harris County, a federal trial court enjoined the misdemeanor bail system of Houston, Texas, freeing approximately 20,000 indigent defendants annually. To do this, the trial court drew upon Reconstruction era precedents establishing intensive federal oversight of state criminal proceedings. The court explicitly invoked the Civil War and Reconstruction transformation of the federal judiciary, comparing the County’s defenses to slavery era arguments. Conversely, when the en banc Fifth Circuit reviewed a similar order in Dallas, Texas, six years later, it rejected this historical framework, condemning such litigation as an impermissible “ongoing federal audit of state criminal proceedings.” …

Justice And Peace Shall Kiss: A Comparative Analysis Of Law From Ancient Israel To Modern America, Evan Nix

Honors Theses

Modern legal scholarship frequently attributes American criminal jurisprudence to Roman structures, Enlightenment rationality, and English common law, which obscures the American system’s roots in Hebraic natural-law value frameworks. The present thesis asks: “To what extent does the American criminal justice system embody core values of ancient Hebrew law, and how does such a framework compare to purely secular models regarding societal stability and equity?” A comparative analysis draws on biblical texts of the Torah, Hebrew wisdom literature, and American constitutional and statutory provisions, tracing a genealogy from covenantal laws of ancient Israel to modern American constitutionalism. Findings indicate preservation of …

The Crime We Forget? White-Collar Crime: Problems In Defining Motive And Enforcement Of Followers, John Stillman

Notre Dame JLEPP: In Limine

John Stillman explains problems in defining and enforcing against white-collar crime, focusing on followers.

The Politics Of Preservation: Federal Implications Of The Smithsonian Executive Order, Autumn H. Duncan

Missouri Law Review

When society thinks of the phrase “revisionist history,” George Orwell’s harrowing words likely come to mind. The term itself is used in the political realm as “an accusation of deliberately distorting irrefutable historical ‘facts’ to serve a particular political agenda or viewpoint.” Although the topic of revisionism is a hot-button issue among historians and non-historians alike, Americans are divided over how to approach history. About 47% of the population believes that history should question the nation’s past, while 53% contend that history should celebrate it. This divide becomes even more evident when broken down by party lines: 84% of Republicans …

Child Support Factory: Racist History, Harm, And Unconstitutionality Of The Child Support System's Contractual Operations, Daniel L. Hatcher

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

Within America’s justice institutions, the child support system has become a business. The intended mission of aid has been traded and abdicated through contractual deals to churn vulnerable families into factory-like revenue operations. Juvenile and family courts across the country have partnered through countless intertwined interagency contracts with human service agencies, prosecutors, attorneys general’s offices, probation departments, and policing offices—all aimed at generating revenue from impoverished children and parents rather than serving their best interests. The resulting child support factory is vast, harmful, unconstitutional, unethical, and grew from a racist history that devastated Black families, and still operates with starkly …

How And Why Hundreds Of Preventable Deaths Continue To Occur Behind America's Prison Walls And Jail Cells, Melody Monssen

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

This Note examines how the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) came to be and the consequences of its passage. The PLRA was largely a response to the growing movement of prisoners’ rights that began in the 1960s and continued until the 1990s. As the Court grew more conservative, the legal system became less receptive to prisoners’ plights. Consequently, PLRA was enacted in an effort to curtail prison litigation. Consequently, conditions in correctional institutions have continued to worsen, leaving prisoners with little recourse. Although the passage of PLRA was justified by claiming that prisoners were bringing frivolous lawsuits, the continued upward …

Federal Extreme Risk Protection Orders: A Potential Pathway To Preventing Mass Shootings, Lilly H. Donahue

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

This Note examines how the creation and implementation of a federal extreme risk protection order (ERPO) statute would impact federal investigations, mass shooting prevention, and the reduction of firearm deaths at large. While ERPOs exist in several states, there is currently no federal statutory scheme to allow federal law enforcement agencies to pursue ERPOs against citizens at risk of harming themselves or others with firearms. By examining the current legal landscape of state-level ERPOs, federal agencies’ investigatory procedures and failures, constitutional and racial equity concerns, and industry best practices, this Note aims to explore what a federal ERPO statute could …

Cyclones Of Crime: How Environmental Degradation In Haiti Strengthens Gangs In Governmental Power Vacuums And How The International Community Can Respond Beyond Military Intervention, Stephanie Minor

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

In Haiti, the ground beneath people’s feet, both politically and literally, has never stopped shifting, as cycles of gang violence and environmental disasters feed each other in a relentless spiral of instability. This Note intends to be an analysis of the cycle of gang violence and environmental disasters, along with possible legal and organizational solutions. It begins with a very brief historical analysis of how the situation has progressed from state creation to present day and how Haiti’s colonial past shaped its current governance problems. At its creation in 1804, Haiti became the first state founded by enslaved persons through …

Drug War Repair Guarantees, Amber Baylor

Washington and Lee Law Review

Drug legalization, especially cannabis legalization, is a critical step forward in states’ willingness to address systemic disparities, privacy intrusions, violence, and other harms of the drug war. Yet, reforms center on legalization and repair through a narrow lens, focused on changes to the penal code. The public has found that narrow forms of legalization cannot serve their purported reparative purpose. Narrowly drawn legalization is illusory. Drug war harms and punishment for legalized substance use continue. Legalization reforms are vulnerable to political trends, resulting in rollback and retrenchment of drug war operations.

Legalization cannot deliver on its reparative terms without guarantees. …

Comment On “Voices From Beyond The Grave: Protecting The Audio Of Murder Victims Through (Intellectual) Property Law” By Alexandra M. Hudson, Christopher B. Seaman

Washington and Lee Law Review

Alex’s Note correctly identifies the tension between two important, competing values when it comes to how the law should deal with the sound recordings of murder victims captured in a public record, such as a 911 call or body camera footage. The first value is government transparency, including disclosure of public records through federal and state Freedom of Information Acts (FOIAs). As the Supreme Court has explained, “[t]he basic purpose of FOIA is to ensure an informed citizenry, vital to the functioning of a democratic society, needed to check against corruption, and to hold the governors accountable to the governed.” …

Education As A Right, Homelessness As A Crisis: The Displaced Futures Of American Homeless Youth, Tina Pham

Washington and Lee Law Review

Homelessness in the United States has been a humanitarian crisis affecting youth as one of its most vulnerable populations. Education is one of the few opportunities to break through this cycle of poverty. Recognizing the gap in education for homeless students and other students, Congress enacted the McKinney-Vento Act, which guarantees homeless youth educational rights to access public education. Following the Supreme Court’s decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson, however, the rise of criminalizing policies, such as encampment sweeps and anticamping ordinances, threatens the success of the Act. These policies not only destabilize families, but they also leave homeless youth …

Mapping Disabled Justice: Empirical Research Towards A People-Centered Approach, Qudsiya Naqui

Book Chapters

This paper reviews access to justice for people with disabilities, focusing on what we know—and still need to know—about how justice systems can better serve and include disabled populations. Based on existing research, we know that disabled people, constituting roughly 16% of the global population, face significant legal, informational, communication, physical, and economic barriers at all stages of the justice process, and are disproportionately represented in both civil and criminal legal systems. We also know that these barriers impede disabled people’s access to the law, access to legal processes, and access to just outcomes, undermining their ability to engage in …