Digital Commons Network^™

Child Abuse Evidence: New Perspectives From Law, Medicine, Psychology & Statistics: Question And Answer Session, Kimberly Thomas, Keith B. Maddox, Samuel R. Sommers, Patrick Barnes, Richard Leo

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

A transcript of the Question and Answer session during the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform Symposium, Child Abuse Evidence: New Perspectives from Law, Medicine, Psychology & Statistics.

Race, Rhetoric, And Judicial Opinions: Missouri As A Case Study, Brad Desnoyer, Anne Alexander

Faculty Publications

This Essay studies the relationship between race, rhetoric, and history in three twentieth century segregation cases: State ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, Kraemer v. Shelley, and Liddell v. Board of Education. Part I gives a brief overview of the scholarship of Critical Race Theory, majoritarian narratives and minority counter-narratives, and the judiciary’s rhetoric in race-based cases. Part II analyzes the narratives and language of Gaines, Kraemer, and Liddell, provides the social context of these cases, and traces their historical outcomes.

The Essay contends that majoritarian narratives with problematic themes continue to perpetuate even though court opinions have evolved to use …

What Impact Is Felony Disenfranchisement Having On Hispanics In Florida?, Angel E. Sanchez

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This research produces original empirical estimates of Hispanics in Florida’s Dept. of Corrections (FDOC) and uses those estimates to measure the impact felony disenfranchisement is having on Hispanics in Florida. Research institutions find that data on Hispanics in the criminal justice system, particularly in Florida, is either lacking or inaccurate. This research addresses this problem by applying an optimal surname list method using Census Bureau data and Bayes Theorem to produce an empirical estimate of Hispanics in FDOC’s data. Using the Hispanic rate derived from the empirical FDOC analysis, the rate of Hispanics in the disenfranchised population is estimated. The …

Critical Black Protectionism, Black Lives Matter, And Social Media: Building A Bridge To Social Justice, Katheryn Russell-Brown

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article provides a detailed, contemporary examination and critique of the practice of Black protectionism. The discussion focuses on how Black protectionism has evolved over the decades, and whether the changes make it a more useful tool for community empowerment than its applications in previous eras. Its latest iteration, herein labeled Critical Black Protectionism, is assessed and evaluated in light of the increasing use of social media.This Article is divided into five parts. Part I provides an overview of Black protectionism, its roots and evolution. As well, this Part examines how African Americans have used protectionism. Part II sets out …

Valuing Identity, Osamudia R. James

Articles

No abstract provided.

Biased And Broken Bodies Of Proof: White Heteropatriarchy, The Grand Jury Process, And Performance On Unarmed Black Flesh, Blanche Bong Cook

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

On Normative Effects Of Immigration Law, Emily Ryo

Faculty Scholarship

Can laws shape and mold our attitudes, values, and social norms, and if so, how do immigration laws affect our attitudes or views toward minority groups? I explore these questions through a randomized laboratory experiment that examines whether and to what extent short-term exposures to anti-immigration and pro-immigration laws affect people's implicit and explicit attitudes toward Latinos. My analysis shows that exposure to an anti-immigration law is associated with increased perceptions among study participants that Latinos are unintelligent and law-breaking. In contrast, Ifind no evidence that exposure to pro-immigration laws promotes positive attitudes toward Latinos. Taken together, these results suggest …

Aggressive Encounters & White Fragility: Deconstructing The Trope Of The Angry Black Woman, Trina Jones, Kimberly Jade Norwood

Faculty Scholarship

Black women in the United States are the frequent targets of bias-filled interactions in which aggressors: (1) denigrate Black women; and (2) blame those women who elect to challenge the aggressor’s acts and the bias that fuels them. This Article seeks to raise awareness of these “aggressive encounters” and to challenge a prevailing narrative about Black women and anger. It examines the myriad circumstances (both professional and social) in which aggressive encounters occur and the ways in which these encounters expose gender and racial hierarchies. It then explores how the intersectional nature of Black women’s identities triggers a particularized stereotype …

Blue Lives Have Always Mattered: The Usurping Of Hate Crime Laws For An Unintended And Unnecessary Purpose, Lisa M. Olson

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

Abstract forthcoming.

Race, Rhetoric, And Judicial Opinions: Missouri As A Case Study, Brad Desnoyer, Anne Alexander

Faculty Works

This Essay studies the relationship between race, rhetoric, and history in three twentieth century segregation cases: State ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, Kraemer v. Shelley, and Liddell v. Board of Education. Part I gives a brief overview of the scholarship of Critical Race Theory, majoritarian narratives and minority counter-narratives, and the judiciary’s rhetoric in race-based cases. Part II analyzes the narratives and language of Gaines, Kraemer, and Liddell, provides the social context of these cases, and traces their historical outcomes.

The Essay contends that majoritarian narratives with problematic themes continue to perpetuate even though court opinions have evolved to use …

A Culture Of Silence: Exploring The Impact Of The Historically Contentious Relationship Between African-Americans And The Police, Mikah K. Thompson

Faculty Works

The relationship between African-Americans and the police has traditionally been focused on authority, control, and the enforcement of laws we now acknowledge were racially discriminatory. This historical relationship, when combined with a modern-day narrative that the police disproportionately stop, arrest, and utilize deadly force against African-Americans, has resulted in pervasive, inter-generational fear and distrust of the police. Most African-Americans view police officers not as the heroic protectors they can call upon when in need of help or the hard-hitting investigators they would trust to look into a family member’s murder. Instead, many African-Americans believe police officers have bought into the …

Student Surveillance, Racial Inequalities, And Implicit Racial Bias, Jason P. Nance

UF Law Faculty Publications

In the wake of high-profile incidents of school violence, school officials have increased their reliance on a host of surveillance measures to maintain order and control in their schools. Paradoxically, such practices can foster hostile environments that may lead to even more disorder and dysfunction. These practices may also contribute to the so-called “school-to-prison pipeline” by pushing more students out of school and into the juvenile justice system. However, not all students experience the same level of surveillance. This Article presents data on school surveillance practices, including an original empirical analysis of restricted data recently released by the U.S. Department …

"To Help, Not To Hurt": Justice Thomas's Equality Canon, Nicole Stelle Garnett, William S. Consovoy

Journal Articles

To comprehend Justice Thomas’s views on racial equality requires an understanding of how his life experiences influence his approach to questions of race and the law. Recurring themes in his opinions about racial equality include his belief that racial preferences stigmatize their beneficiaries, his concern that the prevailing notion that racial integration is necessary to black achievement is rooted in a presumption of racial inferiority, his worry that affirmative action efforts provide cover for the failure to address the urgent needs of disadvantaged Americans, and his knowledge that seemingly benign policies can mask illicit motives. Finally, Justice Thomas contends that …

Aggressive Encounters & White Fragility: Deconstructing The Trope Of The Angry Black Woman, Kimberly Jade Norwood, Trina Jones

Scholarship@WashULaw

Black women in the United States are the frequent targets of bias-filled interactions in which aggressors: (1) denigrate Black women; and (2) blame those women who elect to challenge the aggressor’s acts and the bias that fuels them. This Article seeks to raise awareness of these “aggressive encounters” and to challenge a prevailing narrative about Black women and anger. It examines the myriad circumstances (both professional and social) in which aggressive encounters occur and the ways in which these encounters expose gender and racial hierarchies. It then explores how the intersectional nature of Black women’s identities triggers a particularized stereotype …

Tolling For The Aching Ones Whose Wounds Cannot Be Nursed’: The Marginalization Of Racial Minorities And Women In Institutional Mental Disability Law, Michael L. Perlin, Heather Ellis Cucolo

Articles & Chapters

Individuals with mental disabilities have traditionally been and continue to be subjected to rights violations and pervasive discrimination because of their mental disabilities. Seen as “the other,” individuals who are racial minorities and/or are women are marginalized to an even greater extent than other persons with mental disabilities in matters related to civil commitment and institutional treatment (especially involving theright to refuse medication).

It is impossible to examine these questions critically without coming to grips with the ways that expert testimony — testimony that is essential and necessary in all these cases — is infected with bias that leads to …

What We Think, What We Know And What We Think We Know About False Convictions, Samuel Gross

Articles

False convictions are notoriously difficult to study because they can neither be observed when they occur nor identified after the fact by any plausible research strategy. Our best shot is to collect data on those that come to light in legal proceedings that result in the exoneration of the convicted defendants. In May 2012, the National Registry of Exonerations released its first report, covering 873 exonerations from January 1989 through February 2012. By October 15, 2016, we had added 1,027 cases: 599 exonerations since March 1, 2012, and 428 that had already happened when we issued our initial report but …

Firearms In The Family, Carolyn B. Ramsey

Publications

This Article considers firearms prohibitions for domestic violence offenders, in light of recent Supreme Court decisions and the larger, national debate about gun control. Unlike other scholarship in the area, it confronts the costs of ratcheting up the scope and enforcement of such firearms bans and argues that the politicization of safety has come at the expense of a sound approach to gun control in the context of intimate-partner abuse. In doing so, it expands scholarly arguments against mandatory, one-size-fits-all criminal justice responses to domestic violence in a direction that other critics have been reluctant to go, perhaps because of …

Brief On Behalf Of The National Black Law Students Association As Amicus Curiae In Buck V. Davis, Aderson Francois, Deborah N. Archer, Daniel Warshawsky

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Pressing Charges, Zohra Ahmed

Scholarly Works

There is a prosecutor in Manhattan Criminal Court who wears a Black Lives Matter button on the job. One day, a group of public defenders, myself included, found him alone in a courtroom where only quality of life offenses are heard, authorizing plea bargains more lenient than the standard recommendations of the New York County District Attorney’s office: reducing fines, reducing community service, even avoiding convictions. The button seemed a puzzling appropriation for a prosecutor. At the height of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2015, after all, public defenders had worn the same pins in court only to face …

Criminal Law As Family Law, Andrea L. Dennis

Scholarly Works

The criminal justice system has expanded dramatically over the last several decades, extending its reach into family life. This expansion has disproportionately and negatively impacted Black communities and social networks, including Black families. Despite these pervasive shifts, legal scholars have virtually ignored the intersection of criminal, family, and racial justice. This Article explores the gap in literature in two respects. First, the Article weaves together criminal law, family law, and racial justice by cataloging ways in which the modern criminal justice state regulates family life, particularly for Black families. Second, the Article examines the depth of criminal justice interference in …

Reproducing Gender And Race Inequality In The Blawgosphere, Jane C. Murphy, Solangel Maldonado

All Faculty Scholarship

The use of the Internet and other digital media to disseminate scholarship has great potential for expanding the range of voices in legal scholarship. Legal blogging, in particular, with its shorter, more informal form, seems ideal for encouraging commentary from a diverse group of scholars. This Chapter tests this idea by exploring the role of blogging in legal scholarship and the level of participation of women and scholars of color on the most visible academic legal blogs. After noting the predominance of white male scholars as regular contributors on these blogs, we analyze the relative lack of diversity in this …

The American Death Penalty Decline, Brandon L. Garrett, Alexander Jakubow, Ankur Desai

Faculty Scholarship

American death sentences have both declined and become concentrated in a small group of counties. In his dissenting opinion in Glossip v. Gross in 2014, Justice Stephen Breyer highlighted how from 2004 to 2006, "just 29 counties (fewer than 1% of counties in the country) accounted for approximately half of all death sentences imposed nationwide." That decline has become more dramatic. In 2015, fifty-one defendants were sentenced to death in thirty-eight counties. In 2016, thirty-one defendants were sentenced to death in twenty-eight counties. In the mid-1990s, by way of contrast, over 300 people were sentenced to death in as many …

Race And The New Policing, Jeffrey Fagan

Faculty Scholarship

Several observers credit nearly 25 years of declining crime rates to the “New Policing” and its emphasis on advanced statistical metrics, new forms of organizational accountability, and aggressive tactical enforcement of minor crimes. This model has been adopted in large and small cities, and has been institutionalized in everyday police-citizen interactions, especially among residents of poorer, often minority, and higher crime areas. Citizens exposed to these regimes have frequent contact with police through investigative stops, arrests for minor misdemeanors, and non-custody citations or summons for code violations or vehicle infractions. Two case studies show surprising and troubling similarities in the …

New Policing, New Segregation: From Ferguson To New York, Jeffrey Fagan, Elliott Ash

Faculty Scholarship

In popular and political culture, many observers credit nearly twenty-five years of declining crime rates to the “New Policing.” Breaking with a past tradition of “reactive policing,” the New Policing emphasizes advanced statistical metrics, new forms of organizational accountability, and aggressive tactical enforcement of minor crimes. The existing research and scholarship on these developments have focused mostly on the nation’s major cities, where concentrated populations and elevated crime rates provide pressurized laboratories for police experimentation, often in the spotlight of political scrutiny. An additional line of scholarship has looked more closely at how the tactics of the New Policing have …

Race And Criminal Justice In Canada, Charles E. Reasons, Shereen Hassan, Melinda Bige, Christianne Paras, Simranjit Arora

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of the Sciences

The relationship between race and crime has long been a subject of study in the United States; however, such analysis is more recent in Canada. A major factor impeding such study is the fact that racial/ethnic data are not routinely collected and available in Canada, unlike the United States. The collection of such data would arguably undermine the multi-cultural mosaic of Canada as a place of acceptance and tolerance. However, the lack of such data bellies research suggesting that race plays a role in the Canadian criminal justice system. Using available, albeit, limited research studies and their data, the role …

Unconventional Methods For A Traditional Setting: The Use Of Virtual Reality To Reduce Implicit Racial Bias In The Courtroom, Natalie Salmanowitz

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

The presumption of innocence and the right to a fair trial lie at the core of the United States justice system. While existing rules and practices serve to uphold these principles, the administration of justice is significantly compromised by a covert but influential factor: namely, implicit racial biases. These biases can lead to automatic associations between race and guilt, as well as impact the way in which judges and jurors interpret information throughout a trial. Despite the well-documented presence of implicit racial biases, few steps have been taken to ameliorate the problem in the courtroom setting. This Article discusses the …

Innocent Suffering: The Unavailability Of Post-Conviction Relief In Virginia Courts, Kaitlyn Potter

University of Richmond Law Review

This comment examines actual innocence in Virginia: the progress it has made, the problems it still faces, and the possibilities for reform. Part I addresses past reform to the system, spurred by the shocking tales of Thomas Haynesworth and others. Part II identifies three of the most prevalent systemic challenges marring Virginia's justice system: (1) flawed scientific evidence; (2) the premature destruction of evidence; and (3) false confessions and guilty pleas. Part III suggests ways in which Virginia can, and should, address these challenges to ensure that the justice system is actually serving justice.

Am I My Client? Revisited: The Role Of Race In Intra-Race Legal Representation, Julie D. Lawton

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article examines the challenges of intra-race legal representation for lawyers of color, law students of color, and those teaching law students of color by analyzing how the dynamics of the lawyer’s and client’s racial sameness impact legal representation. This Article brings together three strands of lawyering theory – the role of race in lawyering, critical race theory, and the role of the lawyer in intra-race legal representation. In doing so, this Article explores a number of provocative questions: Does being the same race as their clients make lawyers better legal representatives? Should lawyers of color embrace or resist race’s …

The Tyranny Of Small Things, Yxta Maya Murray

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

In this legal-literary essay, I recount a day I spent watching criminal sentencings in an Alhambra, California courthouse, highlighting the sometimes mundane, sometimes despairing, imports of those proceedings. I note that my analysis resembles that of other scholars who tackle state over-criminalization and selective law enforcement. My original addition exists in the granular attention I pay to the moment-by-moment effects of a sometimes baffling state power on poor and minority people. In this approach, I align myself with advocates of the law and literature school of thought, who believe that the study (or, in this case, practice) of literature will …

Tightening The Ooda Loop: Police Militarization, Race, And Algorithmic Surveillance, Jeffrey L. Vagle

Michigan Journal of Race and Law

This Article examines how military automated surveillance and intelligence systems and techniques, when used by civilian police departments to enhance predictive policing programs, have reinforced racial bias in policing. I will focus on two facets of this problem. First, I investigate the role played by advanced military technologies and methods within civilian police departments. These approaches have enabled a new focus on deterrence and crime prevention by creating a system of structural surveillance where decision support relies increasingly upon algorithms and automated data analysis tools and automates de facto penalization and containment based on race. Second, I will explore these …