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Federalization Of Local Criminal Justice Procedure: A Study Of Conflicts In Values And Process, Kam C. Wong

Kam C. Wong

This article is an investigation into why the U.S. federal courts have failed to effectively control local police conduct by means of constitutional rules. In so doing, the article finds that the federal courts’ approach to the control of police abuse of power – federalization and constiotutionalization of criminal procedures – is ill informed of the nature and essence of police work within the community context and at the grassroots level. Particularly, it fails to take into account the structural and normative forces giving rise to police abuse. The central thesis of this paper is that the federal courts’ constitutional …