Digital Commons Network^™

Judicial Externships, Mariana Hogan, Michael Roffer

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Merchants And Thieves, Hungry For Power: Prosecutorial Misconduct And Passive Judicial Complicity In Death Penalty Trials Of Defendants With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In spite of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Ford v. Wainwright (1986), Atkins v. Virginia (2002), and Hall v. Florida (2014), persons with severe psychosocial and intellectual disabilities continue to be given death sentences, in some cases leading to actual execution. Although the courts have been aware of this for decades -- dating back at least to the infamous Ricky Rector case in Arkansas -- these base miscarriages of justice continue and show no sign of abating. Scholars have written clearly and pointedly on this issue (certainly, more frequently since the Atkins decision in 2002), but little has changed.

I …

In The Wasteland Of Your Mind: Criminology, Scientific Discovieries And The Criminal Process, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

This paper addresses a remarkably-underconsidered topic: the potential impact of scientific discoveries and an increased understanding of the biology of human behavior on sentencing decisions in the criminal justice system, specifically, the way that sentencing has the capacity to rely on scientific evidence (such as brain imaging) as a mitigating factor (or perhaps, in the mind of some, as an aggravating factor) in determining punishment.

Such a new method of evaluating criminality, we argue, can be beneficial not only for the defendant, but also for the attorneys and judge involved in the case. If used properly, it may help to …

Book Review Of Re-Understanding The Child's Right To Identity: On Belonging, Responsiveness And Hope, By Ya'ir Ronen, Michael L. Perlin

Other Publications

No abstract provided.

Said I, But You Have No Choice: Why A Lawyer Must Ethically Honor A Client's Decision About Mental Health Treatment Even If It Is Not What S/He Would Have Chosen, Michael L. Perlin, Naomi Weinstein

Articles & Chapters

This paper addresses a remarkably under-considered topic: the ethical standards for lawyers representing persons with mental disabilities. Although there is an extensive body of literature endorsing “zealous advocacy” as the standard for the criminal defense lawyer in “ordinary” cases, there is virtually no literature (or case law) on this question in this context.

Our thesis is simple. We reject the model of “paternalism/best interests” that is regularly substituted for a traditional legal advocacy position, and a substitution that is rarely questioned. We believe this presumption flies in the face of statutory law, constitutional law, and international human rights law, and …

Had To Be Held Down By Big Police: A Therapeutic Jurisprudence Perspective On Interactions Between Police And Persons With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

It is a truism that the largest mental health facilities in the nation are the nation’s largest urban jails. Most of the predictable solutions that are offered to curb the influx of individuals with mental illness into jails -- especially those that urge the loosening of civil commitment standards and the return to large psychiatric institutions -- are dreary at best, unconstitutional at heart, and mean-spirited at worst. However, we pay remarkably little attention to one of the primary causes of this reality: the decisionmaking processes "on the street" by police officers who choose to apprehend and arrest certain cohorts …

Your Corrupt Ways Had Finally Made You Blind: Prosecutorial Misconduct And The Use Of Ethnic Adjustments In Death Penalty Cases Of Defendants With Intellectual Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In a recent masterful article, Professor Robert Sanger revealed that, since the Supreme Court's decision in Atkins v. Virginia, some prosecution experts have begun using so-called "ethnic adjustments" to artificially raise minority defendants' IQ scores, making such defendants-who would otherwise have been protected by Atkins and, later, by Hall v. Florida-eligible for the death penalty. Sanger accurately concluded that ethnic adjustments are not logically or clinically appropriate when computing a person's IQ score for Atkins purposes. He relied further on epigenetics to demonstrate that environmental factors-such as childhood abuse, poverty, stress, and trauma-can cause decreases in actual IQ scores, and …

Current Issues In Therapeutic Jurisprudence, David Wexler

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Unraveling The Law Of War, Stephen J. Ellmann

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Can Prosecutors Be Both Coach And Referee?, Rebecca Roiphe

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Tyler Clementi Internet Safety Conference, Innovation Center For Law And Technology

Innovation Center for Law and Technology

October 3-4, 2015

The Internet Safety Conference is an unprecedented gathering of policy makers, political and business leaders, attorneys, social scientists, academics, teachers, students, and nonprofit advocates all focused on combatting cyberharassment.

Today, we launch a first-of-its-kind pro bona clinic that will help victims of cyberharassment obtain justice. The Tyler Clementi Institute for Internet Safety will eradicate cyberharassment one client at a time. Over the next two days, our community will begin a conversation that will raise awareness of the problem of cyberharassment, identify what work needs to be done, and empower us to take action. In particular, we will …

Strategic Plan Progress And Outcomes (2015), New York Law School

Strategic Plan and Initiatives

Click here to view the report online.

Safety With Dignity, Nyc Criminal Justice, New York Police Department, Nyc Department Of Education, City Of New York

Conference/Symposium CLE materials

COMPLETE REPORT BY THE MAYOR’S LEADERSHIP TEAM ON SCHOOL CLIMATE AND DISCIPLINE

PHASE I RECOMMENDATIONS

2015 Commencement Program, New York Law School

Commencement Programs

Click here to view online.

Transitional Justice And Judicial Activism— A Right To Accountability?, Ruti Teitel

Articles & Chapters

Victims of systemic rights abuses, their families, and non-governmental organizations are turning to international and regional human rights tribunals to address the failure of states to investigate, prosecute, and remedy past human rights violations. In many cases this relates to acts that occurred decades ago and for which a previous repressive regime was responsible. In other cases there may be powerful interests within the state, such as the police or security service, that are complicit with the violations in question. This Article explores the historical and political contexts in which these cases have arisen, how the courts approach the question …

Viewbook 2015, New York Law School

Admissions Viewbooks

To view online version, click here.

Impact: Collected Essays On The Threat Of Economic Inequality, New York Law School

Articles and Writings

On April 17, 2015, the Impact Center for Public Interest Law at New York Law School hosted a symposium entitled "Tackling Economic Inequality" to bring together policymakers, advocates, academics, and community members to explore some of the causes and solutions to this growing problem. The essays collected in this volume, written by leading social justice advocates, are published to stimulate continued conversation on this critically important issue.

Contributors:

THE CHALLENGE OF ECONOMIC INEQUALITY | Richard R. Buery, Jr., Honorable Fern Fisher

HOUSING AND COMMUNITY | Steven W. Bender, Elise C. Boddie , Andrew Scherer

CRIMINAL JUSTI CE REFORM | Michael …

How Teaching About Therapeutic Jurisprudence Can Be A Tool Of Social Justice, And Lead Law Students To Personally And Socially Rewarding Careers: Sexuality And Disability As A Case Example, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

Therapeutic jurisprudence (TJ) asks us to look at law as it actually impacts people’s lives and focuses on the law’s influence on emotional life and psychological well-being. It suggests that law should value psychological health, should strive to avoid imposing anti-therapeutic consequences whenever possible, and — when consistent with other values served by law — should attempt to bring about healing and wellness. The ultimate aim of TJ is to determine whether legal rules and procedures or lawyer roles can or should be reshaped to enhance their therapeutic potential while not subordinating due process principles. An inquiry into therapeutic outcomes …

Transitional Justice In Unified Korea (2015), Baek Buhm-Suk, Ruti G. Teitel

Books

How will a unified Korea respond to the Kim regime's crimes against humanity? Will North and South Korea be able to reconcile their differences after being divided for so long? Will China, the US, Japan, Russia, and U.N. drive the process? This book examines the challenges associated with Korean unification and human rights accountability.

A Postcolonial Theory Of Spousal Rape: The Caribbean And Beyond, Stacy-Ann Elvy

Articles & Chapters

Many postcolonial states in the Caribbean continue to struggle to comply with their international treaty obligations to protect women from sexual violence. Reports from various United Nations programs, including UNICEF, and the annual U.S. State Department Country Reports on Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Jamaica, and Saint Lucia (“Commonwealth Countries”), indicate that sexual violence against women, including spousal abuse, is a significant problem in the Caribbean. Despite ratification of various international instruments intended to eliminate sexual violence against women, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, Commonwealth Countries have retained the …

I Expected It To Happen/I Knew He'd Lost Control: The Impact Of Ptsd On Criminal Sentencing After The Promulgation Of Dsm-5, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

The adoption by the American Psychiatric Association of DSM-5 significantly changes (and in material ways, expands) the definition of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a change that raises multiple questions that need to be considered carefully by lawyers, mental health professionals, advocates and policy makers.

My thesis is that the expansion of the PTSD criteria in DSM-5 has the potential to make significant changes in legal practice in all aspects of criminal procedure, but none more so than in criminal sentencing. I believe that if courts treat DSM 5 with the same deference with which they have treated earlier versions of …

An Awakening: How The Civil Rights Movement Helped Shape My Life, Frederick A.O. Schwarz, Jr.

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Remembering The Freedom Riders: An Interview With The Honorable Ernst H. Rosenberger, Ernst H. Rosenberger

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Financial Action Task Force And The Legal Profession, Duncan E. Osborne

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Lawyers In Combating Money Laundering And Terrorist Financing: Lessons From The English Approach, John A. Terrill Ii, Michael A. Breslow

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

U.S. Legal Profession Efforts To Combat Money Laundering And Terrorist Financing, Laurel S. Terry

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Paying The Piper: The Cost Of Compliance With The Federal Sex Offender Registration And Notification Act, Jennifer N. Wang

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Are Prosecutors The Constitution's Gatekeepers?, Rebecca Roiphe

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

'Love Is Just A Four-Letter Word': Sexuality, International Human Rights, And Therapeutic Jurisprudence, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

One of the most controversial social policy issues that remains dramatically underdiscussed in scholarly literature is the sexual autonomy of persons with psychosocial and intellectual disabilities, especially those who are institutionalized. This population – always marginalized and stigmatized – has traditionally faced a double set of conflicting prejudices: on one hand, people with disabilities are infantilized (as not being capable of having the same range of sexual desires, needs and expectations as persons without disabilities), and on the other, this population is demonized (as being hypersexual, unable to control base or primitive urges). Although attitudes about the abilities and capabilities …

There's A Dyin Voice Within Me Reaching Out Somewhere: How Tj Can Bring Voice To The Teaching Of Mental Disability Law And Criminal Law, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In this article, I discuss my historical involvement with therapeutic jurisprudence (TJ), how I use it in my classes (both in the free-standing TJ class and in all the others that I teach), its role in my written scholarship, and its role in conferences that I regularly attend. Although this is all positive and supportive of all efforts to widen the appeal of TJ as well as its applicability in the classroom, in scholarship and in “real life,” I also share some information that is far from optimistic with regard to the way that TJ is being reacted to by …