Digital Commons Network^™

Prior Racist Acts And The Character Evidence Ban In Hate Crime Prosecutions, Paul F. Rothstein, Ronald J. Coleman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The killing of unarmed African-American Ahmaud Arbery and others ignited a wave of public outrage and re-focused attention on race and the criminal justice system. During the recent federal hate crimes proceedings for Arbery’s death, the prosecution introduced evidence relating to the alleged past racist acts of the defendants. This type of evidence may be seen as highly probative and desperately needed to do justice in hate crimes cases. On its face, however, such type of evidence appears to be inadmissible owing to the well-known—but little understood— evidentiary ban on character evidence prescribed in Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) and …

Equity Of Overdose Education And Naloxone Distribution Provided In The Kentucky Healing Communities Study, Douglas R. Oyler, Hannah K. Knudsen, Carrie B. Oser, Sharon L. Walsh, Monica Roberts, Shawn R. Nigam, Philip M. Westgate, Patricia R. Freeman

Biostatistics Faculty Publications

Background: Opioid overdoses differentially affect demographic groups. Strategies to reduce overdose deaths, specifically overdose education and naloxone distribution (OEND), are not consistently delivered equitably. Methods: The HEALing Communities Study^SM (HCS) is a cluster-randomized trial designed to implement evidence-based practices, including OEND, to reduce overdose deaths across communities. Individuals receiving OEND in eight Kentucky counties between January 2020 and June 2022 provided demographics and overdose history. Recipient characteristics were compared to opioid overdose decedent characteristics to evaluate whether OEND was equitably delivered to the target population. Recipient characteristics were also analyzed based on whether OEND was delivered in criminal justice, …

Mercer Law School’S Legacy Of Service To The Profession, Franklin T. Gaddy, Siena Berrios Gaddy, Thomas Alec Chappell, E. Tate Crymes

Mercer Law Review

Hon. William Augustus Bootle, a 1925 graduate of Mercer Law School and 1924 graduate of Mercer University, penned of his alma mater, “[the] school was conceived in professionalism and dedicated to excellence.” Similarly, “Altruism, not the promotion of selfish aims, has been the inspiration of the [Georgia Bar] Association throughout its entire history.” As noted by Judge Bootle, Mercer Law School’s legacy of service to the profession began long before the establishment of the State Bar of Georgia as we know it today.

Today, Mercer Law School remains dedicated to serving the legal profession. This commitment to serve and devote …

Audience Response To Covid Monologues: Research-Based Theater On The Societal Impact Of Covid-19, Emily A. Hurley, Saraniya Tharmarajah, Genevieve De Mahy, Jess Rassp, Joe Salvatore, Jonathan P. Jones, Steven A. Harvey

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

PURPOSE: Research-based theater uses drama to communicate research findings to audiences beyond those that typically read peer-reviewed journals. We applied research-based theater to translate qualitative research findings on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on different segments of U.S. society.

APPROACH: Theater artists and public health researchers collaborated to create a collection of eight monologues from systematically sourced, peer-reviewed publications. Following three virtual performances in Spring, 2021, audience members were invited to complete a survey.

SETTING/PARTICIPANTS: Audience survey respondents (n = 120) were mostly U.S.-based and were diverse in terms of age, race/ethnicity, gender, profession, and experience attending theater.

METHOD: …

It's The Final Countdown: How A Legislative Solution Might Rectify The Staffing Shortages & Horrors Of Rikers Island, Rochelle Podolsky

Hofstra Labor & Employment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Readers’ Workshop Model Impact Urban Primary Students’ Motivation And Reading Progress, Narissa Waller

Dissertations

In order to assess the impact of the Readers' Workshop on academic success and literacy progress of primary students in an urban Midwest primary school, the researcher conducted a study. Through this study, the researcher aimed to determine whether the implementation of the Readers' Workshop positively affected the academic and literacy progress of primary students in an urban setting. Student progress was analyzed by comparing their assessment scores and reading levels in fall 2022 and spring 2023. The study aimed to identify effective teaching practices that can be implemented to bridge the achievement gap between urban students and their counterparts. …

Legal Framework For The Use Of Artificial Intelligence (Ai) Technology In The Canadian Criminal Justice System, Gideon Christian

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This article seeks to identify and examine critical issues arising from the deployment and use of AI recidivism risk assessment tools in the Canadian criminal justice system. It commences with the historical evolution of these tools in the criminal justice system, tracing their development from the first generation to the emergence of AI-driven risk assessments. By examining the progression of risk assessment tools from their origins to the current AI-powered systems this research aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the challenges and opportunities that these tools present. The article then delves into crucial issues such as algorithmic bias, highlighting …

New Hurdles To Redistricting Reform: State Evasion, Moore, And Partisan Gerrymandering, Manoj Mate

Journal Articles

Proponents of fair districting reforms continue to face challenges in seeking to address the problem of partisan gerrymandering. Even in states that have successfully enacted redistricting reforms, state actors have been able to evade compliance, and state courts have been unable to guarantee fair districts. In addition, the Supreme Court’s decision in Moore v. Harper could also limit state court efforts to guarantee fair districts. This Article argues that state evasion and Moore threaten to undermine the efficacy of fair districting norms recognized by state courts or enacted through either state political processes. Moore could create a one-way ratchet by …

The Road To Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions: Deinstitutionalization And Mass Incarceration Nation, Corinna Barrett Lain

William & Mary Law Review

They say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and our failed implementation of deinstitutionalization in the 1970s is a prime example of the point. In this symposium contribution—a response to Jeffrey Bellin’s book Mass Incarceration Nation—I offer a historical account of deinstitutionalization of state mental hospitals, tracing how severely mentally ill patients were discharged from state hospitals and eventually made their way back to secure beds, but in our nation’s jails and prisons instead. Mental health and mass incarceration are not separate crises, I argue, but rather interconnected problems with an interconnected past that require …

Charging Abortion, Milan Markovic

Fordham Law Review

As long as Roe v. Wade remained good law, prosecutors could largely avoid the question of abortion. The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has now placed prosecutors at the forefront of the abortion wars. Some chief prosecutors in antiabortion states have pledged to not enforce antiabortion laws, whereas others are targeting even out-of-state providers. This post-Dobbs reality, wherein the ability to obtain an abortion depends not only on the politics of one’s state but also the policies of one’s local district attorney, has received minimal scrutiny from legal scholars.

Prosecutors have broad charging discretion, …

Extraordinary Punishment: Conditions Of Confinement And Compassionate Release, Meredith B. Esser

Fordham Law Review

People experience severe forms of harm while incarcerated, including medical neglect, prolonged solitary confinement, sexual and physical violence, and a host of other ills. But civil rights litigation under the Eighth Amendment—the most common vehicle through which people seek to redress these harms—presents significant practical and doctrinal barriers to incarcerated plaintiffs. Most notably, the Eighth Amendment’s “deliberate indifference” standard asks not whether a person has been harmed, but instead requires plaintiffs to demonstrate a criminally reckless mental state on the part of prison officials. Further, Eighth Amendment remedies are limited to damages or injunctions, which may not adequately redress a …

Foreword: The Legal Profession And Social Change, Atinuke O. Adediran, Bruce A. Green

Fordham Law Review

Fordham University School of Law’s Stein Center for Law and Ethics has collaborated with the Fordham Law Review every year since the late 1990s to encourage, collect, and publish scholarly writings on different aspects of the legal profession, including its norms, regulation, organization, history, and development—that is, on themes relating to what law schools loosely call “legal ethics.” The legal profession is an important subject of study for legal scholars, among others. Although one U.S. Supreme Court Justice, himself a former law professor, airily derided legal ethics as the “least analytically rigorous . . . of law-school subjects,” we dispute …

Community Responsive Public Defense, Alexis Hoag-Fordjour

Fordham Law Review

This colloquium asks us to consider how social change is influencing the legal profession and the legal profession’s response. This Essay applies these questions to organizing around criminal injustice and the response from public defenders. This Essay surfaces the work of four innovative indigent defense organizations that are engaged with and duty-bound to the communities they represent. I call this “community responsive public defense,” which is a distinct model of indigent defense whereby public defenders look to their clients and their clients’ communities to help shape advocacy, strategy, and representation.

Methodologically, this Essay relies primarily on qualitative interviews with leaders …

We S.O.A.R: Student Original Arts Repertory, University Of Dayton

Dance and Theater Programs

We SOAR was a collaboration between students from a variety of majors and programs and members of our own Dayton community. Each piece reflected the diverse perspectives and passions of our student artists, each contributing to a collective narrative that champions positive change and social impact.

Symposium Introduction: The Volume Problem, Jeffrey Bellin

William & Mary Law Review

Introduction to the 2024 William & Mary Law Review symposium, "Understanding and Responding to Mass Incarceration."

Bottom-Up Federal Sentencing Reform, Andrew W. Grindrod

William & Mary Law Review

Today, about 160,000 people live behind the bars of a federal prison. That is roughly the population of Alexandria, Virginia. Starting from the premise that the federal system’s contribution to mass incarceration should be curbed and recognizing that broad legislative reform seems unlikely, this Article considers the federal judiciary’s potential role in sentencing reform.

Bottom-up sentencing reform consists of federal trial judges exercising their decisional authority in individual cases to engage with the fundamental premises and assumptions that underlie traditional sentencing decisions, categorically rejecting them when appropriate. This approach to reform is available under current law. In fact, a few …

Critical Data Theory, Margaret Hu

William & Mary Law Review

Critical Data Theory examines the role of AI and algorithmic decisionmaking at its intersection with the law. This theory aims to deconstruct the impact of AI in law and policy contexts. The tools of AI and automated systems allow for legal, scientific, socioeconomic, and political hierarchies of power that can profitably be interrogated with critical theory. While the broader umbrella of critical theory features prominently in the work of surveillance scholars, legal scholars can also deploy criticality analyses to examine surveillance and privacy law challenges, particularly in an examination of how AI and other emerging technologies have been expanded in …

Baselining Historical And Cultural Context For Law Students: Aba Standard 303(C) And New York Law School’S “Community Days: Law In Context” Programme, Anthony W. Crowell

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Designing Sanctuary, Rick Su

Michigan Law Review

In recent decades, a growing number of cities in the United States have adopted “sanctuary policies” that limit local participation in federal immigration enforcement. Existing scholarship has focused on their legality and effect, especially with respect to our nation’s immigration laws. Largely overlooked, however, is the local process through which sanctuary policies are designed and the reasons why cities choose to adopt them through city ordinances, mayoral orders, or employee handbooks. This Article argues that municipal sanctuary policies are far from uniform, and their variation reflects the different local interests and institutional actors behind their adoption and implementation. More specifically, …

Voting While Trans: How Voter Id Laws Unconstitutionally Compel The Speech Of Trans Voters, Emmy Maluf

Michigan Law Review

Thirty-five states currently request or require identification documents for in-person voting, and these requirements uniquely impact transgender voters. Of the more than 697,800 voting-eligible trans people living in states that conduct primarily in-person elections, almost half (43 percent) lack documents that correctly reflect their name or gender. When an ID does not align with a trans voter’s gender presentation, the voter may be disenfranchised—either because a poll worker denies them the right to cast a ballot or because the voter ID requirement chills their participation in the first place. Further, when a trans voter presents an ID that does not …

Dhea: A Neglected Biological Signal That May Affect Fetal And Child Development, Natasha A. Bailey, Elysia Poggi Davis, Curt A. Sandman, Laura M. Glynn

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

The stress-sensitive maternal hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis through the end-product cortisol, represents a primary pathway through which maternal experience shapes fetal development with long-term consequences for child neurodevelopment. However, there is another HPA axis end-product that has been widely ignored in the study of human pregnancy. The synthesis and release of dehydroepiandosterone (DHEA) is similar to cortisol, so it is a plausible, but neglected, biological signal that may influence fetal neurodevelopment. DHEA also may interact with cortisol to determine developmental outcomes. Surprisingly, there is virtually nothing known about human fetal exposure to prenatal maternal DHEA and offspring neurodevelopment. The current study …

Perbandingan Pengaturan Kuota Pemilihan Perempuan Dan Kondisi Keterwakilan Perempuan Di Parlemen: Studi Kasus Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Dan Finlandia (A Comparison Study Of The Quotas And Conditions For Women's Representation In Parliament In Indonesia, Timor-Leste, And Finland), Ramadhanya Elwinne Huzaima Sibarani

The Indonesian Journal of Socio-Legal Studies

Women’s representation in parliament is an important aspect of improving gender equality in a country. As of the 2019 parliamentary elections, women’s representation in the Parliament of the Republic of Indonesia (DPR RI) has only reached 21.4%. This figure is far below Timor-Leste and Finland, which respectively have 40% and 47% women’s representation. To increase the number of women’s representation in parliament, there is a concept called women's electoral quota. This study attempts to compare how women’s electoral quotas are regulated in Indonesia, Timor-Leste, and Finland. In addition, this study also reviews the condition of women’s representation in the parliaments …

Diondre Also Has Bad Days: Cannabis Use And The Criminalization Of Black Youth, Rommel Johnson

School of Rehabilitation Services & Counseling Faculty Publications

Black, school-aged youth may experience socioeconomic, psychological, and emotional difficulties that affect their mental health, leading to maladaptive ways of coping, such as cannabis use. Instead of getting treatment and support to help them manage their stressors in positive ways, Black youth often receive punitive school practices, including referrals to the juvenile justice system. Counselors who work with school-aged youth are likely to encounter many Black youth and can thus either be instrumental to their psychological development or inadvertently impede their well-being with over-pathologization and criminalization of their cannabis use. In this article, the author reflects on a particular experience …

Building A Bridge Between Punitive And Restorative Practices: A Comparative Study Of Best Practice Models For Restorative Justice Within Student Conduct In Higher Education, Justin Stern

Theses and Dissertations

This study analyzes several leading restorative practices programs in Higher Education as they relate to student conduct. The purpose of this study is to craft a best practice model of restorative justice within the framework of student conduct work in higher education. This study uses a qualitative approach to establish the learning outcomes of restorative justice on a college campus, as well as how this practice is operationalized. The study also reviews the general and possible implications future research of such a paradigm shift within student conduct in higher education.

A Scoping Review Of Fair Machine Learning Techniques When Using Real-World Data, Yu Huang, Jingchuan Guo, Wei-Han Chen, Hsin-Yueh Lin, Huilin Tang, Fei Wang, Hua Xu, Jiang Bian

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Objective: The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) in health care to aid clinical decisions is widespread. However, as AI and ML take important roles in health care, there are concerns about AI and ML associated fairness and bias. That is, an AI tool may have a disparate impact, with its benefits and drawbacks unevenly distributed across societal strata and subpopulations, potentially exacerbating existing health inequities. Thus, the objectives of this scoping review were to summarize existing literature and identify gaps in the topic of tackling algorithmic bias and optimizing fairness in AI/ML models using real-world data …

The Wall Between Latinas And Latinos? Gender And Immigration Enforcement Attitudes Among U.S. Latina/O Voters, Álvaro José Corral

Political Science Faculty Publications

Donald Trump’s surprising level of support among U.S. Latina/o voters in 2016 and his improved performance in the 2020 election posed a puzzle for Latina/o politics scholars given his stridently anti-immigrant agenda. Although scholars have acknowledged the political gender gap between Latinas and Latino men, few studies have outlined the theoretical basis or explored the empirical existence of gender differences in Latina/o immigration enforcement attitudes. Building on the Latina politics literature documenting Latinas’ greater engagement in solidarity work with immigrants and their greater desire for cultural transmission and the maintenance of pan-ethnic identity, I test two hypotheses. The first (the …

Racial And Neighborhood Disparities In New York City Criminal Summons Practices, Anna Stenkamp, Michael Rempel

Publications and Research

The purpose of this study is to assess trends in criminal summons practices by the New York City Police Department (NYPD), including if and how they disproportionately impact low income and/or Black and Brown communities. The New York City Council commissioned the study as part of the Police Reform and Reinvention Collaborative Plan. Approved March 2021, the goals of this plan were both to document and ameliorate policies and practices that have led to historic injustices and over-policing of low-income New Yorkers and communities of color.

Assessing Progress In Reducing Racial Disparities In New York City Law Enforcement, 2013-2022, Stephen Koppel, Michael Rempel

Publications and Research

As part of New York City's Police Reform and Reinvention Collaborative Plan, this study assesses overall trends and racial disparities from 2013 to 2022 in four law enforcement practices: (1) pedestrian stops, (2) desk appearance tickets, (3) arrests, and (4) prosecutions by district attorneys.

Color Contrast: Racial And Ethnic Disparities In New York City Law Enforcement, Gina Moreno, Richard A. Espinobarros, Sheyla A. Delgado, Jeffrey A. Butts

Publications and Research

Researchers at the John Jay College Research and Evaluation Center examined racial and ethnic disparities in arrest rates across New York City neighborhoods, focusing on assault and larceny offenses. Using 911 call data and demographic controls, the study grouped neighborhoods by proportions of Black and Hispanic residents and analyzed arrest patterns. While arrests of Black and Hispanic individuals were more common in neighborhoods with higher populations of these groups, the arrest-to-resident ratios revealed disproportionate impacts, especially for larceny. The findings highlight the importance of monitoring disparities to promote equitable justice practices.

Which Police Departments Make Black Lives Matter?, Robert Maranto, Wilfred Reilly, Patrick J. Wolf

Education Reform Faculty and Graduate Students Publications

Black Lives Matter (BLM) has gained support across racial lines and considerable financial backing. Yet it is unclear whether social science has responded with research likely to save Black lives. To encourage more applied research and related public discussion, we rank police departments in the 50 largest U.S. cities by their effectiveness in keeping homicides low and not taking civilian lives, while adjusting for poverty, which makes policing more difficult. We find enormous variation in police performance and offer qualitative evidence that this reflects organizational practices. We conclude with ideas for reform.