Law Commons^™

Will The Real Mens Rea Please Stand Up: Assessing The Fifth Circuit’S Kickback Jurisprudence After United States V. Nora, John J. Locurto

St. Mary's Law Journal

Many criminal statutes require willful misconduct, yet willfulness remains an elusive concept. Its meaning and application depend as much on the outcome a court desires as the definition or legal standard a court claims to apply. Ambiguity in the required mens rea is an age-old problem with a venerable pedigree in the circuits and Supreme Court. This article considers anew the struggle to define “willfully” as that term is used in the Anti-Kickback Statute (AKS), 42 U.S.C. § 1320a-7b, one of the federal government’s key weapons against health care fraud.

When it decided United States v. Nora and reversed the …

Mens Rea Reform And Its Discontents, Benjamin Levin

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

This Article examines the contentious debates over recent proposals for “mens rea reform.” The substantive criminal law has expanded dramatically, and legislators have criminalized a great deal of conduct that is quite common. Often, new criminal laws do not require that defendants know they are acting unlawfully. Mens rea reform proposals seek to address the problems of overcriminalization and unintentional offending by increasing the burden on prosecutors to prove a defendant’s culpable mental state. These proposals have been a staple of conservative-backed bills on criminal justice reform. Many on the left remain skeptical of mens rea reform and view …

Postpartum Psychosis As A Defense To Infant Murder, Barbara E. Rosenberg

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Depraved Mind Murder And Intoxication: Some Sobering Thoughts On People V. Register

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Book Review: H. Fingarette & A. Fingarette Hasse, Mental Disabilities And Criminal Responsibilities, John Q. La Fond

Seattle University Law Review

Whether mental illness and related impairments in the human psyche should affect an individual's criminal responsibilityfor law-breaking behavior has always provoked intense andwide-ranging debate. This debate clearly reflects society's lack of consensus concerning the appropriateness and scope of considering mental impairment in assessing individual criminal responsiblility. Thus, it is not unexpected that recently proposals to abolish the insanity defense have been seriously suggested or that noted scholars have urged society to place the disposition of mentally ill offenders in the exclusive hands of experts. That this heated discussion continues unabated should come as no surprise, since legal doctrines which excuse …