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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Innocent Defendant’S Dilemma: An Innovative Empirical Study Of Plea Bargaining’S Innocence Problem, Lucian Dervan, Vanessa Edkins
The Innocent Defendant’S Dilemma: An Innovative Empirical Study Of Plea Bargaining’S Innocence Problem, Lucian Dervan, Vanessa Edkins
Lucian E Dervan
In 1989, Ada JoAnn Taylor was accused of murder and presented with stark options. If she pleaded guilty, she would be rewarded with a sentence of ten to forty years in prison. If, however, she proceeded to trial and was convicted, she would likely spend the rest of her life behind bars. Over a thousand miles away in Florida and more than twenty years later, a college student was accused of cheating and presented with her own incentives to admit wrongdoing and save the university the time and expense of proceeding before a disciplinary review board. Both women decided the …
Bargained Justice: Plea Bargaining's Innocence Problem And The Brady Safety-Valve, Lucian Dervan
Bargained Justice: Plea Bargaining's Innocence Problem And The Brady Safety-Valve, Lucian Dervan
Lucian E Dervan
If any number of attorneys were asked in 2004 whether Lea Fastow’s plea bargain in the Enron case was constitutional, the majority would respond with a simple word – Brady. Yet while the 1970 Supreme Court decision Brady v. United States authorized plea bargaining as a form of American justice, the case also contained a vital caveat that has been largely overlooked by scholars, practitioners, and courts for almost forty years. Brady contains a safety-valve that caps the amount of pressure that may be asserted against defendants by prohibiting prosecutors from offering incentives in return for guilty pleas that are …
Hearing On Stolen Or Counterfeit Goods Legislation, Lucian Dervan
Hearing On Stolen Or Counterfeit Goods Legislation, Lucian Dervan
Lucian E Dervan
On March 28, 2012, Professor Dervan was called to testify before the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security (Judiciary Committee, U.S. House of Representatives) and offer his thoughts regarding proposed counterfeit goods legislation (The Safe Doses Act (H.R. 4223) and the Counterfeit Drug Penalty Enhancement Act of 2011 (H.R. 3668)). In his prepared statement, Professor Dervan examines the phenomenon of overcriminalization, the collapse of mens rea, the true impact of increased statutory maximums, plea bargaining, and the continued deterioration of our constitutionally protected right to trial by jury. His closing remarks to the Committee offer a poignant critique of …
Overcriminalization 2.0: The Symbiotic Relationship Between Plea Bargaining And Overcriminalization, Lucian Dervan
Overcriminalization 2.0: The Symbiotic Relationship Between Plea Bargaining And Overcriminalization, Lucian Dervan
Lucian E Dervan
In discussing imperfections in the adversarial system, Professor Ribstein notes in his article entitled Agents Prosecuting Agents, that “prosecutors can avoid the need to test their theories at trial by using significant leverage to virtually force even innocent, or at least questionably guilty, defendants to plead guilty.” If this is true, then there is an enormous problem with plea bargaining, particularly given that over 95% of defendants in the federal criminal justice system succumb to the power of bargained justice. As such, this piece provides a detailed analysis of modern-day plea bargaining and its role in spurring the rise of …
The Surprising Lessons From Plea Bargaining In The Shadow Of Terror, Lucian Dervan
The Surprising Lessons From Plea Bargaining In The Shadow Of Terror, Lucian Dervan
Lucian E Dervan
Since September 11, 2001, several hundred individuals have been convicted of terrorism related charges. Of these convictions, over 80% resulted from a plea of guilty. It is surprising and counterintuitive that such a large percentage of these cases are resolved in this manner, yet, even when prosecuting suspected terrorists caught attempting suicide attacks, the power of the plea bargaining machine exerts a striking influence. As a result, a close examination of these extraordinary cases offers important insights into the forces that drive the plea bargaining system. Utilizing these insights, this article critiques two divergent and dominant theories of plea bargaining …
Plea Bargaining's Survival: Financial Crimes Plea Bargaining, A Continued Triumph In A Post-Enron World, Lucian E. Dervan
Plea Bargaining's Survival: Financial Crimes Plea Bargaining, A Continued Triumph In A Post-Enron World, Lucian E. Dervan
Lucian E Dervan
This article examines the war on financial crimes that began after the collapse of Enron in 2001. Although many believed that the reforms implemented following this scandal led to greater prosecutorial focus on financial crimes and longer prison sentences, an analysis of data from 1995 through 2006 reveals that little has actually changed. The statistics demonstrate that the government's focus on financial crimes has not increased and prison sentences for fraud have remained stagnant. How could this be the case? It is this author's hypothesis that although prosecutors could have chosen to use new statutes and amendments to the United …