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Articles 1 - 13 of 13
Full-Text Articles in Law
The Confrontation Right, Richard D. Friedman
The Confrontation Right, Richard D. Friedman
Book Chapters
This chapter examines the right of criminal defendants to be confronted with the witnesses against them. It first provides an overview of the nature, purposes, and costs of the confrontation right before discussing the history of the confrontation right. It then considers a range of issues that may arise in any jurisdiction (or in some cases, any common law jurisdiction) with regard to the confrontation right, using as a touchstone the current status of the right in the United States. In particular, it describes situations in which the question of whether a statement is testimonial typically arises, such as fresh …
Victim Participation At The International Criminal Court And The Extraordinary Chambers In The Courts Of Cambodia: A Feminist Project, Susana Sacouto
Victim Participation At The International Criminal Court And The Extraordinary Chambers In The Courts Of Cambodia: A Feminist Project, Susana Sacouto
Michigan Journal of Gender & Law
The question this Article poses is whether victim participation--one of the most recent developments in international criminal law--has increased the visibility of the actual lived experience of survivors of sexual and gender-based violence in the context of war, mass violence, or repression. Under the Rome Statute, victims of the world's most serious crimes were given unprecedented rights to participate in proceedings before the Court. Nearly a decade later, a similar scheme was established to allow victims to participate as civil parties in the proceedings before the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC or Extraordinary Chambers), a court created …
Shaken Baby Syndrome, Abusive Head Trauma, And Actual Innocence: Getting It Right, Keith A. Findley, Patrick D. Barnes, David A. Moran, Waney Squier
Shaken Baby Syndrome, Abusive Head Trauma, And Actual Innocence: Getting It Right, Keith A. Findley, Patrick D. Barnes, David A. Moran, Waney Squier
Articles
In the past decade, the existence of shaken baby syndrome (SBS) has been called into serious question by biomechanical studies, the medical and legal literature, and the media. As a result of these questions, SBS has been renamed abusive head trauma (AHT). This is, however, primarily a terminological shift: like SBS, AHT refers to the two-part hypothesis that one can reliably diagnose shaking or abuse from three internal findings (subdural hemorrhage, retinal hemorrhage, and encephalopathy) and that one can identify the perpetrator based on the onset of symptoms. Over the past decade, we have learned that this hypothesis fits poorly …
Prosecuting The Informant Culture, Andrew E. Taslitz
Prosecuting The Informant Culture, Andrew E. Taslitz
Michigan Law Review
Alexandra Natapoff, in her outstanding new book, Snitching: Criminal Informants and the Erosion of American Justice, makes a compelling case for reform of the system by which we regulate police use of criminal informants. Indeed, as other writers have discussed, law enforcement's overreliance on such informants has led to a "snitching culture" in which informant snitching replaces other forms of law enforcement investigation (pp. 12, 31, 88-89). Yet snitches, especially jailhouse snitches, are notoriously unreliable.
Thoughts From Across The Water On Hearsay And Confrontation, Richard D. Friedman
Thoughts From Across The Water On Hearsay And Confrontation, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
This article draws on the history of the hearsay rule, and on recent decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, to argue that the right to confrontation should be recognised as a basic principle of the law of evidence, and that aspects of the Law Commission's proposals for reform of the hearsay rule, and of the Home Office's proposals for restrictions on the right of cross-examination, are therefore unsatisfactory.
Bad Samaritanism And The Duty To Render Aid: A Proposal, Mark K. Obseck
Bad Samaritanism And The Duty To Render Aid: A Proposal, Mark K. Obseck
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Part I of this Note explains the history of the law's response to Bad Samaritanism. Part II discusses the benefits of enacting a duty to notify. Part III responds to various objections that might be raised against the duty to notify. And Part IV offers a model statute for legislatures to follow in enacting the duty to notify.
Constitutional Constraints On The Admissibility Of Grand Jury Testimony: The Unavailable Witness, Confrontation, And Due Process, Barbara L. Strack
Constitutional Constraints On The Admissibility Of Grand Jury Testimony: The Unavailable Witness, Confrontation, And Due Process, Barbara L. Strack
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Defendants, however, have raised serious constitutional objections to the introduction of grand jury testimony when the witness is unavailable to testify at trial. These claims have focused on the confrontation clause of the sixth amendment and the due process clauses of the fifth and fourteenth amendments. Defendants have contended that the introduction of testimony from a grand jury proceeding which cannot be subjected to cross-examination fatally compromises the defendant's right to a fair trial. Lower courts are split over admitting grand jury testimony in these circumstances, and the Supreme Court has yet to rule on the issue. As a result, …
The Confrontation Clause And The Scope Of The Unavailability Requirement, Jerry J. Phillips
The Confrontation Clause And The Scope Of The Unavailability Requirement, Jerry J. Phillips
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The confrontation clause is that language of the sixth amendment to the United States Constitution which provides, "[I]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right… to be confronted with the witnesses against him." Despite the seemingly absolute language of the confrontation clause, which would suggest that no hearsay evidence may be admitted against an accused in a criminal proceeding, its guarantee has been subject to exception. For example, when either a witness to an event or his testimony is shown to be unavailable, others will be allowed to testify as to the information which the declarant-witness has related …
Title Iii - Recalcitrant Witnesses, Jeffrey J. Greenbaum
Title Iii - Recalcitrant Witnesses, Jeffrey J. Greenbaum
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
This title represents a congressional attempt to codify the court-developed civil contempt practice. When a witness is granted immunity and still refuses to answer the question presented to him he can be ordered by a court to answer the specific question. Upon his continued refusal, a court can have him confined summarily until he complies with such order, or until he is no longer able to comply. Such confinement is not intended to be punitive in nature, but rather to coerce compliance with the court's order by imposing imprisonment as an alternative to answering the question. The witness will be …
Title Iv - False Declarations, Jeffrey J. Greenbaum
Title Iv - False Declarations, Jeffrey J. Greenbaum
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Title IV was designed to facilitate the bringing of federal perjury prosecutions, thereby strengthening the deterrent value of the perjury penalties and acting as a greater incentive for truthful testimony. It establishes a new false declarations statute applicable to court and grand jury proceedings, with maximum penalty slightly increased over that allowable under the previously controlling perjury statute.
Title Vi - Depositions, Peter A. Kelly
Title Vi - Depositions, Peter A. Kelly
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Title VI expands Rule 15 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure to permit the Government to depose its witnesses in certain limited classes of cases. Previously only the defendant had been accorded this right. Upon the motion of either party at any time after a criminal indictment or information has been filed, the court may order that the testimony of the party's witnesses be taken by deposition if "due to exceptional circumstances it is in the interest of justice" that such testimony be taken and preserved. Such exceptional circumstances were intended by Congress to include the existence of a …
Abstracts, Katherine Kempfer
Abstracts, Katherine Kempfer
Michigan Law Review
The abstracts consist merely of summaries of the facts and holdings of recent cases and are distinguished from the notes by the absence of discussion.
Evidence-Corroboration In Criminal Cases
Evidence-Corroboration In Criminal Cases
Michigan Law Review
On the night of September 12, 1931, Mrs. Thalia Massie, while walking unescorted along a road near Honolulu, was forced into a car, taken to a lonely spot, and attacked by five young men. The five alleged attackers were placed on trial for rape. The jury was unable to reach a verdict and a mistrial was declared.