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Full-Text Articles in Law
Editor's Observations: The 2001 Economic Crime Package: A Legislative History, Frank O. Bowman Iii
Editor's Observations: The 2001 Economic Crime Package: A Legislative History, Frank O. Bowman Iii
Faculty Publications
On April 6, 2001, the U.S. Sentencing Commission approved a group of amendments to guidelines governing the sentencing of economic crimes. These measures, collectively known to as the “economic crime package,” are the culmination of some six years of deliberations by both the Conaboy and Murphy Sentencing Commissions working together with interested outside groups such as the defense bar, the Justice Department, probation officers, and the Criminal Law Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference, The package contains three basic components. First, the now-separate theft and fraud guidelines, Sections 2B1.1 and 2F1.1, will be consolidated into a single guideline. Second, the …
Felony Murder And Mens Rea Default Rules: A Study In Statutory Interpretation, Guyora Binder
Felony Murder And Mens Rea Default Rules: A Study In Statutory Interpretation, Guyora Binder
Journal Articles
The Model Penal Code's influential approach to culpability included default rules assigning a culpable mental state to every conduct, circumstance and result element of each offense. Such rules have been enacted in half of the American states. The Code's drafters also rejected what they understood to be the felony murder rule's imposition of "a form of strict liability for... homicide." Yet almost every state has retained some form of the felony murder rule and so repudiated the Model Penal Code's proposed reform. Because the Model Penal Code's disapproval of felony murder flows from its general disapproval of strict liability, the …
The Problem Of Obtaining Evidence For International Criminal Courts, Jacob Katz Cogan
The Problem Of Obtaining Evidence For International Criminal Courts, Jacob Katz Cogan
Faculty Articles and Other Publications
International criminal courts will be judged by their fairness to defendants as well as to victims. In a very practical way, such claims will hinge, inter alia, on the ability of prosecutors and defendants to have reasonable access to probative evidence. But international criminal courts depend on states to provide them with evidence or access to evidence. The obligation of states to cooperate with international criminal tribunals in the production of evidence was at issue in the recent decision of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Blaki case (1997). That judgment and the provisions of the …
Meaning And Motive In The Law Of Homicide (Reviewing Samuel H. Pillsbury, Judging Evil: Rethinking The Law Of Murder And Manslaughter), Guyora Binder
Meaning And Motive In The Law Of Homicide (Reviewing Samuel H. Pillsbury, Judging Evil: Rethinking The Law Of Murder And Manslaughter), Guyora Binder
Book Reviews
Many criminal law scholars have criticized the Model Penal Code’s restrictive conception of culpability as awareness of risk, and have sought to incorporate motives and desires into culpoability analysis. In his excellent book Judging Evil, Samuel Pillsbury has applied this richer conception of culpability to homicide law. The result is a comprehensive theory of homicide liability, unified by an effort to predicate liability on deficient moral reasoning rather than merely awareness of risk. This review essay explicates and commends Pillsbury’s theory but also criticizes one crucial deficiency. Pillsbury shrinks from one of the most obvious but potentially most controversial implications …
The French Experience With Duty To Rescue: A Dubious Case For Criminal Enforcement, Edward A. Tomlinson
The French Experience With Duty To Rescue: A Dubious Case For Criminal Enforcement, Edward A. Tomlinson
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Continuing Payment Of One's Debt To Society: The German Model Of Felon Disenfranchisement As An Alternative, Nora V. Demleitner
Continuing Payment Of One's Debt To Society: The German Model Of Felon Disenfranchisement As An Alternative, Nora V. Demleitner
Scholarly Articles
None available.
Framed: Utilitarianism And Punishment Of The Innocent, Guyora Binder, Nicholas J. Smith
Framed: Utilitarianism And Punishment Of The Innocent, Guyora Binder, Nicholas J. Smith
Journal Articles
This paper is a defense of utilitarian penology, against the familiar retributivist charge that it promotes framing the innocent, and other charges similarly depending on the notion that utilitarianism encourages officials to deceive the public. Our defense proceeds from the striking fact that utilitarianism's critics do not cite textual evidence that the originators of utilitarian penology in fact endorsed punishing the innocent or deceiving the public. Instead, critics claim that these unsavory policies follow logically from the premises of utilitarianism. Our argument, in brief, is that the charge of framing the innocent rests on a misunderstanding of utilitarian penology. We …
The Criminal Defense Lawyer's Fiduciary Duty To Clients With Mental Disability, Christopher Slobogin, Amy Mashburn
The Criminal Defense Lawyer's Fiduciary Duty To Clients With Mental Disability, Christopher Slobogin, Amy Mashburn
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This Article has argued that the defense attorney has a multifaceted fiduciary duty toward the client with mental disability. That duty requires, first and foremost, respect for the autonomy of the client. The lawyer shows that respect not only by heeding the wishes of the competent client but by refusing to heed the wishes of the incompetent client. A coherent approach to the competency construct is therefore important. Following the lead of Professor Bonnie, this Article has broken competency into two components: assistance competency and decisional competency. It has defined the former concept in traditional terms, as an understanding of …
A Proposal For A New Massachusetts Notoriety For Profit Law: The Grandson Of Sam, Sean J. Kealy
A Proposal For A New Massachusetts Notoriety For Profit Law: The Grandson Of Sam, Sean J. Kealy
Faculty Scholarship
In recent years, two women stood convicted of highly publicized major crimes in Massachusetts. Katherine Ann Power ("Power") was a fugitive who committed felony-murder in 1970. She led a life on the run as a fugitive until 1993 when she revealed her true identity and surrendered to authorities to face the consequences of her crimes. Louise Woodward ("Woodward"), an au pair originally from England, gained notoriety on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean when she was convicted of killing the baby entrusted to her care. Both women captured the attention of the national media for months and reportedly had opportunities …
An End To Insanity: Recasting The Role Of Mental Disability In Criminal Cases, Christopher Slobogin
An End To Insanity: Recasting The Role Of Mental Disability In Criminal Cases, Christopher Slobogin
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This article argues that mental illness should no longer be the basis for a special defense of insanity. Instead, mental disorder should be considered in criminal cases only if relevant to other excuse doctrines, such as lack of mens rea, self-defense and duress, as those defenses have been defined under modern subjectively-oriented codes. With the advent of these subjectively defined doctrines (a development which, ironically, took place during the same period that insanity formulations expanded), the insanity defense has outlived its usefulness, normatively and practically. Modern official formulations of the defense are overbroad because, fairly construed, they exculpate the vast …
Foreword: Is Justice Just Us?, Christopher Slobogin
Foreword: Is Justice Just Us?, Christopher Slobogin
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
This is a review of JUSTICE, LIABILITY AND BLAME, by Paul Robinson and John Darley. The book is a summary of 18 studies which surveyed lay subjects about their attitudes toward various aspects of criminal law doctrine, including the act requirement for attempt, omission liability, accomplice liability, the felony-murder role, and the intoxication and insanity defenses. In virtually every study, the authors found that the subjects disagreed with the Model Penal Code's position, the common law's position, or both. The authors contend that results of surveys such as theirs should play a significant role in designing criminal doctrine, both because …