Law Commons^™

Legal Punishment As Civil Ritual: Making Cultural Sense Of Harsh Punishment, Professor Spearit

The Bridge: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Legal & Social Policy

This article is an excerpt American Prisons: A Critical Primer on Culture and Conversion to Islam. The central aim of this chapter is to examine the post-civil rights push toward harsh punishment through the cultural lens of ritual. The United States is one of the most punitive countries on the planet--the country is the world leader in imprisonment and is one of the top five that executes capital defendants. However, determining the catalysts of this turn to harsh punishment has proved vexing. Scholars have adequately explained how the end of the welfare state, followed by a proliferation of drug laws, …

Citizenship And Severity: Recent Immigration Reforms And The New Penology, Teresa A. Miller

Teresa A. Miller

Over the past twenty years, scholars of criminal law, criminology and criminal punishment have documented a transformation in the practices, objectives, and institutional arrangements underlying a range of criminal justice system functions that are at the heart of penal modernism. In contrast to the preceding eighty years of criminal justice practices that were progressively more modern in their belief in the rationality of the criminal offender and their concern for enhancing civilization through rehabilitative responses to criminality, these scholars note that since the mid-198''0s the relatively settled assumptions about the framework that shaped criminal justice and penal practices for nearly …

A New Look At Neo-Liberal Economic Policies And The Criminalization Of Undocumented Migration, Teresa A. Miller

Teresa A. Miller

This paper situates the current “crisis” surrounding the arrival and continued presence of undocumented immigrants in the United States within penological trends that have taken root in American law over the past thirty years. It positions the shift from more benevolent to the increasingly harsh legal treatment of undocumented immigrants as the continuation of a succession of legal reforms criminalizing immigrants, and governing immigration through crime. By charting the increasing salience of crime in public perceptions of undocumented immigrants, and comparing the immediately preceding criminal stigmatization of so-called “criminal aliens”, this paper exposes current severity toward undocumented immigrants as consistent …

The Pro Bono Collaborative Project Spotlight: Rwu Law Street Law: Teaching Teens About The Law And Inspiring Future Lawyers 11-16-2017, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Pro Bono Collaborative Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

Looking Backward To Address The Future? Transitional Justice, Rising Crime And Nation Building, James L. Cavallaro

Maine Law Review

This is not an Article about the Nazi regime’s war on crime, nor does it analyze the possible lawlessness of the Weimar Republic. It does, however, consider the role of crime in transitional states. As such, the observation above is relevant to the issues examined in the pages that follow. Crime and the manipulation of the fear it promotes were essential to the rise of Nazism, the fall of the Weimar Republic, and the historical record of both regimes. I contend that we must recognize the vital role of street crime in the stability and instability of newly democratic and …

The Reduction In The Number Of Entries In The Criminal File Is A Phenomenon That Is Observed Throughout Germany. Practice And Legislation Differ More And More?, M. Christian, S. Shenrok

Review of law sciences

the author reveals the order of registration of criminal cases in Germany, it also reveals the differences between practices and legislation on the issue.

Differentiation, Individualization, Execution Of Criminal Punishments And Its Goals: Way To Success, N. Salaev

Review of law sciences

This paper aims to explore the multifaceted meaning of the rational application of spice principles, such as differentiation and individualization in the execution of criminal penalties. The author reported on the reforms in the penitentiary system that is being conducted in Uzbekistan, while at the same time critical analyzing the existing problems in penitentiary legislation and practice. On the basis of scientific analysis, the author gives concrete suggestions and recommendations on the elimination of these problems.

The Federal Government's Role In Securing Justice In Domestic Abuse Cases, Margaret Groban

Maine Law Review

Domestic Violence is a national crime problem that knows no boundaries—it impacts people of all races, colors, creeds, nationalities, religions, and sexual orientation. It impacts the rich and the poor and the middle class. It is clearly an equal opportunity crime. From 1980-2008, over two-thirds of victims murdered by a spouse or ex-spouse were killed by guns. In 2008, 53% of these victims were killed with guns. When a gun was in the house, an abused woman was six times more likely than other abused women to be killed. The domestic violence problem in Maine is equally stark and tragic …

Criminalizing Pregnancy, Cortney E. Lollar

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

The state of Tennessee arrested a woman two days after she gave birth and charged her with assault of her newborn child based on her use of narcotics during her pregnancy. Tennessee's 2014 assault statute was the first to explicitly criminalize the use of drugs by a pregnant woman. But this law, along with others like it being considered by legislatures across the country, is only the most recent manifestation of a long history of using criminal law to punish poor mothers and mothers of color for their behavior while pregnant. The purported motivation for such laws is the harm …

Law Enforcement And Criminal Law Decisions, Erwin Chemerinsky

Erwin Chemerinsky

No abstract provided.

Rwu First Amendment Blog: Andrew Horwitz's Blog: First Amendment Protects The Right To Give And To Receive 05-23-2017, Andrew Horwitz

Law School Blogs

No abstract provided.

Theory For A Starving Obese, Ishai Shapira Kalter

Theses and Dissertations

Theory for a Starving Obese (2017) is both a book and an installation. During the years 2015-2017 I began writing Theory for a Starving Obese; a collection of essays and art criticism about exhibitions that took place in white cubes in New York. I was following my dissatisfaction, and hoped to delve deeper into the question “What is Contemporary Art?” At the end of a process, I sent seventeen envelopes to artists who exhibited solo shows in New York and whose works I have criticized. Each envelope consists of one digital drawing (שרבוט, pronounced Shirbut), DVD with the …

Newsroom: As Manning Released, Trial Attorney Coombs Looks Back On Case, Looks Forward To Teaching Again At Rwu Law 05-17-2017, Edward Fitzpatrick

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

True Crime As A Literature Of Advocacy, Leslie Rowen

Undergraduate Theses

True crime is often dismissed as a genre of cheap paperbacks with little literary merit and highly sensational, pornographic content. By contrast, my paper proposes an alternative literary history of true crime which merits further investigation because of its focus on advocating for justice where the justice system failed. I begin with Catharine Williams’ 1833 piece Fall River: An Authentic Narrative, an early example from true crime literature. The text disputes the acquittal of a Methodist preacher for the murder of a female mill worker, arguing that the trial was unfairly slanted in the defendant’s favor. More than a century …

Pretrial Detention And Bail, Megan Stevenson, Sandra G. Mayson

All Faculty Scholarship

Our current pretrial system imposes high costs on both the people who are detained pretrial and the taxpayers who foot the bill. These costs have prompted a surge of bail reform around the country. Reformers seek to reduce pretrial detention rates, as well as racial and socioeconomic disparities in the pretrial system, while simultaneously improving appearance rates and reducing pretrial crime. The current state of pretrial practice suggests that there is ample room for improvement. Bail hearings are often cursory, with no defense counsel present. Money-bail practices lead to high rates of detention even among misdemeanor defendants and those who …

Criminal Law As Family Law, Andrea L. Dennis

Georgia State University Law Review

The criminal justice system has morphed dramatically over the last several decades, achieving more pervasive control over the lives of individuals than ever before. The expansion began with the proliferation of criminal statutes, generating the now well-known concept of over-criminalization. The expansion also encompassed increasing the range of possible sanctions for criminal misbehavior and creating overlapping enforcement regimes. Two more instances of criminal justice expansion include mass surveillance and policies and practices that swept youth out of the juvenile justice system and into the criminal justice system. A product of the expansion has been mass incarceration; more individuals than at …

How Should Justice Policy Treat Young Offenders?, B J. Casey, Richard J. Bonnie, Andre Davis, David L. Faigman, Morris B. Hoffman, Owen D. Jones, Read Montague, Stephen J. Morse, Marcus E. Raichle, Jennifer A. Richeson, Elizabeth S. Scott, Laurence Steinberg, Kim A. Taylor-Thompson, Anthony D. Wagner

All Faculty Scholarship

The justice system in the United States has long recognized that juvenile offenders are not the same as adults, and has tried to incorporate those differences into law and policy. But only in recent decades have behavioral scientists and neuroscientists, along with policymakers, looked rigorously at developmental differences, seeking answers to two overarching questions: Are young offenders, purely by virtue of their immaturity, different from older individuals who commit crimes? And, if they are, how should justice policy take this into account?

A growing body of research on adolescent development now confirms that teenagers are indeed inherently different from adults, …

Crimmigration: The Missing Piece Of Criminal Justice Reform, Yolanda Vazquez

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

Over the last decade, a new push for criminal justice reform has taken hold. While the moral and fiscal costs have been exorbitant over the last forty years, failing state budgets and bipartisan recognition of the “broken” system have finally caused legislatures, politicians, and advocates to reassess the costs and benefits of the criminal justice system. Breaking the “tough on crime/soft on crime” binary, the “smart on crime” motto has become a helpful tool in reform efforts aimed at reducing the number of individuals incarcerated and ensuring its fairness, regardless of race and socioeconomic status. Little attention, however, has been …

How Should Justice Policy Treat Young Offenders?: A Knowledge Brief Of The Macarthur Foundation Research Network On Law And Neuroscience, Bj Casey, Richard J. Bonnie, Andre Davis, David L. Faigman, Morris B. Hoffman, Owen D. Jones, Read Montague, Stephen J. Morse, Marcus E. Raichle, Jennifer E. Richeson, Elizabeth S. Scott, Laurence Steinberg, Kim Taylor-Thompson, Anthony Wagner

Faculty Scholarship

The justice system in the United States has long recognized that juvenile offenders are not the same as adults, and has tried to incorporate those differences into law and policy. But only in recent decades have behavioral scientists and neuroscientists, along with policymakers, looked rigorously at developmental differences, seeking answers to two overarching questions: Are young offenders, purely by virtue of their immaturity, different from older individuals who commit crimes? And, if they are, how should justice policy take this into account?

A growing body of research on adolescent development now confirms that teenagers are indeed inherently different from adults, …

Punishment, Liberalism, And Public Reason, Chad Flanders

All Faculty Scholarship

The article argues for a conception of the justification of punishment that is compatible with a modern, politically liberal regime. Section I deals with what some have thought are the obvious social interests society has in punishing criminals, and tries to develop those possible interests somewhat sympathetically. Section II suggests that many of those reasons are not good ones if punishment is regarded (as it should be) from the perspective of political philosophy. Social responses to bad things happening to people cannot be grounded in controversial metaphysical views about what is good for people or what people deserve, but many …

Understanding Recent Spikes And Longer Trends In American Murders, Jeffery Fagan, Daniel Richman

Faculty Scholarship

On September 7, 2016, four of the nation’s newspapers of record weighed in on the connected crises in crime and policing. The New York Times revealed the tensions between the Mayor’s office in Chicago and several community and professional groups over a plan to overhaul Chicago’s police disciplinary board – a plan developed in the wake of the shooting of an unarmed teenager, Laquan McDonald, and the release of a video of that killing. The Wall Street Journal related a vigorous defense of New York City’s “broken windows” policing strategy – a strategy that has been a recurring source of …