Law Commons^™

Responsibility In Capital Sentencing, Steven Semeraro

San Diego Law Review

Although modem doctrine is worth preserving, it could be improved significantly by focusing explicitly on heightening individual responsibility. Two concrete ways to improve it would be to (1) explain the sentencer' s role in the narrative voice, a way of speaking that, at least in American society, appears to be associated with the assignment of responsibility; and (2) require heightened scrutiny of death sentences by state appellate courts, bringing the responsibility of state appellate judges in capital cases in line with the responsibility they bear in constitutional cases dealing with analogous mixed questions of fact and law under the First, …

Balancing The Anonymity Of Threatened Witnesses Versus A Defendant’S Right Of Confrontation: The Waiver Doctrine After Alvarado, Joan Comparet-Cassani

San Diego Law Review

As this Article will show, the Alvarado holding is very narrow, requiring disclosure only when a witness is crucial to the prosecution and when the witness’s credibility is at issue.

The interesting issue left unresolved by Alvarado is whether the identity of a crucial witness whose credibility is not at issue must be disclosed to the defense at trial when the witness has been threatened and attacked by the defendant or at the defendant’s behest. Or, whether because of that intimidation, the defendant has waived his right of confrontation as to the witness’s identity. This question is ripe for exploration …