Law Commons^™

Circumventing Congress: How The Federal Courts Opened The Door To Impeaching Criminal Defendants With Prior Convictions, Jeffrey Bellin

Faculty Publications

This Article spotlights the flawed analytical framework at the heart of the federal courts’ approach to one of the most controversial trial practices in American criminal jurisprudence — the admission of prior convictions to impeach the credibility of defendants who testify. As the Article explains, the flawed approach is a byproduct of the courts’ reliance on a five-factor analytical framework to implement the governing legal standard enacted by Congress in Federal Rule of Evidence 609. Tracing the evolution of the fivefactor framework from its roots in pre-Rule 609 case law, the Article demonstrates that the courts’ reinterpretation of the framework …

Summary Of Valdez V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 97, Elham Roohani

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Cumulative effect of prosecutorial misconduct and the abuse of discretion on the part of the district court through a failure to give the jury a written bifurcation instruction and the resultant effect of juror misconduct warrants reversal warranted reversal of a first-degree murder and attempted murder conviction.

Legitimating Criminal Justice Through Community Engagement: Lessons From The Jury Experience, Mark Findlay

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Fundamentally justifying the jury is the opportunity it provides for community participation in criminal justice and the legitimation function that offers. Indeed, a strong political motivation for the recent introduction of jury trial in several transitional jurisdictions is the public confidence it transfers to the system at large. Recent research on juror comprehension and satisfaction suggests the possibility of interrogating the participation/confidence nexus more intricately. This note argues that it is the quality of the participation and the participant satisfaction which eventuates that predicts juror confidence. Where the legitimacy of criminal justice through juror participation is to be maximised then …

Summary Of State V. Harte, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 82, Ian Houston

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a district court order partially granting a post-conviction petition for a writ of habeas corpus in a death penalty case.

Summary Of Hernandez V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. 83, Julian R. Gregory

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a district court order denying Defendant’s post-conviction petition for a writ of habeas corpus in a capital case.

Summary Of Rubio V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 87, Holly Cheong

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a district court order denying relief for ineffective assistance in a criminal case resulting in deportation.

Everyone Deserves Defense, Peter Keane

Publications

In his decades as a public defender, Peter Keane represented murderers and other criminals as skillfully as he could – even when he knew they were guilty . Keane believes every one, no matter what they’ve done, deserves to have somebody on their side.

Summary Of Davidson V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. 76, Moorea Katz

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a criminal conviction of two counts of burglary, two counts of robbery, two counts of battery, and adjudication as a habitual criminal.

Summary Of Knipes V State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 79, Miranda Mahe

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a conviction of driving under the influence causing death on the basis that the district court failed to follow the procedural safeguards for juror questioning.

Prosecutors' New Ethical Duty Relating To Wrongful Convictions, Niki Kuckes

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Danforth, Retroactivity, And Federalism, J. Thomas Sullivan

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Get In The Game Or Get Out Of The Way: Fixing The Politics Of Death, Adam M. Gershowitz

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Case Of Weak Will And Wayward Desire., Vera Bergelson

Rutgers Law School (Newark) Faculty Papers

In this article, I confront Garvey¡¯s argument that a weak-willed individual deserves partial excuse for trying to resist a strong desire that pushes him toward commission of a criminal act even though in the end he unreasonably abandons his resistance and commits the crime.

I attempt to refute Garvey¡¯s argument on two counts: one, I question whether the law should indeed provide mitigation to such an offender; and two, I argue that, even if it should, this mitigation may not come in the form of a partial defense. Defenses, even partial, are desert based, and there is nothing in Garvey¡¯s …

Summary Of Mitchell V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 107, Aubree Nielsen

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Donald Mitchell appeals his second-degree murder conviction. Mitchell argues that the district court trial contained five procedural errors, the most significant being a violation of his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

Summary Of Chartier V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 66, Kelly Stout

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

This case is an appeal from a jury conviction in district court on one count of conspiracy to commit murder and two counts of first-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon.

Summary Of Fergusen V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 69, Tara Zimmerman

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a judgment of conviction, upon jury verdict, of one count each of burglary, sexual assault, robbery, and first-degree kidnapping.

Summary Of Picetti V. State, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 68, Kristopher Zeppenfeld

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

This appeal arises from a judgment of conviction, pursuant to a guilty plea, of one count of driving under the influence (DUI), which is his third offense within 7 years, a class B felony. Paul Thomas Picetti (“Picetti”) contends that the district court erred by denying his motion to suppress his prior DUI convictions. Moreover, he claims the district court erroneously refused to allow him an opportunity to apply for a treatment program established in NRS 484.379412 for third offense DUI offenders.

Brief Of Amicus Curiae In Support Of Appellants, Quinton Richmond, Et Al., V. The District Court Of Maryland, Et Al., No. 08-54, Brenda Bratton Blom, Robert Rubinson, Phillip J. Closius

Court Briefs

Amici curiae brief filed by 78 faculty members from the University of Maryland School of Law and the University of Baltimore School of Law, on behalf of Appellants Quinton Richmond, et al. Amicus members felt the need to comment on the application and implications of the statutory right to counsel under Maryland law for indigent criminal defendants. The issue before the Court of Appeals was whether the Court’s previous holding in McCarter v. State, 363 Md. 705 (2001), that the plain language of the Maryland Public Defender Act created a right to counsel during all stages of a criminal …

The Significance (If Any) For The Federal Criminal Justice System Of Advances In Lie Detector Technology, Jeffrey Bellin

Faculty Publications

Against a backdrop of accelerating developments in the science of lie detection certain to reopen the debate on the reliability and therefore admissibility of lie detector evidence in the federal courts, this Article examines whether the prohibition on hearsay evidence (or other evidentiary objections) will preclude admissibility of even scientifically reliable lie detector evidence. The Article concludes that the hearsay prohibition, which has been largely ignored by courts and commentators, is the primary obstacle to the future admission of scientifically valid lie detector evidence. The Article also suggests a potential solution to the hearsay problem that may allow admission of …

Finding A Happy And Ethical Medium Between A Prosecutor Who Believes The Defendant Didn't Do It And The Boss Who Says That He Did, Melanie D. Wilson

NULR Online

No abstract provided.

Integrating Comparative Criminal Law: Criminal Law And Procedure, At Home And Abroad, Roger Fairfax

Presentations

No abstract provided.

Dna – Intimate Information Or Trash For Public Consumption?, Melanie D. Wilson

Scholarly Articles

“Surreptitious sampling” may be police officers’ trump card in cracking otherwise unsolvable crimes as serious as murder, arson and rape. Law enforcement officers engage in surreptitious sampling when they covertly collect DNAsamples from unsuspecting people, who inadvertently leave behind hair, skin cells, saliva or other biological materials.Surreptitious sampling is a terrific crime-resolution tool. It allows diligent law enforcement officers to collect proof-positive evidence of guilt or innocence without the hassle of obtaining a warrant and absent probable cause or reasonable suspicion to believe that the contributor of the biological evidence committed a crime. Provided an officer has the energy and …

Summary Of Browning V. State Of Nevada, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. Citation 50, Philip Erwin

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

This is an appeal from a sentence of death after remand for a new penalty hearing.

Summary Of Hill V. State, 124 Nev., Advance 52, Meredith Holmes

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Defendant-Appellant argued that the district court improperly denied his motion to dismiss the grand jury indictment and pretrial petition for writ of habeas corpus based on the State’s failure to report grand jury bias.

Summary Of State V. Dist. Ct. (Pullin), 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 54, Katie Maw

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

This case came to the Court on a petition for a writ of mandamus challenging a district court’s order sentencing the real party in interest pursuant to NRS 193.165 amendments, which were made affective after the crimes in question were committed.

Consent To Harm, Vera Bergelson

Rutgers Law School (Newark) Faculty Papers

This article continues conversation about consent to physical harm started in Vera Bergelson, The Right to Be Hurt: Testing the Boundaries of Consent, 75 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 165 (2007).

Intentionally injuring or killing another person is presumptively wrong. To overcome this presumption, the perpetrator must establish a defense of justification. Consent of the victim may serve as one of the grounds for such a defense. This article puts forward criteria for the defense of consent.

One element of the proposed defense is essential to both its complete and partial forms ¨C that consent of the victim be rational and …

The Grand Jury Legal Advisor: Resurrecting The Grand Jury’S Shield, Thaddeus A. Hoffmeister

School of Law Faculty Publications

This Article advocates for the creation of a Grand Jury Legal Advisor (GJLA) to resurrect the historical autonomy of grand juries. The Article draws upon Hawaii's experiences with the GJLA, and incorporates survey responses from a representative sample of former GJLAs.

The Article begins with a general and historical overview of the grand jury process. This portion of the Article demonstrates how all three branches of government have contributed to the diminishment of the powers of grand jurors. Part IV of this Article discusses the important policy rationales underlying the need for grand jury autonomy; Part V recommends the implementation …

Eyewitness Identification Reform In Massachusetts, Stanley Z. Fisher

Faculty Scholarship

This article traces the impact of the new scientific learning upon police eyewitness identification procedures in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Over the past 25 years, experimental psychologists have devised more reliable techniques for gathering eyewitness identification evidence than have been traditionally used by police. Massachusetts has over 350 autonomous municipal police departments, plus approximately 39 college campus police departments, the state police, and the MBTA (transit) Police Department. The decision how to investigate crime rests principally with the police chief responsible for each department. How does such a system of policing absorb new, scientifically superior methods of investigation?

A Floor, Not A Ceiling: Federalism And Remedies For Violations Of Constitutional Rights In Danforth V. Minnesota, Ilya Somin

NULR Online

No abstract provided.

Summary Of Diomampo V. State Of Nevada, 124 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 41, Tyler James Watson

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a judgment of conviction, upon jury verdict, of one count of mid-level trafficking in a controlled substance.