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Full-Text Articles in Law
Waiting For Justice, Jeffrey Bellin
Waiting For Justice, Jeffrey Bellin
Popular Media
One man’s seven-year wait for a trial reveals the ways mandatory minimums distort our courts.
The Silence Penalty, Jeffrey Bellin
The Silence Penalty, Jeffrey Bellin
Faculty Publications
In every criminal trial, the defendant possesses the right to testify. Deciding whether to exercise that right, however, is rarely easy. Declining to testify shields defendants from questioning by the prosecutor and normally precludes the introduction of a defendant’s prior crimes. But silence comes at a price. Jurors penalize defendants who fail to testify by inferring guilt from silence.
This Article explores this complex dynamic, focusing on empirical evidence from mock juror experiments—including the results of a new 400-person mock juror simulation conducted for this Article—and data from real trials. It concludes that the penalty defendants suffer when they refuse …