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Full-Text Articles in Law
Believe It Or Not: Mitigating The Negative Effects Personal Belief And Bias Have On The Criminal Justice System, Sarah Mourer
Believe It Or Not: Mitigating The Negative Effects Personal Belief And Bias Have On The Criminal Justice System, Sarah Mourer
Sarah Mourer
This article examines the prosecutor’s and defense attorney’s personal pre-trial beliefs regarding the accused’s guilt or innocence. This analysis suggests that when an attorney does hold pretrial beliefs, such beliefs lead to avoidable bias and errors. These biases may alter the findings throughout all stages of the case. The procedure asking that the prosecution seek justice while having nothing more than probable cause results in the prosecutor’s need to have a belief in guilt before proceeding to trial. While this belief is intended to foster integrity and fairness in the criminal justice system, to the contrary, it actually contributes to …
When Success Breeds Attack: The Coming Backlash Against Racial Profiling Studies, David A. Harris
When Success Breeds Attack: The Coming Backlash Against Racial Profiling Studies, David A. Harris
Michigan Journal of Race and Law
The author proposes that in an ongoing debate on questions concerning the possibility of racial or other types of invidious discrimination by public institutions, we should apply a prima facie standard to these claims in the public arena. In other words, if African Americans or Latinos say that they have been the victims of racial profiling, we should not ask for conclusive proof in the strictest statistical sense; rather, if they can present some credible evidence beyond anecdotes, some statistics that indicate that we may, indeed, have a problem, the burden should then shift to the public institution-here, law enforcement …