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Full-Text Articles in Law
Judges Judging Judicial Candidates: Should Currently Serving Judges Participate In Commissions To Screen And Recommend Article Iii Candidates Below The Supreme Court Level?, Mary Clark
Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals
In the lead-up to the 2008 presidential election, the American Bar Association (ABA), among others, called upon the next president to reform the federal judicial selection process by using bipartisan commissions to screen and recommend Article III candidates for presidential nomination and Senate confirmation below the Supreme Court level. This proposal may well find support in the Obama administration, given the new president’s emphasis on bipartisan consensus-building and transparency of government operations. This Article addresses one question that the ABA and others have not: Should currently serving judges participate in bi-partisan commissions to screen and recommend Article III candidates below …
The Eyewitness Conundrum: How Courts, Police And Attorneys Can Reduce Mistakes By Eyewitnesses, Bennett L. Gershman
The Eyewitness Conundrum: How Courts, Police And Attorneys Can Reduce Mistakes By Eyewitnesses, Bennett L. Gershman
Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications
Reducing the incidence of wrongful convictions based on eyewitness mistakes poses a difficult challenge to the criminal justice system. There is near-unanimity among courts and commentators that eyewitness mistakes account for more erroneous convictions than any other type of proof. It is therefore incumbent on every key participant in the criminal justice system - judge, prosecutor, police, and defense counsel - to use every available tool to protect an accused from being mistakenly identified by an eyewitness. For the judge, protecting the accused requires a willingness to give the jury special instructions on eyewitness identification and a willingness to allow …
A Witness To Justice, Jessica Silbey
A Witness To Justice, Jessica Silbey
Faculty Scholarship
In the 1988 film The Accused, a young woman named Sarah Tobias is gang raped on a pinball machine by three men while a crowded bar watches. The rapists cut a deal with the prosecutor. Sarah's outrage at the deal convinces the assistant district attorney to prosecute members of the crowd that cheered on and encouraged the rape. This film shows how Sarah Tobias, a woman with little means and less experience, intuits that according to the law rape victims are incredible witnesses to their own victimization. The film goes on to critique what the right kind of witness would …