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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Supreme Court And The Politics Of Death, Stephen F. Smith
The Supreme Court And The Politics Of Death, Stephen F. Smith
Stephen F. Smith
This article explores the evolving role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the politics of death. By constitutionalizing the death penalty in the 1970s, the Supreme Court unintentionally set into motion political forces that have seriously undermined the Court's vision of a death penalty that is fairly administered and imposed only on the worst offenders. With the death penalty established as a highly salient political issue, politicians - legislators, prosecutors, and governors - have strong institutional incentives to make death sentences easier to achieve and carry out. The result of this vicious cycle is not only more executions, but less …
Localism And Capital Punishment, Stephen F. Smith
Localism And Capital Punishment, Stephen F. Smith
Stephen F. Smith
Professor Adam Gershowitz presents an interesting proposal to transfer from localities to states the power to enforce the death penalty. In his view, state-level enforcement would result in a more rationally applied death penalty because states would be much more likely to make capital charging decisions based on desert, without the distorting influence of the severe resource constraints applicable to all but the wealthiest of localities. As well conceived as Professor Gershowitz’s proposal is, however, I remain skeptical that statewide enforcement of the death penalty would be preferable to continued local enforcement. First, Professor Gershowitz underestimates the benefits of localism …
Depravity Thrice Removed: Using The 'Heinous, Cruel, Or Depraved' Factor To Aggravate Convictions Of Nontriggermen Accomplices In Capital Cases, Richard W. Garnett
Depravity Thrice Removed: Using The 'Heinous, Cruel, Or Depraved' Factor To Aggravate Convictions Of Nontriggermen Accomplices In Capital Cases, Richard W. Garnett
Richard W Garnett
No abstract provided.
Sectarian Reflections On Lawyers' Ethics And Death-Row Volunteers, Richard W. Garnett
Sectarian Reflections On Lawyers' Ethics And Death-Row Volunteers, Richard W. Garnett
Richard W Garnett
What should lawyers think about and respond to death-row volunteers? When a defendant accused of a capital crime attempts to plead guilty, or instructs his lawyer not to present a particular defense; when a convicted killer refuses to permit the introduction of potentially life-saving mitigating evidence - or even urges the jury to impose a death sentence - at the sentencing phase of a death-eligible case; when a condemned inmate refuses to file, or to appeal the denial of, habeas corpus and other post-conviction petitions for relief; when he elects not to object to a particular capital-punishment method, to call …
Blind Dates: When Should The Statute Of Limitations Begin To Run On A Method-Of-Execution Challenge?, Ty Alper
Blind Dates: When Should The Statute Of Limitations Begin To Run On A Method-Of-Execution Challenge?, Ty Alper
Ty Alper
This Article is the first to take a comprehensive look at the issue of statute-of-limitations accrual in method-of-execution cases. In other words, when does the clock start ticking on a death row inmate's right to challenge the way in which the state intends to execute him? Most circuit courts have held that method-of-execution challenges accrue at the completion of the direct appeal process. This means that death row inmates in these jurisdictions must file method-of-execution challenges years, and sometimes even decades, before an actual execution is scheduled. Although this approach has been the subject of much criticism, even the dissenting …
Rectifying Wrongful Convictions: May A Lawyer Reveal Her Client's Confidences To Rectify The Wrongful Conviction Of Another? (A Roundtable Discussion Of The Aba's Standards For Criminal Litigation), James E. Moliterno
James E. Moliterno
None available.
Sentencing The Mentally Retarded To Death: An Eighth Amendment Analysis, John H. Blume, David Bruck
Sentencing The Mentally Retarded To Death: An Eighth Amendment Analysis, John H. Blume, David Bruck
David I. Bruck
Today, on death rows across the United States, sit a number of men with the minds of children. These people are mentally retarded. Typical of these individuals is Limmie Arthur, who currently is imprisoned at Central Correctional Institution in Columbia, South Carolina. Although Arthur is twenty-eight years old, all the mental health professionals who have evaluated him, including employees of the South Carolina Department of Corrections, agree he has the mental capacity of approximately a 10-year-old child. Arthur was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of a neighbor. At his first trial, his court appointed attorneys did not …