Law Commons^™

Do Kids Belong In Prison? The Answer Will Say A Lot About What Type Of Society We Are, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.

Run For The Border: Laptop Searches And The Fourth Amendment, Nathan Alexander Sales

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Locked Up, Overlooked: Women Behind Bars: The Crisis Of Women In The U.S. Prison System, Giovanna Shay

Faculty Scholarship

Journalist Silja Talvi’s Women Behind Bars: The Growing Crisis of Women in the U.S. Prison System (“Women Behind Bars”) is an engaging overview of issues affecting incarcerated women. It succinctly illustrates some of the important connections involving the War on Drugs, racial disparity, and the high rate of substance abuse and physical and sexual abuse among incarcerated women. Each of the chapters could be assigned on its own to a class or reading group. While Talvi states that she is not trying to write a scholarly book, as a contribution to public discourse, Women Behind Bars furthers the goal of …

Ad Law Incarcerated, Giovanna Shay

Faculty Scholarship

This Article examines one part of the legal regime administering "mass incarceration" that has not been a focus of legal scholarship: prison and jail policies and regulation. Prison and jail regulation is the administrative law of the "carceral state," governing an incarcerated population of millions, a majority of whom are people of color. The result is an extremely regressive form of policy-making, affecting poor communities and communities of color most directly. This Article proceeds in three parts. Part I first sketches the history of court involvement in prison reform, explaining that prison litigation made institutions more bureaucratic and increased the …

Prisons Must Cease Re-Traumatizing Women: A Call For Gender-Responsive Programs That End The Cycle Of Abuse, Sally Abrahamson

Legal Writing Competition Winners

“They break us out there and then more in here. And they don't do anything to build us back up.” This is a quote from a woman serving thirty-one years for assault and crack-cocaine possession. Like many other incarcerated women, she has a history of being in domestically abusive relationships. Prison, she said, felt like an extension of feeling the same hopelessness she did before entering prison. Using drugs was a means to escape the reality of abuse and poverty. Her time in prison further disempowered her economically and socially, as she received no job-training and lost many of her …

Happiness And Punishment (With J. Bronsteen & J. Masur), Christopher J. Buccafusco

All Faculty Scholarship

This article continues our project to apply groundbreaking new literature on the behavioral psychology of human happiness to some of the most deeply analyzed questions in law. Here we explain that the new psychological understandings of happiness interact in startling ways with the leading theories of criminal punishment. Punishment theorists, both retributivist and utilitarian, have failed to account for human beings' ability to adapt to changed circumstances, including fines and (surprisingly) imprisonment. At the same time, these theorists have largely ignored the severe hedonic losses brought about by the post-prison social and economic deprivations (unemployment, divorce, and disease) caused by …

Happiness And Punishment (With J. Bronsteen & J. Masur), Christopher J. Buccafusco

Christopher J. Buccafusco

This article continues our project to apply groundbreaking new literature on the behavioral psychology of human happiness to some of the most deeply analyzed questions in law. Here we explain that the new psychological understandings of happiness interact in startling ways with the leading theories of criminal punishment. Punishment theorists, both retributivist and utilitarian, have failed to account for human beings' ability to adapt to changed circumstances, including fines and (surprisingly) imprisonment. At the same time, these theorists have largely ignored the severe hedonic losses brought about by the post-prison social and economic deprivations (unemployment, divorce, and disease) caused by …

Institutionalizing Torture: The Case Of Hospitals And Prisons In China, Leighann Mcchesney

Human Rights & Human Welfare

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has a notorious reputation, especially within the international human rights community, concerning its state-implemented practices of torture. Although the government of China has been charged by many international organizations with having a gruesome human rights record, on anything from freedom of speech to freedom of religion, the accusations of state-sanctioned torture undoubtedly have caused some of the strongest reactions around the world. This article seeks to address the various manifestations of torture that take place inside two of the most prominent public institutions in China: the prisons and the mental hospitals. By utilizing these …

A Legal System That Compromises Due Process And Promotes Organ Harvesting And Human Rights Abuse Of Prisoners: A Case Study Of China, Shivani Ramdeo

Human Rights & Human Welfare

On June 21, 1989, three men were executed in Shanghai two weeks after their arrests. The Xinhua News Agency reported that Bian Hanwu, Xu Guoming and Yan Xuerong were arrested, charged and convicted for sabotaging transportation. Upon rejection of their appeals by the Shanghai People’s High Court, they were executed. Again, Xinhua reported on January 26, 2003, the execution of Lobsang Dondrub, (who was found guilty of inciting a split in the country and illegally possessing firearms and ammunition), hours after his death sentence was approved by the Sichuan Province Higher People’s Court, despite an assurance to a US delegation …

Hiv Testing In State Correctional Systems, James Lee Pope

Journal of Law and Health

In recent years, reports have surfaced that the prevalance of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) within U.S. prison systems is three to five times higher than that of the general population. These reports, combined with the release of new HIV testing guidelines by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in 2006, have caused many states to change their laws and policies regarding HIV testing in state correctional facilities. This report briefly discusses some of the issues related to HIV testing within state correctional facilities. This report also discusses the methods of HIV testing currently used in …

Queer Lockdown: Coming To Terms With The Ongoing Criminalization Of Lgbtq Communities, Ann Cammett

Scholarly Works

The criminal justice system exacts a toll on some Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) communities. The experience of living in poverty and the concomitant exposure to a variety of governmental systems puts all poor, but especially LGBTQ low-income people of color, at risk of incarceration. What typically goes unexamined are the myriad ways that LGBTQ people are drawn into and experience the carceral system because of sexual identities and expression. This negative effect surfaces at every conceivable level: the marginalization and subsequent criminalization of queer youth; anti-gay bias in the judicial system; the rerouting of domestic violence cases …

Extraordinary And Compelling: A Re-Examination Of The Justifications For Compassionate Release, William W. Berry Iii

Maryland Law Review

No abstract provided.

Panel 3: Transparency And Access Of Independent Experts To All Places Of Detention: Oversight Practices Of U.S. Juvenile Facilities , Ted H. Rubin

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Criminalization Of Housing: A Revolving Door That Results In Boarded Up Doors In Low-Income Neighborhoods In Baltimore, Maryland, Sarah Spangler Rhine

University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class

No abstract provided.

Leveraging Maximum Reform While Enforcing Minimum Standards, Alphonse Gerhardstein

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Article focuses on criminal justice reform in the context of litigation. Specifically, it offers solutions for how to promote effective policies to reduce recidivism and ultimately keep the public safe from crime. It takes the position that litigation that merely focuses on constitutional violations of prison confinement is not complete without a focus on programming and supervision options upon return to society. Part I of the Article reviews some of the problems facing efforts to improve recidivism rates, specifically litigation that solely focuses on prison conditions. Part II deals with programs that should be undertaken to reduce recidivism in …

Labor And Employment Law: Tools For Prevention, Investigation And Discipline Of Staff Sexual Misconduct In Custodial Settings, Susan D. Carle

Susan D. Carle