Law Commons^™

Promising Protection: 911 Call Records As Foundation For Family Violence Intervention, James G. Dwyer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Voice Of Reason—Why Recent Judicial Interpretations Of The Antiterrorism And Effective Death Penalty Act’S Restrictions On Habeas Corpus Are Wrong, Judith L. Ritter

Judith L Ritter

By filing a petition for a federal writ of habeas corpus, a prisoner initiates a legal proceeding collateral to the direct appeals process. Federal statutes set forth the procedure and parameters of habeas corpus review. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) first signed into law by President Clinton in 1996, included significant cut-backs in the availability of federal writs of habeas corpus. This was by congressional design. Yet, despite the dire predictions, for most of the first decade of AEDPA’s reign, the door to habeas relief remained open. More recently, however, the Supreme Court reinterpreted a key portion …

A Deal Is A Deal: Plea Bargains And Double Jeopardy After Ohio V. Johnson, Philip Chinn

Seattle University Law Review

The Double Jeopardy Clause provides that no person will “be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” On March 10, 2004, Pedro Cabrera made a statement that cost him fourteen years of his life: he proclaimed his innocence. The court accepted this plea and ordered a finding of guilty with a recommended sentence of six years. However, during an exchange that followed, Mr. Cabrera asserted that he was actually innocent but that he preferred “to take the time” instead of proceeding to trial. The judge then refused to accept Mr. Cabrera’s guilty …

Character, Liberalism, And The Protean Culture Of Evidence Law, Daniel D. Blinka

Seattle University Law Review

It is time to rethink character evidence. Long notorious as the most frequently litigated evidence issue, character doctrine plagues courts, trial lawyers, and law students with its infamously “grotesque” array of nonsensical rules, whimsical distinctions, and arcane procedures. Character is a calculation of social worth and value; it is the sum total of what others think of us, whether expressed as their own opinion or the collective opinions of many (reputation). Once we grasp that character is a social construct, we are in a better position to address some of the problems that plague evidence law. To provide needed clarity …

The Voice Of Reason—Why Recent Judicial Interpretations Of The Antiterrorism And Effective Death Penalty Act’S Restrictions On Habeas Corpus Are Wrong, Judith L. Ritter

Seattle University Law Review

By filing a petition for a federal writ of habeas corpus, a prisoner initiates a legal proceeding collateral to the direct appeals process. Federal statutes set forth the procedure and parameters of habeas corpus review. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) first signed into law by President Clinton in 1996, included significant cut-backs in the availability of federal writs of habeas corpus. This was by congressional design. Yet, despite the dire predictions, for most of the first decade of AEDPA’s reign, the door to habeas relief remained open. More recently, however, the Supreme Court reinterpreted a key portion …

Section 6: Criminal Law, Institute Of Bill Of Rights Law, William & Mary Law School

Supreme Court Preview

No abstract provided.

Fighting Cybercrime After United States V. Jones, David C. Gray, Danielle Keats Citron, Liz Clark Rinehart

Danielle Keats Citron

In a landmark non-decision last term, five Justices of the United States Supreme Court would have held that citizens possess a Fourth Amendment right to expect that certain quantities of information about them will remain private, even if they have no such expectations with respect to any of the information or data constituting that whole. This quantitative approach to evaluating and protecting Fourth Amendment rights is certainly novel and raises serious conceptual, doctrinal, and practical challenges. In other works, we have met these challenges by engaging in a careful analysis of this “mosaic theory” and by proposing that courts focus …

The Dog Days Of Fourth Amendment Jurisprudence, Kit Kinports

NULR Online

No abstract provided.

Survey Of Washington Search And Seizure Law: 2013 Update, Justice Charles W. Johnson, Justice Debra L. Stephens

Seattle University Law Review

This survey is intended to serve as a resource to which Washington lawyers, judges, law enforcement officers, and others can turn as an authoritative starting point for researching Washington search and seizure law. In order to be useful as a research tool, this Survey requires periodic updates to address new cases interpreting the Washington constitution and the U.S. Constitution and to reflect the current state of the law. Many of these cases involve the Washington State Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Washington constitution. Also, as the U.S. Supreme Court has continued to examine Fourth Amendment search and seizure jurisprudence, its …

Evidentiary Hearings In Federal Habeas Corpus Cases, Charles D. Weisselberg

Charles D Weisselberg

Discusses federal habeas corpus cases in the United States. Debate on the writ of habeas corpus; View that federal habeas corpus serves as a federal appeal for state prisoners; Development of federal writ of habeas corpus; Growth of federal civil litigation and habeas corpus petitions; Frequency of evidentiary hearings in habeas corpus cases; Proposals to reform federal habeas corpus.

Big Law's Sixth Amendment: The Rise Of Corporate White-Collar Practices In Large U.S. Law Firms, Charles D. Weisselberg, Su Li

Charles D Weisselberg

Over the last three decades, corporate white-collar criminal defense and investigations practices have become established within the nation's largest law firms. It was not always this way. White-collar work was not considered a legal specialty. And, historically, lawyers in the leading civil firms avoided criminal matters. But several developments occurred at once: firms grew dramatically, the norms within the firms changed, and new federal crimes and prosecution policies created enormous business opportunities for the large firms. Using a unique data set, this Article profiles the Big Law partners now in the white-collar practice area, most of whom are male former …

The Admissibility Of Cell Site Location Information In Washington Courts, Ryan W. Dumm

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment principally explores when and how a party can successfully admit cell cite location information into evidence. Beginning with the threshold inquiry of relevance, Part III examines when cell site location information is relevant and in what circumstances the information, though relevant, could be unfairly prejudicial, cumulative, or confusing. Part IV provides the bulk of the analysis, which centers on the substantive foundation necessary to establish the information’s credibility and authenticity. Part V looks at three ancillary issues: hearsay, a criminal defendant’s Sixth Amendment confrontation rights, and the introduction of a summary of voluminous records. Finally, Part VI offers …

“Lonesome Road”: Driving Without The Fourth Amendment, Lewis R. Katz

Seattle University Law Review

The protections of the Fourth Amendment on the streets and highways of America have been drastically curtailed. This Article traces the debasement of Fourth Amendment protections on the road and how the Fourth Amendment’s core value of preventing arbitrary police behavior has been marginalized. This Article contends that the existence of a traffic offense should not be the end of the inquiry but the first step, and that defendants should be able to challenge the reasonableness even when there is proof of a traffic offense.

Not For The Truth Of The Matter: Defendant's Hearsay And The Necessity Of Limiting Instructions In Psychological Defenses, Brian A. Ford

Brian A Ford

This paper presents a thorough discussion of the use of a defendant's hearsay statements to a psychological expert as the basis of the expert's opinion at trial, under California Law.

Who’S Who In The Legal Zoo: The Jury, Jodie O'Leary

Jodie O'Leary

Extract: Juries have been portrayed in movies, such as The Juror and the much earlier 12 Angry Men, depicted in books (particularly by John Grisham), such as The Last Juror or Runaway Jury, and featured in television programs like Law and Order. Most of us in the common law world know someone who served on one (or at least got a notice to attend jury duty). But what do you really know about this institution that has been described as ‘the lamp that shows that freedom lives’ or the ‘sacred bulwark’ of liberty?

The First Day Of Criminal Law: Forgetting Everything You Thought You Already Knew, Kami Chavis Simmons

Faculty Publications

Whether from the media or the seemingly endless rotation of Law and Order episodes, many students enter law school with a great deal of knowledge about important concepts that dominate Criminal Law, including murder, manslaughter, conspiracy, self-defense, or insanity. This familiarity with criminal law presents a dual challenge for students and professors alike. First, as future lawyers, they must force themselves to think critically about these familiar topics, and despite their basic knowledge of the criminal justice system, students quickly learn that there is much more to criminal law than meets the eye. Second, part of this critical analysis requires …

Cleaning Up The Financial Crisis Of 2008: Prosecutorial Discretion Or Prosecutorial Abdication?, David J. Reiss, Bradley T. Borden

David J Reiss

When finance professionals play fast and loose, big problems result. Indeed, the 2008 Financial Crisis resulted from people in the real estate finance industry ignoring underwriting criteria for mortgages and structural finance products. That malfeasance filled the financial markets with mortgage-backed securities (MBS) that were worth a small fraction of the amount issuers represented to investors. It also loaded borrowers with liabilities that they never had a chance to satisfy.

Despite all the wrongdoing that caused the financial crisis, prosecutors have been slow to bring charges against individuals who originated bad loans, pooled bad mortgages, and sold bad MBS. Unfortunately, …

Transcending The Criminal Law's "One Size Fits All" Response To Domestic Violence, Hannah Brenner

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

Domestic violence is no longer a private matter confined within the four walls of the home. The shift from private to public is connected with marked progress within the legal system, which strives to protect victims and hold batterers accountable through a myriad of specific responses that have ranged from attitudinal and logistical shifts from law enforcement to increased attention within legal education to a general acknowledgment of the impact of domestic violence on individual victims, children, families, and the broader community to the passage of federal and state legislation.

The state legislative landscape has historically centered around a very …

California Adopts The Unproven Federal Minority View Of Entrapment , Steven D. Campen

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Contratto Di Apertura Di Credito, Calcolo Del Tasso Effettivo Globale Medio E Usura Civilistica, Valerio Sangiovanni

Valerio Sangiovanni

No abstract provided.

Beyond Breard, Erik G. Luna, Douglas J. Sylvester

Erik Luna

No abstract provided.

A Latina Law Professor's Personal Perspective After The Zimmerman Trial Verdict, Maritza I. Reyes

Journal Publications

No abstract provided.

Partially Concurrent Sentences, Statutory Interpretation, And Legislative Intent: Amicus Brief Filed In State V. Bryant Wilson (Indiana Supreme Court), Adam Lamparello, Charles Maclean

Adam Lamparello

Indiana Code § 35-50-1-2 states that terms of imprisonment “shall be served concurrently or consecutively.” The Code’s plain language does not authorize courts to impose partially consecutive, blended, or “split sentences. Partially consecutive sentences would impermissibly read into the Code a third sentencing option, thus contradicting Indiana’s well-settled jurisprudence and undermining the goal of reasonable uniformity in sentencing. The decision of the Indiana Court of Appeals should therefore be reversed.

Amicus Brief: State V. Glover (Maine Supreme Judicial Court), Adam Lamparello, Charles Maclean

Adam Lamparello

When law enforcement seeks to obtain a warrantless, pre-arrest DNA sample from an individual, that individual has the right to say “No.” If silence is to become a “badge of guilt,” then the right to silence—under the United States and Maine Constitutions—might become a thing of the past. Allowing jurors to infer consciousness of guilt from a pre-arrest DNA sample violates the Fourth Amendment to the United States and Maine Constitutions.

Karl Fontenot V. State Of Oklahoma, District Court Of Pontotoc County State Of Oklahoma, No. Cr-88-43. Brief In Support Of Application For Post-Conviction Relief., Tiffany R. Murphy

Tiffany Murphy

No abstract provided.

Broader Social Context As A Lens For Learning: Teaching Criminal Law, Alex Steel, Melanie Schwartz

Alex Steel

This chapter considers how best to teach criminal law in broader social contexts and beyond a focus on positivist doctrinal accounts. It provides examples of how broader social science research could be included within a criminal law curriculum.

The Movement Of U.S. Criminal And Administrative Law: Processes Of Transplanting And Translating, Toby S. Goldbach, Benjamin Brake, Peter Katzenstein

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

This article examines the transplanting and translating of law in the domains of criminal procedure and administrative law. The transnational movement of law is full of unexpected twists and turns that belie the notion of the United States as a legal behemoth. Furthermore, the movement of legal procedures which occurs both within and across countries with common and civil law legal traditions challenges preconceived notions of an orderly divide between legal families. While the spread of elements of the U.S. jury system and methods of plea bargaining reveals the powerful influence of U.S. legal ideas, the ways that these procedures …

Five Answers And Three Questions After United States V. Jones (2012), The Fourth Amendment Gps Case, Benjamin Priester

Journal Publications

Each year, the United States Supreme Court's docket includes a range of "high profile" cases that attract attention not merely from law professors and others with an acquired fascination with the Court, but also from a general audience of law students, lawyers, scholars and commentators on American politics and society, as well as, occasionally, the public at large. During the 2011 Term, one of those cases was "the GPS case," formally known as United States v. Jones.' Media coverage of the case spread far beyond the legal blogosphere to a wide variety of mainstream and popular sources, both in print …

De-Naturalizing Criminal Law: Of Public Perceptions And Procedural Protections, Benjamin Levin

Scholarship@WashULaw

In this essay, I examine and challenge the rhetorical trope of the guilty going free by emphasizing the institutional and political intricacies that comprise the criminal justice system and necessarily under-gird a determination of “guilt”. My goal, at its essence, is to de-naturalize the criminal law and discussions of the criminal justice system in the context of this symposium. I aim to emphasize that a guilty verdict is the result of a series of (politically-inflected) decisions about how to draft criminal statutes, how to structure a trial, and how to select a jury. De-naturalizing criminal law is, of course, a …

American Gangsters: Rico, Criminal Syndicates, And Conspiracy Law As Market Control, Benjamin Levin

Scholarship@WashULaw

In an effort to re-examine legal and political decisions about criminalization and the role of the criminal law in shaping American markets and social institutions, this Article explores the ways in which criminal conspiracy laws in the United States have historically been used to subdue non-state actors and informal markets that threatened the hegemony of the state and formal market. To this end, the Article focuses primarily on the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) as illustrative of broader trends in twentieth century criminal policy. Enacted in 1970, RICO provides criminal sanctions for individuals engaged in unacceptable organized activities …