Law Commons^™

Sentence Served And No Place To Go: An Eighth Amendment Analysis Of "Dead Time" Incarceration, Christopher B. Scheren

Northwestern University Law Review

Although the state typically releases incarcerated people to reintegrate into society after completing their terms, indigent people convicted of sex offenses in Illinois and New York have been forced to remain behind bars for months, or even years, past their scheduled release dates. A wide range of residency restrictions limit the ability of people convicted of sex offenses to live near schools and other public areas. Few addresses are available for them, especially in high-density cities such as Chicago or New York City, where schools and other public locations are especially difficult to avoid. At the intersection of sex offenses …

What Lurks Below Beckles, Leah M. Litman, Shakeer Rahman

Northwestern University Law Review

This Essay argues that if the Supreme Court grants habeas relief in Beckles v. United States, then it should spell out certain details about where a Beckles claim comes from and who such a claim benefits. Those details are not essential to the main question raised in the case, but the federal habeas statute takes away the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction to hear just about any case that would raise those questions. For that reason, this Essay concludes that failing to address those questions now could arbitrarily condemn hundreds of prisoners to illegal sentences and lead to a situation where the …

Toxic Confinement: Can The Eighth Amendment Protect Prisoners From Human-Made Environmental Health Hazards?, Brenna Helppie-Schmieder

Northwestern University Law Review

What would you do if you realized a nearby factory or energy operation was making everyone in your town sick? You might try to rally your neighbors in protest, take legal action, or cut your losses and move away. But what if your options were more limited? What if you were forced to stay? This is the situation for prisoners across the country who live in prisons located near dangerous energy industry operations.

The increased reliance on incarceration in recent times has resulted in prisons being built on undesirable land, often the same land occupied by the energy industry. This …