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Full-Text Articles in Law

Individualizing Criminal Law’S Justice Judgments: Shortcomings In The Doctrines Of Culpability, Mitigation, And Excuse, Paul H. Robinson, Lindsay Holcomb Jan 2022

Individualizing Criminal Law’S Justice Judgments: Shortcomings In The Doctrines Of Culpability, Mitigation, And Excuse, Paul H. Robinson, Lindsay Holcomb

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In judging an offender’s culpability, mitigation, or excuse, there seems to be general agreement that it is appropriate for the criminal law to take into account such things as the offender’s youthfulness or her significantly low IQ. There is even support for taking account of their distorted perceptions and reasoning induced by traumatic experiences, as in battered spouse syndrome. On the other hand, there seems to be equally strong opposition to taking account of things such as racism or homophobia that played a role in bringing about the offense. In between these two clear points, however, exists a large collection …


Findlay Stark, Culpable Carelessness: Recklessness And Negligence In The Criminal Law, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016, Kimberly Kessler Ferzan Jan 2018

Findlay Stark, Culpable Carelessness: Recklessness And Negligence In The Criminal Law, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016, Kimberly Kessler Ferzan

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Culpable Carelessness by Findlay Stark is a careful and considered contribution to the 'punishment for negligence' debate. As well as providing a comprehensive overview of the doctrinal and theoretical aspects of recklessness and negligence in the criminal law, it also offers novel insights for scholars already steeped in these debates. An additional methodological strength is that Stark takes seriously the connection between theory and law, offering useful potential jury instructions on recklessness and negligence.


Felony Murder, Paul H. Robinson, Tyler Scot Williams Jan 2018

Felony Murder, Paul H. Robinson, Tyler Scot Williams

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It is common for criminal law scholars from outside the United States to discuss the “American rule” and compare it to the rule of other countries. As this volume makes clear, however, there is no such thing as an “American rule.” Because each of the states, plus the District of Columbia and the federal system, have their own criminal law, there are fifty-two American criminal codes.

American criminal law scholars know this, of course, but they too commonly speak of the “general rule” as if it reflects some consensus or near consensus position among the states. But the truth is …


Torts And Innovation, Gideon Parchomovsky, Alex Stein Oct 2008

Torts And Innovation, Gideon Parchomovsky, Alex Stein

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This Essay exposes and analyzes a hitherto overlooked cost of the current design of tort law: its adverse effect on innovation. Tort liability for negligence, defective products, and medical malpractice is determined by reference to custom. We demonstrate that courts’ reliance on custom and conventional technologies as the benchmark of liability chills innovation and distorts its path. Specifically, the recourse to custom taxes innovators and subsidizes replicators of conventional technologies. We explore the causes and consequences of this phenomenon and propose two possible ways to modify tort law in order to make it more welcoming to innovation.


Compliance With Advance Directives: Wrongful Living And Tort Law Incentives, Holly Fernandez Lynch, Michele Mathes, Nadia N. Sawicki Jun 2008

Compliance With Advance Directives: Wrongful Living And Tort Law Incentives, Holly Fernandez Lynch, Michele Mathes, Nadia N. Sawicki

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Modern ethical and legal norms generally require that deference be accorded to patients' decisions regarding treatment, including decisions to refuse life-sustaining care, even when patients no longer have the capacity to communicate those decisions to their physicians. Advance directives were developed as a means by which a patient's autonomy regarding medical care might survive such incapacity. Unfortunately, preserving patient autonomy at the end of life has been no simple task. First, it has been difficult to persuade patients to prepare for incapacity by making their wishes known. Second, even when they have done so, there is a distinct possibility that …


Self-Handicapping And Managers’ Duty Of Care, David A. Hoffman Jan 2007

Self-Handicapping And Managers’ Duty Of Care, David A. Hoffman

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This symposium essay focuses on the relationship between managers' duty of care and self-handicapping, or constructing obstacles to performance with the goal of influencing subsequent explanations about outcomes. Conventional explanations for failures of caretaking by managers have focused on motives (greed) and incentives (agency costs). This account of manager behavior has led some modern jurists, concerned about recent corporate scandals, to advocate for stronger deterrent measures to realign manager and shareholder incentives. * Self-handicapping theory, by contrast, teaches that bad manager behavior may occur even when incentives are well-aligned. Highly successful individuals in particular come to fear the pressure of …


Prohibited Risks And Culpable Disregard Or Inattentiveness: Challenge And Confusion In The Formulation Of Risk-Creation Offenses, Paul H. Robinson Jan 2003

Prohibited Risks And Culpable Disregard Or Inattentiveness: Challenge And Confusion In The Formulation Of Risk-Creation Offenses, Paul H. Robinson

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Because they track the Model Penal Code, current criminal law formulations of risk offenses typically fail to distinguish the rule of conduct question - What risks does the criminal law prohibit? - from the adjudication question - When is a particular violator's conscious disregard of, or his inattentiveness to, a risk in a particular situation sufficiently condemnable to deserve criminal liability? Instead, the formulations address only the second question - through their definition of reckless and negligent culpability - and fail to provide a rule of conduct provision to define a prohibited risk. This reliance upon culpability definitions as the …