Law Commons^™

Member Of The Panel, "Dred Scott To Grutter: Civil Rights Through The Years", Robert Bloom

Robert Bloom

No abstract provided.

Other: National Criminal Procedure Moot Court Team Coach, Robert Bloom

Robert Bloom

Coach of the National Criminal Procedure Moot Court Team, which won two national championships in 2006 and 2007, at Seton Hall Law School in Newark, New Jersey.

Criminal Procedure: The Constitution And The Police, Examples And Explanations, Robert Bloom, Mark Brodin

Robert Bloom

No abstract provided.

Legislating Racial Fairness In Criminal Justice, Olatunde C.A. Johnson

Faculty Scholarship

Twenty years ago, in McCleskey v. Kemp, the Supreme Court rejected a capital defendant's claim that statistical evidence of racial discrimination in the administration of Georgia's death penalty system constituted a violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. Yet, even as McCleskey effectively bars constitutional challenges to racial disparities in the criminal justice system where invidious bias is difficult to establish, the Court invites advocates to pursue legislation as a remedy to racial disparities. Indeed, the McCleskey Court offers as a rationale for its ruling the judiciary's institutional incompetence to remedy these disparities, holding that "McCleskey's arguments are best …

Summary Of Johnson V. State, Nev. Adv. Op. No. 113, Jason Ray

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a death sentence and conviction by jury of four counts of first degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon, among other crimes, after a death sentence entered by a three judge panel was appealed and vacated.

Summary Of Santana V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 121, Robert Stephens

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a conviction in the Eighth Judicial District Court of 19 counts of coercion resulting in five consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole and fourteen concurrently running life sentences. Appellant argues that the jury instructions did not instruct the jury to apply the reasonable person test and therefore seeks a new trial.

Summary Of Summers V. State, Nev. Adv. Op. No. 112, Jason Ray

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a judgment of conviction, entered after jury verdict, for first-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon, and assault with the use of a deadly weapon, attempted murder with the use of a deadly weapon, and assault with the use of a deadly weapon, and from sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Summary Of Thomas V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. 114, 148 P.3d 727, James Robertson

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a death sentence following a second penalty hearing conducted pursuant to a remand by the Nevada Supreme Court.

Summary Of Mitchell V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 107, Aubree Nielsen

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from the denial of a post-conviction petition for a writ of habeas corpus in a criminal case.

Summary Of Rosas V. State, Nev. Adv. Op. No. 106, Sherry Moore

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The district court convicted Appellant of committing battery upon an officer and rejected Appellant’s proffered jury instruction on the crime resisting a public officer, a lesser-included offense of battery upon an officer.s

Picking Up The Pieces Of The Gordian Knot: Towards A Sensible Merger Methodology, Bruce A. Antkowiak

ExpressO

This question of merger is one of the most perplexing that courts face in the criminal sentencing process. This article not only explores that question but proposes specific new methods a court may use to resolve this question in a way consonant with the Constitution and the intent of the legislature.

The article takes as its starting point a brilliant analysis of the Double Jeopardy doctrine set out by Professor Ann Poulin of Villanova Law School in an article entitled Double Jeopardy and Multiple Punishment: Cutting the Gordian Knot, 77 U. Colo. L. Rev. 595 (2006). Professor Poulin’s work demonstrates …

Book Review: The I Chong: Meditations From The Joint (2006), Donald E. Wilkes Jr.

Popular Media

Book Review of THE I CHONG: MEDITATIONS FROM THE JOINT, by Tommy Chong (NY: Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2006).

An Unprecedented Curtailment Of Liberty: Samson V. California And Its Gift Of A Limitless Blank Check For “Arbitrary, Capricious, Or Harassing” Searches And Seizures , Jillian Ostrove

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Summary Of Calvin V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. 100, Michelle L'Hommedieu

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

NRS 178.400, Nevada's standard for a defendant's competency to stand trial, conforms to the standard set out by the United States Supreme Court in Dusky v. United States.

Child Statements In A Post-Crawford World: What The United States Supreme Court Failed To Consider With Regard To Child Victims And Witnesses, Allie Phillips

ExpressO

With the issuance of Crawford v. Washington, 514 U.S. 36 (2004), by the United States Supreme Court on March 8, 2004, wide spread confusion and concern swept through the nation’s prosecutorial community. The new rule announced in Crawford created too many questions and provided few answers by the Court. In particular, anxiety arose from the child protection community in regard to one primary issue: Are forensic interviews of child victims and witnesses, and other statements made by children, considered “testimonial statements” according to Crawford, thus requiring the child to take the witness stand? The Court further confused the new rule …

Detention For The Purpose Of Interrogation As Modern "Torture", Rinat Kitai-Sangero

ExpressO

Although the Court in Miranda stated that custodial interrogation is designed to undermine the will of the interogee, it has not prohibited the admission of confession given under such circumstances. It rather assumed that it is possible to dispel the pressures of a custodial interrogation by means of proper safeguards. The article claims that there is no plausible way to dispel the coercive atmosphere engendered by a custodial interrogation. Custody today constitutes a refined version of torture used in the past in order to extract confessions. Consequently, the confession of a suspect under circumstances of custodial interrogation is involuntary and …

Summary Of State V. Rincon, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. 99, Michelle L'Hommedieu

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

A motorist is driving below the speed limit is, by itself, insufficient to give rise to a reasonable suspicion of driving while intoxicated warranting an investigative stop. While reasonable suspicion is not a stringent standard, it requires more than a mere observation that a motorist is driving slowly. There must be additional indicia of erratic driving or unusual behavior before a reasonable suspicion arises justifying an investigative stop. Where no reasonable suspicion exists, an inquiry stop may nonetheless be justified under the community caretaking doctrine when a police officer has an objectively reasonable belief that a slow driver is in …

Crumbs From The Master's Table: The Supreme Court, Pro Se Defendants And The Federal Guilty Plea Process, Julian A. Cook

Scholarly Works

This Article will commence with a review of the rather significant evolution of Rule 11, including a review of several pertinent Supreme Court decisions that have helped shape its current structure. Thereafter, the predominant judicial methodology for conducting Rule 11 hearings will be discussed. Specifically, this Article will take a brief but critical look at, inter alia, the examination techniques employed by the judiciary when conducting Rule 11 hearings, and conclude that the process typically employed inadequately assesses whether a defendant's guilty plea was entered into knowingly and voluntarily. Next, this Article will discuss two very recent Supreme Court decisions--United …

Taking Judicial Notice Of Genocide? The Problematic Law And Policy Of The Karemera Decision, Ralph Mamiya

ExpressO

On June 16, 2006, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda issued a decision in Prosecutor v. Karemera taking judicial notice of the fact that genocide occurred in Rwanda in 1994. This decision startled many court observers. While no internationally respected commentator would today question whether the Rwanda genocide took place, should such an event be judicially noticed without evidence? This paper examines that question, arguing that the ICTR Appeals Chamber’s expansive use of judicial notice in Karemera was both illogical and unwise. Genocide, whether as an historical fact or legal charge, fails to meet the “common …

The Jurisdictional Heritage Of The Grand Jury Clause, Roger A. Fairfax

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Criminal Law, Laura D. Hogue, Franklin J. Hogue

Mercer Law Review

The tension between prosecuting those charged with violating the laws of this state and defending the rights of those accused of having committed crimes sets the stage for the multitude of opinions from the Georgia Court of Appeals and the Georgia Supreme Court in the field of criminal law. As always, we strive to present cases that will assist attorneys in their practice, either by surveying cases that present careful reiteration of age-old principles or by surveying cases that alter old rules or establish new ones. We limit our Article to cases that affect the practice of criminal law but …

Victims And Prison Release: A Modest Proposal, Erin O'Hara O'Connor

Scholarly Publications

No abstract provided.

Summary Of Estes V. State, 122 Nev. Adv. Op. No. 96, Michael Hammer

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

Appeal from a conviction, by jury, of two counts of preventing or dissuading a person from testifying or producing evidence, one count of first-degree kidnapping, two counts of battery with intent to commit a crime, six counts of sexual assault of a minor under 14, two counts of coercion, and two counts of lewdness with a child under 14. The primary issue on appeal was the admissibility of evidence gathered while the Appellant was committed to a mental institution for the purpose of evaluating competency to stand trial.

Historical Background: Evolution Of The International Criminal Law, Individual Criminal Accountability And The Idea Of A Permanent International Court, Cenap Cakmak

Human Rights & Human Welfare

© Cenap Cakmak. All rights reserved.

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Time Travel, Hovercrafts, And The Framers: James Madison Sees The Future And Rewrites The Fourth Amendment, George Thomas

George C Thomas III

The Framers could not have contemplated the interpretational problems that cloud the Fourth Amendment because police, in the modern sense, were unknown to the Framers. Also unknown to the Framers, of course, were wiretaps, drug interdiction searches, thermal imagining, helicopters, and blood tests. We can infer from the history surrounding the Fourth Amendment what the Framers hoped it would accomplish in their time. What if the Framers could have seen the future and known the kind of police techniques that are being used today? What kind of Fourth Amendment would they have written with that knowledge? This article seeks to …

Missing Miranda's Story, A Review Of Gary L. Stuart's, Miranda: The Story Of America's Right To Remain Silent, George C. Thomas Iii

George C Thomas III

Miranda v. Arizona is the best known criminal procedure decision in the history of the Supreme Court. It has spawned dozens of books and hundreds of articles. The world does not need another Miranda book unless it has something new and interesting to tell readers. Unfortunately, to borrow an old cliche, the parts of Gary Stuart’s book that are new are, for the most part, not interesting and the parts that are interesting are, for the most part, not new. Stuart adds material to the Miranda storehouse about the involvement of local Arizona lawyers and judges in the original case, …

Justice Story Cuts The Gordian Knot Of Hung Jury Instructions, George C. Thomas Iii, Mark Greenbaum

George C Thomas III

Constitutional law grows more complex over time. The complexity is due, in large part, to the rule of stare decisis. When faced with precedents that it does not wish to follow, the Court usually distinguishes the case before it. Thus, the constitutional landscape is littered with cases that do not fit well together. Navigating past these shoals is often difficult for courts following the Supreme Court’s lead. One example is the law governing instructions that a trial judge can give a deadlocked jury in a criminal case. The right to a jury trial entails the right to have the jury …

Codifying Shari'a: International Norms, Legality & The Freedom To Invent New Forms, Paul H. Robinson, Adnan Zulfiqar, Margaret Kammerud, Michael Orchowski, Elizabeth A. Gerlach, Adam L. Pollock, Thomas M. O'Brien, John C. Lin, Tom Stenson, Negar Katirai, J. John Lee, Marc Aaron Melzer

All Faculty Scholarship

The United Nations Development Program and the Republic of the Maldives, a small Muslim country with a constitutional democracy, commissioned this project to craft the country's first system of codified penal law and sentencing guidelines. This Article describes the special challenges and opportunities encountered while drafting a penal code based on Shari'a (Islamic law). On the one hand, such comprehensive codification is more important and more likely to bring dramatic improvements in the quality of justice than in many other societies, due in large part to the problems of assuring fair notice and fair adjudication in the uncodified Shari'a-based system …

Death Penalty Jurisprudence In New York And The Supremacy Clause Of The United States Constitution: How Supreme Is It ?, Joseph E. Fahey

ExpressO

This article deals with the treatment of the Supremacy Clause by the New York Court of Appeals in the evolution of its death penalty jurisprudence. It traces the application of the Clause by the Court and its abandonment in its imposition of stronger guarantees under the New York State Constitution

First Principles For Virginia's Fifth Century, Hon. Robert F. Mcdonnell

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.