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2015

Death penalty

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Full-Text Articles in Law

Death, Desuetude, And Original Meaning, John F. Stinneford Nov 2015

Death, Desuetude, And Original Meaning, John F. Stinneford

John F. Stinneford

One of the most common objections to originalism is that it cannot cope with cultural change. One of the most commonly invoked examples of this claimed weakness is the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause, whose original meaning would (it is argued) authorize barbaric punishment practices like flogging and branding, and disproportionate punishments like the death penalty for relatively minor offenses. This Article shows that this objection to originalism is inapt, at least with respect to the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause. As I have shown in prior articles, the original meaning of “cruel and unusual” is “cruel and contrary to …


The Death Penalty On The Streets: What The Eighth Amendment Can Teach About Regulating Police Use Of Force, Jelani Jefferson Exum, D. A. Telman Nov 2015

The Death Penalty On The Streets: What The Eighth Amendment Can Teach About Regulating Police Use Of Force, Jelani Jefferson Exum, D. A. Telman

Missouri Law Review

This Article offers punishment as another lens through which to view police force. The Supreme Court has consistently rejected arguments that the Eighth Amendment is the appropriate vehicle for dealing with excessive police force claims.5 However, reconceptualizing the use of deadly force by police officers as punishment provides a new understanding of the gravity of deadly police force and adds necessary substance to the reasonableness analysis. When police force is likened to punishment, the use of fatal force by police officers can be considered the administration of the death penalty on the streets, absent the procedural protections and focus on …


Is It Time To Stop Tinkering With The Machinery Of Death?, Alan E. Garfield Oct 2015

Is It Time To Stop Tinkering With The Machinery Of Death?, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.


Dying To Appeal: The Long-Lasting And Ineffective Appeal Process Of The Death Sentence, Marlene Brito Aug 2015

Dying To Appeal: The Long-Lasting And Ineffective Appeal Process Of The Death Sentence, Marlene Brito

Marlene Brito

The appeal process for death sentences in Florida must be revised to correct the ineffectiveness that is currently in place. The long-lasting procedure allows inmates to indefinitely delay their execution and live via the appeal process for over fifteen years because the statute does not provide a definite time limit. The comment discusses the death penalty in the United States, the jury override law and its consequences, the appeal process itself, and proposes an amendment to section 921.141, Florida Statutes.


Legislative Response To Furman V. Georgia - Ohio Restores The Death Penalty, Jeffrey T. Heintz Aug 2015

Legislative Response To Furman V. Georgia - Ohio Restores The Death Penalty, Jeffrey T. Heintz

Akron Law Review

THE ABOVE REPRESENTS the first inclusion of a prohibition against cruel and unusual punishments in any charter of any colony in the New World. Believed to be traceable to the Magna Charta, such a prohibition is now embodied in our eighth amendment. It has been the subject of much litigation and construction, most recently in Furman v. Georgia, where the death penalty, as then imposed, was declared to be invalid as cruel and unusual. Some states, including Ohio, have responded with new statutes controlling imposition of the death penalty in order to circumvent the Furman proscriptions. Only time will tell …


Death Penalty; Cruel And Unusual Punishment; Individualized Sentencing Determination; Lockett V. Ohio; Bell V. Ohio, James C. Ellerhorst Jul 2015

Death Penalty; Cruel And Unusual Punishment; Individualized Sentencing Determination; Lockett V. Ohio; Bell V. Ohio, James C. Ellerhorst

Akron Law Review

“In Bell v. Ohio and Lockett v. Ohio the United States Supreme Court found the sentencing provisions of the Ohio capital punishment statute to be incompatible with the eighth and fourteenth amendments which prohibit cruel and unusual punishment. These two opinions represent the most recent attempt by the Supreme Court to explain what elements must be included in a constitutionally valid capital punishment statute.”


Death Row Conditions: Progression Toward Constitutional Protections, Nancy Holland Jul 2015

Death Row Conditions: Progression Toward Constitutional Protections, Nancy Holland

Akron Law Review

Beginning with recapitulation of the quest for the meaning and scope of the eighth amendment, this comment will review both the evolution of judicial scrutiny and the constitutional limitations of criminal incarceration and will also analyze the narrow body of case law affecting the quality of life on America's death rows.


The Ohio Supreme Court's Move Toward Quality Control Of Court-Appointed Counsel For Indigent Defendants Charged With Capital Offense Crimes, George J. Ticoras Jul 2015

The Ohio Supreme Court's Move Toward Quality Control Of Court-Appointed Counsel For Indigent Defendants Charged With Capital Offense Crimes, George J. Ticoras

Akron Law Review

This comment outlines the law in Ohio concerning court-appointed representation of indigent defendants in capital offense cases. A brief look at Ohio's "pre-C.P.Sup.R. 65" period provides the proper backdrop in which to examine C.P.Sup.R. 65's relation to the Ohio Public Defender's Regulations and the impact this rule may have throughout the State.


Barefoot In Quicksand: The Future Of "Future Dangerousness" Predictions In Death Penalty Sentencing In The World Of Daubert And Kumho, Thomas Regnier Jul 2015

Barefoot In Quicksand: The Future Of "Future Dangerousness" Predictions In Death Penalty Sentencing In The World Of Daubert And Kumho, Thomas Regnier

Akron Law Review

To understand the Barefoot decision, it is necessary to examine Jurek v. Texas, an earlier case in which the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of using predictions of future dangerousness as an element in capital sentencing. I will begin by analyzing the background to Barefoot, and then the Barefoot case itself. I will consider how admissibility of future dangerousness testimony in capital cases may or may not have changed after the Supreme Court’s decisions in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals and Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael. I will argue that future dangerousness predictions in capital cases are an unconstitutional due …


Implicit Bias And Capital Decision-Making: Using Narrative To Counter Prejudicial Psychiatric Labels, Sean O'Brien, Kathleen Wayland Jul 2015

Implicit Bias And Capital Decision-Making: Using Narrative To Counter Prejudicial Psychiatric Labels, Sean O'Brien, Kathleen Wayland

Faculty Works

Overreliance on psychiatric diagnostic labels in the defense of death penalty cases risks triggering prejudicial associations in the minds of decision-makers. This article emphasizes the importance of developing a mitigating counter-narrative of the defendant’s life story, based on an extensive longitudinal and developmental investigation of the defendant and his family’s life trajectory. It is the client’s life story, not diagnostic labels, that reveals his humanity. Cognitive psychology provides a useful framework for explaining human perceptions, and how implicit or explicit biases can interfere with the objective interpretation of data in ways that affect judgment and behavior.


Guerrilla Warfare And The Constitution, Sonja R. West Jul 2015

Guerrilla Warfare And The Constitution, Sonja R. West

Popular Media

Earlier this week, the United States Supreme Court upheld, by a 5-4 vote, the states’ ability to execute death row inmates with a three-drug lethal injection cocktail that critics argue causes excruciating pain. The Court reasoned that states should be allowed to use the drug in question, despite its involvement in several botched executions, in part because states can no longer attain more effective alternatives. In the majority opinion, the justices spin an erroneous tale about “anti-death-penalty advocates” pressuring pharmaceutical companies into refusing to supply other, more humane drugs to the states for use in capital punishment. This alleged radical …


Newsroom: Nason '05 Cited By U.S. Supreme Court, Roger Williams University School Of Law Jun 2015

Newsroom: Nason '05 Cited By U.S. Supreme Court, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.


Two Wrongs Don't Make A Right: Federal Death Eligibility Determinations And Judicial Trifurcations, Michael D. Pepson, John N. Sharifi Jun 2015

Two Wrongs Don't Make A Right: Federal Death Eligibility Determinations And Judicial Trifurcations, Michael D. Pepson, John N. Sharifi

Akron Law Review

Broadly speaking, the purpose of this article is to bring attention to this radical and irreconcilable disparity between the unequivocal Sixth Amendment right of confrontation criminal defendants are afforded at trial,and the limited, qualified right of confrontation the FDPA grants federal capital defendants during death-eligibility determinations, which occur as part of the sentencing phase. It advances the argument that there is no tenable principled distinction on which this disparate procedural treatment may rest. We will attempt to demonstrate that, as written, the statutory provision that governs the admission of evidence at capital sentencings—18 U.S.C. § 3593(c)—is unconstitutional on its face …


The Challenge And Dilemma Of Charting A Course To Constitutionally Protect The Severely Mentally Ill Capital Defendant From The Death Penalty, Lyn Entzeroth Jun 2015

The Challenge And Dilemma Of Charting A Course To Constitutionally Protect The Severely Mentally Ill Capital Defendant From The Death Penalty, Lyn Entzeroth

Akron Law Review

This article examines these issues in the context of an important and emerging constitutional challenge to the death penalty: whether the death penalty can be imposed on capital defendants who suffer from severe mental illness at the time of the commission of their crimes. The American Bar Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill all endorse a death penalty exemption for the severely mentally ill. Recent law review articles suggest that such an exemption may even be compelled by the Supreme Court’s decisions in Roper v. Simmons and Atkins v. …


The Challenge And Dilemma Of Charting A Course To Constitutionally Protect The Severely Mentally Ill Capital Defendant From The Death Penalty, Lyn Entzeroth Jun 2015

The Challenge And Dilemma Of Charting A Course To Constitutionally Protect The Severely Mentally Ill Capital Defendant From The Death Penalty, Lyn Entzeroth

Akron Law Review

This article examines these issues in the context of an important and emerging constitutional challenge to the death penalty: whether the death penalty can be imposed on capital defendants who suffer from severe mental illness at the time of the commission of their crimes...At the outset, this article briefly sets out the problem of mental illness among capital offenders and the death row population and reviews the characteristics of severe mental illnesses, such as schizophrenia, that plague some individuals who are sentenced to die. In order to contextualize the severely mentally ill offender’s place within the United States’ modern death …


A Tale Of Two (And Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability And Capital Punishment Twelve Years After The Supreme Court's Creation Of A Categorical Bar, John H. Blume, Sheri Lynn Johnson, Paul Marcus, Emily C. Paavola Jun 2015

A Tale Of Two (And Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability And Capital Punishment Twelve Years After The Supreme Court's Creation Of A Categorical Bar, John H. Blume, Sheri Lynn Johnson, Paul Marcus, Emily C. Paavola

Sheri Lynn Johnson

This article examines empirically the capital cases decided by the lower courts since the United States Supreme Court created the categorical ban against the execution of persons with intellectual disability twelve years ago in the Atkins decision.


Too Young For The Death Penalty: An Empirical Examination Of Community Conscience And The Juvenile Death Penalty From The Perspective Of Capital Jurors, William J. Bowers, Benjamin Fleury-Steiner, Valerie P. Hans, Michael E. Antonio Jun 2015

Too Young For The Death Penalty: An Empirical Examination Of Community Conscience And The Juvenile Death Penalty From The Perspective Of Capital Jurors, William J. Bowers, Benjamin Fleury-Steiner, Valerie P. Hans, Michael E. Antonio

Valerie P. Hans

As our analysis of jury decisionmaking in juvenile capital trials was nearing completion, the Missouri Supreme Court declared the juvenile death penalty unconstitutional in Simmons v. Roper. The court held that the execution of persons younger than eighteen years of age at the time of their crime violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. This decision patently rejected the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Stanford v. Kentucky, which permitted the execution of sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds. In deciding Simmons, the Missouri Supreme Court applied the U.S. Supreme Court's reasoning in Atkins v. Virginia to the juvenile death …


Capital Jurors As The Litmus Test Of Community Conscience For The Juvenile Death Penalty, Michael E. Antonio, Benjamin Fleury-Steiner, Valerie P. Hans, William J. Bowers Jun 2015

Capital Jurors As The Litmus Test Of Community Conscience For The Juvenile Death Penalty, Michael E. Antonio, Benjamin Fleury-Steiner, Valerie P. Hans, William J. Bowers

Valerie P. Hans

This fall, the United States Supreme Court will consider the constitutionality of the juvenile death penalty in Simmons v. Roper. The Eighth Amendment issue before the Court in Simmons will be whether the juvenile death penalty accords with the conscience of the community. This article presents evidence that bears directly on the conscience of the community in juvenile capital cases as revealed through extensive in-depth interviews with jurors who made the critical life-or-death decision in such cases. The data come from the Capital Jury Project, a national study of the exercise of sentencing discretion in capital cases conducted with the …


A Tale Of Two (And Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability And Capital Punishment Twelve Years After The Supreme Court's Creation Of A Categorical Bar, John H. Blume, Sheri Lynn Johnson, Paul Marcus, Emily C. Paavola Jun 2015

A Tale Of Two (And Possibly Three) Atkins: Intellectual Disability And Capital Punishment Twelve Years After The Supreme Court's Creation Of A Categorical Bar, John H. Blume, Sheri Lynn Johnson, Paul Marcus, Emily C. Paavola

John H. Blume

This article examines empirically the capital cases decided by the lower courts since the United States Supreme Court created the categorical ban against the execution of persons with intellectual disability twelve years ago in the Atkins decision.


Death Penalty And The Right To Counsel Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Richard Klein Jun 2015

Death Penalty And The Right To Counsel Decisions In The October 2005 Term, Richard Klein

Richard Daniel Klein

No abstract provided.


Omnes Vulnerant, Postuma Necat; All The Hours Wound, The Last One Kills: The Lengthy Stay On Death Row In America, Mary Elizabeth Tongue Jun 2015

Omnes Vulnerant, Postuma Necat; All The Hours Wound, The Last One Kills: The Lengthy Stay On Death Row In America, Mary Elizabeth Tongue

Missouri Law Review

Why inmates spend so long on death row and the accompanying mental ramifications are discussed in Part II. Part III discusses the response of American courts to the lengthy stays of inmates on death row. Next, Part IV discusses the international opinion on America’s lengthy stay on death row, international tribunal holdings on the matter, the philosophical implications of a lengthy stay on death row, and possible solutions. Finally, Part V concludes this Note, finding that abolition of the death penalty is the best solution.


Pondering The Death Penalty, Even For The Boston Bomber, Alan E. Garfield May 2015

Pondering The Death Penalty, Even For The Boston Bomber, Alan E. Garfield

Alan E Garfield

No abstract provided.


Six Overrulings, Andrew Koppelman Apr 2015

Six Overrulings, Andrew Koppelman

Michigan Law Review

John Paul Stevens, who retired in 2010 at the age of ninety after more than thirty-four years on the Supreme Court, has capped his astoundingly distinguished career by becoming an important public intellectual. He reviews books, gives high-profile interviews, wrote a memoir of the chief justices he has known, and has now written a second book. Six Amendments revisits half a dozen old, lost battles. Stevens appeals over the heads of his colleagues to a higher authority: the public. Now that he is off the Court, Stevens explains why six decisions in which he dissented should be overruled by constitutional …


Blind Justice, Andrea Lyon Mar 2015

Blind Justice, Andrea Lyon

Andrea D. Lyon

No abstract provided.


Acknowledgements, Leah Stiegler Mar 2015

Acknowledgements, Leah Stiegler

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.


Temporal Arbitrariness: A Back To The Future Look At A Twenty-Five-Year-Old Death Penalty Trial, Mary Kelly Tate Mar 2015

Temporal Arbitrariness: A Back To The Future Look At A Twenty-Five-Year-Old Death Penalty Trial, Mary Kelly Tate

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.


Mercy By The Numbers: An Empirical Analysis Of Clemency And Its Structure, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Mercy By The Numbers: An Empirical Analysis Of Clemency And Its Structure, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

Clemency is an extrajudicial measure intended both to enhance fairness in the administration of justice, and allow for the correction of mistakes. Perhaps nowhere are these goals more important than in the death penalty context. The recent increased use of the death penalty and concurrent decline in the number of defendants removed from death row through clemency call for a better and deeper understanding of clemency authority and its application. Questions about whether clemency decisions are consistently and fairly distributed are particularly apt. This study uses 27 years of death penalty and clemency data to explore the influence of defendant …


Jones, Lackey, And Teague, Richard Broughton Feb 2015

Jones, Lackey, And Teague, Richard Broughton

Richard Broughton

In a recent, high-profile ruling, a federal court finally recognized that a substantial delay in executing a death row inmate violated the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishments. Courts have repeatedly rejected these so-called “Lackey claims,” making the federal court’s decision in Jones v. Chappell all the more important. And yet it was deeply flawed. This paper focuses on one of the major flaws in the Jones decision that largely escaped attention: the application of the non-retroactivity rule from Teague v. Lane. By comprehensively addressing the merits of the Teague bar as applied to Lackey claims, and making …


Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient Test Scores And The Impropriety Of “Ethnic (Or Socio-Economic) Adjustment” In Atkins Cases, Robert Sanger Jan 2015

Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient Test Scores And The Impropriety Of “Ethnic (Or Socio-Economic) Adjustment” In Atkins Cases, Robert Sanger

Robert M. Sanger

After attending this presentation, attendees will gain new information regarding developments in epigenetics which relate to the validity of Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient (FSIQ) scores in determining intellectual disability for the purpose of eligibility of a criminal defendant to be executed if otherwise subject to the death penalty. (Complete Abstract at page 727 of the proceedings: http://www.aafs.org/sites/default/files/2015/2015Proceedings.pdf )


Executing On An Empty Tank: Protecting The Supply Of Lethal Injection Drugs From Public Records Requests, Ira K. Rushing Jan 2015

Executing On An Empty Tank: Protecting The Supply Of Lethal Injection Drugs From Public Records Requests, Ira K. Rushing

Ira K Rushing

With the US Supreme Court holding the death penalty and lethal injection as Constitutional, there has been a new strategy for condemned prisoners. Using public information requests to discover the identities of the suppliers of lethal injection drugs and others in ancillary roles, the media has broad range to publish this information. This has led to many suppliers and compounding pharmacies to withhold supplies of the drugs to states using them in executions. This paper lays out a history of the death penalty in Mississippi that has gotten us to this point. It then attempts to provide persuasive arguments on …