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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Ambiguity And Unfairness Of Dismissing Bad Writing, Benjamin D. Raker
The Ambiguity And Unfairness Of Dismissing Bad Writing, Benjamin D. Raker
Cleveland State Law Review
Courts routinely choose to explicitly dismiss arguments and issues raised by parties, regardless of their merit, based on unexplained determinations that the briefing was bad. This practice, which I call abandonment by poor presentation, is sometimes justified by practicality, by pointing to federal and local rules, by waiver and forfeiture doctrines, and by the norm of party presentation. None of these justifications hold water. I contend that the real reason judges find abandonment by poor presentation is agenda control: judges rely on the practice as a means of retaining control over how they decide cases. This unexplained, poorly justified, and …
Certiorari In Patent Cases, Christa J. Laser
Certiorari In Patent Cases, Christa J. Laser
Law Faculty Articles and Essays
In the decade from 2010 to 2019, the Supreme Court has decided more patent law cases than in the prior three decades combined. A higher percentage of its docket has been patent cases--5.45%--than in any decade in the last century. A number of scholars have advanced theories of why this rate of review of patent cases has increased and provided quantitative analyses. Yet no scholarship to date has used qualitative data to investigate why the Supreme Court’s patent docket is increasing and what factors the Supreme Court considers in its review of patent cases. This paper shares statistics of the …
An Open Letter To The Ohio Supreme Court: Setting A Uniform Standard On Anders Briefs, Matthew D. Fazekas
An Open Letter To The Ohio Supreme Court: Setting A Uniform Standard On Anders Briefs, Matthew D. Fazekas
Cleveland State Law Review
Attorneys are faced with an ethical dilemma when they represent indigent defendants who wish to appeal a criminal sentence, but that appeal would be frivolous. In 1967, the United States Supreme Court, in Anders v. California, introduced a procedure protecting the rights of indigent defendants that balanced the ethical concerns of an attorney forced to file a frivolous appeal. In 2000, the Court in Smith v. Robbins held that the states can set their own procedure for the aforementioned ethical dilemma, so long as it protects the rights of indigent defendants in compliance with the Fourteenth Amendment. This has …
Decoding Judicial Reasoning In China: A Comparative Empirical Analysis Of Guiding Cases, Runhua Wang
Decoding Judicial Reasoning In China: A Comparative Empirical Analysis Of Guiding Cases, Runhua Wang
Cleveland State Law Review
The judicial system in China recently started using legal precedents—known as guiding cases—as a new legal source to eliminate adjudicative inconsistency. Guiding cases (“GCs”) present the current judicial reasoning to some extent and can be used to predict the future of judicial reasoning in China. What are GCs? What legal issues do GCs address? How do they address legal issues? How do GCs affect the legal system and adjudication in China? This Article answers these questions with empirical evidence and comparisons to judicial reasoning in the United States. It is the first empirical research providing a systematic review of all …
Land Of The Free, If You Can Afford It: Reforming Mayor's Courts In Ohio, Lucia Lopez-Hisijos
Land Of The Free, If You Can Afford It: Reforming Mayor's Courts In Ohio, Lucia Lopez-Hisijos
Cleveland State Law Review
Unlike most states in America, Ohio has a unique system of punishing minor misdemeanors and ordinance violations through municipal institutions called mayor’s courts. In 2017, Ohio had 295 of these courts, and they heard nearly 300,000 cases. But these are not normal courts. Ohio’s mayor’s courts do not conduct ability to pay hearings and can jail defendants who fail to pay court fines. With the author’s original research into Ohio’s mayor’s courts, this Note argues that these institutions can function like modern-day debtor’s prisons and violate indigent defendants’ constitutional right to Due Process. Ultimately, this Note proposes a model bill …
The Federal Sentencing Guidelines: A Guideline To Remedy Ohio's Sentencing Disparities For White-Collar Criminal Defendants, Joelle Livorse
The Federal Sentencing Guidelines: A Guideline To Remedy Ohio's Sentencing Disparities For White-Collar Criminal Defendants, Joelle Livorse
Cleveland State Law Review
Over the past few decades, white-collar crimes have significantly increased across the country, especially in Ohio. However, Ohio’s judges are ill-equipped to handle the influx of cases. Unlike federal judges who are guided by the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s Federal Sentencing Guidelines, Ohio’s judges have significantly more sentencing discretion because the Ohio legislature provides minimal guidance for these crimes. As a result, Ohio’s white-collar criminal defendants are experiencing dramatic sentencing variations. To solve this problem, Ohio should look to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines and neighboring states to adopt and create an innovative sentencing model tailored to white-collar crime. Unlike the federal …