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Capital punishment

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University of Missouri School of Law

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Dueling Decisions: The Wrongful Death Clock Clangs Twice On The Same Day, Stacey Ann Lannert Apr 2016

Dueling Decisions: The Wrongful Death Clock Clangs Twice On The Same Day, Stacey Ann Lannert

Missouri Law Review

Part II of this Note provides the facts and holding in Boland. Part III presents the legal background of Boland, discusses both the statutory and common law origins of wrongful death causes of action, and explores Missouri’s unique history of wrongful death statutory interpretation. Part IV analyzes the rationale of the Boland court’s return to the strict interpretation standard of days past. Finally, Part V discusses the ramifications of the court's decision and explores why the court should have acknowledged wrongful death claims that ascended from common law.


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 …


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.


Life Without Parole, Or A Juvenile Death Sentence, Kyle Gottuso Nov 2011

Life Without Parole, Or A Juvenile Death Sentence, Kyle Gottuso

Missouri Law Review

Part II of this Note will look at the court's decision to allow juveniles to be sentenced to life without parole. In doing so, this Note will outline the policies underlying the U.S. Supreme Court's Eighth Amendment jurisprudence. Next, Part III of this Note will survey more broadly the U.S. Supreme Court's interpretation of the Eighth Amendment in terms of life without parole as well as death penalty cases. Part IV of this Note will then look at the reasoning of the majority and the dissent in the instant case. Finally, Part V of this Note will attempt to reconcile …


Death Of The Challenge To Lethal Injection - Missouri's Protocol Deemed Constitutional Yet Again, Tanya M. Maerz Nov 2010

Death Of The Challenge To Lethal Injection - Missouri's Protocol Deemed Constitutional Yet Again, Tanya M. Maerz

Missouri Law Review

Lethal injection is currently the predominant form of execution nationwide. Most proponents of this method cite the convenience and the humanity of this procedure over past methods of execution. However, lethal injections are fraught with problems such as the specificity and safety of the written procedures themselves, implementation of such procedures, and whether lethal injection and executions in general are constitutional. Most often, prisoners file constitutional challenges to lethal injections under the Eighth Amendment, which prevents imposing cruel and unusual punishment on an American citizen. One of the more recent cases in Missouri cited such a challenge to the implementation …


Imposing A Cap On Capital Punishment, Adam M. Gershowitz Jan 2007

Imposing A Cap On Capital Punishment, Adam M. Gershowitz

Missouri Law Review

This Article argues that because prosecutors have discretion to seek the death penalty and too many cases, they lack the incentive to police themselves and choose carefully. Put simply, because there are too few legal constraints - and virtually no political constraints - on the sheer number of cases in which prosecutors can pursue the death penalty, the Government is not under sufficient pressure to limit its use of capital punishment to only the most heinous cases. As a result, two things happen. First, the death penalty is sought and meted out in some cases, which though terrible, are no …


Justice Blackmun, Franz Kafka, And Capital Punishment, Martha Dragich Oct 1998

Justice Blackmun, Franz Kafka, And Capital Punishment, Martha Dragich

Faculty Publications

The Article discusses the problem of judging death penalty cases, comparing Justice Blackmun's death penalty jurisprudence to the struggle of a character in Kafka's story. It focuses on three critical moments in the decisional process--hesitation, decision, and escape--and assesses Justice Blackmun's performance at each step. It concludes that although Justice Blackmun's views remained consistent throughout his judicial career, his death penalty legacy is equivocal, and in some important respects, unsatisfying.