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Articles 1 - 10 of 10
Full-Text Articles in Law
Ai Risk Assessment Tools Amid The War On Drugs: Productive Or Counterproductive?, Matin Pedram
Ai Risk Assessment Tools Amid The War On Drugs: Productive Or Counterproductive?, Matin Pedram
Mitchell Hamline Law Journal of Public Policy and Practice
The War on Drugs refers to a situation in which all the processes of production, distribution, and consumption of all illegal drugs are prohibited. This ambitious goal has imposed considerable costs on societies. The war has weaponized harsher punishments such as life imprisonment, execution, and long-term incarceration against drug offenders. Nonviolent offenders, those who possessed illegal drugs, have been easy targets for governments to show that the war is still ongoing. Although some countries became pioneers in changing the laws to end this costly war, Iran and the United States have made their stance on the drug issue clear, and …
Criminal Justice Secrets, Meghan J. Ryan
Criminal Justice Secrets, Meghan J. Ryan
Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters
The American criminal justice system is cloaked in secrecy. The government employs covert surveillance operations. Grand-jury proceedings are hidden from public view. Prosecutors engage in closed-door plea-bargaining and bury exculpatory evidence. Juries convict defendants on secret evidence. Jury deliberations are a black box. And jails and prisons implement clandestine punishment practices. Although there are some justifications for this secrecy, the ubiquitous nature of it is contrary to this nation’s Founders’ steadfast belief in the transparency of criminal justice proceedings. Further, the pervasiveness of secrecy within today’s criminal justice system raises serious constitutional concerns. The accumulation of secrecy and the aggregation …
Washington’S Young Offenders: O’Dell Demands A Change To Sentencing Guidelines, Erika Vranizan
Washington’S Young Offenders: O’Dell Demands A Change To Sentencing Guidelines, Erika Vranizan
Seattle University Law Review
This Note argues that the O’Dell decision was a watershed moment for criminal justice reform. It argues that the reasoning in O’Dell should be seized upon by the legislature to take action to remediate instances in which defendants are legal adults but do not possess the cognitive characteristics of an adult sufficient to justify adult punishment. Given both the scientific impossibility of identifying a precise age at which characteristics of youthfulness end and adulthood begins and the Court’s repeated recognition that these very factors impact culpability, the current approach to sentencing young offenders aged eighteen to twenty-five as adults simply …
The Crime Lab In The Age Of The Genetic Panopticon, Brandon L. Garrett
The Crime Lab In The Age Of The Genetic Panopticon, Brandon L. Garrett
Michigan Law Review
Review of Unfair: The New Science of Criminal Injustice by Adam Benforado, Inside the Cell: The Dark Side of Forensic DNA by Erin E. Murphy, and Cops in Lab Coats: Curbing Wrongful Convictions Through Independent Forensic Laboratories by Sandra Guerra Thompson.
The Basics Of Us Criminal Justice System, Bethel G.A Erastus-Obilo
The Basics Of Us Criminal Justice System, Bethel G.A Erastus-Obilo
Bethel G.A Erastus-Obilo
The criminal justice system is complex. It is also bureaucratic by design and has evolved over the years from simple unstructured peacekeeping units to the large complex crime-fighting system that it is today. Many of those who work within it find it challenging and unwieldy. Many of those who are accused of an offense find it confusing and intimidating. This goes for citizens and foreigners whether they are competent in the English language or not. For most members of ethnic minority groups, the experience can be harrowing and often fatal.
Twenty-First Century Forensic Science Challenges For Trial Judges In Criminal Cases: Where The "Polybutadiene" Meets The "Bitumen", Hon. Donald E. Shelton
Twenty-First Century Forensic Science Challenges For Trial Judges In Criminal Cases: Where The "Polybutadiene" Meets The "Bitumen", Hon. Donald E. Shelton
Hon. Donald E. Shelton
This artice discusses the challenges faced by trial judges in crimnal cases in fulfilling their Daubert "gatekeeping" role in the face of rapid advancements in forensic science. Admissibility questions for various forms of scientific evidence are reviewed, from DNA to fingerprints to social science "syndrome" evidence. The article discusses the pretrial issues presented by DNA databases, search issues and limitations problems as well as the impact of forensic science developments on juror expectations. Finally, forensic science issues regarding trial conduct are discussed, including voir dire, arguments and jury instructions,
A Brave New World Of Criminal Justice: Neil Gerlach's Genetic Imaginary, Stephen Coughlan
A Brave New World Of Criminal Justice: Neil Gerlach's Genetic Imaginary, Stephen Coughlan
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
In this well written and intriguing book, Neil Gerlach asks why the criminal justice system has accepted DNA evidence in much the same way that our Anglo-Saxon predecessors accepted trial by ordeal. Why have we not instead shown the same caution we show polygraph evidence? To be sure, he does not present the issue in those terms, and might shudder at the analogy. Still, the central issue he pursues in the book is the question of how DNA evidence has managed to assume its current aura of infallibility, as evidence which is somehow uniquely objective and "true": how it has …
Fifteen Years After The Federal Sentencing Revolution: How Mandatory Minimums Have Undermined Effective And Just Narcotics Sentencing Perspectives On The Federal Sentencing Guidelines And Mandatory Sentencing, Ian Weinstein
Faculty Scholarship
Federal criminal sentencing has changed dramatically since 1988. Fifteen years ago, judges determined if and for how long a defendant would go to jail. Since that time, changes in substantive federal criminal statutes, particularly the passage of an array of mandatory minimum penalties and the adoption of the federal sentencing guidelines, have limited significantly judicial sentencing power and have remade federal sentencing and federal criminal practice. The results of these changes are significantly longer federal prison sentences, as was the intent of these reforms, and the emergence of federal prosecutors as the key players in sentencing. Yet, at the same …
Regulating The Market For Snitches , Ian Weinstein
Regulating The Market For Snitches , Ian Weinstein
Faculty Scholarship
These are boom times for the sellers and buyers of cooperation in the federal criminal justice system. While prosecutors have always welcomed the assistance of snitches, tougher federal sentencing laws have led to a significant increase in cooperation as more defendants try to provide "substantial assistance in the investigation or prosecution of another person," to have some chance of receiving a significant sentence reduction. In 1996 one of every five defendants sentenced in the federal courts won mitigation by providing substantial assistance. Many more defendants tried but failed to close the deal. The overheated cooperation market is creating serious problems …
Substantial Assistance And Sentence Severity: Is There A Correlation Substantial Assistance, Ian Weinstein
Substantial Assistance And Sentence Severity: Is There A Correlation Substantial Assistance, Ian Weinstein
Faculty Scholarship
How much more severe are sentences imposed in districts with low substantial assistance rates than those in which the rate is very high? In the aggregate, not at all. At first blush this may puzzle readers because substantial assistance (SA) departures are very unevenly distributed across districts and SA accounts for nearly two-thirds of all downward departures, almost 7,900 of the 12,000 in fiscal 1996. Although this pattern could result in gross disparities among districts, my analysis of inter-district sentencing patterns reveals no statistically significant correlation between the rate of SA departures and the average length of sentences imposed in …