Law Commons^™

Guest View: In Defense Of Student Privacy, Richard J. Peltz-Steele

Richard J. Peltz-Steele

Privacy is another American value we rush to sacrifice on the altar of accountability. In Ohio, reporters swarm the yards of liberated kidnapping victims. And in Massachusetts, news trucks besiege the campus at UMass Dartmouth, where I work, and where marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was a student. Media want to know everything about Tsarnaev and his college friends. The university, bound by federal privacy law, has refused access to student academic and financial aid records.

Candor, Zeal, And The Substitution Of Judgment: Ethics And The Mentally Ill Criminal Defendant , John D. King

John D. King

This Article explores the tension between autonomy and paternalism that characterizes the attorney-client relationship when a criminal defense attorney represents a mentally impaired client. Specifically, the Article analyzes the ethical frameworks that constrain the discretion of the attorney in this situation and proposes a new paradigm for ethical decisionmaking when an attorney represents a marginally competent client.

The criminal defense attorney is both a zealous advocate for her client and an officer of the legal system. In representing a marginally competent client, the initial ethical dilemma facing the attorney is whether she has an obligation to alert the court to …