Law Commons^™

The Sense And Nonsense Of Criminalizing Transfers Of Obscene Material: Criminalizing Privacy Violations (2008) 26 Singapore Law Review 126, Dennis J. Baker

Dr. Dennis J Baker

The recent distribution of nude photos of a number of high profile Hong Kong celebrities has provoked intense discussion about the state of Hong Kong's obscenity and indecency laws. In this paper, I argue that Hong Kong's laws prohibiting the transfer of obscene and indecent information and images between consenting adults are both under-inclusive and over-inclusive. The Control of Obscene and Indecent Articles Ordinance is under-inclusive in that it does not adequately criminalise grave violations of privacy. It is also over-inclusive because it is a blanket prohibition against the transfer by all parties (including consenting adults) of all forms of …

Fantasy Crime, Susan Brenner

Susan Brenner

The article "Fantasy Crime" analyzes activity in virtual worlds that would constitute a crime if it were committed in the real world. The article reviews the evolution of virtual worlds like Second Life and notes research which indicates that more and more of our lives will move into this realm. It analyzes the criminalization of virtual conduct that inflicts "harm" in the real world and virtual conduct that only inflicts "harm" in the virtual world. It explains that the first category qualifies as cybercrime and can be prosecuted under existing law. It then analyzes the necessity and propriety of criminalizing …

Taking The 'Hate' Out Of Hate Crimes: Applying Unfair Advantage Theory To Justify The Enhanced Punishment Of Opportunistic Bias Crimes, Jordan Woods

Jordan Blair Woods

Determinative Sentencing Laws: Understanding The Law And Ethical Concerns, Linsey L. Krauss

Linsey L Krauss

No abstract provided.

North Carolina, Juvenile Court Jurisdiction, And The Resistance To Reform, Tamar R. Birckhead

Tamar R Birckhead

North Carolina is the only state in the United States that treats all sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds as adults when they are charged with criminal offenses and then denies them the ability to appeal for return to the juvenile system. Thirty-seven states cap juvenile court jurisdiction at age eighteen, while ten do so at seventeen. In addition, as reflected by international treaties and instruments, many nations of the world consider eighteen to be the most appropriate age for delineating between juvenile and adult court jurisdiction. Not surprisingly, the consequences of North Carolina's scheme for prosecuting minors can be particularly severe. The …

Trapped In The Law? How Lawyers Reconcile The Legal And Social Aspects Of Their Work, Hadar Aviram

Hadar Aviram

This Article addresses an immensely important, and often neglected, problem faced by legal practitioners in their daily professional lives: how do legal actors feel, and act, when the cases in which they are involved have evident, and disturbing, socio-economic implications? This situation is particularly uncomfortable for prosecutors, judges, and defense attorneys, whose criminal case workload often reflects much deeper social inequalities and problems, and whose defendant population is characterized by an overrepresentation of disempowered groups. Legal actors who engage daily with "the tip of the social iceberg" in the courtroom are keenly aware of the broader aspects of the problem; …

Death Is Unconstitutional: How Capital Punishment, Eric A. Engle

Eric A. Engle

Argues that capital punishment is unconstitutional as a violation of natural law because the punishment is disproportional, uncertain, and irrevocable.

The Age Of The Child: Interrogating Juveniles After Roper V. Simmons, Tamar R. Birckhead

Tamar R Birckhead

With its recent decision in Roper v. Simmons, invalidating the imposition of the death penalty on offenders who were younger than eighteen when their crimes were committed, the U.S. Supreme Court has heralded a major shift in the perspective of the legal system—and the culture at large—towards adolescents who commit crimes. Invoking social science research as well as a “common sense” understanding of the differences between teenagers and adults, the Court found that as a categorical matter, juveniles are not as culpable as adults and thus, cannot be classified among the “worst offenders,” deserving of the most severe punishment. Yet, …

Free To Leave? An Empirical Look At The Fourth Amendment’S Seizure Standard, David K. Kessler

David K Kessler

Whether a person has been “seized” often determines if he or she receives Fourth Amendment protection. The Supreme Court has established a standard for identifying seizures: a person is seized when a reasonable person in his situation would not have felt free to leave or otherwise terminate the encounter with law enforcement. In applying that standard, today’s courts conduct crucial seizure inquiries relying only on their own beliefs about when a reasonable person would feel free to leave. Both the Court and scholars have noted that, though empirical evidence about whether people actually feel free to leave would help guide …

Ricin And The Assassination Of Georgi Markov, Marios Papaloukas, Christos Papaloucas, Apostolos Stergioulas

Marios Papaloukas

This article by Professors Marios Papaloukas, Christos Papaloukas, Apostolos Stergioulas investigates the causes of death of Georgi Markov, Georgi Markov, a well known Bulgarian novelist and playwright, dissident of the communist regime in his country, escaped to England where he dedicated himself in broadcasting from BBC World Service, the Radio Free Europe and the German Deutsche Welle against the communist party and especially against its leader Todor Zhivkov who in a party’s meeting told that he wanted Markov silenced for ever. On the 7th September 1978 Markov was executed with the deadly poison ricin injected to his thigh by a …

Human Dignity Under The Fourth Amendment, John D. Castiglione

John D. Castiglione

Fourth Amendment "reasonableness" jurisprudence as currently constituted is incapable of providing consistent decisions reflective of the underlying philosophical and moral structure of the Constitution. Increasingly, courts have allowed reasonableness analysis to devolve into little more than an awkward balancing exercise between the needs of law enforcement and the interests of "privacy." Upon initial consideration, this seems appropriate; the Fourth Amendment has been long been understood as a bulwark against unreasonable privacy invasions in the course of law enforcement. This understanding is, however, incomplete. As courts have moved towards an almost exclusive focus on privacy as the counter-balance to the government's …

Not Just The Peace Pipe But Also The Lance: Exploring Different Possibilities For Indigenous Control Over Criminal Justice, David Milward

Dr. David Milward

This article will exploring whether contrasts between restorative and punitive models of criminal justice inform an ideological struggle between Western and Indigenous approaches of criminal justice as Indigenous communities strive for greater control over criminal justice. The answer to this question will be examined in light of considerations for Indigenous control over justice. One concern by Western states is that Indigenous justice must strike the proper balance beteen community safety and offender healing. This paper contends that for self-determination to be effective, Indigenous leaders must include and consider the community at large when making decisions over criminal justice.

The Rhetoric Of Self Defense, Janine Young Kim

Janine Kim

Investigating The Continuity Of Sex Offending: Evidence From The Second Philadelphia Birth Cohort, Franklin E. Zimring, Wesley G. Jennings, Alex R. Piquero, Stephanie Hays

Franklin E. Zimring

This study uses data from the Second Philadelphia Birth Cohort to examine the natural history of sex offenders and their involvement in sexual offending through age 26. Several key findings emerged from our effort. First, only one in ten of the 221 male and female juvenile sex offenders had a sex-related offense during the first eight years of adulthood. Second, 92% of all the cohort males with adult sex records had no prior juvenile sex offense. Third, a boy with no sex contacts but five or more total juvenile police contacts was more than twice as likely to commit a …