Criminal Law Commons^™

Inmates’ E-Mails With Their Attorneys: Off-Limits For The Government?, Amelia H. Barry

Catholic University Law Review

The attorney-client privilege is vital to inmates who otherwise have limited opportunities for private communications in prison. Traditionally, inmates have only been able to communicate with their attorneys via in-person visits, phone calls, and mailed letters. As federal inmates have begun using e-mail to converse with their attorneys, courts have had to determine if these conversations are protected by the attorney-client privilege. This Comment discusses courts’ approaches to this question, many of which have found that inmates’ e-mail communications with their attorneys are not privileged because by using the federal prison e-mail system, which warns users that conversations can be …

Adequacy Of Notice Under Cafra: Resolving Constitutional Due Process Challenges To Administrative Forfeitures, Rebecca Hausner

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Constitution And Revenge Porn, John A. Humbach

Pace Law Review

While the Supreme Court has recognized a number of circumstances that justify government impingements on free expression, the Court has been extremely reluctant to permit speech restrictions that discriminate based on a message’s content, its viewpoint, or the speaker. It has nearly always refused to tolerate such discrimination unless the case falls within one of the several historically established exceptions to First Amendment protection. Because of the special place that the modern First Amendment cases accord to content discrimination (and the allied discriminations based on viewpoint and speaker), any statutes designed specifically to outlaw revenge porn as such would seem …

You Have The Right To Remain Silent, But Anything You Don’T Say May Be Used Against You: The Admissibility Of Silence As Evidence After Salinas V. Texas, Andrew M. Hapner

Florida Law Review

In Salinas v. Texas, the United States Supreme Court held that a suspect’s refusal to answer an officer’s questions during a noncustodial, pre-Miranda, criminal interrogation is admissible at trial as substantive evidence of guilt. In a plurality decision, Justice Samuel Alito emphasized that before a suspect can rely on the privilege against self-incrimination, the suspect must invoke the privilege. Consequently, because silence does not invoke the privilege, and because the petitioner failed to expressly invoke the privilege in words, the prosecutor’s use of his pre-Miranda silence during a noncustodial interrogation did not violate the Fifth Amendment. …

Guilt Without Mens Rea: How Florida’S Elimination Of Mens Rea For Drug Possession Is Constitutional, Marc B. Hernandez

Florida Law Review

The Florida Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act is almost unique among criminal drug statutes in the United States. Like all states, Florida prohibits the possession, sale, and delivery of certain controlled substances. However, a recent revision of the Florida Comprehensive Drug Act removed Florida’s burden of proving one aspect of defendants’ mens rea in drug cases. Although several cases have challenged the Florida Comprehensive Drug Act for disregarding the traditional role of mens rea in criminal law and for subjecting innocent people to prosecution, the state of Florida continues to prosecute and obtain convictions under the statute.

This …

Lost In Compromise: Free Speech, Criminal Justice, And Attorney Pretrial Publicity, Margaret Tarkington

Florida Law Review

Prior approaches to examining attorney speech rights have failed to address pretrial publicity in a manner that protects the criminal justice system and the essential roles of the prosecutor and defense attorney therein, as discussed in Part I. Yet the access-to-justice theory, as discussed in Part II, attunes attorney speech rights to the role of the attorney in the proper and constitutional functioning of the justice system. As discussed in Part III, the very nature of the criminal justice system imposes vastly differing obligations and duties on the prosecution and defense and their respective attorney–client relationships. In Part IV, this …

Impact Of The “Nirbhaya” Rape Case: Isolated Phenomenon Or Social Change?, Tina P. Lapsia

Honors Scholar Theses

In December 2012, a twenty-three year old college student, who was given the pseudonym “Nirbhaya” (“fearless”), was fatally gang-raped on a private bus in Delhi, India, galvanizing the country to swiftly adopt new legislative measures and catapulting the issue of violence against women in India into the international spotlight. Although assault and rape cases have made India infamous for its high volume of crimes against women, the reaction to this particular incident was much different from before. This paper investigates whether the governmental and societal responses represent social change, as indicated by changing attitudes towards violence against women in India. …

Following Orders: Campbell V. United States, The Waiver Of Appellate Rights, And The Duty Of Counsel, Jacob Szewczyk

Catholic University Law Review

In the 1984 case of Strickland v. Washington, the Supreme Court announced a two-pronged test to analyze whether a criminal defendant has received ineffective assistance of counsel. Since the rule was announced, the Court has expanded Strickland’s scope to apply to analyze counsel’s review at different stages of the criminal proceeding. This Comment addresses one issue that has remained unanswered by the Supreme Court: whether counsel’s failure to file a notice of appeal, after a defendant has waived his right to appeal through a plea bargain, constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel. This Comment discusses the circuit split that …

People V. Cole: Is The Incarceration Of An "Actually Innocent" Person Constitutional?, Aileen R. Kavanagh

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Judge Levine: A Survey Of His Most Influential Court Of Appeals Decisions - 1993-2002, Jean D'Alessandro

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Constitutional Limits To The Fight Against Terrorism, Leon Friedman

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Applying The 'Cuffs: Consistency And Clarity In A Bright-Line Rule For Arrest-Like Restraints Under Miranda Custody, Luis Then

Florida State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Contagion Of Fear: Post-9/11 Alarm Expands Executive Branch Authority And Sanctions Prosecutorial Exploitation Of America's Privacy, Carol M. Bast, Cynthia A. Brown

Cardozo Public Law, Policy & Ethics Journal

No abstract provided.

A Cautionary Tale About Policing Peaceful Protests: First Amendment Rights Still Reign Supreme, Kia H. Vernon

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

Wild West Campus: A Discussion On Concealed Weapons And The College Campus, Luke W. Mcminn

Senior Honors Theses

This thesis reviews the recent history of gun-related violence on college campuses in relation to gun control laws and argues whether college campuses should allow students and teachers with Carrying a Concealed Weapon permits to carry these weapons on campus, or if such a policy would merely exacerbate the issue at hand. The purpose of this thesis is to show that such a policy is effective, safe, and overall a benefit to the campus atmosphere and experience. Important points considered include the legal history of carrying concealed weapons, the current policies of universities concerning students carrying concealed weapons, the opinions …

Solving Batson, Tania Tetlow

William & Mary Law Review

The Supreme Court faced an important ideological choice when it banned the racial use of peremptory challenges in Batson v. Kentucky. The Court could either ground the rule in equality rights designed to protect potential jurors from stereotyping, or it could base the rule on the defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to an “impartial jury” drawn from a “fair cross-section of the community.” By choosing the equal protection analysis, the Court turned away from the defendant and the fair functioning of the criminal justice system, and instead focused on protecting potential jurors. In doing so, the Court built a fatal error …

The Privacies Of Life: Automatic License Plate Recognition Is Unconstitutional Under The Mosaic Theory Of Fourth Amendment Privacy Law, Jessica Gutierrez-Alm

Hamline Law Review

Abstract

The Death Penalty: Should The Judge Or The Jury Decide Who Dies?, Valerie P. Hans, John H. Blume, Theodore Eisenberg, Amelia Courtney Hritz, Sheri L. Johnson, Caisa Elizabeth Royer, Martin T. Wells

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This article addresses the effect of judge versus jury decision making through analysis of a database of all capital sentencing phase hearing trials in the State of Delaware from 1977– 2007. Over the three decades of the study, Delaware shifted responsibility for death penalty sentencing from the jury to the judge. Currently, Delaware is one of the handful of states that gives the judge the final decision-making authority in capital trials. Controlling for a number of legally relevant and other predictor variables, we find that the shift to judge sentencing significantly increased the number of death sentences. Statutory aggravating factors, …

Lethal Injections: States Medicalize Execution, Joel B. Zivot

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Has The "Machinery Of Death" Become A Clunker?, Stephen F. Smith

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Battle Of The Amendments: Why Ending Discrimination In The Courtroom May Inhibit A Criminal Defendant’S Right To An Impartial Jury, Gina M. Chiappetta

Fordham Law Review

    Since the U.S. Supreme Court began limiting the exercise of peremptory challenges to safeguard potential jurors from discrimination, it has faced a nearly impossible task. The Court has attempted to safeguard a juror’s equal protection rights without eradicating the peremptory challenge’s ability to preserve a criminal defendant’s right to an impartial jury. Under the current legal framework, it is not certain whether either constitutional right is adequately protected. This Note examines the history of the Supreme Court’s limitation on peremptory challenges. It then discusses the current federal circuit split over whether peremptory challenges should be further limited. Finally, this Note …

Trending@Rwu Law: Professor Emily Sack's Post: More Death Penalty Puzzles Highlighted By New Supreme Court Case, Emily Sack

Law School Blogs

No abstract provided.

Using Outcomes To Reframe Guilty Plea Adjudication, Anne R. Traum

Florida Law Review

The Supreme Court’s 2012 decisions in Lafler v. Cooper and Missouri v. Frye lay the groundwork for a new approach to judicial oversight of guilty pleas that considers outcomes. These cases confirm that courts possess robust authority to protect defendants’ Sixth Amendment right to the effective assistance of counsel and that plea outcomes are particularly relevant to identifying and remedying prejudicial ineffective assistance in plea-bargaining. The Court’s reliance on outcome-based prejudice analysis and suggestions for trial court-level reforms to prevent Sixth Amendment violations set the stage for trial courts to take a more active, substantive role in regulating guilty pleas. …

Indemnification As An Alternative To Nullification, Robert A. Mikos

Montana Law Review

No abstract provided.

Letting Innocence Suffer: The Need For Defense Access To The Law Enforcement Dna Database, Jason Kreag

Cardozo Law Review

Law enforcement has gradually amassed a sizable DNA database that holds considerable promise for solving cold cases and identifying suspects. The Supreme Court has blessed this effort, allowing investigators to include profiles of arrestees as well as convicted persons in the database. At present, though, law enforcement has a near monopoly on use of the DNA database, leaving defendants at the whim of the law enforcement officials who control access to this tool. Legal scholars have alternatively praised and decried the database, but none has examined its prospects for proving defendants' innocence post-conviction. This Article fills that void by identifying …

The Intracorporate Conspiracy Trap, J. S. Nelson

Cardozo Law Review

In the recent case of Commonwealth v. Lynn, Pennsylvania prosecuted a Roman Catholic priest who had not abused children himself but who, to protect the archdiocese that employed him, covered up information about priests who had abused children and reassigned the priests to new parishes. This case was the first of its kind to bring criminal charges against an official of the Church solely for how he supervised the careers of priests to protect his employer.

Because the intracorporate conspiracy doctrine prohibits it, the state - as is now typical of both state and federal jurisdictions around the country …

Hijacking Justice: Assessing The Emergency Driven Analysis Of Confrontation Clause Jurisprudence, Steven C. Berlowitz

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

From Wolves, Lambs (Part I): The Eighth Amendment Case For Gradual Abolition Of The Death Penalty, Kevin Barry

Florida Law Review

This spring, the Connecticut Supreme Court will take up a novel question, unprecedented in modern death penalty jurisprudence: Can a state gradually abolish its death penalty? Restated, can it leave the sentences of those currently on death row in place but abolish the death penalty going forward? This Article argues that it can. On simple statutory construction grounds, “prospective-only” repeals of death penalty legislation are not given retroactive effect. Although the constitutional considerations are admittedly less straightforward, prospective-only repeals do not offend the Constitution. The death penalty remains constitutional per se under the Eighth Amendment, and “as-applied” challenges under Atkins …

Overcriminalizing Speech, Michal Buchhandler-Raphael

Scholarly Articles

Recent years have seen a significant expansion in the criminal justice system’s use of various preemptive measures, aimed to prevent harm before it occurs. This development consists of adopting a myriad of prophylactic statutes, including endangerment crimes, which target behaviors that merely pose a risk of future harm but are not in themselves harmful at the time they are committed.

This Article demonstrates that a significant portion of these endangerment crimes criminalize various forms of speech and expression. Examples include conspiracies, attempts, verbal harassment, instructional speech on how to commit crimes, and possession crimes. The Article argues that in contrast …

Government Retention And Use Of Unlawfully Secured Dna Evidence, Wayne A. Logan

Scholarly Publications

No abstract provided.