Criminal Law Commons^™

Wiggins V. State: Receiving A Fair Trial Under The Specter Of Aids, Charles Zamora

Akron Law Review

Wiggins v. State presented two unique issues: (1) whether it was proper to authorize courtroom security personnel to use prophylactic apparel while escorting a defendant merely suspected of having acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), and (2) the extent to which this handling procedure impacted the jury.

This Note will analyze the Wiggins decision, emphasizing the court's reasoning as it pertains to the following: (1) the guarantee of a fair and impartial jury trial for defendants either having or being suspected of having AIDS; (2) the permissible exercise of discretion by the trial judge in authorizing precautions during the course of the …

Evidentiary Use Of Prior Acquittals: When Analysis Exceeds Reality, Paul Harper

Akron Law Review

The purpose of this note is to assess the basis and propriety of that decision and to highlight some potential problems with the Court's conclusion. Additionally, this casenote will attempt to envision how this holding may affect future prosecutions.

Finally it will offer an alternative model which may more adequately address the tension between the government's legitimate prosecutorial interests and the defendant's interest in finality of judgment.

Lilly V. Virginia: Silencing The "Firmly Rooted" Hearsay Exception With Regard To An Accomplice's Testimony And Its Rejuvenation Of The Confrontation Clause, Leslie Morsek

Akron Law Review

This Note examines the impact on the confrontation clause of introducing an accomplice's custodial statements which inculpate a defendant. Part II delves into the background of this issue by examining the confrontation clause's origin, the significance of hearsay with respect to the confrontation clause, and important cases in this area. Part III provides a statement of the facts, the procedural history, and the United States Supreme Court's decision in Lilly. Finally, Part IV analyzes the Lilly decision and its rejuvenation of the confrontation clause.

Dna Storage Banks: The Importance Of Preserving Dna Evidence To Allow For Transparency And The Preservation Of Justice, Cristina Martin

Chicago-Kent Law Review

What is the duty to preserve information in today’s society? In order for humanity to evolve, change and flourish in the future, society needs to preserve its information from the past. In the criminal justice field, preservation of evidence has special significance. DNA evidence in particular has become a helpful aid for innocent defendants who have been improperly imprisoned. Over the past twenty years, the number of exonerations of imprisoned criminal defendants has increased dramatically. With the advancement of technology, old, previously untestable or improperly tested DNA evidence will need to be retested. However, most states do not have proper …

Newly Discovered Evidence Of Innocence: Its History And Future Treatment In Montana, E. Lars Phillips

Montana Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dangerous Diagnoses, Risky Assumptions, And The Failed Experiment Of "Sexually Violent Predator" Commitment, Deirdre M. Smith

Faculty Publications

In its 1997 opinion, Kansas v. Hendricks, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a law that reflected a new model of civil commitment. The targets of this new commitment law were dubbed “Sexually Violent Predators” (SVPs), and the Court upheld indefinite detention of these individuals on the assumption that there is a psychiatrically distinct class of individuals who, unlike typical recidivists, have a mental condition that impairs their ability to refrain from violent sexual behavior. And, more specifically, the Court assumed that the justice system could reliably identify the true “predators,” those for whom this unusual and extraordinary deprivation of liberty …

After Rape Law: Will The Turn To Consent Normalize The Prosecution Of Sexual Assault?, Donald Dripps

Akron Law Review

This essay explores the new rape exceptionalism. My thesis holds that rape exceptionalism is rooted in a divide between elite opinion, reflected in statutes, court decisions, and academic commentary, and popular opinion, as reflected in jury verdicts. Elite opinion values sexual autonomy and suspects, when it does not despise, sexual aggression. Popular opinion supposes that sexual autonomy may be forfeited by female promiscuity or flirtation, and views male sexual aggression as natural, if not indeed admirable...pressions of consent,8 is an academic exercise. If we really want to normalize rape law, we must bypass the jury openly. We can’t conceal the …

Black Boxes: Fmri Detection And The Role Of The Jury, Julie Seaman

Akron Law Review

Before I offer some thoughts on that question, let me mention three real-life cases in which cutting-edge neuroscientific evidence either did – or conceivably might in a not-so-distant future – influence the outcome of a criminal prosecution. In the first case, reported last week in the New York Times, EEG brain-fingerprinting-type evidence was admitted against a woman on trial in India for murdering her husband. She was convicted. In the second case, in England recently, neuroscientists performed an fMRI lie-detection scan on a woman who had previously been convicted of poisoning a child in her care. She claimed that she …

"His Brain Has Been Mismanaged With Great Skill": How Will Jurors Respond To Neuromimaging Testimony In Insanity Defense Cases?, Michael L. Perlin

Akron Law Review

A review of the literature on neuroimaging, predictably, reveals a broad array of positions, promises and prophecies. Carter Snead argues that the ambition of cognitive neuroscientists is “to use the claims of their discipline and the new powers conferred by neuroimaging to overthrow retributive justice as a legitimate justification for criminal sanctions.” In this paper, I do not take sides on this debate. Rather, I discuss a related, but distinctly separate issue: which of these positions will jurors think is right, especially in the context of deciding insanity defense cases. The primary and robust debate that has taken place so …

Two Wrongs Don't Make A Right: Federal Death Eligibility Determinations And Judicial Trifurcations, Michael D. Pepson, John N. Sharifi

Akron Law Review

Broadly speaking, the purpose of this article is to bring attention to this radical and irreconcilable disparity between the unequivocal Sixth Amendment right of confrontation criminal defendants are afforded at trial,and the limited, qualified right of confrontation the FDPA grants federal capital defendants during death-eligibility determinations, which occur as part of the sentencing phase. It advances the argument that there is no tenable principled distinction on which this disparate procedural treatment may rest. We will attempt to demonstrate that, as written, the statutory provision that governs the admission of evidence at capital sentencings—18 U.S.C. § 3593(c)—is unconstitutional on its face …

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 …

Summary Of Guitron (Miguel) V. State, 131 Nev. Adv. Op. 27 (May 21, 2015), Aleem Dhalla

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined that (1) the State presented sufficient evidence for a jury to convict Guitron of incest and sexual assault, (2) the district court did err by not allowing Guitron to introduce evidence of the victims sexual knowledge, but this error was harmless, (3) the district court did err refusing to give the jury Guitron’s requested inverse elements instruction, but this error was also harmless, and (4) Guitron could not show that the district court erred by denying his Batson challenge.

Systemic Lying, Julia Simon-Kerr

William & Mary Law Review

This Article offers the foundational account of systemic lying from a definitional and theoretical perspective. Systemic lying involves the cooperation of multiple actors in the legal system who lie or violate their oaths across cases for a consistent reason that is linked to their conception of justice. It becomes a functioning mechanism within the legal system and changes the operation of the law as written. By identifying systemic lying, this Article challenges the assumption that all lying in the legal system is the same. It argues that systemic lying poses a particular threat to the legal system. This means that …

Does Removing The Force Element Matter?: An Empirical Comparison Of Rape Statistics In Massachusetts And Colorado, Peter Landsman

William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Newsroom: Waters '98 Testifies For Innocence Project, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

A Prosecutor's Guide To Character Evidence: When Is Uncharged Possession Evidence Probative Of A Defendant's Intent To Distribute?, James Decleene

Marquette Law Review

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Gay Panic, Gay Victims, And The Case For Gay Shield Laws, J. Kelly Strader, Molly Selvin, Lindsey Hay

Cardozo Law Review

In a highly publicized "gay panic" case, Brandon McInerney shot and killed Larry King in their middle school classroom. King was a self-identified gay student who sometimes wore jewelry and eye makeup to school and, according to those who knew him, was possibly transgender. Tried as an adult for first-degree murder, McInerney asserted a heat of passion defense based upon King's alleged sexual advances. The jury deadlocked, with a majority accepting McInerney's defense.

Drawing largely upon qualitative empirical research, this Article uses the Larry King murder case as a prism though which to view the doctrinal, theoretical, and policy bases …

The Admissibility Of Trueallele: A Computerized Dna Interpretation System, Katherine L. Moss

Washington and Lee 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 …

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

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reasonable Expectations Of Privacy Settings: Social Media And The Stored Communications Act, Christopher J. Borchert, Fernando M. Pinguelo, David Thaw

Duke Law & Technology Review

In 1986, Congress passed the Stored Communications Act (“SCA”) to provide additional protections for individuals’ private communications content held in electronic storage by third parties. Acting out of direct concern for the implications of the Third-Party Records Doctrine—a judicially created doctrine that generally eliminates Fourth Amendment protections for information entrusted to third parties—Congress sought to tailor the SCA to electronic communications sent via and stored by third parties. Yet, because Congress crafted the SCA with language specific to the technology of 1986, courts today have struggled to apply the SCA consistently with regard to similar private content sent using different …

Visualizing Dna Proof, Nicholas L. Georgakopoulos

Criminal Law Practitioner

No abstract provided.

Amending Rape Shield Laws: Outdated Statutes Fail To Protect Victims On Social Media, 48 J. Marshall L. Rev. 1087 (2015), Sydney Janzen

UIC Law Review

This Comment will first discuss the discoverability and admissibility of social media evidence in criminal and/or civil sexual assault cases. Section II(A) provides a broad overview of both federal and state rape shield laws, including the legislative policies behind their enactments, as well as the modern expansion of social media in the context of the legal system. Section II(B) will address the modern utility of social media in the context of the legal system. Section III first analyzes how courts look at discoverability and admissibility of social media evidence generally, and then focuses on sexual assault cases specifically. Further, Section …

Taking A Bite Out Of Forensic Science: The Misuse Of Accelerant-Detecting Dogs In Arson Cases, 48 J. Marshall L. Rev. 1149 (2015), Andrew Scott

UIC Law Review

This Comment identifies the proper uses of canine handler teams in arson investigations and trials. Part II discusses the origins of forensic science in criminal trials, the use of expert witnesses in the courtroom, the history and role of forensic science and canine handler teams in arson cases, and the problem of “junk science.” Part III analyzes the pros and cons of using canine handler teams in arson investigations and the dilemma courts face when confronted with unconfirmed canine alerts. Part IV resolves the issue of using canine handler teams in arson investigations. First, it advocates for their continued use …

Forensic Evidence And The Court Of Appeal For England And Wales, Lissa Griffin

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal has extensively analyzed the role of forensic evidence. In doing so, the court has grappled with the admissibility and reliability of a broad range of forensic evidence, from DNA and computer forensics to medical and psychological proof, to more outlying subjects like facial mapping, fiber analysis, or voice identification. The court has analyzed these subjects from two perspectives: the admissibility of such evidence in the lower courts and the admissibility of such evidence as fresh evidence on appeal. In both contexts, the court has taken a practical approach to admitting forensic proof …

Serial: The Presumption Of Guilt, Staff Editors

University of Baltimore Law Review

Below is a transcript of a panel discussion with key participants in the defense of Adnan Syed which inspired the popular Serial podcast. The Student Bar Association of the University of Baltimore School of Law hosted the event on February 12, 2015.

Diagnosis Dangerous: Why State Licensing Boards Should Step In To Prevent Mental Health Practitioners From Speculating Beyond The Scope Of Professional Standards, Jennifer S. Bard

Utah Law Review

This Article reviews the use of mental health experts to provide testimony on the future dangerousness of individuals who have already been convicted of a crime that qualifies them for the death penalty. Although this practice is common in many states that still retain the death penalty, it most frequently occurs in Texas because of a statute that makes it mandatory for juries to determine the future dangerousness of the defendant they have just found guilty. Both the American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychological Association have protested the use of mental health professionals in this setting because there are …

Wrongful Convictions And Upstream Reform In The Criminal Justice System, Kate Kruse

Faculty Scholarship

This Article explores the viability of upstream criminal justice reforms within the context of an adversary and procedural system of criminal justice, focusing on reforms in eyewitness identification procedures. Mistaken eyewitness identification evidence is often cited as the leading cause of wrongful convictions in the United States. Eyewitness identification reforms have also been the most developed upstream efforts to grow out of the innocence movement. The success and limitation of upstream reform in eyewitness identification shed light on the efficacy of upstream criminal justice system reform more generally, as well as in areas that are less developed, such as the …

Unspringing The Witness Memory And Demeanor Trap: What Every Judge And Juror Needs To Know About Cognitive Psychology And Witness Credibility, Mark W. Bennett

American University Law Review

The soul of America's civil and criminal justice systems is the ability of jurors and judges to accurately determine the facts of a dispute. This invariably implicates the credibility of witnesses. In making credibility determinations, jurors and judges necessarily decide the accuracy of witnesses' memories and the effect of the witnesses' demeanor on their credibility. Almost all jurisdictions' pattern jury instructions about witness credibility explain nothing about how a witness's memories for events and conversations work-and how startlingly fallible memories actually are. They simply instruct the jurors to consider the witness's "memory" with no additional guidance. Similarly, the same pattern …

Doin' Time For An Unproven Crime: The Problem Of Unpreserved Evidence Sufficiency Issues In Criminal Appeals, Richard Sanders

St. Thomas Law Review

Sections I and II of the article lay out the general principles of the preservation rule and its fundamental-error exception. Section III discusses the Florida cases that have wrestled with the problem of unpreserved sufficiency issues in criminal cases. The problem in the cases-seen in F.B. and in the pre-F.B. district court cases-is that Florida courts do not say that all valid-but-unpreserved sufficiency issues should be remedied as fundamental error. This means there will be some cases where the evidence in the record fails to establish all the elements of the crime of conviction but the court will affirm because …