Criminal Law Commons^™

County Prosecution And State Preemption: The Confusing Politics Of Criminal Legal Reform And Backlash, John Pfaff

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Urban reform prosecutors, who are generally elected at the county level, find themselves in a tricky political spot. On the one hand. most urban counties are in many ways “too big” for reformers: they include large numbers of suburban voters who generally dislike reform, in no small part because they are relatively unaffected by the decisions prosecutors make. On the other hand, these counties are also often “too small”: they lack the political power to resist efforts by conservative state legislatures and governors to rein in, if not outright remove, reformers. This Article examines both vulnerabilities. It first maps out …

Bending The Rules Of Evidence, Edward K. Cheng, G. Alexander Nunn, Julia Simon-Kerr

Northwestern University Law Review

The evidence rules have well-established, standard textual meanings—meanings that evidence professors teach their law students every year. Yet, despite the rules’ clarity, courts misapply them across a wide array of cases: Judges allow past acts to bypass the propensity prohibition, squeeze hearsay into facially inapplicable exceptions, and poke holes in supposedly ironclad privileges. And that’s just the beginning.

The evidence literature sees these misapplications as mistakes by inept trial judges. This Article takes a very different view. These “mistakes” are often not mistakes at all, but rather instances in which courts are intentionally bending the rules of evidence. Codified evidentiary …

The Architecture Of Discretion: Implications Of The Structure Of Sanctions For Racial Disparities, Severity, And Net Widening, Ryan T. Sakoda

Northwestern University Law Review

About four million people are serving a term of probation, parole, or post-release supervision in the United States. Due to the extensive use of incarceration as a punishment for conditions violations, these community supervision programs are a major factor contributing to mass incarceration and, as this Article shows, can play a significant role in exacerbating racial disparities in the criminal legal system.

In recent years, jurisdictions throughout the United States have made reforms to their community supervision programs. A major trend in community supervision reform is the integration of new sanctioning structures, such as “swift and certain” sanctions, for conditions …

Why Criminal Defendants Cooperate: The Defense Attorney's Perspective, Jessica A. Roth, Anna D. Vaynman, Steven D. Penrod

Northwestern University Law Review

Cooperation is at the heart of most complex federal criminal cases, with profound ramifications for who can be brought to justice and for the fate of those who decide to cooperate. But despite the significance of cooperation, scholars have yet to explore exactly how individuals confronted with the decision whether to pursue cooperation with prosecutors make that choice. This Article—the first empirical study of the defense experience of cooperation—begins to address that gap. The Article reports the results of a survey completed by 146 criminal defense attorneys in three federal districts: the Southern District of New York, the Eastern District …

White-Collar Crime, Sentencing Gender Disparities Post-Booker, And Implications For Criminal Sentencing, Sarah Turner

JCLC Online

“White-collar crime” is an amorphous term that has yet to be conclusively defined since its first use in 1939. This category of criminal activity results in what can be characterized as either economic harm or an impediment to the government’s ability to run successfully while minimizing conflicts of interest. Sentencing of white-collar crimes came into question in the late twentieth century due to a perception that white-collar offenders were receiving much lower sentences than offenders committing more traditional crimes. Additionally, the relationship between sentencing outcomes and status characteristics like race, age, citizen status, and gender were cause for concern. Different …

Felony Murder Liability For Homicides By Police: Too Unfair And Too Much To Bear, Maria T. Kolar

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

On November 23, 2020, a fifteen-year-old boy was gunned down by five Oklahoma City police officers, after he exited a convenience store and dropped the gun that he and a sixteen-year-old partner had earlier used to rob the store’s owner. Initially, the boy’s non-present partner was charged with first-degree (felony) murder for this killing. But after months of efforts by the boy’s mother and local activists, the district attorney also charged five officers with first-degree manslaughter for this same killing.

This case raises the question of whether Oklahoma—or any American state—can convict a defendant of felony murder based upon a …

The Problem Of Habitual Offender Laws In States With Felony Disenfranchisement, Daniel Loehr

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Habitual offender laws operate to increase the sentence of an individual if that person already has a felony conviction. At the same time, many people with felony convictions cannot vote or run for office due to felony disenfranchisement laws. Thus, habitual offender laws target a formally disenfranchised group—people with felony convictions. That creates an archetypal political process problem. As John Hart Ely argued, laws that target a formally disenfranchised group are tainted and deserve heightened constitutional scrutiny. When reviewing habitual offender laws under the Eighth Amendment, however, courts have applied the opposite of heightened scrutiny—they have applied an extreme form …

The Fourth Amendment And The Problem Of Social Cost, Thomas P. Crocker

Northwestern University Law Review

The Supreme Court has made social cost a core concept relevant to the calculation of Fourth Amendment remedies but has never explained the concept’s meaning. The Court limits the availability of both the exclusionary rule and civil damages because of their “substantial social costs.” According to the Court, these costs primarily consist of letting the lawbreaker go free by excluding evidence or deterring effective police practices that would lead to more criminal apprehension and prosecution. But recent calls for systemic police reform by social movements have a different view of social cost. So too do calls for reforming qualified immunity. …

Flint's Fight For Environmental Rights, Noah D. Hall

Northwestern University Law Review

This Essay reviews the recent development of environmental rights within U.S. constitutional law, advanced through a series of federal court decisions in the wake of the Flint water crisis. The residents of Flint were poisoned and lied to by their government for nearly two years. They experienced how American environmental governance has failed at the state and federal levels and how our environmental laws leave individuals and communities unprotected. And then Flint fought back, in the courts, for five years. Flint residents have been overwhelmingly successful, achieving some justice for themselves and advancing substantive rights and remedies within our constitutional …

Modern Sentencing Mitigation, John B. Meixner Jr.

Northwestern University Law Review

Sentencing has become the most important part of a criminal case. Over the past century, criminal trials have given way almost entirely to pleas. Once a case is charged, it almost always ends up at sentencing. And notably, judges learn little sentencing-relevant information about the case or the defendant prior to sentencing and have significant discretion in sentencing decisions. Thus, sentencing is the primary opportunity for the defense to affect the outcome of the case by presenting mitigation: reasons why the nature of the offense or characteristics of the defendant warrant a lower sentence. It is surprising, then, that relatively …

Are Constitutional Rights Enough? An Empirical Assessment Of Racial Bias In Police Stops, Rohit Asirvatham, Michael D. Frakes

Northwestern University Law Review

This Article empirically tests the conventional wisdom that a permissive constitutional standard bearing on pretextual traffic stops—such as the one announced by the Supreme Court in Whren v. United States—contributes to racial disparities in traffic stops. To gain empirical traction on this question, we look to state constitutional law. In particular, we consider a natural experiment afforded by changes in the State of Washington’s rules regarding traffic stops. Following Whren, the Washington Supreme Court first took a more restrictive stance than the U.S. Supreme Court, prohibiting pretextual stops by police officers, but later reversed course and instituted a …

Reexamining The Application Of Duress And Necessity Defenses To Prison Escape In The Context Of Covid19, Bill Clawges

JCLC Online

The classic example of the necessity defense involves a prisoner escaping from a burning prison. Surely, the law would not require them to stay in the prison when doing so would put their life at an immediate and grave risk. This example epitomizes the purpose of the necessity defense; society would rather the prisoner survive and leave prison than die ablaze while obeying the letter of the law. In recent years, the difference between the two justification defenses of necessity and duress has become blurred, especially in cases involving prison escape. Both are equally applicable, and both are relevant in …

Regulating Police Chokeholds, Trevor George Gardner, Esam Al-Shareffi

JCLC Online

This Article presents findings from an analysis of police chokehold policies enacted at the federal, state, and municipal levels of government. In addition to identifying the jurisdictions that restricted police chokeholds in the wake of George Floyd’s death on May 25, 2020, the Article conveys (via analysis of an original dataset) the considerable variance in the quality of police chokehold regulation. While many jurisdictions regulate the police chokehold, the strength of such regulations should not be taken for granted. Police chokehold policies vary by the type of chokehold barred (“air choke” and/or carotid choke), the degree of the chokehold restriction, …

Friends Without Benefits: Criminal Insider Trading Liability And The "Personal Benefit" Test After Blaszczak, Curtis A. French

JCLC Online

The U.S. Supreme Court established the “personal benefit” test in Dirks v. SEC to determine whether a tippee assumed a fiduciary duty to not trade based on or disclose inside information when a tipper breached his or her fiduciary duty by improperly disclosing such information to the tippee. Under the personal benefit test, a tipper breaches his or her fiduciary duty if the tipper derives a personal benefit, either directly or indirectly, from disclosing the inside information to a tippee. The Supreme Court provided examples as to what constitutes a personal benefit, such as the tipper’s expectation of reputational benefits …

The Saga Of Reginald Mcfadden—"Pennsylvania's Willie Horton" And The Commutation Of Life Sentences In The Commonwealth: Part Ii, Regina Austin

JCLC Online

The saga of the commutation of Reginald McFadden is a tortuous story of blunders, coincidences, and numerous instances of governmental officials tempting fate. It has the makings of a Serial true-crime podcast. In states throughout the country, there are lifers who are unfairly paying the price for the actions of one person who should never have had her or his life sentence commuted. This is the second in a series of two essays that explore Reginald McFadden’s commutation. This Part considers whether, in hindsight, there was any sound basis for McFadden’s release given the policy grounds for commutations and describes …

Losing Someone Then Losing Yourself: Helping Juveniles In The Justice System Experiencing Grief With A Trauma-Informed Pretrial Diversion Program, Sydney Ford

JCLC Online

Grief is something we all experience at some point in our lives. When a child experiences grief and loss, those emotions, if not addressed, can cause adverse effects. Many of our country’s detained youth have fallen victim to these effects because they have been unable to address the underlying grief that causes their behaviors. Because of this, this Article advocates for creating a trauma-informed pretrial diversion program focused on helping grieving youth. First, this Article examines the overwhelming number of grieving children in our juvenile justice system, and how their grief has led them to where they are today. Second, …

Forced Prison Labor: Punishment For A Crime?, Wafa Junaid

Northwestern University Law Review

The Thirteenth Amendment’s prohibition of involuntary servitude carves out an exception to its protections that allows the use of forced labor as “punishment for a crime” when an individual is “duly convicted.” Courts have interpreted this language as placing a categorical bar on Thirteenth Amendment claims alleged by individuals who are incarcerated. Yet, a consistent understanding of the term “punishment” that draws from the term’s use in the Eighth Amendment’s Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause supports a narrower interpretation of the Thirteenth Amendment’s punishment exception. This Note argues that individuals cannot be denied Thirteenth Amendment protections unless they are explicitly …

The Saga Of Reginald Mcfadden—"Pennsylvania's Willie Horton" And The Commutation Of Life Sentences In The Commonwealth: Part I, Regina Austin

JCLC Online

The saga of the commutation of Reginald McFadden is a tortuous story of blunders, coincidences, and numerous instances of governmental officials tempting fate. It has the makings of a Serial true-crime podcast. In states throughout the country, there are lifers who are unfairly paying the price for the actions of one person who should never have had her or his life sentence commuted. This is the first in a series of two essays that explore Reginald McFadden’s commutation.

Cannibalizing The Constitution: On Terrorism, The Second Amendment, And The Threat To Civil Liberties, Francesca Laguardia

JCLC Online

This article explores the links between internet radicalization, access to weapons, and the current threat from terrorists who have been radicalized online. The prevalence of domestic terrorism, domestic hate groups, and online incitement and radicalization have led to considerable focus on the tension between counterterror efforts and the First Amendment. Many scholars recommend rethinking the extent of First Amendment protection, as well as Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment protections, and some judges appear to be listening. Yet the Second Amendment has avoided this consideration, despite the fact that easy access to weapons is a necessary ingredient for the level of …

Immigration Public Defenders: A Model For Going Beyond Adequate Representation, Matthew Chang

JCLC Online

What does adequate legal representation for noncitizen criminal defendants look like? After the Supreme Court decided the landmark case of Padilla v. Kentucky, criminal defense attorneys became responsible for advising clients if and when there might be immigration consequences that accompany acceptance of a guilty plea deal, such as a potential risk of deportation. Currently, the criminal and immigration representation are completely divided. This Comment argues that the Padilla mandate alone, while important, fails to adequately provide noncitizen criminal defendants their Fifth Amendment Due Process Right and Sixth Amendment Right to Counsel. Using the Supreme Court’s legal analysis in …

A Trauma-Centered Approach To Addressing Hate Crimes, Avlana Eisenberg

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

A dominant justification for hate crime laws is that they serve a crucial expressive function—sending messages of valuation to victims, and of denunciation to defendants. Yet, as this Essay will demonstrate, the focus on criminalizing hate—through the enactment of either sentencing enhancements or stand-alone hate crime statutes—has resulted in a thin conception of messaging that fails to recognize the limitations of the criminal law in addressing psychic harm.

This Essay argues that a more robust approach to addressing hate crimes must consider alternatives—beyond incarceration—that would center the trauma associated with hate crimes. This includes restorative justice models that might benefit …

Protecting The Substantive Due Process Rights Of Immigrant Detainees: Using Covid-19 To Create A New Analogy, Liamarie Quinde

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

While the Supreme Court has defined certain constitutional protections for incarcerated individuals, the Court has never clearly defined the due process rights of immigrant detainees in the United States. Instead, the Supreme Court defers to the due process protections set by Congress when enacting U.S. immigration law. Increasingly, the federal courts defer to Congress and the Executive’s plenary power over immigration law and enforcement. This has resulted in little intervention in immigration matters by the federal courts, causing the difference between immigration detention and criminal incarceration to diminish in both organization and appearance. Immigration detention, however, is a form of …

Is Juvenile Probation Obsolete? Reexamining And Reimagining Youth Probation Law, Policy, And Practice, Patricia Soung

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

The dramatic growth of prison populations in the United States during the latter half of the twentieth century, as well as the problems of over-policing and police misconduct, have been well documented and decried.¹ But the related expansion and problems of community supervision receive far less attention. Across the nation, reform efforts have increasingly included a focus on probation, especially juvenile probation, as an actor that both jails and polices youth in the community while also trying to rehabilitate them and promote their well-being. This Article studies the juvenile probation system, with a focus on California as one important …

Qualified Immunity And Unqualified Assumptions, Teressa E. Ravenell, Riley H. Ross Iii

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Section 1983 gives people the right to sue a government official for violating their constitutional rights. Qualified immunity provides these same officials with an affirmative defense -- even if they violated the constitution, they are not liable for monetary damages if the right at issue was not clearly established at the time of the alleged conduct. The qualified immunity is based upon the basic assumption that “a reasonably competent public official should know the law governing his conduct.” If the law was clearly established the official will be liable. If not, the Court has reasoned that it would be unfair …

Policing Suspicion: Qualified Immunity And "Clearly Established" Standards Of Proof, Seth W. Stoughton, Kyle Mclean, Justin Nix, Geoffrey Alpert

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

This Article explores the intersection of Fourth Amendment standards of proof and the “clearly established” prong of qualified immunity. It illustrates how the juxtaposition of the Court’s insistence on a low level of specificity for the development of suspicion and a high degree of specificity for the imposition of liability makes it exceedingly difficult to hold officers accountable for violating constitutional rights. And it offers both a path for future research into the development of suspicion and suggestions for methods that police agencies can use to improve the development and articulation of suspicion. Ultimately, it contends that policing in the …

Prison Medical Deaths And Qualified Immunity, Andrea Craig Armstrong

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

The defense of qualified immunity for claims seeking monetary damages for constitutionally inadequate medical care for people who are incarcerated is misguided. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, medical illness is the leading cause of death of people incarcerated in prisons and jails across the United States. Qualified immunity in these cases limits accountability for carceral actors, thereby limiting incentives for improvements in the delivery of constitutionally adequate medical care. The qualified immunity defense also compounds other existing barriers, such as higher subjective intent standards and the Prison Litigation Reform Act, to asserting legal accountability of prison and jail …

Recalibrating Qualified Immunity: How Tanzin V. Tanvir, Taylor V. Riojas, And Mccoy V. Alamu Signal The Supreme Court's Discomfort With The Doctrine Of Qualified Immunity, Patrick Jaicomo, Anya Bidwell

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

In December 2020, the United States Supreme Court issued its most important decision on qualified immunity since Harlow v. Fitzgerald, and the issue in the case did not even involve the doctrine. In the Court’s unanimous opinion in Tanzin v. Tanvir, which dealt with the interpretation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, Justice Thomas explicitly distanced the Court from the very type of policy reasoning used to create qualified immunity. He also embraced the availability of damages claims against government officials as historically justified and often necessary to vindicate individual rights and to check the government’s power. The …

Civil Rights Litigation In The Lower Courts: The Justice Barrett Edition, Aaron L. Nielson, Paul Stancil

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Now that Justice Amy Coney Barrett has joined the United States Supreme Court, most observers predict the law will shift on many issues. This common view presumably contains at least some truth. The conventional wisdom, however, overlooks something important: the Supreme Court’s ability to shift the law is constrained by the cases presented to it and how they are presented. Lower courts are thus an important part of the equation. Elsewhere, the authors have offered a model of certiorari to demonstrate how lower courts in theory can design their decisions to evade Supreme Court review; they also explain why such …

How Culture Impacts Courtrooms: An Empirical Study Of Alienation And Detachment In The Cook County Court System, Maria Hawilo, Kat Albrecht, Meredith Martin Rountree, Thomas Geraghty

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Courtrooms operate as unique microcosms—inhabited by courtroom personnel, legal actors, defendants, witnesses, family members, and community residents who necessarily interact with each other to conduct the day-to-day functions of justice. This Article argues that these interactions create a nuanced and salient courtroom culture that separates courtroom insiders from courtroom outsiders. The authors use the Cook County courts, specifically the George N. Leighton Courthouse at 2650 S California Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, to investigate courtroom culture and construct a thematic portrait of one of the largest criminal court systems in the United States. Using this newly constructed data source of rich …

Risk-Based Sentencing And The Principles Of Punishment, Christopher Lewis

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Risk-based sentencing regimes use an offender’s statistical likelihood of returning to crime in the future to determine the amount of time he or she spends in prison. Many criminal justice reformers see this as a fair and efficient way to shrink the size of the incarcerated population, while minimizing sacrifices to public safety. But risk-based sentencing is indefensible even (and perhaps especially) by the lights of the theory that supposedly justifies it. Instead of trying to cut time in prison for those who are least likely to reoffend, officials should focus sentencing reform on the least advantaged who tend to …