Criminal Law Commons^™

Prosecuting Pregnant Women: Should Washington Take The Next Step?, Amanda E. Vedrich

Seattle University Law Review

The first section of this Comment will analyze the case against Deborah Zimmerman and the court's reasons for refusing to dismiss the charges against her. The second section will examine current Washington law and why similar charges could not be brought in this state. The third section will look at the policy rationales for changing Washington law to allow charges to be filed against women for attempting to intentionally endanger the life of a viable fetus. This Comment argues that Washington law should be so amended in order to achieve these policy goals.

Protecting Child Sex-Crime Victims: How Public Opinion And Political Expediency Threaten Civil Liberties, Michelle Johnson

Seattle University Law Review

This Article looks at the enactment and subsequent nullification of a 1992 Washington law that state legislators intended to protect the privacy of child sex-crime victims. The Article uses this statute to illustrate that through the enactment of such statutes, politicians may sacrifice constitutional rights, such as freedom of the press and access to government proceedings, in order to achieve short-term political gains. Therefore, because it is somewhat less affected by elections and the political process, the judiciary is often the only branch of government responsible for protecting civil liberties. In the case of Washington's law on access to child …

Preface: Double Jeopardy In Washington And Beyond, Justice Philip A. Talmadge

Seattle University Law Review

The prohibition against double jeopardy is of ancient lineage in western civilization. In a ringing and scholarly dissent that rewards reflection, Justice Hugo Black said:

Fear and abhorrence of governmental power to try people twice for the same conduct is one of the oldest ideas found in western civilization. Its roots run deep into Greek and Roman times. Even in the Dark Ages, when so many other principles of justice were lost, the idea that one trial and one punishment were enough remained alive through the canon law and the teachings of the early Christian writers. By the thirteenth century …

Double Jeopardy—Civil Forfeitures And Criminal Punishment: Who Determines What Punishments Fit The Crime, Barbara A. Mack

Seattle University Law Review

This Article will attempt to distill from this confusion a meaningful double jeopardy policy, applicable to parallel civil and criminal proceedings, that takes into account the history of double jeopardy, recent changes in statutory law, and the contemporary chaotic state of parallel civil and criminal proceedings. Under current law, double jeopardy protects against three abuses: (1) a second prosecution for the same offense after acquittal, (2) a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction, and (3) multiple punishments for the same offense. This Article will show that the multiple punishments prong has little basis in law, other than reliance …

When The Constable Blunders: A Comparison Of The Law Of Police Interrogation In Canada And The United States, Robert Harvie, Hamar Foster

Seattle University Law Review

This Article explores the Supreme Court of Canada's use of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms in limiting police interrogations and compares its case decisions with cases from the Supreme Court of the United States. Part II of this Article examines the purposes and policies underlying sections 10(b), 7, and 24(2) of the Charter. Part III then examines the application of sections 10(b) and 7 in situations where (1) suspects are interrogated by uniformed police officers or other persons known to be in authority, and (2) suspects are interrogated surreptitiously by persons not known to be in authority. In both …

The Denial Of A State Constitutional Right To Bail In Juvenile Proceedings: The Need For Reassessment In Washington State, Kathleen A. Baldi

Seattle University Law Review

Article I, section 20 of the Washington Constitution states that "[a]ll persons charged with crimes shall be bailable by sufficient sureties, except for capital offenses when the proof is evident, or the presumption great." Despite seemingly unequivocal language that this constitutional provision is applicable to "all persons," the Washington Supreme Court, in Estes v. Hopp, declared that juveniles do not have a constitutional right to bail. The Estes court engaged in little constitutional analysis, but instead, reasoned that juvenile proceedings are civil in nature and that article 1, section 20 applies only in criminal proceedings. Central to the Estes …

Washington Defendants' New Right Of Pre-Trial Flight, Christopher T. Igielski

Seattle University Law Review

Certainly, it is only by disregarding the "victim's rights" that one can begin to fathom the Washington Supreme Court's decision in State v. Jackson. This decision reversed the conviction of a man who raped his four-year-old niece on Christmas Eve in 1979, causing her to contract gonorrhea. Following his arraignment, Jackson fled and failed to appear at his trial. After attempts to locate Jackson failed, a trial was held in absentia' and he was found guilty of rape, with sentencing suspended pending his return to custody. Jackson evaded the law for nearly thirteen years.'0 Shortly after his eventual capture …

Washington's Sexually Violent Predator Statute: Constitutionally Sound And The Best Alternative For The Problem Of Violent Predators, Carla B. Keegan

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that the SVP statute is not only constitutionally sound, but is also the best alternative for the problem of sexually violent predators. Part II describes the SVP statute and how it came to be enacted. Next, in examining the constitutionality of the statute, Part III briefly describes the decision rendered by the Washington Supreme Court in 1993 which upheld the SVP statute, as well as the federal district court's 1995 ruling, which held the statute to be unconstitutional. In arguing that the statute is constitutional, Part IV addresses and refutes the arguments made by the federal district …

The Double Jeopardy Implications Of In Rem Forfeiture Of Crime-Related Property: The Gradual Realization Of A Constitutional Violation, Andrew L. Subin

Seattle University Law Review

Over the past decade, the government has escalated its "war on drugs." Although the "war" has not decreased drug use or limited the availability of drugs on the street, the government continues to sacrifice the constitutional rights of its citizens in an effort to escalate the hostility. Since the "zero tolerance" policy of the Reagan Administration, the government has relied heavily on the forfeiture of property related to drug crimes as a tool to deter and punish the illegal distribution of drugs. The federal forfeiture statute, 21 U.S.C. § 881, allows the government to seize any property used to facilitate …

State V. Riker, Battered Women Under Duress: The Concept The Washington Supreme Court Could Not Grasp, Ann-Marie Montgomery

Seattle University Law Review

Although some people have the option of going to the police after receiving threats on their lives, this was not the case for Deborah Riker: Deborah is a battered woman. Since age nine, Deborah suffered repeated torture and abuse at the hands of men who were in her life. In 1987, Deborah met Rupert Burke, a man who abused both women and drugs. When Burke threatened both Deborah and her sister, Deborah did what he told her to do: she soldhim cocaine. As a result, Deborah was charged with delivery and possession of cocaine. Deborah's case presented the classic defense …

Comparative Proportionality Review: Will The Ends, Will The Means , Bruce Gilbert

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment attempts to achieve several objectives. Part II discusses the reasons that the death penalty was found to be unconstitutional in Furman v. Georgia. Part III reviews several post-Furman Supreme Court cases and the revised death penalty statutes that were deemed to satisfy the procedural inadequacies found in pre-Furman death sentence statutes. This Part also discusses the role proportionality review plays in making a death penalty statute constitutional. Part IV examines the development of comparative proportionality review in the State of Washington. State v. Benn will serve as the focus of this discussion. Part V demonstrates that Washington's application …

The Plain Feel Doctrine In Washington: An Opportunity To Provide Greater Protections Of Privacy To Citizens Of This State, Laura T. Bradley

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that Washington should return to an independent analysis of search and seizure doctrine under article I, section 7 of the state constitution and reject the admission of contraband seized during the course of a pat-down frisk. The decisions in Hudson and Dickerson have established an unnecessary and unworkable standard, and involve an increased invasion of personal privacy without the counter-balancing need to protect the safety of others. The plain feel doctrine as announced in Dickerson and Hudson developed from two well-established concepts in search and seizure law-the Terry frisk of persons to discover weapons and the plain …

Youth Justice In A Unified Court: Response To Critics Of Juvenile Court Abolition, Janet Ainsworth

Faculty Articles

In this article, Professor Ainsworth argues that a unified criminal justice system is preferable to our present two-tiered adult-juvenile court system. In fact, she contends that the cultural and ideological assumptions that underpin the current two-tiered justice system not only engender many of the serious shortcomings of the juvenile justice system, but also serve to exacerbate the very policies and practices of the adult criminal justice system that make it so abhorrent to defenders of the juvenile court. Critics of juvenile court abolitionists thus miss the point when they argue that juveniles would be worse off than they are at …

Roulette V. City Of Seattle: A City Lives With Its Homeless, William M. Berg

Seattle University Law Review

This Note analyzes the Roulette holding with respect to prior decisions on begging and vagrancy. In addition, this Note discusses the sidewalk ordinance with respect to the efforts of other communities to control the detrimental effects of a growing homeless population. This Note concludes that the Roulette holding strikes a constitutionally valid doctrinal and jurisprudential middle ground between abandoning the streets to the homeless and driving them from the community. It is argued that the sidewalk ordinance is normatively valid, in that it sets a reasonable standard of conduct that meets commonly accepted norms of civility, serving to benefit the …

So What's In A Name? A Rhetorical Reading Of Washington's Sexually Violent Predators Act, J. Christopher Rideout

Seattle University Law Review

In this Article, I will examine this socially constitutive function of narratives in the enactment of Washington State's Sexually Violent Predators Act.'0 This Act is a prime recent example of how social narratives-in this case, narratives of violence, pain, and outrage-lie behind the official language of the law. As Winter would point out, narrative was the vehicle that prompted legal change. The question for this Article, however, is what happens once the story has been recast into another form, here that of a statute? How well do the immediacy of the details and the authorial voice of the story lend …

What Would Happen If Videotaped Depositions Of Sexually Abused Children Were Routinely Admitted In Civil Trials? A Journey Through The Legal Process And Beyond , John B. Mitchell

Seattle University Law Review

As all of us are aware, there has been concern throughout our legal system about the trauma that child victims of sexual abuse suffer when testifying at criminal trials. It is likely that these same concerns will follow into the civil arena as civil cases for sexual abuse of child victims become more common. In response, advocates of child victims will propose that videotapes of child depositions be admitted in trial in place of live testimony. Such evidence may have profound effects on juries and may also alter the role of advocates in our civil system. This Article is about …

Keynote Address: Predators And Politics, Norval Morris

Seattle University Law Review

The following article is a transcription of portions of Mr. Morris's keynote address presented at the Predators and Politics Symposium on March 9, 1992 at the University of Puget Sound School of Law.

Confronting Violence: In The Act And In The Word, David Boerner

Seattle University Law Review

In this Symposium Article, the author narrates his experience as a member of the Task Force to create Washington’s Sexually Violent Predator Civil Commitment Law.

A Psychiatric Perspective On Washington's Sexually Violent Predators Statute, Robert M. Wettstein, M.D.

Seattle University Law Review

This Article will critique Washington's Community Protection Act from the perspective of a clinical and forensic psychiatrist. Part II of the Article will address and examine problems with the statute's definitions and consider some of the problems in conducting evaluations of proposed sexual predators. Part III will then discuss some of the many difficulties inherent in providing treatment under the statute. Part IV will review the potential abuses, costs and risks to the participants presented by the statute. Finally, Part V will focus on the ethical issues in providing expert medical testimony pursuant to the statute.

Limits On The State's Power To Confine "Dangerous" Persons: Constitutional Implications Of Foucha V. Louisiana, James W. Ellis

Seattle University Law Review

This Article does not attempt a complete analysis of all the constitutional implications of Foucha,nor does it attempt to provide a definitive answer to the question of the constitutionality of Washington's sexual predator statute. Rather, because Foucha addressed important due process and equal protection questions relevant to the Washington statute, the Article is an attempt to analyze the case's basic constitutional holdings and discussion on the issue of state deprivation of physical liberty.

The Constitutionality And Morality Of Civilly Committing Violent Sexual Predators, Alexander D. Brooks

Seattle University Law Review

This Article will address four major substantive constitutional and moral challenges to the Washington Sexually Violent Predator statute. The first is that the statute provides for unacceptable preventive detention contrary to American tradition and law. The second is that the terminology used to identify the mental condition of sexually violent predators is vague and meaningless, resulting in inaccurate and unfair applications and lacking in uniformity. The third objection is that the treatment program necessarily relies on a false assumption that efficacious treatment is available and argues that without efficacious treatment the statute must fail. Fourth, the confinement involved, which theoretically …

The Politics Of Sexual Psychopathy: Washington State's Sexual Predator Legislation, Stuart Scheingold, Toska Olson, Jana Pershing

Seattle University Law Review

What are the principles that guide this return to indeterminacy? Taken at face value, rehabilitation would seem to be the goal of the civil commitment provisions that make avail- able a treatment program to cure and reintegrate sexual offenders. Of course, rehabilitation was unequivocally rejected by determinate sentencing reformers, who considered it both discriminatory and ineffective.6 An alternative interpretation is that the sexual predator provisions lead in an incapacitative direction-that is, they are designed to predict which offenders are so dangerous that they must be more or less permanently institutionalized to protect the society. Either way, the sexual predator legislation …

The Community Protection Act And The Sexually Violent Predators Statute, Norm Maleng

Seattle University Law Review

In this Symposium Article, former prosecutor Norm Maleng discusses his experience with The Community Protection Act and Washington’s Sexually Violent Predator Law.

Sources Of Security, Julie Shapiro

Seattle University Law Review

The fixable problems relating to the specifics of the stat- ute thus do not raise the hardest questions that a statute like this one presents precisely because they are fixable. If I agreed that the general idea of the statute was a good one, I still might find the specifics of this statute unacceptable. But I would be able to propose an acceptable statute that accomplished the same basic purpose. Thus, although the specifics of this statute are of enormous importance to the legal questions pending in the courts and to those who must litigate under the statute, the specifics …

Sexual Predators: Mental Illness Or Abnormality? A Psychiatrist's Perspective, James D. Reardon, M.D.

Seattle University Law Review

In this Symposium Article, the author discusses Washington’s Sexually Violent Predator Act, RCW 71.09.060, from a psychiatrist’s perspective.

Sexual Violence, Sanity, And Safety: Constitutional Parameters For Involuntary Civil Commitment Of Sex Offenders, Beth Keiko Fujimoto

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment will address two questions: (1) whether the Washington law is substantially similar to or fundamentally different from the Illinois statute; and (2) whether the Washington statute should be upheld as a constitutional exercise of the state's civil commitment authority under Allen v. Illinois. This Comment argues that the Washington scheme is fundamentally different from the Illinois statute under Allen because it is essentially a lifetime preventive detention scheme and therefore fails to meet the constitutional requirements set forth in Allen. To that end, Part II of this Comment generally explores the involuntary commitment of sex offenders, …

The Doctrine Of Lesser Included Offenses, Kyron Huigens

Seattle University Law Review

This Article attempts to bring the early lesser included offense cases back to life, to uncover the origins and deeper logic of the doctrine, and to re-introduce the older, elegant solutions to the doctrine’s central problems back into current practice. With regard to the first part of State v. Workman’s two-pronged standard, this Article explores the innate wisdom of the classic elements test and a failed attempt to supplant it and then proposes changing it. With regard to the second prong, this Article proposes a wholesale replacement of the current formulation on the ground that it is fundamentally flawed. This …

Extinguishing The Burning Crosses: Washington's Malicious Harassment Statute In Light Of The Issues Of Overbreadth And Vagueness, Edward Comitz

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment briefly discusses how Washington’s malicious harassment statute should be interpreted in light of the recent United States Supreme Court case R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul. Because the issues of overbreadth and vagueness are of imminent importance, to Washington’s statute, the majority of this Comment focuses on an analysis of those issues Both issues are discussed in terms of the specific crime of cross burning with the intent to intimidate or harass as proscribed by Section (1) of Washington’s malicious harassment statute. Finally, because the real harms minority victims of hate crimes experience, this Comment argues that Washington’s …

Juvenile Justice In Washington: A Punitive System In Need Of Rehabilitation, Jeffrey K. Day

Seattle University Law Review

This Comment argues that the juvenile justice system should be retained in theory, but that Washington’s punitive approach has failed and should be restructured to embrace a system that focuses more on the needs of the offender than on the results of the offense. This Comment advocates for the punitive system to be replaced by laws that once again make rehabilitation a primary goal, but that also provide juveniles with the procedural safeguards necessary to ensure survival in the system. This Comment proposes a significant restructuring of the current system as a means of achieving that goal.

Editor's Preface: Predators And Politics: The Dichotomies Of Translation In The Washington Sexually Violent Predators Statute, Nancy Watkins Anderson, Kenneth W. Masters

Seattle University Law Review

No abstract provided.