Criminal Law Commons^™

Rhode Island Department Of Corrections: Presentation, Caitlin O'Connor, Danielle Barron

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Let Us Live With All The People, Judith C. Savage

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Matter Of Balance: Mathews V. Eldridge Provides The Procedural Fairness Rhode Island's Judiciary Desperately Needs, Brett Beaubien

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Between A Constitutional Rock And A Procedural Hard Place: Placing Petitioners In An Eighth Amendment Battle Of Persuasion, Kelley E. Nobriga

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Restoring The Character Evidence Rule: Reconsidering Evidence Of Crimes, Wrongs, And Other Acts In Rhode Island, Edward Pare Iii

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Toward A Civilized System Of Justice: Reconceptualizing The Response To Sexual Violence In Higher Education, Hannah Brenner, Kathleen Darcy

Faculty Scholarship

The reporting, investigation, and prevention of sexual violence in settings that are closed off from the greater community and subject to their own laws, rules, norms and biases present special challenges for survivors of sexual violence. This essay builds on our existing scholarship that explores the pervasive problem and exceedingly high incidence of sexual violence perpetrated against women in closed institutional systems like prison, the military, and immigration detention centers. Survivors in these contexts are routinely denied access to justice internally and from the external criminal justice system; they also face major limitations (imposed by both federal law and Supreme …

Cooperating Individual Or Entity: Law Enforcement's Friend In A Time Of Escalating Deficits And Tight Budgets, Albert F. Tellechea

Florida A & M University Law Review

No abstract provided.

From Jones To Jones: Fifteen Years Of Incoherence In The Constitutional Law Of Sentencing Factfinding, Benjamin Priester

Journal Publications

For over 15 years, the United States Supreme Court has struggled to define the constitutional constraints upon a ubiquitous practice in contemporary American criminal justice: the exercise of factfinding authority by sentencing judges in the course of determining the specific punishment to be imposed upon an individual convicted of a criminal offense. While the Court has permitted much sentencing factfinding to continue unabated, its decisions have identified certain scenarios in which an offender's constitutional rights are violated when a fact found at sentencing creates particular impacts on the punishment. Unfortunately, from the beginning this new constitutional doctrine in criminal procedure …

The Bumpiness Of Criminal Law, Adam Kolber

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Can We Forgive Those Who Batter? Proposing An End To The Collateral Consequences Of Civil Domestic Violence Cases, Joann M. Sahl

Akron Law Faculty Publications

Domestic violence is the most common tort committed in our country, involving nearly 1.3 million victims. When a domestic violence incident occurs, the press regularly reports it. Highlighted in these articles is the name of the perpetrator. Perpetrators identified as committing an act of domestic violence face public outrage, contempt, and stigma. This is particularly true if a court determines that the act of domestic violence necessitates a civil protection order (CPO) that bars the perpetrator from having any contact with the victim. Nearly 1.2 million people receive a CPO each year. More people use this civil remedy than those …

The International Reach Of Criminal Copyright Infringement Laws, Sara K. Morgan

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

Piracy and illegal downloading in the Internet age have been on the forefront of the intellectual property community's mind since the early 2000s. Websites such as The Pirate Bay are often labeled as being leaders in copyright infringement, giving users the ability to illegally download thousands of files. However, there are both jurisdictional and extradition issues with prosecuting the founders of these websites, because The Pirate Bay and many others like it are often based in other countries. Recently, the Stop Online Piracy Act and PROTECT IP Act have stirred up controversy, with many alleging that their international reach went …

Rape Law Revisited, Aya Gruber

Publications

This essay introduces the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law Symposium, “Rape Law Revisited” (Vol. 13(2)). The Symposium features articles by Deborah Tuerkheimer, Kimberly Ferzan, David Bryden and Erica Madore, Bennett Capers, and Erin Collins. The symposium provides fresh perspectives on the issues surrounding sexual assault law and policy in today’s environment. The introduction notes that the current rape reform redux is not just a rehashing of old arguments, but boasts many new features. Today’s rape activism occurs in a moment when feminist ideas about coerced sex no longer exist at the margins — they govern and enjoy cultural acceptance, …

Zero-Tolerance Comes To International Law, Aya Gruber

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Lgbt Piece Of The Underenforcement-Overenforcement Puzzle, Aya Gruber

Publications

No abstract provided.

Guns And Drugs, Benjamin Levin

Publications

This Article argues that the increasingly prevalent critiques of the War on Drugs apply to other areas of criminal law. To highlight the broader relevance of these critiques, this Article uses as its test case the criminal regulation of gun possession. This Article identifies and distills three lines of drug war criticism and argues that they apply to possessory gun crimes in much the same way that they apply to drug crimes. Specifically, this Article focuses on: (1) race- and class-based critiques; (2) concerns about police and prosecutorial power; and (3) worries about the social and economic costs of mass …

Rationed Justice, Jennifer M. Smith

Journal Publications

In the United States, "equal justice under law" is at the very forefront of our American justice system. "Equal justice" is meant to guarantee equal access to the justice system. "Equal access to the judicial process is the sin qua non of a just society." Many Americans, however, do not have any access to the justice system, never mind that of equal access. "Equal justice" has not reached the nation's indigent, or even many of our moderate-income citizens.

Unintended Lawlessness Of Stand Your Ground: Justitia Fiat Coelum Ruat, Ann Marie Cavazos

Journal Publications

This paper will examine Florida's Stand Your Ground law by analyzing the origins and purpose of the law, vis-a-vis comparative analysis, and by discussing the application of this law. It will compare the stories of victims and further dissect the necessity and benefits of the Stand Your Ground laws, and examine in particular how it has affected the citizens of Florida and the nation. This Article will examine unforeseen outcomes derived from the enactment of a law meant for the common good and will further discuss how the Castle Doctrine evolved into the current Stand Your Ground laws. It will …

The Incremental Retributive Impact Of A Death Sentence Over Life Without Parole, Michael L. Radelet

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

In this paper, the author takes a closer look at retribution, which is the primary justification for the death penalty today in the United States and the main component of the additional punishment imposed by the death penalty over and above life imprisonment without parole (LWOP). While all criminal punishments, to varying degrees, punish both the inmate and his or her family, this paper argues that the death penalty’s added punishment over LWOP often punishes the family just as much as the inmate, and after the execution the full brunt of the punishment falls on the family. This added impact …

Retention And Reform In Japanese Capital Punishment, David T. Johnson

University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform

This Article focuses on the failure of abolition and of death penalty reform in Japan in order to illustrate contingencies in the trajectory of capital punishment in the modern world. Part I describes three facts about postwar Japan that help explain why it retains capital punishment today: a missed opportunity for abolition during the American occupation of the country after World War II; the long-term rule of a conservative political party; and economic and geopolitical power that has enabled the country to resist the influence of international norms. Part II describes a few ways in which Japanese capital punishment has …

Confronting The Carceral State, Allegra M. Mcleod

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Teaching Criminal Procedure: Why Socrates Would Use Youtube, Stephen E. Henderson, Joseph Thai

Faculty Articles

In this invited contribution to the Law Journal's annual Teaching Issue, we pay some homage to the great philosopher whose spirit allegedly guides our classrooms, in service of two concrete goals. One, we employ dialogue to describe the “nuts and bolts” of teaching Criminal Procedure, most of which are equally relevant to any doctrinal law school course (including course description, office hours, seating charts and attendance, class decorum and recording, student participation, laptops, textbooks, class preparation and presentation, and exams). Two, we explain the benefits of using multimedia in the classroom, including a few of the many modules found on …

Schools Are Employers Too: Rethinking The Institutional Liability Standard In Title Ix Teacher-On-Student Sexual Harassment Suits, Kathleen Mary E. Mayer

Georgia Law Review

To be entitled to any remedy under Title IX, students bringing private causes of action must show that their schools acted with actual knowledge and deliberate indifference. That liability standard is applied to both teacher-on-student and peer-on-peer harassment claims, without regard for an educational institution's relative control over the conduct of its employees versus its students. Schools should be held to a stricter standard in teacher-on-student cases than in peer-on-peer cases for numerous reasons of both law and policy. Considering that Title VII standards of liability do turn on relative control, a quirky imbalance results whereby a school is more …

You've Got Legal Mail: Applying Constitutional Protections To Attorney-Inmate E-Mail Communications, Gregory R. Steele

Georgia Law Review

Several U.S. Attorney's offices have begun to read e-mails between defense attorneys and their inmate-clients sent through the Bureau of Prisons TRULINCS system. District courts have been split on how they address the issue. This Note argues that the practice of reading attorney-inmate e- mails violates the Sixth Amendment. It specifically argues that the legal mail doctrine should be applied to invalidate this practice. It then argues the Bureau of Prisons should promulgate new regulations for legal e-mail that ensure compliance with the constitutional requirements of the newly applied legal e-mail doctrine.

What's Fear Got To Do With It?: The "Armed And Dangerous" Requirement Of Terry, Gerald S. Reamey

Marquette Law Review

Rarely has a court’s opinion, even one from the Supreme Court of the United States, so altered existing notions of constitutional criminal procedure law as did the opinion in Terry v. Ohio. On several levels, the opinion dramatically shifted the way in which the Fourth Amendment was understood. Law students who had learned about the probable cause “requirement” and the warrant “requirement” were surprised to learn, especially in the case of the former, that these “requirements” were not required at all. To continue to conceptualize the Fourth Amendment’s single sentence guarantees as consisting of a “warrant clause” and a “reasonableness” …

Serious Juvenile Offenders: The Need For A Third Sentencing Option In Wisconsin, Danielle S. Snyder

Marquette Law Review

In light of the “Slenderman” trial, it has become abundantly clear that a gap exists between the sentencing options available for “Class A” juvenile offenders and “Class B” juvenile offenders. This Comment proposes an expanded sentencing option for “Class B” serious juvenile offenders under the Juvenile Justice Code to allow those “Class B” serious juvenile offenders the benefit of extended supervision in the Serious Juvenile Offender Program as is available to “Class A” serious juvenile offenders currently. This expansion aims to alleviate the concern that certain “Class B” serious juvenile offenders must remain under original adult court jurisdiction in order …

Should I Stay Or Should I Go?: Why Bolivian Tactics And U.S. "Flexibility" Undermine The Single Convention On Narcotic Drugs, Robert C. Zitt

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

This Note examines the deterioration of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs (“Convention”), as Member State circumvention of treaty spirit continues to highlight the disconnect between progressive drug policies and an enforcement regime armed with little or no power to monitor compliance. It first provides a brief history of the Convention with discussion underscoring the governing bodies of the treaty itself, particularly the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB). Further discussion will note the procedural mechanisms whereby parties can propose amendments or reservations to the Convention itself. With such procedures in mind, subsequent examination will analyze how Member States have …

Response: The Icc, Pre-Existing Jurisdictional Treaty Regimes, And The Limits Of The Nemo Dat Quod Non Habet Doctrine--A Reply To Michael Newton, Carsten Stahn

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

It is a pleasure and a privilege to provide a few reflections on Michael Newton's thought-provoking essay on "How the ICC Threatens Treaty Norms." His article marks an important piece of scholarship. It reflects significant concerns about the reach and function of the International Criminal Court (ICC) that merit further attention and explanation in ICC practice. Newton makes a provocative argument. He argues that the ICC might undermine sovereign law enforcement efforts and exceed its powers if it exercises jurisdiction over American forces in Afghanistan or Israeli offenses in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip. This argument is not …

How The International Criminal Court Threatens Treaty Norms, Michael A. Newton

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

This Article demonstrates the disadvantages of permitting a supranational institution like the International Criminal Court (ICC) to aggrandize its authority by overriding agreements between sovereign states. The Court's constitutive power derives from a multilateral treaty designed to augment sovereign enforcement efforts rather than annul them. Treaty negotiators expressly rejected efforts to confer jurisdiction to the ICC based on its aspiration to advance universal values or a self-justifying teleological impulse to bring perpetrators to justice. Rather, its jurisdiction derives solely from the delegation by States Parties of their own sovereign prerogatives. In accordance with the ancient maxim "nemo plus iuris transfer …

Who Shouldn't Prosecute The Police, Kate Levine

Faculty Publications

The job of investigating and prosecuting police officers who commit crimes falls on local prosecutors, as it has in the wake of a number of highly public killings of unarmed African-Americans since Michael Brown died in August 2014. Although prosecutors officially represent “the people,” there is no group more closely linked to prosecutors than the officers they work with daily. This Article focuses on the undertheorized but critically important role that conflict-of-interest law plays in supporting the now-popular conclusion that local prosecutors should not handle cases against police suspects. Surprisingly, scholars have paid little attention to the policies and practices …

Reclaiming The Importance Of The Defendant's Testimony: Prior Conviction Impeachment And The Fight Against Implicit Stereotyping, Anna Roberts

Faculty Publications

Implicit courtroom stereotypes are an urgent problem. When trial defendants are African American, as is disproportionately the case, they are vulnerable to implicit fact finder stereotypes that threaten the presumption of innocence: unconscious associations linking the defendants with violence, weaponry, hostility, aggression, immorality, and guilt. Implicit-social-cognition research reveals that one valuable tool in combating this threat is individuating information — information that, through methods such as defendant testimony, brings an individual to unique life.

Yet courts frequently chill defendant testimony by permitting impeachment by prior conviction. Courts determining whether criminal defendants should be impeached by their prior convictions use a …