Criminal Procedure Commons^™

Managing Digital Discovery In Criminal Cases, Jenia I. Turner

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

The burdens and challenges of discovery—especially electronic discovery—are usually associated with civil, not criminal cases. This is beginning to change. Already common in white-collar crime cases, voluminous digital discovery is increasingly a feature of ordinary criminal prosecutions.

This Article examines the explosive growth of digital evidence in criminal cases and the efforts to manage its challenges. It then advances three claims about criminal case discovery in the digital age. First, the volume, complexity, and cost of digital discovery will incentivize the prosecution and the defense to cooperate more closely in cases with significant amounts of electronically stored information (ESI). Second, …

Sb 127 - Criminal Procedure, Adriana C. Heffley, Allison S. Kim

Georgia State University Law Review

The Act introduces procedure by which victims who were not provided notice criminal proceedings, after requesting notice, may file a motion to be acknowledged by the court. This Act is meant to create a means by which a victim’s rights, as introduced by the constitutional amendment in SR 146, may be raised or enforced.

Sb 407 - Sentencing And Punishment, Abigail L. Howd, Alisa M. Radut

Georgia State University Law Review

The Act provides comprehensive reform for offenders entering, proceeding through, and leaving the criminal justice system. The Act requires all superior court clerks to provide an electronic filing option, and it requires juvenile court clerks to collect and report certain data about juvenile offenders to the Juvenile Data Exchange. In addition, the Act creates the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council and the Criminal Case Data Exchange Board. The Act also changes the grounds for granting and revoking professional licenses and drivers’ licenses to offenders and modifies the provisions relating to issuing citations and setting bail. Inmates of any public institution may …

2018 Changes To The Evidence Act And Criminal Procedure Code - The Criminal Justice Reform Bill And Evidence (Amendment) Bill, Siyuan Chen, Eunice Chua

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Various portions of the Evidence Act and Criminal Procedure Code were amended in 2018 vide the Criminal Justice Reform Bill and Evidence (Amendment) Bill; this was a continuation of a series of gradual but important changes to the criminal justice system that had begun in 2010 when the old Criminal Procedure Code was replaced. This legislation comment outlines and briefly analyses some of the most substantive changes brought about by the 2018 amendments: the video-recording of interviews in criminal proceedings; the introduction of a psychiatrist panel to regulate the reception of evidence from expert psychiatric witnesses in criminal proceedings; and …

Bucklew V. Precythe : Brief Of Arizona Voice For Crime Victims, Inc., And Melissa Sanders As Amici Curiae In Support Of Respondents, Paul Cassell, Allyson N. Ho, Daniel Nowicki, Daniel Chen

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

This amicus brief in Bucklew v. Precythe discusses how undue delay in capital cases can harm crime victims’ families. After reviewing the facts of the cases, the brief draws on the available scholarship to show how extended delays in criminal cases – and particularly death penalty cases – can compound the harms and exacerbate the trauma that victims’ families suffer. The brief concludes that the important interests of victims should be vindicated by affirming the judgment reached below.

A First Step Towards Sentencing Reform, Jeffrey Bellin

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

The Established Continuing Duty, David M. Siegel, Tigran W. Eldred

Faculty Scholarship

This brief article traces the development of a new standard of practice for lawyers handling criminal cases: an obligation to assist their former clients, through affirmatively disclosing to subsequent counsel and protecting from disclosure to prosecutors, any information that may assist the former client in attacking his prior conviction – including attacking the work of his prior lawyer. This continuing duty, most recently and expansively recognized in the American Bar Association’s Standards for the Defense Function (4th Ed. 2016), reflects increased understanding of the importance of ensuring effective assistance of counsel, acknowledged in recent state and federal court decisions, opinions …

A Product Of Childhood: Accounting For Age In The Miranda Analysis, Ariana Rodriguez

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

One of the most polarizing areas of constitutional criminal procedure is that relating to police interrogations and confessions. While the Fifth Amendment guarantees a number of protections from self-incrimination and the inherently coercive nature of criminal investigation, these Constitutional promises are more likely to go unfulfilled when the accused is a child. This Article thoroughly examines the current law’s use of the “totality of the circumstances” test in deciding whether a valid Miranda waiver occurred or whether a juvenile has been taken into custody and, more importantly, explores why this current test remains an inadequate solution for protecting children’s Miranda …

Pro Se Appellants: Opportunities For Law Libraries, Liz Reppe

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

This article is part of the 2018 Dickinson Law Review Symposium entitled “Access to Justice: Innovations and Challenges in Providing Assistance to Pro Se Litigants.” The author is the state law librarian for Minnesota who reports to the Minnesota Supreme Court. This article surveys various resources that Minnesota provides to unrepresented clients, including the website resources found here: https://perma.cc/R2DP-K9YB. The bulk of the article, however, focuses on Minnesota’s innovative in-person “Appeals Self-Help Clinics.” See https://perma.cc/Y2VN-H2L3.

The article’s discussion of Minnesota’s Appeals Self-Help Clinics begins by highlighting some of the factors that provided the impetus for the development …

Jurisdiction, The Internet, And The Good Faith Exception: Controversy Over The Government’S Use Of Network Investigative Techniques, Maureen Weidman

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

In February 2015, the FBI discovered a website dedicated to child pornography located on the Tor Network, a network designed to protect its users’ identities on the Internet. Due to the structure of the Tor Network, the FBI could not take down the website and identify users who previously accessed the website. Instead, the FBI kept the website operational for 30 days and applied for a search warrant in the Eastern District of Virginia to use a device called a Network Investigative Technique (“NIT”). This device operated similarly to malware and “attached” to computers accessing the website, allowing the government …

Fourth Amendment Anxiety, Kiel Brennan-Marquez, Stephen E. Henderson

Faculty Articles

In Birchfield v. North Dakota (2016), the Supreme Court broke new Fourth Amendment ground by establishing that law enforcement’s collection of information can be cause for “anxiety,” meriting constitutional protection, even if subsequent uses of the information are tightly restricted. This change is significant. While the Court has long recognized the reality that police cannot always be trusted to follow constitutional rules, Birchfield changes how that concern is implemented in Fourth Amendment law, and importantly, in a manner that acknowledges the new realities of data-driven policing. Beyond offering a careful reading of Birchfield, this Article has two goals. First, …

She's Nobody's Child/The Law Can't Touch Her At All': Seeking To Bring Dignity To Legal Proceedings Involving Juveniles, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

Recent Supreme Court decisions declaring unconstitutional both capital punishment (Roper v. Simmons, 2005) and life without parole (Graham v. Florida, 2010) in cases involving juveniles might lead a casual observer to think that we are now in an era in which dignity of juveniles is privileged in the legal system and in which humiliation and shame are subordinated. This observation, sadly, would be wrong.

Inquiries into a range of issues involving juveniles – commitment to psychiatric institutions; trials in juvenile courts; aspects of criminal procedure that, in many jurisdictions, bar juveniles from raising the incompetency status or the insanity defense; …

The Fourth Amendment Disclosure Doctrines, Monu Bedi

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

The third party and public disclosure doctrines (together the “disclosure doctrines”) are long-standing hurdles to Fourth Amendment protection. These doctrines have become increasingly relevant to assessing the government’s use of recent technologies such as data mining, drone surveillance, and cell site location data. It is surprising then that both the Supreme Court and scholars, at times, have associated them together as expressing one principle. It turns out that each relies on unique foundational triggers and does not stand or fall with the other. This Article tackles this issue and provides a comprehensive topology for analyzing the respective contours of each …

Farmer V. State, 133 Nev. Adv. Op. 86 (Nov. 16, 2017), Maliq Kendricks

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Nevada Supreme Court determined that (1) Under NRS 173.115(2), separate offenses may be joined against a defendant when they are committed as parts of a common scheme where the defendant’s separate crimes share features idiosyncratic in character; and (2) under NRS 174.165(1), joinder is proper in situations where a defendant commits similar offenses in separate instances.

City Of Las Vegas V. Eighth Judicial Dist. Court, 133 Nev. Adv. Op. 82 (Nov. 16, 2017), Jocelyn Murphy

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

(1) The Court held the district court’s order was “contrary to the evidence” because the record was not sufficient to determine that any unpreserved issues were “plain” error. (2) The court also determined that NRS 50.155(1) does not presently bar witnesses from communicating outside of the courtroom about topics other than witness testimony when the witness exclusion rule is in effect.

The Miranda Custody Requirement And Juveniles, Paul Marcus

Faculty Publications

Concerns about the interrogation process and the ability of minors to navigate the criminal justice system often intersect. The impact of the age of juveniles can be seen in a variety of judicial decisions, most markedly those dealing with punishment. But judicial concern for juveniles goes well beyond sentencing. The interrogation process raises especially grave fears.

Since the Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling in Miranda v. Arizona disallowing compelled inculpatory statements by criminal suspects and defendants, there has been concern as to whether juveniles fully understand and appreciate their rights as articulated in Miranda and based in the Fifth …

Miranda’S Near Death Experience: Reflections On The Occasion Of Miranda’S Fiftieth Anniversary, Eugene R. Milhizer

Catholic University Law Review

Miranda v. Arizona is widely regarded as one of the most controversial Supreme Court decisions in U.S. history. Shortly after the case was decided, Gallop Polls indicated that 63% of the public felt the Supreme Court was too soft on criminals. But despite its controversy, Miranda has become so widely accepted in popular culture that most people cannot imagine a criminal justice system without it. This wide spread acceptance, however, is more of a recent phenomenon in the landmark case’s history.

This article discusses Miranda’s tumultuous past; its harsh criticism from the legal community, academics, and the public at …

City Of Henderson V. Amado, 133 Nev. Adv. Op. 36 (June 22, 2017), Andrew Clark

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

After a prosecutor voluntarily dismisses a criminal case, NRS § 174.085(5)(b) allows that prosecutor to file an amended complaint in the original case with the original case number. Further, a district court acts arbitrarily and capriciously when it requires the prosecutor to file a new complaint with a new case number following voluntary dismissal.

"A Middle Temperature Between The Two": Exploring Intermediate Remedies For The Failure To Comply With Maryland's Eyewitness Identification Statute, Marc A. Desimone Jr.

University of Baltimore Law Review

This article addresses what remedies should be available to a criminal defendant in Maryland who has been identified in an extrajudicial identification procedure that does not comply with the present statutory requirements. Part II of this article provides an overview of the present due process test for evaluating the admissibility of extrajudicial eyewitness identifications, the present Maryland iteration of that test, and alternatives to that approach that have been adopted in other jurisdictions. Part III reviews recent legislative reforms to extrajudicial identification procedures, which are required in Maryland as of January 1, 2016. Section IV.A of this article argues why …

A Lost Opportunity For Sentencing Reform: Plea Bargaining And Barriers To Effective Assistance, Margaret Etienne

South Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Statewide Rules Of Criminal Procedure: A 50 State Review, Emily Dyer, Chelsea Stacey, Adrian Viesca

Nevada Law Journal Forum

Nevada is amongst the minority of states without statewide criminal procedure rules. Statewide rules are important because they promote fairness, regularity, and transparency regardless of where in the state a criminal case is being adjudicated and who it is being adjudicated in front of. This report intends to compare the varying states’ criminal procedure rules, to provide Nevada’s legal community with an awareness of how rules can be structured, what rules are included, and how rules interact with statutes and other court rules. If Nevada chooses to follow in the path of the forty-seven states and develop statewide criminal procedure …

The Bail Book: A Comprehensive Look At Bail In America's Criminal Justice System - Introduction, Shima Baughman

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

Mass incarceration is one of the greatest social problems facing the United States today. America incarcerates a greater percentage of its population than any other country and is one of only two countries that requires arrested individuals to pay bail to be released from jail while awaiting trial. After arrest, the bail decision is the single most important cause of mass incarceration, yet this decision is often neglected since it is made in less than two minutes. Shima Baradaran Baughman draws on constitutional rights and new empirical research to show how we can reform bail in America. Tracing the history …

Reducing The Dangers Of Future Dangerousness Testimony: Applying The Federal Rules Of Evidence To Capital Sentencing, Jaymes Fairfax-Columbo, David Dematteo

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

The United States Supreme Court has long held that the death penalty cannot be imposed arbitrarily, and that during sentencing in capital cases, jurors must be provided with guidelines to assist them in narrowing down the class of individuals for whom the death penalty is appropriate. Typically, this is accomplished through the presentation of aggravating and mitigating evidence. One aggravating factor is a capital offender’s future dangerousness, or the likelihood that the individual will engage in violent institutional misconduct while in prison. Future dangerousness may be assessed using a variety of measures; Hare’s Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), a measure of personality …

Revisiting Our Administrative System Of Criminal Justice, Benjamin E. Rosenberg

Res Gestae

Nineteen years after Judge Lynch’s piece, "Our Administrative System of Criminal Justice," this Article considers recent developments in the criminal justice system and whether Judge Lynch’s observations have withstood the test of time. It suggests that Judge Lynch’s observation—that our criminal justice system has strayed far from the model of the adversarial system—remains as true today as it was when he made it in 1998. It further explains that developments in the nineteen years since the publication of “Our Administrative System of Criminal Justice” have caused the criminal justice system to stray even further from the adversarial model and in …

The Miranda App: Metaphor And Machine, Andrew Ferguson, Richard Leo

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

For fifty years, the core problem that gave rise to Miranda – namely, the coercive pressure of custodial interrogation – has remained largely unchanged. This article proposes bringing Miranda into the twenty-first century by developing a “Miranda App” to replace the existing, human Miranda warnings and waiver process with a digital, scripted computer program of videos, text, and comprehension assessments. The Miranda App would provide constitutionally adequate warnings, clarifying answers, contextual information, and age-appropriate instruction to suspects before interrogation. Designed by legal scholars, validated by social science experts, and tested by police, the Miranda App would address several decades of …

White Paper Of Democratic Criminal Justice, Joshua Kleinfeld, Laura I. Appleman, Richard A. Bierschbach, Kenworthey Bilz, Josh Bowers, John Braithwaite, Robert P. Burns, R. A. Duff, Albert W. Dzur, Thomas F. Geraghty, Adriaan Lanni, Marah Stith Mcleod, Janice Nadler, Anthony O'Rourke, Paul H. Robinson, Jonathan Simon, Jocelyn Simonson, Tom R. Tyler, Ekow N. Yankah

Journal Articles

This white paper is the joint product of nineteen professors of criminal law and procedure who share a common conviction: that the path toward a more just, effective, and reasonable criminal system in the United States is to democratize American criminal justice. In the name of the movement to democratize criminal justice, we herein set forth thirty proposals for democratic criminal justice reform.

'What Do I Do With The Porn On My Computer?': How A Lawyer Should Counsel Clients About Physical Evidence, Peter A. Joy, Rodney J. Uphoff

Scholarship@WashULaw

This Article critically analyzes the legal and ethical limits of advice a lawyer may give clients about evidence of crimes, and provides examples of that advice in a number of situations involving clients with questions about what they should do with real and electronic evidence. When criminal charges have not been brought and are not expected, how much latitude does a lawyer have in giving advice to a client? When may a lawyer counsel a client to destroy contraband or other evidence of a crime? When a lawyer may not counsel destruction, is a lawyer legally and ethically permitted to …

Grave Crimes And Weak Evidence: Fact-Finding Evolution In International Criminal Law, Nancy Amoury Combs

Faculty Publications

International criminal courts carry out some of the most important work that a legal system can conduct: prosecuting those who have visited death and destruction on millions. Despite the significance of their work--or perhaps because of it--international courts face tremendous challenges. Chief among them is accurate fact-finding. With alarming regularity, international criminal trials feature inconsistent, vague, and sometimes false testimony that renders judges unable to assess with any measure of certainty who did what to whom in the context of a mass atrocity. This Article provides the first-ever empirical study quantifying fact-finding in an international criminal court. The study shines …

A Contextual Approach To Harmless Error Review, Justin Murray

Articles & Chapters

Harmless error review is profoundly important, but arguably broken, in the form that courts currently employ it in criminal cases. One significant reason for this brokenness lies in the dissonance between the reductionism of modern harmless error methodology and the diverse normative ambitions of criminal procedure. Nearly all harmless error rules used by courts today focus exclusively on whether the procedural error under review affected the result of a judicial proceeding. I refer to these rules as “result-based harmlesserror review.” The singular preoccupation of result-based harmless error review with the outputs of criminal processes stands in marked contrast with criminal …

Plea Bargaining And Disclosure In Germany And The United States: Comparative Lessons, Jenia I. Turner

William & Mary Law Review

This Article analyzes recent trends in plea bargaining and disclosure of evidence in Germany and the United States. Over the last two decades, a number of U.S. jurisdictions have adopted rules requiring broader and earlier discovery in criminal cases. This development reflects a growing consensus that, in a system that resolves most of its cases through guilty pleas, early and extensive disclosure is necessary to ensure fair and informed outcomes.

The introduction of broader discovery in criminal cases in the United States aligns American rulesmore closely with longstanding German rules on access to the investigative file. At the same time, …