Law and Gender Commons^™

A Matter Of Principle And Consistency: Understanding The Battered Woman And Cultural Defenses, Sharan K. Suri

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

To adequately explain and argue why feminists, as a matter of legal theory, must take both the BWS and cultural defenses seriously, these defenses need further elaboration. Section I details what these defenses are, how they developed, and how they work in the justice system. Section II enlarges the picture by revealing the similarities between the two defenses which share not only the same theoretical and practical goals, but also the same criticisms and flaws highlighted by scholars. Finally, Section III asserts that cultural evidence and evidence of battering must be admitted to show the absence of mens rea. However, …

Stalking: Cultural, Clinical, And Legal Considerations, Carol E. Jordan, Karen Quinn, Bradley O. Jordan, Celia R. Daileader

Office for Policy Studies on Violence Against Women Publications

Crimes of violence against women are unique in their treatment by our culture and our system of legal justice. Both culturally and statutorily, victims of crimes which have historically been perpetrated against women, such as rape, domestic violence, and stalking have received significant focus. This article highlights cultural considerations and provides a statutory and case law analysis.

The "Normal" Successes And Failures Of Feminism And The Criminal Law, Victoria Nourse

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

To write of feminist reform in the criminal law is to write of simultaneous success and failure. We have seen marked changes in the doctrines and the practice of rape law, domestic violence law, and the law of self-defense. There is not a criminal law casebook in America today, nor a state statute book, that does not tell this story. Yet for all of this success, we also live in a world in which reform seems to suffer routine failures. Many believe, for example, that feminist reforms have rid rape law of the resistance requirement; however, recent scholarship makes it …

Criminal And Civil Parental Liability Statutes: Would They Have Saved The 15 Who Died At Columbine?, Eric P. Ebenstein

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note argues that current parental liability statutes in the United States are insufficient to hold parents accountable for their children's violent acts, such as the Columbine High School massacre. It advocates for strengthening these laws, particularly by adopting a negligence standard, to incentivize parents to monitor their children's activities more effectively and prevent such tragedies.

Punishment Goes Global: International Criminal Law, Conflict Zones, And Gender (In)Equality, Mark A. Drumbl

Scholarly Articles

The creation of the International Criminal Court (ICC) enables the international community to hold accountable those who inflict violence in the form of sexual and ethnic hatred. Drawing on case studies from Rwanda and Bosnia, the author observes the extent to which retributive criminal justice can deter offenders and foster structural societal change.

Rights For The Rape Victim: Lifting Statute Of Limitations For Prosecution Of Violent Crimes, Suzanne M. Knight

Buffalo Women's Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Praxis And Pedagogy: Domestic Violence, Cynthia Grant Bowman, Eden Kusmiersky

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

What Rape Is And What It Ought Not Be, Katharine K. Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Sex, Rape And Shame, Katharine K. Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

This article explores how shame sanctions may be able to change the social meaning and decrease the prevalence of date rape. Arguing that men's tendency to date rape is fostered by social norms that treat sex as an accomplishment and, importantly, an accomplishment that enhances a man's masculinity status, the article suggests that one way to curb date rape is to curb the extent to which it is associated with masculine behavior. This strategy is necessary because the high premium society places on masculinity and the cultural confusion about when date rape is morally wrong and how it is different …

Text, Context And The Problem With Rape, Katharine K. Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Traffic Jam: Recommendations For Civil Penalties To Curb The Recent Trafficking Of Women From Post-Cold War Russia, Christopher M. Pilkerton

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article will examine the recent criminal trend of trafficking women from post-Cold War Russia into the United States. First, it will examine the Russian mafia and its development. It will also discuss the system of economic corruption that currently exists in Russia, which facilitates government involvement with this criminal activity. It will further investigate the issues surrounding trafficked women and the international anti-trafficking conventions that have been created by the United Nations. Next, it will go into a deeper discussion of the current status of relevant international law and the issues involving the International Criminal Court. Finally, this Article …

Be Careful What You Wish For: An Examination Of Arrest And Prosecution Patterns Of Domestic Violence Cases In Two Cities In Michigan, Andrea D. Lyon

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This Article will examine six months of data on arrests for domestic violence in the cities of Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor. In order to be able to interpret what the data means Lyon did some other research. The results were surprising- for example, although women tend to be injured most severely by domestic violence, they use violence in intimate relationships a little more often than men. Part I of this Article traces a brief history of domestic violence and discusses the issue of who commits domestic violence, Part II discusses the "must arrest" and "should arrest" policies and their history, …

Women's Equality In The Canadian Criminal Justice System: Something Less Than A Fair Shake, P. Michael Cantlon

LLM Theses

This thesis examines the issue of gender equality in the Canadian criminal justice system. It dissects two specific issues, the disclosure of a sexual assault complainant's therapeutic or counselling records and the prosecution of domestic assault charges. Within these two issues it is argued that the criminal justice system has failed to treat female victims of violent crime fairly and equally. Moreover, it is suggested that this failure is anchored in a neglect of the appreciation of the unique gender issues connected to these matters within a contextual framework. With regards to the disclosure issue, a fundamental tenet, the presumption …

The New Normativity: The Abuse Excuse And The Resurgence Of Judgment In The Criminal Law, Victoria Nourse

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article reviews Moral Judgment: Does the Abuse Excuse Threaten Our Legal System? by James Q. Wilson (1997).

There is growing interest within the academy in reviving the "normative" in criminal law scholarship. Enter a recent book, Moral Judgment, by the distinguished criminologist James Q. Wilson. Professor Wilson's work prompts the question: What is meant by the term ''judgment"? Considering three different models--judgment as community, judgment as character, and judgment as critique--this review argues that Professor Wilson's idea of judgment both departs from the "new normativity" in existing scholarship and shows how easily ''judgment" may stand in for partial …

A Clash Of The Titans: Judicial Deference To Arbitration And The Public Policy Exception In The Context Of Sexual Harassment, Stephen Buehrer

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Feminism And Defending Men On Death Row, Phyllis L. Crocker

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

In this Essay I explore the relationship between being a feminist and representing men on death row. It is appropriate to engage in this inquiry in considering how the law has developed in the twenty-five years since Furman v. Georgia. During that time both Furman and the advent of feminist legal theory have required a restructuring in the way we think about two fundamental legal questions: for death penalty jurisprudence, how and why we sentence an individual to death; and for feminist jurisprudence, how the law views crimes of violence against women. The relationship between these two developments becomes apparent …

Reaching Beyond The Bars: An Analysis Of Prison Nurseries, Nicole Mauskopf

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note argues that prison nurseries offer a viable solution to the challenges faced by incarcerated mothers and their children, addressing the detrimental effects of separation on both. It advocates for the implementation of prison nurseries to support maternal care and rehabilitation, while also highlighting the need for legal and policy reforms to ensure equitable treatment and protect parental rights.

Neonaticide And The "Ethos Of Maternity": Traditional Criminal Law Defenses And The Novel Syndrome, Judith E. Macfarlane

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note explores the legal and psychological dimensions of neonaticide, proposing the recognition of a Neonaticide Syndrome to better understand the mental state of perpetrators and inform legal defenses. It argues that such a syndrome, characterized by denial of pregnancy and psychotic breaks, could provide a framework for lenient sentencing and negate intent in homicide charges, similar to how Rape Trauma Syndrome and Battered Woman Syndrome are used in court. The analysis emphasizes the need for expert testimony to explain the mental state of defendants and the admissibility of such evidence under Frye and Daubert standards.

Retribution Revisited: A Reconsideration Of Feminist Criminal Law Reform Strategies, Dianne L. Martin

Osgoode Hall Law Journal

Were the last 30 years of feminist law reform activity around criminal justice misdirected? Or, if not misdirected, have the efforts been appropriated and manipulated by the New Right? This commentary reflects on this history, and on the failures of the retributive justice project generally, and argues for a reexamination of both. The discussion focuses on the tactics of the New Right and on the retributive goals of some victims' rights organizations as a means of highlighting the unintended consequences of key feminist initiatives around violence against women. Finally, the commentary identifies alternatives to retribution and a need for careful …

Putting Sex To Work, Katherine M. Franke

Faculty Scholarship

When I was living in New Haven a number of years ago, a miracle happened that drew people by the thousands to witness evidence of the Divine. A crucifix had been found to appear in the body of an oak tree in the middle of Worchester Square. I went – after all, how often do you get to see that kind of thing? Not surprisingly, at first I couldn't see anything but the usual trunk and limbs of a tree. Yet a believer took the time to show me what was really there, something that my untrained eye could not …

Where We Have Been, And Where We Might Be Going: Some Cautionary Reflections On Rape Law Reform, The Sixty-Eighth Cleveland-Marshall Fund Lecture , Joshua Dressler

Cleveland State Law Review

We should always be looking to see where we are, how we got there, and where we appear to be going. My purpose in this article has been to ask those questions in the context of rape law. In evaluating rape reform, I have tried to be fair-minded and balanced in my observations. I have suggested areas in which the law should go further to protect against sexual misconduct, but I have also expressed my belief that rape law reform threatens to move in undesirable directions. In particular, I have argued that there is a risk that courts will follow …

An End To Silence: Women Prisoners’ Handbook On Identifying And Addressing Sexual Misconduct, 2nd Ed., Brenda V. Smith, Marcia Greenberger, Nancy Duff Campbell, Deborah Brake, Joanna Grossman, Kathie Donnelly, Laura Cutiletta, Christina Davis, Marelisa Fabrega, Kristin Flynn, Kristin Holman, Jessica Jackson, Heather Lamberg, Kimberly Harris, Shauna Helton, Alvin Stith, Aurie Hall, Jonathan Smith, Andie Moss, Theresa Hunt Katsel, Drs. Elaine Carmen, Shelley Neiderbach

Research Reports & White Papers

The National Women’s Law Center is a non-profit organization that has been working since 1972 to advance and protect women’s legal rights. The Center focuses on major policy areas of importance to women and their families including education, employment, reproductive rights, health, family support and income security, with special attention given to the concerns of low-income women.

As a legal arm of the women’s movement, the Center has litigated ground-breaking cases and filed briefs in landmark Supreme Court decisions; advocated before state and federal policymakers to shape legislation and policies affecting women’s lives; and educated the public about issues important …

The Negative Effects Of Expert Testimony On The Battered Women's Syndrome, Pamela Posch

American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law

No abstract provided.

Redirecting The Debate Over Trafficking In Women: Definitions, Paradigms, And Contexts, Janie Chuang

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

Sex And The Social Order: The Selective Enforcement Of Colonial American Adultery Laws In The English Context, Carolyn B. Ramsey

Publications

No abstract provided.

Regulating Rites: Legal Responses To Female Genital Mutilation In The West, Carol M. Messito

In the Public Interest

No abstract provided.

Unshackling Black Motherhood, Dorothy E. Roberts

Michigan Law Review

When stories about the prosecutions of women for using drugs during pregnancy first appeared in newspapers in 1989, I immediately suspected that most of the defendants were Black women. Charging someone with a crime for giving birth to a baby seemed to fit into the legacy of devaluing Black mothers. I was so sure of this intuition that I embarked on my first major law review article based on the premise that the prosecutions perpetuated Black women's subordination. My hunch turned out to be right: a memorandum prepared by the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project documented cases brought against pregnant women …

Once A Rapist? Motivational Evidence And Relevancy In Rape Law, Katharine K. Baker

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Was The First Woman Hanged In North Carolina A "Battered Spouse?", Jeffrey P. Gray

Campbell Law Review

No abstract provided.

Women's Powerless Tool: How Congress Overreached The Constitution With The Civil Rights Remedy Of The Violence Against Women Act, 30 J. Marshall L. Rev. 803 (1997), Lisa A. Carroll

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.