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Articles 1 - 13 of 13

Full-Text Articles in Legal History

On The Very Idea Of Transitional Justice, Jens David Ohlin Apr 2007

On The Very Idea Of Transitional Justice, Jens David Ohlin

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The phrase "transitional justice" has had an amazingly successful career at an early age. Popularized as an academic concept in the early 1990s in the aftermath of apartheid's collapse in South Africa, the phrase quickly gained traction in a variety of global contexts, including Rwanda, Yugoslavia, Cambodia, and Sierra Leone. A sizeable literature has been generated around it, so much so that one might even call it a sub-discipline with inter-disciplinary qualities. Nonetheless, the concept remains an enigma. It defines the contours of an entire field of intellectual inquiry, yet at the same time it hides more than it illuminates. …


Revisiting 'Dreyfus': A More Complete Account Of A Trial By Mathematics, David H. Kaye Jan 2007

Revisiting 'Dreyfus': A More Complete Account Of A Trial By Mathematics, David H. Kaye

Journal Articles

Legal literature and case law depicts the infamous conviction of Alfred Dreyfus for treason and espionage in 1899 as a prime example of the irresistible power of even grossly fallacious mathematical demonstrations to overwhelm a legal tribunal. This essay shows that Dreyfus is not a case of mathematics run amok, unchecked and uncomprehended. To the contrary, the defects in the mathematical proof were dramatically exposed, and this evidence did not lead Dreyfus's judges to condemn him. This history undercuts the reliance of modern courts and commentators on Dreyfus as an indication or illustration of the alleged dangers of probability evidence …


The Trial Of John Brown: A Commentary, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

The Trial Of John Brown: A Commentary, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

The arrest, trial, and execution of John Brown in the fall of 1859 came at a critical moment in United State history. According to historian David S. Reynolds in his biography, "John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights" (2005), Brown's actions and statements following his failed attempt to begin a slave insurrection near Harper's Ferry, Virginia so polarized northern and southern opinion on the slavery issue as to ensure Abraham Lincoln's election and cause the Civil War to occur perhaps two decades earlier than it might have otherwise. Reynolds is quick …


The Mcmartin Preschool Abuse Trial, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

The Mcmartin Preschool Abuse Trial, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

The McMartin Preschool Abuse Trial, the longest and most expensive criminal trial in American history, should serve as a cautionary tale. When it was all over, the government had spent seven years and $15 million dollars investigating and prosecuting a case that led to no convictions. More seriously, the McMartin case left in its wake hundreds of emotionally damaged children, as well as ruined careers for members of the McMartin staff. No one paid a bigger price than Ray Buckey, one of the principal defendants in the case, who spent five years in jail awaiting trial for a crime (most …


Taking Victims Seriously: A Dworkinian Theory Of Punishment, Luis E. Chiesa Jan 2007

Taking Victims Seriously: A Dworkinian Theory Of Punishment, Luis E. Chiesa

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Truth, Deterrence, And The Impeachment Exception , James L. Kainen Jan 2007

Truth, Deterrence, And The Impeachment Exception , James L. Kainen

Faculty Scholarship

James v. Illinois permits illegally-obtained evidence to impeach defendants, but not defense witnesses. Thus far, all courts have construed James to allow impeachment of defendants' hearsay declarations. This article argues against allowing illegally-obtained evidence to impeach defendants' hearsay declarations because doing so unduly diminishes the exclusionary rule's deterrent effect. The distinction between impeaching defendants and defense witnesses disappears when courts allow prosecutors to impeach defendants' hearsay declarations. Because defense witnesses report exculpatory conduct of a defendant who always has a substantial interest in disguising his criminality, their testimony routinely incorporates defendant hearsay. Defense witness testimony thus routinely paves the way …


On The Moral Structure Of White-Collar Crime, Mitchell N. Berman Jan 2007

On The Moral Structure Of White-Collar Crime, Mitchell N. Berman

All Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


The Trial Of Richard Bruno Hauptmann, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

The Trial Of Richard Bruno Hauptmann, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

Journalist H. L. Mencken called the trial of Bruno Hauptmann, the accused kidnapper of the baby of aviator Charles Lindbergh, the greatest story since the Resurrection. While Mencken's description is doubtless an exaggeration, measured by the public interest it generated, the Hauptmann trial stands with the O. J. Simpson and Scopes trials as among the most famous trials of the twentieth century. The trial featured America's greatest hero, a good mystery involving ransom notes and voices in dark cemeteries, a crime that is every parent's worst nightmare, and a German-born defendant who fought against U. S. forces in World War …


Trial Of The Rosenbergs: An Account, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

Trial Of The Rosenbergs: An Account, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

The Rosenberg Trial is the sum of many stories: a story of betrayal, a love story, a spy story, a story of a family torn apart, and a story of government overreaching. As is the case with many famous trials, it is also the story of a particular time: the early 1950's with its cold war tensions and headlines dominated by Senator Joseph McCarthy and his demagogic tactics. The Manhattan Project was the name given to the top-secret effort of Allied scientists to develop an atomic bomb. One of the Manhattan Project scientists working in Los Alamos was a British …


The Feminist War On Crime, Aya Gruber Jan 2007

The Feminist War On Crime, Aya Gruber

Publications

One of the most celebrated successes of the feminist movement is its lasting impact on domestic violence criminal laws. Today, society has moved from discourse characterizing domestic abuse as legitimate or merely a private problem to a belief that battering is a heinous crime, more egregious than garden-variety assault. I know all too well how far the pendulum has swung, having practiced as a public defender in the District of Columbia domestic violence system. Day after day, prosecutors proceeded with cases against the wishes of victims, resulting in the mass incarceration of young black men. Could this have been the …


The Oklahoma City Bombing And The Trial Of Timothy Mcveigh, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

The Oklahoma City Bombing And The Trial Of Timothy Mcveigh, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

A bomb carried in a Ryder truck exploded in front of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City at 9:02 a.m. on April 19, 1995. The bomb claimed 168 innocent lives. That a homegrown, war-decorated American terrorist named Timothy McVeigh drove and parked the Ryder truck in the handicap zone in front of the Murrah Building there is little doubt. In 1997, a jury convicted McVeigh and sentenced him to death. The federal government, after an investigation involving 2,000 agents, also charged two of McVeigh's army buddies, Michael Fortier and Terry Nichols, with advance knowledge of the bombing and participation …


The Trial Of Lizzie Borden, Douglas O. Linder Jan 2007

The Trial Of Lizzie Borden, Douglas O. Linder

Faculty Works

"Lizzie Borden took an axe, and gave her mother forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one." Actually the Bordens received only 29 whacks, not the 81 suggested by the famous ditty, but the popularity of the poem is a testament to the public's fascination with the 1893 murder trial of Lizzie Borden. The source of that fascination might lie in the almost unimaginably brutal nature of the crime - given the sex, background, and age of the defendant - or in the jury's acquittal of Lizzie in the face of prosecution evidence that …


The Sad, Sad Story Of Lula Viers, Richard H. Underwood, Sharon Ray Jan 2007

The Sad, Sad Story Of Lula Viers, Richard H. Underwood, Sharon Ray

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

In this article, Professor Richard H. Underwood explores the murder ballad entitled Lula Viers. Lula Viers was from the Appalachia region of Kentucky.