Sexuality and the Law Commons^™

Adult Survivors Of Childhood Sexual Abuse And The Statute Of Limitations: The Need For Consistent Application Of The Delayed Discovery Rule, Gregory G. Gordon

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Recovered Memories, Extended Statutes Of Limitations And Discovery Exceptions In Childhood Sexual Abuse Cases: Have We Gone Too Far?, Jorge L. Carro, Joseph V. Hatala

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Predators And Propensity: The Proper Approach For Determining The Admissibility Of Prior Bad Acts Evidence In Child Sexual Abuse Prosecutions, Basyle Tchividjian

Faculty Publications and Presentations

PREDATORS AND PROPENSITY: THE PROPER APPROACH FOR DETERMINING THE ADMISSIBILITY OF PRIOR BAD ACTS EVIDENCE IN CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE PROSECUTIONS

Basyle J. Tchividjian†

Abstract

The admissibility of prior bad act evidence in child sexual abuse prosecutions oftentimes makes the difference between a guilty and not guilty verdict. Recently, jurisdictions have growingly embraced the admission of such evidence for the purpose of establishing the defendant’s propensity to sexually victimize children. Due to the potentially high prejudicial effect of admitting propensity evidence, it is more critical than ever that courts carefully apply the decisive evidentiary gatekeeper, the probative value balancing test …

Referenda And The District Of Columbia's Human Rights Act: Voting On Same-Sex Marriage In The Nation's Capital, Jacob Stewart

Legislation and Policy Brief

Beginning with Massachusetts in 2003, the courts and legislatures of many states have had to decide whether same-sex marriage is or should be a fundamental right under their respective constitutions.  Although only five states and the District of Columbia legally perform same-sex marriages, a few other jurisdictions are in the process of proposing laws moving in that direction.  However, the vast majority of states are holding fast to the traditional heterosexual definition of marriage.  Thirty-eight states have adopted some sort of Defense of Marriage Act, constitutional amendment, or similar measure that defines marriage as the union between one man and …

When The Child Abuser Has A Bible: Investigating Child Maltreatment Sanctioned Or Condoned By A Religious Leader, Basyle Tchividjian, Victor Vieth

Faculty Publications and Presentations

In many cases of child sexual and physical abuse, perpetrators use religious or spiritual themes to justify their abuse of a child. Although no known religion in modern culture suggests that sexual abuse is condoned or taught as part of its tenets, some church leaders engage in conduct suggesting the child is equally, if not more to blame than the perpetrator, while also urging immediate reconciliation between the perpetrator and victim. In more than one case, pastors have asked children to confess their own “sins” in being sexually abused and have even required children to “confess” in front of an …

Situations, Frames, And Stereotypes: Cognitive Barriers On The Road To Nondiscrimination, Marybeth Herald

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

A study of the psychological literature can enhance legal theory by focusing attention on how the human brain perceives, distinguishes, categorizes, and ultimately makes decisions. The more that we learn about the brain's intricate operations, the more effective we can be at combating the types of gender biased decisions that influence our lives. In developing strategies to achieve equality, feminist, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and intersex activists would be wise to learn from the psychological literature. This Article highlights a few examples illustrating how this knowledge might re-direct strategic choices for combating gender inequality.

Public Attitudes Toward Applying Sex Offender Registration Laws To Juvenile Offenders, Jessica M. Salerno, Margaret C. Stevenson, Tisha R. A. Wiley, Cynthia J. Najdowski, Bette L. Bottoms, Rachel A. Schmillen

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

In this chapter, we provide a summary of current registration laws for juvenile sex offenders across the United States and discuss the assumptions that drive these laws. We consider whether these assumptions have been supported or refuted by the research produced on the topic thus far. Then, turning to new data from our own laboratory, we discuss public perceptions of registration laws. This is an important issue because expansion of registry laws to juveniles might be driven by strong public support—or politicians' and policy makers' perceptions that there is public support—for expansion of the registry. As we discuss, research does …

Love As Legal Methodology: Comments On Love In A Time Of Envy, Naomi Mezey

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In academic papers about emotion, it is not uncommon to find a kind of disconnect between the detachment of theoretical and scholarly language and the subject of the paper--the emotions. One of the lovely, and challenging, aspects of Jonathan Goldberg-Hiller's article is that it not only conveys the emotions that are its subject, but it brims with its own emotion; it reads like a text written out of shattered love. Goldberg-Hiller takes up Jean-Luc Nancy's contention that "love is shattered by its very essence. It fragments the self at the same time as it refracts into many forms." Goldberg-Hiller understands …

Social Factoring The Numbers With Assisted Reproduction, Bridget J. Crawford

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In late winter 2009, the airwaves came alive with stories about Nadya Suleman, the California mother who gave birth to octuplets conceived via assisted reproductive technology. Nadya Suleman and her octuplets are the vehicles through which Americans express their anxiety about race, class and gender. Expressions of concern for the health of children, the mother’s well-being, the future of reproductive medicine or the financial drain on taxpayers barely conceal deep impulses towards racism, sexism and classism. It is true that the public has had a longstanding fascination with multiple births and with large families. This is evidenced by a long …

Public Perceptions Of Registry Laws For Juvenile Sex Offenders, Carrie E. Reynolds, Cynthia J. Najdowski, Jessica M. Salerno, Margaret C. Stevenson, Tish R.A. Wiley, Bette L. Bottoms

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Understanding jurors’ perceptions of juvenile defendants has become increasingly important as more and more juvenile cases are being tried in adult criminal court rather than family or juvenile court. Intellectual disability and child maltreatment are overrepresented among juvenile delinquents, and juveniles (particularly disabled juveniles) are at heightened risk for falsely confessing to crimes. In two mock trial experiments, we examined the effects of disability, abuse history, and confession evidence on jurors’ perceptions of a juvenile defendant across several different crime scenarios. Abused juveniles were treated more leniently than nonabused juveniles only when the juvenile’s crime was motivated by self-defense against …

It's Really About Sex: Same-Sex Marriage, Lesbigay Parenting, And The Psychology Of Disgust, Richard E. Redding

Working Paper Series

The effects of gay and lesbian parenting on children has been the touchstone issue in much of the recent state litigation on same sex marriage, with opponents of same sex marriage arguing that there is a rational basis for denying marriage rights to gays and lesbians because the central purpose of marriage is procreation and childrearing, but that children are harmed or disadvantaged when raised by gay or lesbian parents. To interrogate this claim, I critique the social science research that informs the concerns frequently expressed about the possible negative effects of lesbigay parenting on children's emotional, psychosocial, and sexual …

A Complete Property Right Amendment, John H. Ryskamp

ExpressO

The trend of the eminent domain reform and "Kelo plus" initiatives is toward a comprehensive Constitutional property right incorporating the elements of level of review, nature of government action, and extent of compensation. This article contains a draft amendment which reflects these concerns.

Parental Consent And Notification Laws In The Abortion Context: Rejecting The "Maturity" Standard In Judicial Bypass Proceedings, Anna Bonny

ExpressO

The choice to become a parent, to give a baby up for adoption, or to terminate a pregnancy presents a life-altering decision for a minor. The majority of states require minors to engage their parents or legal guardians in their choice to obtain an abortion, but not in decisions to give their babies up for adoption or to become parents. Though the Supreme Court has held that parental consent and notification laws do not infringe on a minor's constitutional rights if judicial bypass options are available, the reality of these judicial proceedings demonstrates a biased and unworkable legal avenue. Even …

Forgetting Freud: The Courts' Fear Of The Subconscious In Date Rape (And Other) Criminal Cases, Andrew E. Taslitz

ExpressO

Courts too often show a reluctance to learn the lessons taught by social science in criminal cases, especially where subconcious processes are involved. The subconscious is seen as rarely relevant and, in the unusual cases where it is relevant, it is viewed as a disease commandeering the conscious mind and thus helping to exculpate the accused. Drawing on the example of forensic linguistics in date rape cases as illustrative of a broader phenomenon, this article argues that the courts' misuse of social science stems from fear and misunderstanding of the workings of the subconscious mind. Accordingly, the piece contrasts the …

Fuck, Christopher M. Fairman

ExpressO

This Article is as simple and provocative as its title suggests: it explores the legal implications of the word fuck. The intersection of the word fuck and the law is examined in four major areas: First Amendment, broadcast regulation, sexual harassment, and education. The legal implications from the use of fuck vary greatly with the context. To fully understand the legal power of fuck, the nonlegal sources of its power are tapped. Drawing upon the research of etymologists, linguists, lexicographers, psychoanalysts, and other social scientists, the visceral reaction to fuck can be explained by cultural taboo. Fuck is a taboo …

Taking The Stand: The Lessons Of The Three Men Who Took The Japanese American Internment To Court, Lorraine K. Bannai

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Breaking The Bank: Revisiting Central Bank Of Denver After Enron And Sarbanes-Oxley, Celia Taylor

ExpressO

No abstract provided.

Limited In Sex, They Dare: Attitudes Toward Issues Of Patient Sexuality, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

The author frequently speaks on issues involving the sexuality rights of persons with mental disabilities who are institutionalized. In this article, he discusses the prevalent attitudes of audience members to these presentations, attitudes ranging from anger to denial to projection to transference/countertransference to fear to expressions of religiosity. In some cases, an important connection is made between the speaker and audience members. The article considers these attitudes and seeks to offer explanations for why this is such a threatening topic to so many listeners.

International Child Abductions: The Challenges Facing America , Charles F. Hall

ExpressO

International child abductors often escape domestic law enforcement and disappear without consequence or resolution. International child abductions occur too frequently; in the United States alone, the number of children abducted abroad every year has risen to over 1,000. Currently, 11,000 American children live abroad with their abductors. These abductions occur despite international treaties and the Congressional resolutions that have significantly stiffened the penalties for those caught. Effectively combating international child abductions requires drafting resolutions that are acceptable across the diverse societies and cultures of the international community. Without such resolutions to fill the gaps of current treaties this problem will …

The Quandary Of Megan's Law: When The Child Sex Offender Is A Child, 37 J. Marshall L. Rev. 73 (2003), Timothy E. Wind

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law, Self-Pollution, And The Management Of Social Anxiety, Geoffrey P. Miller

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

This article considers the anxieties about masturbation and spermatorrhoea from the standpoint of cultural-legal analysis. Seen from this perspective, the worries about masturbation provided an object onto which social anxieties could be displaced and thereby managed. Norm entrepreneurs who played on public fears manipulated basic cultural polarities in order to present masturbation and spermatorrhoea as objects of horror and disgust-things that needed to be expelled, if possible, from the body social.

Trends. Homosexual Politics And Security: The American Psychological Association (Apa) Brief Of Amicus Curiae No. 99-699, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

This article discusses the American Psychological Association's (APA's) brief of amicus curiae, which the APA submitted in order to provide a context for the Supreme Court of the United States to review the policy of the Boy Scouts of America and Monmouth Council, Boy Scouts of America, which involved the Boy Scouts, homosexuality, and claims about discrimination against homosexuals.

Suppressing Memory, Lynne N. Henderson

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Adult Repression Of Childhood Sexual Assault: From Psychology To The Media And Into The Courtroom, Susan J. Hall

North Carolina Central Law Review

No abstract provided.

An Essay On The Piano, Law, And The Search For Women's Desire, Julia E. Hanigsberg

Michigan Journal of Gender & Law

The thesis of this essay is a simple one: to have a measure of control over her destiny, to have any choices, a woman must be a sexual agent, a subject of desire rather than an object. How can women exercise any autonomy in any other realms if in their most intimate lives they are unable to voice their desires? I do not mean to suggest that sexuality has unlimited explanatory power or that everything about women's domination can be explained by a rearticulation of desire. I do believe, however, that although the issue of sexuality is much discussed, feminist …

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 …

Hospitalized Patients And The Right To Sexual Interaction: Beyond The Last Frontier, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Death Penalty: A Solution To The Problem Of Intentional Aids Transmission Through Rape, 26 J. Marshall L. Rev. 941 (1993), Stefanie S. Wepner

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

Words That Deny, Devalue, And Punish: Judicial Responses To Fetus-Envy?, Sherry F. Colb

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Abstract needed.

Legal Rape: The Marital Rape Exemption, 24 J. Marshall L. Rev. 393 (1991), Sandra L. Ryder, Sheryl A. Kuzmenka

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.