Why Not Believe Women In Sexual Assault Cases?: An Engagement With Professors Tuerkheimer, Colb, And Many Others,
2018
touro law center
Why Not Believe Women In Sexual Assault Cases?: An Engagement With Professors Tuerkheimer, Colb, And Many Others, Dan Subotnik
Touro Law Review
No abstract provided.
A Tale Of Two Wives: 404(B) Evidence Simplified,
2018
University of Colorado Law School
A Tale Of Two Wives: 404(B) Evidence Simplified, Josiah Beamish
University of Colorado Law Review
Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) is a constant source of confusion, contempt, and convoluted reasoning. Rule 404(b) prohibits evidence of an individual's prior bad acts when used to prove conformity with a character trait. No Federal Rule of Evidence generates more appellate pages. This Comment argues that there are foundational issues with a rule that generates so much dispute. That proposition becomes even more evident through examination of the murder conviction of Harold Henthorn. The government's case against Mr. Henthorn relied heavily on the introduction of evidence surrounding his first wife's death. That evidence of prior uncharged conduct-404(b) evidence-became the …
Cabining Judicial Discretion Over Forensic Evidence With A New Special Relevance Rule,
2018
University of Michigan Law School
Cabining Judicial Discretion Over Forensic Evidence With A New Special Relevance Rule, Emma F.E. Shoucair
Michigan Law Review
Modern forensic evidence suffers from a number of flaws, including insufficient scientific grounding, exaggerated testimony, lack of uniform best practices, and an inefficacious standard for admission that regularly allows judges to admit scientifically unsound evidence. This Note discusses these problems, lays out the current landscape of forensic science reform, and suggests the addition of a new special relevance rule to the Federal Rules of Evidence (and similar rules in state evidence codes). This proposed rule would cabin judicial discretion to admit non-DNA forensic evidence by barring prosecutorial introduction of such evidence in criminal trials absent a competing defense expert or …
Neither Limited Nor Simplified: A Proposal For Reform Of Illinois Supreme Court Rule 222(B),
2018
University of Michigan Law School
Neither Limited Nor Simplified: A Proposal For Reform Of Illinois Supreme Court Rule 222(B), Michael S. Smith
Michigan Law Review
A limited and simplified discovery system should broaden access to courts, resolve disputes quickly, and expedite relief to injured parties. It should not incentivize procedural gamesmanship or increase the system’s complexity. Regrettably, Illinois’s “limited and simplified” discovery system does both. The initiation procedure for the simplified system, Rule 222(b), creates procedural traps and perverse incentives for both plaintiffs and defendants, and conflicting appellate interpretations of the Rule intensify the problem. This Note examines the flaws underlying the current simplified discovery scheme and argues for reform. It examines simplified discovery schemes in other states to recommend a new system for initiating …
Opting Out Of Discovery,
2018
Notre Dame Law School
Opting Out Of Discovery, Jay Tidmarsh
Journal Articles
This Article proposes a system in which both parties are provided an opportunity to opt out of discovery. A party who opts out is immunized from dispositive motions, including a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim or a motion for summary judgment. If neither party opts out of discovery, the parties waive jury-trial rights, thus giving judges the ability to use stronger case-management powers to focus the issues and narrow discovery. If one party opts out of discovery but an opponent does not, the cost of discovery shifts to the opponent. This Article justifies this proposal in …
Fleeing The Rat’S Nest: Title Vii Jurisprudence After Ortiz V. Werner Enterprises, Inc.,
2018
Brooklyn Law School
Fleeing The Rat’S Nest: Title Vii Jurisprudence After Ortiz V. Werner Enterprises, Inc., Zachary J. Strongin
Brooklyn Law Review
In 2016, the Seventh Circuit issued an opinion that may be a harbinger for an important shift in the federal judiciary’s long-standing employment discrimination jurisprudence. In Ortiz v. Werner Enterprises, Judge Easterbrook reiterated the frustration with the existing “rat’s nest” of tests and standards used in Title VII discrimination and retaliation claims. The note contains two overarching arguments. First, the Supreme Court’s employment discrimination and “rat’s nest” of tests and standards has led to an untenable situation in which federal district courts apply different standards at different stages of litigations. This in turn has caused confusion amongst the various federal …
Forensics, Chicken Soup, And Meteorites: A Tribute To Michael Risinger,
2018
Vanderbilt University Law School
Forensics, Chicken Soup, And Meteorites: A Tribute To Michael Risinger, Edward K. Cheng
Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications
Michael Risinger's scholarship has had a profound impact on our field. And while his work has run the gamut in evidence law, I think it is clear that Michael's true love has always been expert evidence, and more specifically, forensics. So let me take a moment to revisit "an oldie but a goodie": his 1989 article entitled Exorcism of Ignorance as a Proxy for Rational Knowledge: The Lessons of Handwriting Identification "Expertise," published in the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, and co-authored with Mark Denbeaux and Michael Saks.' For those of you who have not read the article, you should. …
The Admissibility Of Sampling Evidence To Prove Individual Damages In Class Actions,
2018
Southern Methodist University, Dedman School of Law
The Admissibility Of Sampling Evidence To Prove Individual Damages In Class Actions, Hillel J. Bavli, John Kenneth Felter
Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters
The 2016 Supreme Court decision in Tyson Foods, Inc. v. Bouaphakeo revived the use of “representative” or sampling evidence in class actions. Federal courts are now more receptive to class plaintiffs’ efforts to prove classwide liability and, occasionally, aggregate damages, with sampling evidence. However, federal courts still routinely deny motions for class certification because they find that calculations of class members’ individual damages defeat the predominance prerequisite of Rule 23(b)(3). As a result, meritorious classwide claims founder. In this paper, we combine legal and statistical analyses and propose a novel solution to this dilemma that adheres to the Tysondecision …
Whether The Bright-Line Cut-Off Rule And The Adversarial Expert Explanation Of Adaptive Functioning Exacerbates Capital Juror Comprehension Of The Intellectual Disability,
2018
Touro University Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center
Whether The Bright-Line Cut-Off Rule And The Adversarial Expert Explanation Of Adaptive Functioning Exacerbates Capital Juror Comprehension Of The Intellectual Disability, Leona Deborah Jochnowitz
Touro Law Review
No abstract provided.
Diamonds In The Rough: A Review Of Tiffany V. Costco And A Call To Apply Daubert To The Admissibility Of Consumer Survey Evidence In Trademark Infringement Litigation,
2018
Touro University Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center
Diamonds In The Rough: A Review Of Tiffany V. Costco And A Call To Apply Daubert To The Admissibility Of Consumer Survey Evidence In Trademark Infringement Litigation, Michael J. Borger
Touro Law Review
No abstract provided.
Admissibility And Constitutional Issues Of The Concealed Information Test In American Courts: An Update,
2018
University of Georgia School of Law
Admissibility And Constitutional Issues Of The Concealed Information Test In American Courts: An Update, John B. Meixner Jr.
Scholarly Works
The use of physiological tools to detect incidentally acquired concealed knowledge about crime-related information has been a controversial and well-researched topic among scholars for well over 100 years. This chapter focuses on potential legal hurdles for courtroom use of concealed information tests, including admissibility issues and constitutional issues under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the US Constitution.
Racial Character Evidence In Police Killing Cases,
2018
Boston University School of Law
Racial Character Evidence In Police Killing Cases, Jasmine Gonzales Rose
Faculty Scholarship
The United States is facing a twofold crisis: police killings of people of color and unaccountability for these killings in the criminal justice system. In many instances, the officers’ use of deadly force is captured on video and often appears clearly unjustified, but grand and petit juries still fail to indict and convict, leaving many baffled. This Article provides an explanation for these failures: juror reliance on “racial character evidence.” Too often, jurors consider race as evidence in criminal trials, particularly in police killing cases where the victim was a person of color. Instead of focusing on admissible evidence, jurors …
User-Generated Evidence,
2018
American University Washington College of Law
User-Generated Evidence, Rebecca Hamilton
Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals
Around the world, people are using their smartphones to document atrocities. This Article is the first to address the implications of this important development for international criminal law. While acknowledging the potential benefits such user-generated evidence could have for international criminal investigations, the Article identifies three categories of concern related to its use: (i) user security; (ii) evidentiary bias; and (iii) fair trial rights. In the absence of safeguards, user-generated evidence may address current problems in international criminal justice at the cost of creating new ones and shifting existing problems from traditional actors, who have institutional backing, to individual users …
2017 Symposium Discussion: The Life Of An Immigration Attorney,
2018
American University Washington College of Law
2017 Symposium Discussion: The Life Of An Immigration Attorney, Cori Alonso-Yoder
Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals
No abstract provided.
Character Assassination: Amending Federal Rule Of Evidence 404(B) To Protect Criminal Defendants,
2018
Fordham University School of Law
Character Assassination: Amending Federal Rule Of Evidence 404(B) To Protect Criminal Defendants, Daniel J. Capra, Liesa L. Richter
Faculty Articles
There is a war raging over the admissibility of the prior bad acts of criminal defendants in federal trials. While many circuits treat Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b) as a rule of “inclusion” and liberally admit such prior bad-acts evidence with predictably explosive effects on criminal juries, a few circuits are developing rigorous standards designed to foreclose prosecutorial use of such bad-acts evidence. This Article chronicles the well-documented permissive admission of the prior bad acts of criminal defendants notwithstanding the prohibition on such evidence by Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b)(1), as well as recent efforts by some federal circuits to …
Debunked, Discredited, But Still Defended: Why Prosecutors Resist Challenges To Bad Science And Some Suggestions For Crafting Remedies For Wrongful Conviction Based On Changed Science,
2018
Indiana University Maurer School of Law
Debunked, Discredited, But Still Defended: Why Prosecutors Resist Challenges To Bad Science And Some Suggestions For Crafting Remedies For Wrongful Conviction Based On Changed Science, Aviva A. Orenstein
Articles by Maurer Faculty
Flawed science has significantly contributed to wrongful convictions. Courts struggle with how to address such convictions when the mistaken science (such as bogus expert claims about the differences between accidental fires and intentionally set ones) significantly affected the guilty verdict but there is no DNA evidence to directly exonerate the accused. My short piece explores why prosecutors often defend bad science. Mistakes in science tend to serve the prosecution, but there are other more subtle factors that explain prosecutors’ reluctance to address flawed forensic testimony. Such reluctance may arise from fondness for the status quo and a resistance to subverting …
When Discretion To Record Becomes Assertive: Body Camera Footage As Hearsay,
2018
Vanderbilt University Law School
When Discretion To Record Becomes Assertive: Body Camera Footage As Hearsay, Natalie P. Pike
Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law
As police body camera footage pervades courtrooms across the country as evidence in criminal trials, courts must reevaluate whether, and under which evidentiary frameworks, they will admit the footage to prove that what the footage depicts is true. This Note analyzes the frameworks under which courts have historically admitted filmic evidence: namely, through authentication and as demonstrative evidence. It concludes that body camera footage is distinct from evidence traditionally admitted through those frameworks because body camera footage is akin to an officer's assertive statement--the officer has discretion to activate and aim the body camera. Courts should therefore exclude the footage …
Waiver, Work Product, And Worry: A Case For Clarifying The Waiver Doctrine In Oklahoma,
2018
University of Oklahoma College of Law
Waiver, Work Product, And Worry: A Case For Clarifying The Waiver Doctrine In Oklahoma, Mitchell B. Bryant
Oklahoma Law Review
No abstract provided.
Will The Jury System Survive The Peña-Rodriguez Exception To Rule 606(B)?: The Court’S Response To Racial Discrimination By A Juror Leaves The Future Of The American Jury Trial System In Jeopardy,
2018
Touro University Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center
Will The Jury System Survive The Peña-Rodriguez Exception To Rule 606(B)?: The Court’S Response To Racial Discrimination By A Juror Leaves The Future Of The American Jury Trial System In Jeopardy, Taurus Myhand
Scholarly Works
The enforcement of no-impeachment rules has been a long-standing tradition in the United States preventing jurors from offering testimony as to impeach their own verdict. In March 2017, the Supreme Court changed course from centuries of jurisprudence and superseded the Federal Rules of Evidence with a new exception to Rule 606(b) in the Court’s decision in Peña-Rodriguez v. Colorado. The Court’s effort to “root out” racial bias in the justice system resulted in the debunking of the legislative authority granted to the Congress while creating an exception that does little, if anything, toward eliminating racial bias during jury deliberations. In …
Introduction: Symposium On “Forensics, Statistics, And Law”,
2018
Duke Law School
Introduction: Symposium On “Forensics, Statistics, And Law”, Brandon L. Garrett
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
