Law Enforcement and Corrections Commons^™

Private Police Regulation And The Exclusionary Remedy: How Washington Can Eliminate The Public/Private Distinction, Jared Rothenberg

Washington Law Review

Private security forces such as campus police, security guards, loss prevention officers, and the like are not state actors covered by the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures nor the Fifth Amendment’s Miranda protections. As members of the umbrella category of “private police,” these private law enforcement agents often obtain evidence, detain individuals, and elicit confessions in a manner that government actors cannot, which can then be lawfully turned over to the government. Though the same statutory law governing private citizens (assault, false imprisonment, trespass, etc.) also regulates private police conduct, private police conduct is not bound by …

How To Punish Your Least Favorite Online Influencer: Wellness Checks As Swatting And Their Disproportionate Impact On Marginalized Creators, Tara Blackwell

Washington and Lee Journal of Civil Rights and Social Justice

Marginalized online creators are vulnerable to attacks using digital means of harassment including traditional swatting as well as the abuse of wellness checks that can act as swatting. Enabled by permissive Supreme Court 4th Amendment jurisprudence, malignant online actors have taken advantage of the ramshackle system of wellness checks that sends armed police officers with little training and even less compassion to the doors of individuals with reported mental health crises. This Note focuses on two polarizing influencers who have been subject to wellness check swatting after being very open about their mental health statuses online. This Note argues that …

Juvenile Genetic Privacy In New York: Dna Collection And Maintenance Post-Francis O., Cassidy Moon

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

The note argues that the compulsory collection and indefinite maintenance of juvenile forensic DNA profiles violate the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. It asserts that such practices are particularly problematic for minors due to their heightened privacy interests, the low recidivism rates among juveniles, and the contradiction with the juvenile justice system's focus on rehabilitation and confidentiality. The note advocates for legislative reforms, such as New York Senate Bills 998 and 3104, to address these issues and protect juveniles' privacy rights.

The Ever-Shifting Ground Of Pretrial Detention Reform, Jenny E. Carroll

Faculty Scholarship

In the past six decades, pretrial detention systems have undergone waves of reform. Despite these efforts, pretrial jail populations across the country continue to swell. The causes of such growth in jail populations are difficult to pinpoint, but some are more readily apparent: Fear over rising crime rates, judicial reluctance to release accused persons, and monetary burdens associated with release have all contributed to increased detention pretrial across criminal legal systems in the United States. This article examines various pretrial detention reform efforts and highlights the need for greater research in the area.

Hydra: Lessons From The World's Largest Darknet Market, Priyanka Goonetilleke, Alex Knorre, Artem Kuriksha

Faculty Scholarship

Research Summary

We present a comprehensive description of Hydra, the largest darknet marketplace in the world until its shutdown in April 2022. We document the main features of Hydra such as dead-drop delivery, feedback and reputation system, escrow, and dispute resolution. Using data scraped from the platform, we quantitatively examine the scale and the structure of the marketplace. We find that it has been highly competitive, geographically covering at least 69% of the Russian population and trading a wide variety of drugs, while also allowing the wholesale trade of drugs and precursors. The dead-drop delivery system used on Hydra was …

Prosecutorial Data In Maine: Themes And Trends From 2017-2021, Tara Wheeler Mppm, Julia Bergeron-Smith Mppm, Msw, George Shaler Mph

Maine Statistical Analysis Center

The Maine Statistical Analysis Center (SAC), partnered with the Maine Prosecutors Association (MPA) to establish statewide and by-district prosecutorial data for a five-year period (2017-2021). These baseline data are for a variety of criminal cases, charges, and outcomes and this report is the first of its kind for Maine. The MPA sought to detail these baseline figures and trends in an annual report to both support the ongoing work of Maine’s District Attorneys to address serious crime through data-informed decision-making and to enable key stakeholders and the public to better understand how limited public resources are being used by their …

Pathways To Success: Unleashing Experiential Learning In Higher Education For Aspiring Law Enforcement Professionals, Leonard A. Averhoff

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

This generic qualitative inquiry (GQI) explores experiential learning in higher education for students interested in law enforcement careers. Through interviews and focus group discussions, the study aimed to uncover insights into the perceptions and experiences of students engaging in a university student security program (USSP). The USSP allows full-time students to work as uniformed, unarmed paid employees of the university’s police department providing various law enforcement type functions. The research identified five themes that emerged from the data analysis: exposure, career development, training, leadership, and personal growth.

The theme of exposure highlighted the importance of hands-on learning, allowing students to …

What Are The Causes And Remedies Of Wrongful Convictions?, Audree Alick

The Mid-Southern Journal of Criminal Justice

Wrongful convictions, also known as miscarriages of justice, are very common in the criminal justice system today. With the first known wrongful conviction in 1872, to the most recent in 2023, researchers have similarly identified three causes of wrongful convictions: false confessions, eyewitness errors, and investigative misconduct. Wrongful convictions can cause many physical and mental effects on post-exonerees and currently incarcerated individuals, including but not limited to, clinical anxiety, depression, and PTSD. Analyses of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) have proven instrumental in cases of wrongful convictions. Each exoneree should have access to the DNA database to test against the DNA evidence …

Unreliable Forensic Science, Sarah Ciuffetelli

Quest

The Effectiveness of Forensic Science

Research in progress for CRIJ 1301: Introduction to Criminal Justice

Faculty Mentor: Stefanie LeMaire

Sarah Ciuffetelli uses critical thinking to examine the effectiveness of forensic sciences during criminal investigations. The assignment requires students to find the most prominent scholarly research in forensic sciences and discuss its efficacy. Further, the research leads students to discuss the potential limitations investigators must consider when examining forensic evidence. Lastly, students find at least six scholarly sources to provide an in-depth analysis of the research.

Sarah begins by discussing the history of forensic science and the ever-increasing technology used in …

Contextual Determinants Of Re-Reporting For Families Receiving Alternative Response: A Survival Analysis In A Midwestern State, Jianchao Lai, Michelle Graef, Todd Franke, Toby Burnham

Center on Children, Families, and the Law: Faculty Publications

Differential response (DR) has been widely adopted in over 30 states to address shortcomings of the traditional approach to child maltreatment reports in complex family and case circumstances. However, despite continued evaluation efforts, evidence of the effectiveness of DR remains inconclusive. The current study aims to assess the impact of a DR program and potential predictors, including service match and number of family case workers, on maltreatment re-reports in a Midwestern state. The study utilized a randomized control trial and assigned eligible families to either the Alternative Response (AR) track or Traditional Response (TR) track. The enrollment was implemented in …

When Machines Can Be Judge, Jury, And Executioner: Justice In The Age Of Artificial Intelligence (Book Review), Stacy Fowler

Faculty Articles

In When Machines Can Be Judge, Jury, and Executioner, former federal judge Katherine Forrest raises concerns over the pervasive use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the American justice system to produce risks and need assessments (RNA) regarding the probability of recidivism for citizens charged with a crime. Forrest’s argument centers on AI’s primary focus on utilitarian outcomes when assessing liberty for individual citizens. This approach leads Forrest to the conclusion that in its current form, AI is “ill-suited to the criminal justice context.” Forrest contends that AI should instead be programmed to focus on John Rawl’ 'concept of justice as …

Evaluation Of Field Sobriety Tests For Identifying Drivers Under The Influence Of Cannabis: A Randomized Clinical Trial, Thomas D Marcotte, Anya Umlauf, David J Grelotti, Emily G Sones, Kyle F Mastropietro, Raymond T Suhandynata, Marilyn A. Huestis, Igor Grant, Robert L Fitzgerald

Institute of Emerging Health Professions Faculty Papers

IMPORTANCE: With increasing medicinal and recreational cannabis legalization, there is a public health need for effective and unbiased evaluations for determining whether a driver is impaired due to Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) exposure. Field sobriety tests (FSTs) are a key component of the gold standard law enforcement officer-based evaluations, yet controlled studies are inconclusive regarding their efficacy in detecting whether a person is under the influence of THC.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the classification accuracy of FSTs with respect to cannabis exposure and driving impairment (as determined via a driving simulation).

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This double-blind, placebo-controlled parallel randomized clinical trial was …

Police Funding As A Deficit Of Democracy, Not Deterrence, Anthony O'Rourke, Rick Su, Guyora Binder

Journal Articles

Professor Noah Smith-Drelich’s Funding the Police is a welcome addition to the growing literature on structural barriers to implementing abolitionist visions of public safety. Professor Smith- Drelich’s central argument is consistent with our findings, in Defunding Police Agencies, that external funding of local police agencies imposes a set of “indirect constraints” that ensure robust police budgets and disincentivize spending on non-police social programs that might better ensure public safety. We believe, however, that Professor Smith-Drelich may be too sanguine about the deterrence potential of constitutional tort judgments. Misconduct judgments are largely financed through commercial insurance and public borrowing. Legal changes …

Breaking Down Bias: A Comparative Analysis Of General Public And Police Officer Attitudes Toward Mental Illness And Officer Decision-Making In Mental Health Crises, Therese L. Todd

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Police responses to persons with mental illness (PMIs) compared to those without appear to be more likely to result in negative outcomes, underscoring the importance of understanding these interactions and the factors that may influence them. Relatively little research has examined officer attitudes toward mental illness, and no study has examined implicit bias toward mental illness among police officers or how police culture may impact outcomes in mental health crises. The present study sought to: 1) measure explicit and implicit bias toward PMIs among the general public and police officers to understand how these constructs may vary among these populations; …

Abolition And Environmental Justice, Allegra M. Mcleod

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

During the coronavirus pandemic, movements for penal abolition and racial justice achieved dramatic growth and increased visibility. While much public discussion of abolition has centered on the call to divest from criminal law enforcement, contemporary abolitionists also understand public safety in terms of building new life-sustaining institutions and collective structures that improve human well-being, linking penal divestment to environmental justice. In urging a reimagination of public safety, abolitionists envision much more than decriminalization or a reallocation of police functions to social service agencies or other alternatives to imprisonment and policing. Instead, for abolitionists, meaningful public safety requires, among other things, …

Carceral Data: The Limits Of Transparency-As-Accountability In Prison Risk Data, Becka Hudson, Tomas Percival

Secrecy and Society

Prison data collection is a labyrinthine infrastructure. This article engages with debates around the political potentials and limitations of transparency as a form of “accountability,” specifically as it relates to carceral management and data gathering. We examine the use of OASys, a widely used risk assessment tool in the British prison system, in order to demonstrate how transparency operates as a means of legitimating prison data collection and ensuing penal management. Prisoner options to resist their file, or “data double,” in this context are considered and the decisive role of OASys as an immediately operationalized technical structure is outlined. We …

United States Of America V. Donald J. Trump, Defendant, Jack Smith

United States Department of Justice: Publications

Violations: Count 1: 18 U.S.C. § 371 (Conspiracy to Defraud the United States) Count 2: 18 U.S.C. § 1512(k) (Conspiracy to Obstruct an Official Proceeding) Count 3: 18 U.S.C. §§ 1512(c)(2), 2 (Obstruction of and Attempt to Obstruct an Official Proceeding) Count 4: 18 U.S.C. § 241 (Conspiracy Against Rights)

The Grand Jury charges that, at all times material to this Indictment, on or about the dates and at the approximate times stated below:

1. The Defendant, DONALD J. TRUMP, was the forty-fifth President of the United States and a candidate for re-election in 2020. The Defendant lost the 2020 …

Wellness And The Occupational Impact Of Being A Police Officer, Daisy Nunez, Karen Park

Summer 2023 Virtual OTD Capstone Symposium

The occupational impact of being a police officer was researched. Along with the barriers and supports to wellness services. The study aimed to answer both those questions to analyze the impact of wellness on the population.

The Lived Experiences Of 911 Dispatchers With Compassion Fatigue: An Interpretive Phenomenology, Angela Johnson

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

911 dispatchers are the “first” first responders in an emergency and play an intrinsic role in the public safety continuum. 911 dispatchers are exposed to daily and cumulative stress from the repeated empathic engagement of those they serve, and from shift work, staffing shortages, and inability to make mistakes. However, there is a dearth of peer reviewed literature on 911 dispatchers and compassion fatigue (CF). CF is described as the emotional and physical exhaustion experienced due to the constant exposure to the trauma of others. CF symptomology in 911 dispatchers has far reaching implications for not only the citizens …

Proceeding Pro Se: Misguided Limitations On The Prison Mailbox Rule In Cretacci V. Call, Eleanor Ritter

Pepperdine Law Review

Under the “prison mailbox rule,” an inmate’s notice of appeal in either a criminal or civil case is considered filed at the moment the notice is given to prison authorities to be mailed. But the prison mailbox rule originated as a common law rule––having developed in Fallen v. United States and Houston v. Lack––and was not codified in the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure until 1993. In light of its complex origins, circuit courts have split over to whom and to which types of filings the rule should apply. More specifically, courts have disagreed over whether the prison mailbox rule …