Legal Research

The Perfect Crime

By mdell

Brian Kalt, Associate Professor of Law at Michigan State College of Law, has written an interesting and provocative article, The Perfect Crime. This article was the fruit of his research on the Sixth Amendment vicinage requirement.  Professor Kalt notes, "Venue (the place a trial is held) and vicinage (the place from which jurors are drawn) are at the root of our problem; they have let people get away with murder before.  In England before 1548, it "often happene[d]" that a murderer would strike his victim in one county, and "by Craft and Cautele" avoid punishment by making sure that the victim died in the next county.  An English jury could only take cognizance of the facts that occurred in its own county, so no jury would be able to find that the killer had committed all the elements of murder."  And apparently, there is a "zone of death" [in the United States].. which "sits at the perimeter of Yellowstone National Park."  Felonies with impunity?  Read more of Professor Kalt's outlying constitutional arguments at SSRN.

Excerpt from: Kalt, Brian C., "The Perfect Crime". Georgetown Law Journal, Vol. 93, No. 2 Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=691642

Posted by Marin Dell taken from Teknoids listserv

Full post as published by FSU College of Law Library Blog on August 11, 2006 (boomark / email).