Criminal Law

Tress on Collateral Consequences and the Early Definition of "Felony"

Posted on December 10, 2009
Will Tress (University of Baltimore - School of Law) has posted Unintended Collateral Consequences: Defining Felony in the Early American Republic (Cleveland State Law Review, Vol. 57, No. 3, pp. 461-491, Fall 2009) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: At....

Capers on Unintentional Rapists

Posted on December 10, 2009
I. Bennett Capers (Hofstra University - School of Law) has posted The Unintentional Rapist (Washington University Law Review, Vol. 87, 2010) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Rape law is replete with troubling cases. Using as a case in point...

Levenson on Prosecutorial Soundbites

Posted on December 09, 2009
Laurie L. Levenson (Loyola Law School Los Angeles) has posted Prosecutorial Soundbites: When Do They Cross the Line? (Georgia Law Review, Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Even good prosecutors can cross the line with media soundbites. Especially in...

King & Hoffman on Habeas Corpus

Posted on December 09, 2009
Nancy J. King (Vanderbilt University School of Law) and Joseph L. Hoffmann (Indiana University-Bloomington, Maurer School of Law) have posted Habeas Corpus for the Twenty-First Century, Chapter One on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This is the introductory chapter of...

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Argument Transcripts in Today's "Honest Services" Cases

Posted on December 08, 2009
Black v. United States is here. Weyhrauch v. United States is here.

Opinion in Alvarez v. Smith

Posted on December 08, 2009
is here. Here is the Court's syllabus: Illinois law provides for forfeiture of movable personal property used to facilitate a drug crime, permits police to seize the property without a warrant, and allows the State to keep the property nearly...

Opinion in Beard v. Kindler

Posted on December 08, 2009
is here. Here is the Court's syllabus: Respondent Kindler was convicted of capital murder in Pennsylvania state court, and the jury recommended a death sentence. Kindler filed postverdict motions challenging his conviction and sentence, but before the trial court could...

Argument Transcript from Florida v. Powell

Posted on December 08, 2009
is here.

Cert Granted in Sentencing Case

Posted on December 07, 2009
The case is Dillon v. United States, summarized as follows at ScotusBlog: That case tests whether the federal Sentencing Guidelines are binding when a federal judge imposes a new sentence. The case will test whether the Supreme Court?s 2005 ruling...

Thompson on Eyewitness Misidentification

Posted on December 07, 2009
Sandra Guerra Thompson (University of Houston Law Center) has posted Judicial Blindness to Eyewitness Misidentification (Marquette Law Review, Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Many studies of exonerations find that erroneous eyewitness identifications play a part in over 75%...

Per Curiam Reversal in Warrantless Entry Case

Posted on December 07, 2009
The Court approved police entry into a dwelling under the "emergency aid" exception to the warrant requirement in Michigan v. Fisher, which you can find at the end of today's order list. Justice Stevens, joined by Justice Sotomayor, dissented on...

Weekend Roundup

Posted on December 07, 2009
CrimProf posts you may have missed over the weekend: Friday Next Week's Criminal Law and Procedure Arguments Green on Retributive Justice for Unjustly Disadvantaged Offenders Frase on Racial Disproportionality in Prisons and Jails Winer on Medellin Saturday Dubber on Legalizing...

Armstrong on Metaphor in Criminal Justice Policy

Posted on December 06, 2009
Sarah Armstrong (Glasgow University) has posted Managing Meaning: The Use of Metaphor in Criminal Justice Policy on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This paper takes an unorthodox approach to the study of policy, by analysing the use of metaphors in...

Fenner on Today's Confrontation Clause

Posted on December 06, 2009
G. Michael Fenner (Creighton University School of Law) has posted Today's Confrontation Clause (After Crawford and Melendez-Diaz) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: In the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the Confrontation Clause states that, ?[i]n all criminal...

Top-Ten Recent SSRN Downloads

Posted on December 06, 2009
are here. The usual disclaimers apply. Rank Downloads Paper Title 1 296 The Emerging Criminal War on Sex Offenders Corey Rayburn Yung, The John Marshall Law School, Date posted to database: August 18, 2009 2 276 The Increased Level of...

"Kentucky Halts Lethal Injections Until Hearings"

Posted on December 06, 2009
The A.P. story is on the New York Times website here: Executions are suspended in Kentucky after the state said Friday that it would not appeal a ruling that found it had failed to follow proper administrative procedures when it...

"A Cincinnati experiment has changed the way police deal with gang violence"

Posted on December 06, 2009
The Crime Report has this interesting story here. In part: The Cincinnati study provides a detailed account of how the city?s police force implemented the anti-violence strategy, which is based essentially on identifying gang members and then calling them in...

Dubber on Legalizing Drug Criminal Law

Posted on December 05, 2009
Markus D. Dubber (University of Toronto - Faculty of Law) has posted Legalizing Drug Criminal Law on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This paper investigates American drug criminal law, or rather the American drug penal regime, from the perspectives of...

"Texas executes death row prisoner despite mental impairment defense"

Posted on December 05, 2009
Jurist has coverage here.

"Interesting take on SCOTUS Porter and Van Hook rulings and 'selective empathy'"

Posted on December 05, 2009
Doug Berman has this post at Sentencing Law and Policy, excerpting this post by Linda Greenhouse of the New York Times.

Bailey on Polygamy

Posted on December 05, 2009
Martha Bailey (Queen's University - Faculty of Law) has posted Should Canada Criminalize Polygamy? on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The question addressed in this paper is whether, in addition to the marriage laws, which do not permit polygamy, and...

Winer on Medellin

Posted on December 04, 2009
Anthony S. Winer (William Mitchell College of Law) has posted An Escape Route from the Medellín Maze on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The recent Supreme Court decision in Medellín v. Texas created a veritable ?maze? for foreign prisoners in...

Frase on Racial Disproportionality in Prisons and Jails

Posted on December 04, 2009
Richard S. Frase (University of Minnesota Law School) has posted What Explains Persistent Racial Disproportionality in Minnesota?s Prison and Jail Populations? (Crime and Justice: A Review of Research, Vol. 38, pp. 201-280) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Racial disparity...

Green on Retributive Justice for Unjustly Disadvantaged Offenders

Posted on December 04, 2009
Stuart P. Green (Rutgers Law School-Newark) has posted Hard Times, Hard Time: Retributive Justice for Unjustly Disadvantaged Offenders (University of Chicago Legal Forum, 2009) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Criminological studies consistently indicate that a disproportionate percentage of crimes...

Next Week's Criminal Law and Procedure Arguments

Posted on December 04, 2009
Description of issue from ScotusWiki, where you can also find links to briefs and opinions below: Monday Florida v. Powell: Must a suspect be expressly advised to his right to counsel during questioning and if so, does the failure to...

Toddlers and Criminal Propensities (Kolber)

Posted on December 03, 2009
Some recent research arguably finds a relationship between toddlers' fear reactions and their propensity to commit crimes as adults. The research suggests that toddlers with weaker fear reactions to a noisy blare are more likely to grow up and commit...

Garvey on Attempts and Treason

Posted on December 03, 2009
Stephen P. Garvey (Cornell Law School) has posted Are Attempts Like Treason? on SSRN. Here is the abstract: If the state can legitimately criminalize only actions that cause or risk harm, and if it respects the fact that an actor...

Pardo on Evidence Theory and the NAS Report on Forensic Science

Posted on December 03, 2009
Michael S. Pardo (University of Alabama School of Law) has posted Evidence Theory and the NAS Report on Forensic Science (Utah Law Review, Forthcoming) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The recent report of the National Academy of Sciences on...

"Death Clash at the High Court"

Posted on December 03, 2009
The post, at BLT, begins as follows: In the wake of the Supreme Court's refusal early this morning to hear the last-minute appeal of a Tennessee death row inmate, two justices clashed--one with some bite--over whether execution after lengthy delay...

Tetlow on Discriminatory Acquittal

Posted on December 02, 2009
Tania Tetlow (Tulane University - School of Law) has posted Discriminatory Acquittal on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This article is the first to analyze a pervasive and unexplored constitutional problem: the rights of crime victims against unconstitutional discrimination by...

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