16885 research outputs found
Sort by
Using Burdens of Proof to Allocate the Risk of Error when Assessing Developmental Maturity of Youthful Offenders
Get PDFBehavioral and neuroscientific research provides a relatively clear window into the timing of developmental maturity from adolescence to early adulthood. We know with considerable confidence that, on average, sixteen-year-olds are less developmentally mature than nineteen-year-olds, who are less developmentally mature than twenty-three-year-olds, who are less developmentally mature than twenty-six-year-olds. However, in the context of a given case, the question presented might be whether a particular seventeen-year-old defendant convicted of murder is “developmentally mature enough” that a sentence of life without parole can be constitutionally imposed on him or her. While developmental maturity can be accurately measured in group data, it cannot be assessed in individuals with confidence. This fact is an instance of a fundamental disconnect that occurs at the intersection of science and law between what scientists study and what courts ordinarily need to know. Scientists typically study phenomena at the group or population level, whereas courts usually need to determine whether a particular case is an instance of some known phenomenon. This is called the group to individual (G2i) problem.
Although the G2i problem cannot be fully resolved, it can be managed by using the base-rate data available in the research literature to set the burden of proof. Setting the burden of proof is a classic mechanism for allocating the risks of making a mistake. Two factors in particular inform judgments about allocating risk of error, with the first being the likelihood or frequency of the fact in question and the second being the costs associated with the error. The rarer the fact and the larger the cost of a mistake, the greater the burden of proof should be. The latter factor, the costs associated with error, lies behind the traditional burdens of proof of preponderance of evidence and proof beyond a reasonable doubt in civil and criminal cases, respectively. In contrast, while the former factor, the frequency of the fact in question, is used regularly in areas of applied science, it has generally not informed allocations of burdens of proof in court.
This Article sets forth a framework of shifting burdens of proof grounded in the research literature that can be employed to allocate the risk of error when assessing developmental maturity in the sentencing of offenders across the age spectrum
Wolf Law Library: First Floor Reading Room (December 2022)
No full textIn December 2022, the first floor reading room was remodeled. This image shows the east side.https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/libraryhistory/1035/thumbnail.jp
A Novel and Controversial Technology. Artificial Face Recognition, Privacy Protection, and Algorithm Bias in Europe
Get PDFR (Bridges) v. Chief Constable of South Wales Police\u27s Court of Appeals ruling... showcases the variety and the thickness of the legal, ethical, and political considerations that lie underneath the deployment of [Artificial Face Recognition]-based police tools and its ramification within Europe and beyond. More broadly, the topic of [f]acial recognition technologies provide[s] a useful case study of the complex and unpredictable ways that norms of procedural fairness, equality, and privacy interact when the state deploys machine-learning tools to draw inferences from otherwise unilluminating data. This Article uses Bridges as a proxy to sketch out the main legal issues that arise from AFR\u27s policy deployment in Europe. After a quick summary of the facts and of the judgment of the court of first instance, it provides a detailed account of the Court of Appeals\u27 judgment. Then it focuses on how the Court of Appeals balanced competing interests and how this resonates with EU rules. Finally it compares Bridges with the Artificial Intelligence Act issued by the European Commission.
This abstract has been adapted from the author\u27s introduction
Criminal Law Docket (recording)
No full textThe Court has already granted a handful of cases that can be loosely grouped under the umbrella of criminal law including the high-profile case about the Boston marathon bombing. This panel will discuss those cases in addition to exploring potential changes to the much-discussed qualified immunity doctrine which shields government officials (including police officers) from liability for their actions
Fraud Against Financial Institutions: Judging Materiality Post-Escobar
Get PDFIn Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1 (1999), the Supreme Court held that proof of materiality is required for convictions under the federal mail, wire and bank fraud statutes. During the past 20 years, the federal courts have endeavored to apply the complex common law concept of materiality to the federal criminal law context. The Supreme Court’s recent decision in Universal Health Services, Inc. v. United States ex rel. Escobar, 136 S. Ct. 1989 (2016), a civil case involving the False Claims Act, provided the federal appellate courts with an ideal opportunity to reconsider materiality standards in federal fraud cases. In particular, criminal fraud defendants have argued that Escobar’s “subjective” materiality standard should be applied in mail, wire and bank fraud cases involving financial institutions. Thus far, these arguments have failed. Instead, the Courts of Appeals have endorsed an objective materiality standard tethered to what a reasonable bank would do—not the behavior of renegade lenders. This Article explores judicial treatment of materiality in federal criminal fraud cases, and investigates the many challenges that criminal fraud defendants face when they try to undermine the government’s proof of materiality by attacking the imprudent or reckless actions of banks and other lenders
Climate Change\u27s Free Rider Problem: Why We Must Relinquish Freedom to Become Free
Get PDFDespite the increasing urgency of climate change, countries continue to struggle to cooperate on even modest solutions. Of international accords that are successfully ratified, agreed-upon commitments are mostly hortatory and vague, succeeding only in engendering a fragmented, voluntary compliance scheme. Unsurprisingly, decades of tepid climate action and procrastination have begotten a staggering emissions gap for the world to close by 2030—requiring a collective greenhouse gas reduction of about fifty percent to limit global warming to the 1.5°C benchmark. Yet, global greenhouse emissions have generally risen, not fallen in the last decade, with 2018 marking a record high despite pledges made in compliance with the celebrated 2015 Paris Agreement. In short, international models of climate cooperation thus far have descriptively been unequal to the task of securing adequate global climate action. Once we recognize and agree that global warming cannot go unaddressed, the conclusion follows that change, perhaps of a radical nature, is required. This Article argues that decades of insufficient international cooperation militate against tweaking current models, and instead proposes a blueprint for a concrete, market-driven compliance scheme that, importantly, would be operative without a world government or divestment of individual sovereignty
Petitions from the Grave: Why Federal Executions Are a Violation of the Suspension Clause
Get PDFThis Note will address the intersection of wrongful convictions, the federal death penalty, and habeas corpus to conclude that the federal death penalty is an unconstitutional violation of the Suspension Clause of the United States Constitution. Part I of this Note will establish that Congress may not suspend the writ of habeas corpus outside of wartime. Then, Part II will show that wrongfully convicted prisoners therefore have a constitutional right to a habeas petition if they discover new, exonerating evidence. Part III will argue that because executed prisoners cannot file a habeas petition for release, executing wrongfully convicted prisoners is an unconstitutional suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. Finally, Part IV will extend Part III to show that the government has no way to know, prior to execution, who will be wrongfully or rightfully executed and therefore the federal government may not execute any prisoners without certainly suspending habeas corpus for some prisoners. Finally, Part V will explore counterarguments to this Note’s argument