It’s no longer a specifically enumerated crime to do that on the streets of Houston in an annoying or flirtatious way [Volokh]
Posts Tagged ‘crime and punishment’
Police and prosecution roundup
- After criticism of heavy-handed Ankeny, Iowa police raid on persons suspected of credit card fraud, not actually reassuring to be told militarized methods needed because one house occupant had firearms carry permit [Radley Balko, more, more]
- Advocates strain mightily to fit unpopular Dunn verdict into Stand Your Ground theme [David Kopel, Jacob Sullum] More: sorry, pundits, but Rasmussen poll shows public’s plurality SYG support unshaken [Althouse]
- “‘Drop the Cabbage, Bullwinkle!’: Alaskan Man Faces Prison for the Crime of Moose-Feeding” [Evan Bernick, Heritage] “Criminalizing America: How Big Government Makes A Criminal of Every American” [ALEC “State Factor”]
- “We’ve also bred into dogs … an eagerness to please us.” Bad news for K-9 forensics [Balko]
- “Has overcharging killed the criminal trial?” [Legal Ethics Forum] Is the “trial penalty” a myth? [David Abrams via Dan Markel, Scott Greenfield]
- What if cops, as opposed to, say, gun owners, were obliged by law to purchase liability insurance? [Popehat]
- That’s productivity: North Carolina grand jury managed to crank out roughly one indictment every 52 seconds [Tim Cushing, TechDirt]
Police and prosecution roundup
- “When do awful thoughts, shared with complete strangers, become criminal actions?” [Robert Kolker, New York mag]
- Why grants to local police departments are among the federal government’s most pernicious spending [Radley Balko, whose new Washington Post blog/column is thriving]
- How bad did you think Florida prosecutor Angela Corey was? She might be worse [Balko, earlier]
- “The unintended consequences of compensating the exonerated” [Will Baude]
- Thousands of Americans are behind bars following shaken-baby convictions. How many are innocent? [Jerry Mitchell, Jackson Clarion-Ledger/USA Today, earlier here, here]
- Private probation as “judicially sanctioned extortion racket” [The Economist]
- “DOJ to Prohibit Profiling Based on Religion, National Origin, and Gender in Federal Investigations” [FedSoc Blog]
Clemency and presidential power
An official with the Department of Justice has signaled that the administration may be willing to consider much more extensive use of presidential clemency for inmates serving long sentences for nonviolent drug offenses under the former sentencing regime, a development I welcome in a new Cato post. Further observations from Mark Osler and Doug Berman (“there are currently over 3,500 pending pardon and commutation applications at the White House right now” which makes it a little odd to suggest that the missing ingredient is more applications) and more [excerpts from speech by Deputy Attorney General James Cole].
Crime and punishment roundup
- Under new Illinois law, third offense of tossing cigarette to ground will be a felony [Andrew Stuttaford]
- “The New York Times calls for prosecutors to establish an ‘open file’ policy to combat prosecutorial misconduct.” [Nicole Hyland, LEF; New York Times; Radley Balko, whose column at the Washington Post has now launched]
- “Three Arrests Illustrate the Impact of New York’s Silly Seven-Round Ammunition Limit” [Jacob Sullum]
- Forfeiture reform on the agenda in Michigan? [John Ross/Reason, Institute for Justice, earlier]
- Speaking of law enforcement for profit, more on the proliferation of fees and third-party collectors that can land minor miscreants in “debtors’ prison” [Fox News; related, Balko]
- “Want to stop repeats of Columbine and Newtown? Deprive mass killers of the spotlight. Can the media do that?” [Ari Schulman, WSJ via @garyrosenwsj]
- “She’s regretted the lie that sent him to prison ever since.” [NY Mag]
Voucherizing indigent criminal defense
A reform proposal floated in a 2010 Cato Institute policy analysis is now becoming a pilot project in one Texas county. More: Greenfield.
President Obama and the pardon power
I’ve got a new op-ed for Bloomberg View (first time I’ve appeared there) calling last week’s venture in presidential clemency “mingy and belated” and, if aimed at prison overcrowding, “like trying to bail out Lake Michigan with a paint can.” On Thursday President Obama commuted the sentences of eight inmates caught up in the crack cocaine sentencing fury, all of whom had already served at least 15 years for what were often relatively peripheral involvement in the drug trade. Clarence Aaron, for example, was serving three life sentences without possibility of parole for a first-time nonviolent offense. Many advocates from all political viewpoints pushed for Aaron’s release, among them Debra Saunders who wrote dozens of columns on his case in the San Francisco Chronicle over the past 12 years (Also in Minneapolis Star-Tribune and other papers, and AP roundup of opinion columns; & Scott Greenfield, Pardon Power).
“In Houston alone, about 300,000 sex trafficking cases are prosecuted each year.”
Someone must have deactivated the Dallas Morning News’s B.S. detectors [Amy Alkon] The paper’s editors uncritically cheer new proposals from Texas Sen. John Cornyn and Rep. Ted Poe for legal changes including wider use of forfeiture and more draconian sentences for johns. More: “There have been two compelling-prostitution cases filed in Harris County this year. Not 300,000. Two.” [Mark Bennett] Yet more: the paper corrected 11/24.
Crime and punishment roundup
- Is there mens rea in the tainted-cantaloupe prosecution? [Politico, Marler-backed Food Safety News]
- “Some unanswered questions about private prison quotas” [Paul Gowder, Concurring Opinions]
- “Smoke A Joint, Lose Your Kids” [Radley Balko]
- Senate “Stand Your Ground” hearing postponed [earlier, and check out our new stand your ground tag];
- “From Streaking to Possible Sex Offender to Tragedy” [Free-Range Kids, Reason; related on sex offender registries, Jacob Sullum, ABA Journal]
- Also related: New app for anonymous denunciation, courtesy of the feds: sure, what could go wrong? [Free-Range Kids, FireDogLake]
- Florida prosecutors consider seeking death penalty for pain doctor whose customers overdosed [Sentencing Law, Broward Palm Beach New Times]
Parents may sue ex-NFLer for saying their kids trashed his house
Over Labor Day weekend, hundreds of teenagers held an illegal party in the upstate New York home of former NFL star Brian Holloway. They left a wide swath of photos on social media, and Holloway put up a website identifying more than 100 of the 300 partiers. “But rather than apologize to Holloway for their children’s behavior, some parents have contacted their lawyers to see what legal action they can take” against him. [New York Daily News; response from radio personalities Chuck and Kelly, WGY]