Deal or No Deal? Remedying ineffective Assistance of Counsel during Plea Bargaining

Does a defendant suffer a remedial prejudice if, as a result of ineffective assistance of counsel during plea-bargaining, s/he rejects a favorable plea offer but subsequently receives a fair trial? Courts on both the federal and state levels remain bitterly divided over this question. Although there is no clear answer, courts have generally taken one of three approaches. The first two options – ordering a new trial or reinstating the original plea offer – are remedial, and assume that the defendant suffers prejudice. The third option finds that the defendant suffered no prejudice because s/he ultimately received a fair trial. Thus, courts that embrace the third approach order no remedy at all. This ARTICLE discusses the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. In particular, it argues that the second approach violates various judicial principles, while the third approach relies on a flawed understanding of the Sixth Amendment. This ARTICLE introduces the notion that ineffective assistance of counsel during plea-bargaining is a structural-error, rather than a trial-error, an argument that hitherto has not been applied to these types of cases, but one that, once applied, supports a finding of prejudice – even if the trial was otherwise “fair.” Given the logistical hurdles involved in reinstating the original plea, I conclude that the only workable solution is to order a new trial

The (In)Admissibility of False Confession Expert Testimony

This Comment discusses the relationship between police interrogation tactics and false confessions in order to address the admissibility of false confession expert testimony, a question that has traditionally been left to the discretion of the trial judge. The current literature-indeed, the prevailing consensus-argues for drastic changes to police interrogation practices to prevent false confessions and, in combination with such changes, demands that expert testimony on false confessions be admitted in criminal trials. Despite the relative unanimity in the literature, state and federal courts remain bitterly divided on the question of admissibility of false confession expert testimony. Each decision in this judicial split has gone one of four ways: some courts only admit expert testimony that discusses aparticular defendant\u27s mental condition; others limit the discussion to a general description of the phenomenon; still others permit a particularized discussion of the elements of a false confession present in the suspect\u27s confession; and finally, many other courts at the state and federal level simply exclude this kind of testimony, whether or not it discusses a cognizable mental condition, the false confession phenomenon in general, or a particularized application of the false confession theory. This Comment begins by conceding that there are proven and documented cases where false confessions have led to wrongful convictionsof innocent persons. However, a review of the empirical research demonstrates that false confessions are exceedingly rare and that the evidence upon which the leading false confession scholars rely on is very unreliable. The rarity of false confessions undermines the attack on current police interrogation practices, while the unreliability of the empirical research suggests that expert testimony on false confessions should not be admissible. Therefore, this Comment rejects the argument that, in light of the false confession phenomenon,we must overhaul our criminal justice system and admit false confession expert testimony. Part I provides a brief exposition on the phenomenon of false confessions. Part II discusses the currentjurisprudence on the admissibility of expert testimony in general, and false confession expert testimony in particular. Part III then addresses the theoretical and practical problems of admitting false confession expert testimony. Part IV discusses the false confession critique of police interrogation, and offers a defense of certain police interrogation tactics that false confession theorists indict

The (In)Admissibility of False Confession Expert Testimony

This Comment discusses the relationship between police interrogation tactics and false confessions in order to address the admissibility of false confession expert testimony, a question that has traditionally been left to the discretion of the trial judge. The current literature-indeed, the prevailing consensus-argues for drastic changes to police interrogation practices to prevent false confessions and, in combination with such changes, demands that expert testimony on false confessions be admitted in criminal trials. Despite the relative unanimity in the literature, state and federal courts remain bitterly divided on the question of admissibility of false confession expert testimony. Each decision in this judicial split has gone one of four ways: some courts only admit expert testimony that discusses aparticular defendant\u27s mental condition; others limit the discussion to a general description of the phenomenon; still others permit a particularized discussion of the elements of a false confession present in the suspect\u27s confession; and finally, many other courts at the state and federal level simply exclude this kind of testimony, whether or not it discusses a cognizable mental condition, the false confession phenomenon in general, or a particularized application of the false confession theory. This Comment begins by conceding that there are proven and documented cases where false confessions have led to wrongful convictionsof innocent persons. However, a review of the empirical research demonstrates that false confessions are exceedingly rare and that the evidence upon which the leading false confession scholars rely on is very unreliable. The rarity of false confessions undermines the attack on current police interrogation practices, while the unreliability of the empirical research suggests that expert testimony on false confessions should not be admissible. Therefore, this Comment rejects the argument that, in light of the false confession phenomenon,we must overhaul our criminal justice system and admit false confession expert testimony. Part I provides a brief exposition on the phenomenon of false confessions. Part II discusses the currentjurisprudence on the admissibility of expert testimony in general, and false confession expert testimony in particular. Part III then addresses the theoretical and practical problems of admitting false confession expert testimony. Part IV discusses the false confession critique of police interrogation, and offers a defense of certain police interrogation tactics that false confession theorists indict

Single spin measurement using cellular automata techniques

We propose an approach for single spin measurement. Our method uses techniques from the theory of quantum cellular automata to correlate a large amount of ancillary spins to the one to be measured. It has the distinct advantage of being efficient, and to a certain extent fault-tolerant. Under ideal conditions, it requires the application of only order of cube root of N steps (each requiring a constant number of rf pulses) to create a system of N correlated spins. It is also fairly robust against pulse errors, imperfect initial polarization of the ancilla spin system, and does not rely on entanglement. We study the scalability of our scheme through numerical simulation.Comment: Submitted to Physical Review Letter

Three-Prong Distribution of Massive Narrow QCD Jets

We study the planar-flow distributions of narrow, highly boosted, massive QCD jets. Using the factorization properties of QCD in the collinear limit, we compute the planar-flow jet function from the one-to-three splitting function at tree-level. We derive the leading-log behavior of the jet function analytically. We also compare our semi-analytic jet function with parton-shower predictions using various generators.Comment: 59 pages, 9 figure

Sceloporus megalepidurus

Number of Pages: 5Integrative BiologyGeological Science

Dynamics and evaporation of defects in Mott-insulating clusters of boson pairs

Repulsively bound pairs of particles in a lattice governed by the Bose-Hubbard model can form stable incompressible clusters of dimers corresponding to finite-size n=2 Mott insulators. Here we study the dynamics of hole defects in such clusters corresponding to unpaired particles which can resonantly tunnel out of the cluster into the lattice vacuum. Due to bosonic statistics, the unpaired particles have different effective mass inside and outside the cluster, and "evaporation" of hole defects from the cluster boundaries is possible only when their quasi-momenta are within a certain transmission range. We show that quasi-thermalization of hole defects occurs in the presence of catalyzing particle defects which thereby purify the Mott insulating clusters. We study the dynamics of one-dimensional system using analytical techniques and numerically exact t-DMRG simulations. We derive an effective strong-interaction model that enables simulations of the system dynamics for much longer times. We also discuss a more general case of two bosonic species which reduces to the fermionic Hubbard model in the strong interaction limit.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures, minor update