Rehabilitation Versus Incarceration of Juvenile Offenders: Public Preferences in Four Models for Change States

Analyzes how American juvenile justice system policy has become increasingly punitive over the last few decades and examines citizens' willingness to pay for incarceration versus rehabilitation of youth offenders

The Scientific Shortcomings of Roper v. Simmons

This Article contends that some of the case law and social science research that form the basis for the United States Supreme Court\u27s decision in Roper v. Simmons are insufficient and outdated. The Court also relies heavily upon briefs submitted by the respondent and his amici, in lieu of providing more pertinent citations and analysis that could have enhanced and modernized the Court\u27s arguments. The sparse and sometimes archaic sources for Roper potentially limit the opinion\u27s precedential value. For example, the Court cites Erik Erikson\u27s 1968 book, Identity: Youth and Crisis, to support the view that, relative to adults, juveniles have more undeveloped and unstable identities. While Erikson\u27s influence as a psychologist is indisputable, his work reflects an outmoded psychoanalytic perspective. Furthermore, the Court does not specify which of Erikson\u27s highly complex theories are relevant to Roper\u27s conclusions. The shortcomings of Erikson\u27s book and other sources cited in the opinion would be less apparent but for the Court\u27s overall dearth of social science support. This Article concludes that despite Roper\u27s correct result, the Court\u27s application of interdisciplinary studies was, in part, flawed, thereby detracting from the Court\u27s otherwise progressive direction. Ultimately, the opinion\u27s strength derives more from its traditional legal analysis than from its application of relevant social science, an outcome the Court may not have fully intended

Criminalizing Normal Adolescent Behavior in Communities of Color: The Role of Prosecutors in Juvenile Justice Reform

There is little dispute that racial disparities pervade the contemporary American juvenile justice system. The persistent overrepresentation of youth of color in the system suggests that scientifically supported notions of diminished culpability of youth are not applied consistently across races. Drawing from recent studies on implicit bias and the impact of race on perceptions of adolescent culpability, Professor Henning contends that contemporary narratives portraying black and Hispanic youth as dangerous and irredeemable lead prosecutors to disproportionately reject youth as a mitigating factor for their behavior. Although racial disparities begin at arrest and persist through every stage of the juvenile justice process, this Article focuses specifically on the unique opportunity and obligation that prosecutors have to address those disparities at the charging phase of the juvenile case. Professor Henning implores juvenile prosecutors to resist external pressures to respond punitively and symbolically to exaggerated perceptions of threat by youth of color and envisions a path toward structured decision making at the charging phase that is informed by research in adolescent development, challenges distorted notions of race and maturity, and holds prosecutors accountable for equitable decision making across race. While fully embracing legitimate prosecutorial concerns about victims’ rights and public safety, Professor Henning frames the charging decision as one requiring fairness, equity, and efficacy. Fairness requires that prosecutors evaluate juvenile culpability in light of the now well-documented features of adolescent offending. Equity demands an impartial application of the developmental research to all youth, regardless of race and socioeconomic status. Efficacy asks prosecutors to rely on scientifically validated best practices for ensuring positive youth development and achieving public safety. Thus, even when neighborhood effects and social structures produce opportunities for more serious and more frequent crime among youth of color, prosecutors have a duty to evaluate that behavior in light of the current developmental research and respond to that conduct with the same developmentally appropriate options that are so often available to white youth. As the gatekeepers of juvenile court jurisdiction, prosecutors should work with developmental experts, school officials, and other community representatives to develop and publish juvenile charging standards that reflect these goals. To increase transparency and encourage buy-in from the public, Professor Henning recommends that prosecutors track charging decisions according to race and geographic neighborhood and provide community representatives and other stakeholders with an opportunity to review those decisions for disparate impact. Finally, to ensure that communities of color are able to respond to adolescent offending without state intervention, Professor Henning contemplates a more expansive role for prosecutors who will engage and encourage school officials and community representatives to identify and develop adequate community-based, adolescent-appropriate alternatives to prosecution

Why States Create International Tribunals: A Response to Professors Posner and Yoo

A recent article in the California Law Review by Professors Eric Posner and John Yoo, Judicial Independence in International Tribunals, argues that the only effective international tribunals are dependent tribunals, by which the authors mean ad hoc tribunals staffed by judges closely controlled by governments through the power of reappointment or threats of retaliation. Independent tribunals, by contrast, meaning tribunals staffed by judges appointed on similar terms as those in domestic courts, pose a danger to international cooperation. According to Posner and Yoo, independent tribunals are suspect because they are more likely to allow moral ideals, ideological imperatives or the interests of other states to influence their judgments. In this response, we identify the many shortcomings in the theory, methodology, and empirics in Judicial Independence in International Tribunals. We do so to challenge the authors\u27 core conjecture: that formally dependent international tribunals are correlated with effective judicial outcomes. We then offer our own counter-theory; a theory of constrained independence in which states establish independent international tribunals to enhance the credibility of their commitments and then use more fine grained structural, political, and discursive mechanisms to limit the potential for judicial excesses

I Ain\u27t Takin\u27 No Plea : The Challenges in Counseling Young People Facing Serious Time

Criminal defendants daily entrust their liberty to the skill of their lawyers. The consequences of the lawyer’s decisions fall squarely upon the defendant. There is nothing untoward in this circumstance. To the contrary, the lawyer as the defendant’s representative is at the core of our adversary process. As practicing lawyers know, interviewing and counseling are at the heart of legal representation. This is what lawyers do, even trial lawyers: we talk with and advise clients. As criminal lawyers know, the decision whether to go to trial is “the most important single decision” a client faces, and requires wise counsel. When the decision is a close call—there is no great cost to going to trial, no clear benefit to accepting a plea, and no serious downside either way—it is easy to accede to a client’s wishes. But when there is no question that going to trial will be ruinous, and the client does not understand this, it is incumbent upon the lawyer to get through to the client. This is especially true when the client is developmentally immature and emotionally traumatized

Why States Create International Tribunals: A Response to Professors Posner and Yoo

A recent article in the California Law Review by Professors Eric Posner and John Yoo, Judicial Independence in International Tribunals, argues that the only effective international tribunals are dependent tribunals, by which the authors mean ad hoc tribunals staffed by judges closely controlled by governments through the power of reappointment or threats of retaliation. Independent tribunals, by contrast, meaning tribunals staffed by judges appointed on similar terms as those in domestic courts, pose a danger to international cooperation. According to Posner and Yoo, independent tribunals are suspect because they are more likely to allow moral ideals, ideological imperatives or the interests of other states to influence their judgments. In this response, we identify the many shortcomings in the theory, methodology, and empirics in Judicial Independence in International Tribunals. We do so to challenge the authors\u27 core conjecture: that formally dependent international tribunals are correlated with effective judicial outcomes. We then offer our own counter-theory; a theory of constrained independence in which states establish independent international tribunals to enhance the credibility of their commitments and then use more fine grained structural, political, and discursive mechanisms to limit the potential for judicial excesses

Questioning the rise of gelatinous zooplankton in the World's oceans

During the past several decades, high numbers of gelatinous zooplankton species have been reported in many estuarine and coastal ecosystems. Coupled with media-driven public perception, a paradigm has evolved in which the global ocean ecosystems are thought to be heading toward being dominated by “nuisance” jellyfish. We question this current paradigm by presenting a broad overview of gelatinous zooplankton in a historicalcontext to develop the hypothesis that population changes reflect the human-mediated alteration of global ocean ecosystems. To this end, we synthesize information related to the evolutionary context of contemporary gelatinous zooplankton blooms, the human frame of reference forchanges in gelatinous zooplankton populations, and whether sufficient data are available to have established the paradigm. We conclude that the current paradigm in which it is believed that there has been a global increase in gelatinous zooplankton is unsubstantiated, and we develop a strategy for addressing the critical questions about long-term, human-related changes in the sea as they relate to gelatinous zooplankton blooms