Peeking behind the Iron Curtain: How Law Works behind Prison Walls

The prison disciplinary process plays a major role in maintaining institutional order. It starts from the premise that the safety of the institution trumps the punishment of the inmate. Given the massive incarceration rates in virtually every part of the United States, most prisons are overcrowded and, therefore, forced to place a premium on order and safety. The only way to maintain order and safety is to have prison rules that deter inmate behavior; and the only way to enforce those rules is fairly and humanely. Peeking Behind the Iron Curtain is a study of the law-in-action. Using a variety of research methodologies, including observational research, recorded interviews, and research in documents, it examines the inmate disciplinary process at a medium/minimum security mid-Western correctional institution. At issue is the role of legality in governing fair and impartial inmate disciplinary hearings. The goal is to go beyond what the substantive law says should happen and instead produce a written record of what actually does happen when inmates are subject to a rule-driven prison disciplinary process. Does law “work” behind prison walls? This answer to this question is implicated both by law’s practicality to mediate conflict in a tense environment as is the special environment in which it operates, for example the prison. Behind prison walls assumptions influence the disciplinary process in many more instances than law itself. As a consequence of these assumptions, the burden of responsibility shifts to the inmate to show that he is not guilty of violating institutional law. A task, in both my opinion and experience, that is insurmountable. Further, since the significance of guilty assumptions are so deeply rooted in the functioning of the penal institutions, the very question regarding the validity of law’s capability to mediate that tension is not only raised, but also answered. As a succinct answer to the posed query, law does “work” behind prison walls – sometimes

From Slavery to Hip-Hop: Punishing Black Speech and What’s “Unconstitutional” About Prosecuting Young Black Men Through Art

This Article, by Professor Donald F. Tibbs and third-year law student Shelly Chauncey, both from the Thomas R. Kline School of Law at Drexel University, addresses the disproportionate targeting and convictions of the African American community through the lens of the “hip-hop” generation. Tibbs and Chauncey show how the prosecutorial use of rap videos and lyrics serves to criminalize Black males within the larger context of policing Black speech in American law. The authors argue that this process is rooted in racial bias toward young Black men and serves no legitimate place in their prosecution

The Bend at the End: What Lawyers Can Learn about Disruptions and Innovations in Criminal Defense Practice from Market Analysis

In the world of stock market analysis, there is one certainty: the stock market is unpredictable. It acts with a will of its own, and despite experts\u27 attempts at market forecast, no single person or machine can accurately predict the highs and lows of each day. Nonetheless, market experts extol new techniques; develop computer algorithms; and attach interesting monikers, such as Stochastics, MACD, and Bollinger Bands. But, in the end, they all succumb to the same rule: the unpredictability of the market suggests that no trading strategy is 100%, without fail, perfect every single trade. That said, however, there is one simple market rule to which, if pressed hard enough, every investor, no matter how sophisticated or novice, would agree. That rule is simply that you should always follow the general direction of all the other investors until it is no longer popular to follow. So common is this approach, affectionately known as Trend Trading, that a popular mantra was developed: The Trend is Your Friend . . . Until the Bend at the End. At its base level, this mantra makes great sense. If everyone else is investing in one direction, why would you be contrarian? To be contrarian, or go against the trend, is a riskier investing strategy, mostly because the world of market investing is a zero-sum game. For every winner, there is a loser. Perhaps, the same can be said of the American criminal justice process. When it comes to the practice of criminal law defense, some similarities exist to stock market investing. Lawyers employ their own strategies or styles, but in the end, they generally stick to the same game plan. That is because the criminal justice process is as unpredictable as the market and is also a zero-sum game: for every winner there is a loser. Of all the different trial strategies employed, the most popular entails defense lawyers not allowing their clients to take the witness stand or not letting the Subaltern Speak