Pain, Love, and Voice: The Role of Domestic Violence Victims in Sentencing

Criminal law systems throughout the world have evolved to a stage where they no longer ask, What is the appropriate role of the victim in a criminal trial? The questions now relate to the scope of the victim\u27s rights, in which procedures she has independent standing, and at what stage she should be heard. The process of the prosecution stepping into the victim\u27s shoes, whereby the state controls the entire criminal process, seemingly on behalf of the victim, has been replaced by the recognition that the interests of the prosecution (the State) are not always consistent with those of the victim. The view that will be developed here as the main thesis of this Article, that victims should be heard at the sentencing stage, irrespective of their views, is far from common. This Article will first establish the theoretical basis for this view by drawing on an expressive theory, discussed in Part I, and will take this theory a step further, into the sphere of the particular victim who asks for leniency

Pain, Love, and Voice: The Role of Domestic Violence Victims in Sentencing

Criminal law systems throughout the world have evolved to a stage where they no longer ask, What is the appropriate role of the victim in a criminal trial? The questions now relate to the scope of the victim\u27s rights, in which procedures she has independent standing, and at what stage she should be heard. The process of the prosecution stepping into the victim\u27s shoes, whereby the state controls the entire criminal process, seemingly on behalf of the victim, has been replaced by the recognition that the interests of the prosecution (the State) are not always consistent with those of the victim. The view that will be developed here as the main thesis of this Article, that victims should be heard at the sentencing stage, irrespective of their views, is far from common. This Article will first establish the theoretical basis for this view by drawing on an expressive theory, discussed in Part I, and will take this theory a step further, into the sphere of the particular victim who asks for leniency

Social Trust in Criminal Justice: A Metric

What is the metric by which to measure a well-functioning criminal justice system? If a modern state is going to measure performance by counting something—and a modern state will always count something—what, in the criminal justice context, should it count? Remarkably, there is at present no widely accepted metric of success or failure in criminal justice. Those there are—like arrest rates, conviction rates, and crime rates—are deeply flawed. And the search for a better metric is complicated by the cacophony of different goals that theorists, policymakers, and the public bring to the criminal justice system, including crime control, racial justice, retributive justice, and social solidarity. This Article proposes a metric based on the concept of social trust. The measure of a well- or poorly functioning criminal system is its marginal effects on (1) the level of trust a polity’s members have toward the institutions, officials, laws, and actions that comprise the criminal justice system; (2) the level of trust a polity’s members have, in virtue of the criminal system’s operations, toward government generally (beyond the criminal justice system); and (3) the level of trust a polity’s members have toward one another following incidents of crime and responses to crime. Social trust, we argue, both speaks to an issue at the philosophical core of crime and punishment and serves as a locus of agreement among the many goals people bring to the criminal justice system. The concept can thus be a site of overlapping consensus, performing the vital function of enabling liberal societies to make policy despite disagreement about first principles

Virtual Criminal Law Dualism

Since the start of the new millennium, technological and societal changes have initiated a transition from physical to virtual spaces. This farreaching phenomenon has extended to the law and legal institutions, including the criminal law domain. This essay coins the term “virtual criminal law dualism” to describe the dynamic relationship between the virtual and physical spaces in the criminal law sphere. We contend that the transition to virtual spaces has manifested in two distinct aspects. The first relates to formal doctrinal, procedural, and institutional changes that the mainstream criminal law and procedure have undergone due to the emergence of virtual spaces and technological developments (“changes from within”). The second relates to the transformation of criminal law and procedure that occurs under the influence of activities taking place in virtual platforms (“changes from the outside”). By exploring the simultaneous developments stemming from the transition to virtual spaces, we analyze the meaning of these developments, discuss their implications, and offer future directions regarding their potential expansion. We argue that the interplay between virtual and physical spaces is normatively neither encouraged nor discouraged in and of itself. Its value relies on the overarching objectives of the criminal legal system and its capacity to further those objectives

Animal Rights in the Shadow of the Constitution

In this Article, we consider whether granting constitutional protections can improve animal welfare. To that end, we carry out a comparative analysis of legal systems that protect animal rights by constitutional tools, identify and analyze the ideas underlying those protections, and explore their adaptability. Focusing mainly on the Israeli case, we argue that constitutional law cannot provide adequate protections for animals and, contrary to the conventional wisdom, might even impair their protection