Law Outlines Criminal Outlines
Criminal outline lays out complex criminal law in easy-to-understand format. This outline is color coded, so that MPC sections and case law is easy to find on your exam day. Outline subjects include: basics, elements of culpability, homicide, rape, inchoate crimes, aiding and abetting, conspiracy, and defenses. There is a Model Penal Code key, a case guide key (with brief, one line descriptions of relevant cases), a short attack outline, and an outline for bar exam preparation (MBE & UBE). This p...
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Introduction
Rationales for Just Punishment
Retributive: holds that punishment is a necessary consequence of a crime and should be calculated based on the gravity of the wrong done.
Emile Durkheim
Retribution can be utilitarian because it creates social cohesion by morally condemning bad acts
Not punishing = disrespecting ourselves
Types
Negative retributivism
Punishment is justified because you deserve it, even if it is clear that nobody else will ever commit this crime ever again.
Michael S. Moore
The innocent should never be punished. Guilty is a necessary precondition for punishment
Positive retributivism
Guilt is both a necessary and sufficient condition for punishment
Assaultive Retributivism
Satisfies society’s need to punish, it is morally right to hate criminals. James Fitzjames Stephen
Protective Retributivism
Respects the rights of the offender, Securing moral balance in society. Herbert Morris
Victim vindication
The wrongdoer has obtained elevation over the victim, this brings it back to normal. Murphy and Hampton.
Rationale
Prevent unjust enrichment
Social utility: stops private vengeance and fosters social cohesion
Studies that show that people feel like the only place they have status is in prison, since their status in society is so low.
Criticism
Is punishment evil?
Equivalence theory leads to excessiveness or barbarism?
Inefficient
Utilitarian
Bentham: maximize human happiness by only justifying pain when its consequences outweight the harm
Deterrence
Bentham: more severe offenses require more severe punishment to induce people to choose the lesser of two crimes, can’t be harsher than it needs to be for deterrence.
General deterrence: uses people as a means. Makes examples of specific deviance.
Counter: you benefit from your own punishment
Specific deterrence: focuses on the exact individual
Rationale
Betters society by preventing future harm
Avoids “evil” punishment for its own sake
Rehabilitation
Forward looking: focuses on future benefits
CS Lewis: “When we cease to consider what the criminal deserves and consider only what will cure him, we have tacitly removed him from the sphere of justice altogether.”
Defendants shouldn’t be used as means to societal ends
US has incredibly high incarceration rate, comparatively
Violent crime and property crime rates are decreasing
Imprisonment rate is increasing
More than a third of felony defendants charged with drug offense
Men: 93%, Women: 7%
Men imprisoned at a rate 15 times higher than females
White: 34%, Black: 38%, Hispanic: 20%
Black males imprisoned at a rate 6.5 times higher than white males
Incapacitation
Selective incapacitation: targets people who they think are more likely to repeat crimes later
Vengeance/social cohesion
Less likely that someone will take it upon themselves to carry out punishment from their own hands
Restorative justice: make the victim whole
Model Penal Code §1.02, subsections 2(a) and (b):
Sentencing provisions are intended to “prevent the commission of crimes (deterrence) and to promote the correction and rehabilitation of offenders.”
Mechanics of Criminal Justice System
Pleas
Does the existence of plea bargaining advance or detract from the cause of justice?
Intimidation
Rationality – you think you’ll lose and you’ll like to wage your chances
Mental illness
Defense attorneys get paid lump sum up front
People who commit the same crime don’t get the same plea bargain (gender, race, socioeconomic status)
Trial Process
Voir Dire/jury selection – opening statements – government case – MJOA – defense case – Renew MJOA – Government Rebuttal – Jury instructions – Closing argument – deliberations – verdict
Juries & Prosecutorial Discretion
Constitutionally – 6 required. If only 6 – must be unanimous. Normally there are 12.
Voir Dire = judge and attorneys ask potential jurors very intimate questions
6th Amendment: criminal prosecutions = right to jury trial at federal level
14th Amendment = due process as it applies to states
Duncan v. Louisiana (1968) – pg 42. Black man, simple battery, concerns regarding judge because there was a lot of discrimination in the parish.
Concept of incorporation of Bill of Rights against the states through the 14th Amendment
Jury trial for serious crimes is seen as necessary to due process. Fundamental part of our justice system.
Jury important not merely because judges and prosecutors might be corrupt, but because they might to be sufficiently sympathetic or democratically accountable.
Right to jury trial depends on severity of crime, which is determined by length of jail time. (misdemeanor = no; serious = yes)
Should the following be allowed?
Jury explicitly asks if it has the power to acquit notwithstanding the law (Fernandez)
Instruction telling jurors to tell judge if any juror says he’s going to nullify (Engelman)
Dismissing a juror for cause if he says in voir dire that he believes in nullification “where appropriate”?
Prosecution seeks a nullification instruction in a rape case where the defendant invokes the marital rape exception?
Power of nullification (de facto power of juries)
The power of jury nullification derives from an inherent quality of most modern common law systems—a general unwillingness to inquire into jurors' motivations during or after deliberations.
Maryland Instructions: whatever I tell you about the law while it is intended to be helpful to you in reaching a just and proper verdict in the case, it is not binding upon you as members of the jury and you may accept or reject it. And you may apply the law as you apprehend it to be in the case.
United States v. Dougherty (1972) - pg 51 : destroyed property in Dow Chemical to attempt to publicize opposition to Vietnam war. Judge denied defense opportunity to propose acquittal based on moral justification to jury. Judge also denied jury instruction on Power of...
Buy the full version of these notes or essay plans and more in our Criminal Outlines.
Criminal outline lays out complex criminal law in easy-to-understand format. This outline is color coded, so that MPC sections and case law is easy to find on your exam day. Outline subjects include: basics, elements of culpability, homicide, rape, inchoate crimes, aiding and abetting, conspiracy, and defenses. There is a Model Penal Code key, a case guide key (with brief, one line descriptions of relevant cases), a short attack outline, and an outline for bar exam preparation (MBE & UBE). This p...
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