Criminal Justice

Manufacturing Racism?

by Wendy McElroy April 5, 2012

On February 26, a 17-year-old black youth named Trayvon Martin was walking at night in an area where he had every right to be. A self-appointed captain of the neighborhood watch named George Zimmerman found the unarmed Trayvon “suspicious” even though the youth was not engaged in criminal activity and none has since been alleged. Zimmerman tailed Trayvon, calling the ...

A Vanishing Miranda

by Wendy McElroy March 21, 2012

One of the few rights prisoners do not give up upon incarceration is that of due process. At least, this used to be the case. On February 20th, in Howes v. Fields, the United States Supreme Court ruled that prisoners do not have the right to be Mirandized even when being questioned about events outside the prison. For the ...

With Freedom and Justice for Some, Part 2

by Glenn Greenwald March 6, 2012

Part 1 | Part 2 Revealingly, the central function of the Constitution as law — the supreme law — was to impose limitations not on the behavior of ordinary citizens but on the federal government itself. The government, and those who ran it, were not placed outside the law, but expressly targeted by it. Indeed, the ...

With Freedom and Justice for Some, Part 1

by Glenn Greenwald February 2, 2012

Part 1 | Part 2 As a litigator who practiced for more than a decade in federal and state courts across the country, I’ve long been aware of the inequities that pervade the American justice system. The rich enjoy superior legal representation and therefore much better prospects for success in court than the poor. The powerful ...

The Long History of Entrapment Insanity

by James Bovard January 26, 2012

America has seen a profusion of entrapment schemes in recent years. Many of the most high-profile domestic-terrorism cases have been ginned up by FBI agents who preyed on persons who had little competence for creating perils on their own. The explosion in entrapment operations is partly the result of a profound shift in the type of abuses that courts ...

Police Nondisclosure Rises to a New Low

by Wendy McElroy January 13, 2012

KOMO News reports (Jan. 4) that the City of Seattle is taking an attorney to court because he requested public records. The legal tug-of-war that will almost certainly ensue has national importance, not only because the lawsuit sets a precedent, but also because it is part of the city’s resistance to a Department of Justice (DOJ) attempt to rein ...

Die in the Name of the Law

by Rich Schwartzman December 7, 2011

The story has become routine: another drug shooting. But it was not drug dealers shooting each other or hitting innocent bystanders during a drive-by, no. It was cops killing an innocent person during a raid that had no business taking place at all. The culprits were members of the Pima County Arizona sheriffs SWAT team. The victim was Jose Guerena ...

Criminalizing Your Internet Profile?

by Wendy McElroy November 23, 2011

The New American (15/11) states, The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is backing a controversial component of an existing computer fraud law that makes it a crime to use a fake name on Facebook or embellish your weight on an online dating profile such as eHarmony. The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), a 25-year-old law that mainly addresses ...

Prosecutors Gone Wild

by George Leef November 1, 2011

One Nation Under Arrest: How Crazy Laws, Rogue Prosecutors, and Activist Judges Threaten Your Liberty edited by Paul Rosenzweig and Brian W. Walsh (Washington, D.C.: Heritage Foundation, 2010); 268 pages. A good case can be made that the overcriminalization of the law is among America’s most serious national problems. True, America’s economic troubles are ...

The American Nightmare That Is Civil Asset Forfeiture

by Wendy McElroy October 18, 2011

Being innocent does not matter. Not being arrested or convicted of a crime is no protection. With amazing ease, the government can take everything you own. And to recover it, you must prove your innocence through an expensive and difficult court proceeding in which a severely lowered standard of evidence favors the government. This is civil asset forfeiture.

Freedom by Jury

by Rich Schwartzman September 2, 2011

We should be celebrating September 5 with at least as much exuberance and respect as we celebrate July 4 or Thanksgiving. It’s Jury Rights Day. Little is made of the date. Most people are completely unaware of its historic significance and have never heard that jurors have rights. Yet it was on that date in 1670 when a group of ...

Police-Thugs With Guns

by Wendy McElroy August 22, 2011

When police brutality cannot be covered up or dismissed by blaming the victim, the next official line is often the “bad apple” defense. The popular phrase “one bad apple can spoil the bunch” generally means that one person’s behavior can negatively reflect upon or influence others. When used defensively, however, the phrase “bad apple” is meant to suggest that ...