Rule of Law, Federal Courts, Constitutional Law
The American version of judicial review stands alone — and almost never stood at all If Chief Justice John Marshall could have been transported on Dr. Who’s “Tardis” back to […]
Rule of Law, Federal Courts
Courts and Congress are, at times, engaged in a kind of ongoing “conversation” about statutory law. Congress has exclusive power to enact statutes — but when statutory language is unclear, […]
Court Administration, Federal Courts
by Francis McGovern, Elizabeth Burch and William Rubenstein
Spring 2020 | Volume 104 Number 1Growing dockets have long been the mother of judicial invention. In 1968, Congress created the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation and authorized it to create multidistrict litigations (or MDLs) to […]
Court Administration, State Courts
Fellow judges, I highly recommend keeping a diary of your daily adventures in the courthouse. It would be hard to make up stories that are better than the reality of […]
Law & Technology, State Courts, Federal Courts, Criminal Law
Eyewitness evidence, in which a witness visually identifies the culprit, is a staple of criminal investigations. But its fallibility is notorious. As the National Academy of Sciences explained in an […]
Court Administration, State Courts, Federal Courts, Criminal Law
Increasing research shows that eyewitness confidence at the time of the initial identification can be a strong predictor of accuracy under appropriate lineup identification conditions.1 In such conditions, police show […]
Court Administration, State Courts, Federal Courts, Criminal Law
In 2016, the Third Circuit sat en banc to hear the case of Commonwealth v. Dennis.1 Little did the court realize the sustained impact this single appeal would have on […]
Law & Technology, State Courts, Federal Courts, Criminal Law
by Thomas D. Albright and Jed S. Rakoff
Spring 2020 | Volume 104 Number 1Six years ago, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) convened a panel of experts to consider the problem of eyewitness identification. Eyewitnesses have long played a significant role in […]
Court Administration, Law & Technology, State Courts, Federal Courts, Criminal Law
by Brandon Garrett and John Monahan
Summer 2019 | Volume 103 Number 2Judges are using risk assessment instruments in criminal cases more than ever before. Their role is increasingly prominent at all stages of the criminal justice system, including policing, pretrial detention, […]
Criminal Law
Here is a forensic-science test for you. Please answer each of the three questions below True or False. Scientific tests conducted over the past 100 years have repeatedly demonstrated that […]
