Sentencing Class @ OSU Moritz College of Law
A new home for an old class blog
recent posts
- Anyone have any distinct views on who Joe Biden should pick as US Attorney General?
- What data in the federal system would indicate the Biden Administration is drawing down the federal drug war?
- A final (too brief) foray into what metrics and data matter for assessing a sentencing system
- Reactions to our look behind the robes with federal sentencing judges?
- Are there any “offender characteristics” that you think must be considered at sentencing? If so, how?
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Category: Death penalty history
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After a final review of what we should take away from the McClesky ruling and our discussion of a possible legislative response, we will turn for our last week of death penalty discussion to the Supreme Court's Eighth Amendment jurisprudence placing categorical limits on what crimes cannot result in a capital sentence and what criminals…
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Though I provided in this post a working draft of a proposed "Ohio Racial and Gender Justice Act" (which I hope to discuss in class on Thursday), I now realize it makes sense to also provide here some recent data and discussion on how race seems to impact our capital justice systems. From the Death…
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As the casebook highlights, Kentucky in 1998 enacted the first statutory response to the McClesky ruling through its Kentucky Racial Justice Act. There has not been much litigation over the Kentucky RJA because that legislation was expressly made not retroactive so that it could not be applied to any person sentenced to death in Kentucky before July 1998. (In contrast,…
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As I mentioned in class, we can only briefly touch on so many interesting big and little issues relating to the death penalty in class that I would eagerly give more time and attention in this forum. Absent suggestions, I will share (and enhance) items from my inbox of interest. Today, this involves this great…
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One idea worth consideration as we explore theories of punishment is whether prison, which is our modern default punishment for all serious offenses, is really any good at advancing any of the traditional theoretical goals. When pressed on this front, advocates of prison and modern mass incarceration often claim that prison is at least good…
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On Friday, as discussed in this post over at my main blog, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decided to decline to exercise a form of extraordinary jurisdiction in order to avoid considering on the merits a challenge to the state's death penalty system. Among the many notable aspects of this story is who was arguing for…
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Next week, we will start the final part of our death penalty discussions by exploring the issue of race in the application of the death penalty. I (too briefly) mentioned in class some data on race and the death penalty, and I thought I would link to some resources related to this issue to get…
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are worth reading in full if you find constitutional history and/or death penalty procedure really interesting (and these are great topics for final papers). The full McGautha can be found here; reading just the majority opinion authored by Justice Harlan (which is only 1/4 of the whole thing) is encouraged, but not required, for having extra fun…
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we have lots of notable Ohio death penalty news. For starters, yesterday a Ohio judge officially imposed a sentence of death here in Columbus as reported in this local article. Here are some details (with a few "whos" highlighted): Clifton Duckson doesn’t know if the man who murdered his daughter and granddaughter in the backyard…
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I just noticed this lengthy new article from the Cincinnati Enquirer headlined "Why is a murder trial here so much more likely to end with a death sentence?". I recommend the piece in full, and here is some of the "who" coverage: Hamilton County has sent more people to death row and is responsible…
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Here is a list of (and links to) rulings by the Supreme Court declaring (or suggesting in the case of Tison v. Arizona) that the Eighth Amendment places substantive categorical limits on the application of the death penalty. Can you see a common thread or theme to these rulings? Crime: Rape: Coker v. Georgia,…
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As mentioned in class, there are many lessons to draw from our Unibomber capital sentencing exercise, so the start of our next class will be continuing our discussion of capital sentencing laws and their application in Florida, Texas and Ohio. One lesson we have already discussed in various ways in various settings is how many different…
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As I have repeatedly mentioned in class, we will be exploring in our next few classes how Florida, Texas and Ohio capital sentencing laws help guide jury death sentencing discretion for the Unibomber (and others). The essentials for preparation appear at pp. 252 to 257 of our text, though you also need to check out two Ohio statutory…
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are worth reading in full if you final constitutional history and/or death penalty procedure really interesting. The full McGautha can be found here; reading just the majority opinion authored by Justice Harlan (which is only 1/4 of the whole thing) is encouraged, but not required, for having extra fun throughout next week's discussion. The full Furman…
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One of my favorite documents in the history of US sentencing law and policy is this document authored by Thomas Jefferson in 1778 under the title "A Bill for Proportioning Crimes and Punishments in Cases Heretofore Capital." I recommend a read of the entire document (as well as this historical discussion of its backstory and its rejection by one…
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One of my all-time favorite documents in the history of US sentencing law and policy is this document authored by Thomas Jefferson in 1778 under the title "A Bill for Proportioning Crimes and Punishments in Cases Heretofore Capital." I recommend a read of the entire document (as well as this historical discussion of its backstory and its…
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I am sorry we did not have more time to allow Kevin Stanek, the Assistant Chief Counsel for Ohio Governor John Kasich, to complete his tales about Ohio's fulsome history with lethal injection litigation. But I trust you all got a flavor of some of the major themes I consider most important for our broader class's purposes:…
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can be found here. Reading just the majority opinion authored by Justice Harlan (which is only 1/4 of the whole thing) is encouraged, but not required, for having extra fun throughout next week's discussion. I also think everyone should at least get started reading Furman and Gregg and subsequent SCOTUS cases in chapter 3 of our…
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Conveniently, my week away proved to be a period in which some interesting local death penalty news and commentary emerged, as evidence by these two recent posts from my main blog: Former GOP Ohio Attorney General explains why he is convinced "the death penalty is just not worth it any more" Is Ohio again about…
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To paraphrase the most memorable line from the least memorable Godfather movie, just when I thought we could be done with our discussions of the death penalty and who sentences, the media and the US Supreme Court keep pulling us back in. Specifically, check out these recent notable posts from my main blog: SCOTUS finally…
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Though I am eager to start migrating our class discussions away from capital sentencing and punishment to non-capital sentencing and punishments, the notable death penalty news keeps coming. Specifically, check out these two recent posts from my main blog: Philadelphia DA sues Pennsylvania Gov asserting execution moratorium is "lawless" and "flagrantly unconstitutional" New Oregon Gov pledges…
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A helpful student alerted me to this notable accounting of mass shooting in 2014 in the United States. Though I will not vouch for all the data, I still think it is notable (and not all that surprising) that this internet accounting of mass shootings lists 283 mass shootings in the US (roughly 5 every week of the year), and yet…
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As mentioned in class, one class activity for the coming week(s) will be to work through how modern post-Furman capital punishment laws might get applied to the (in)famous Unibomber, Ted Kaczynski. (Ted is currently an LWOP resident at superman ADX Florence in Colorado and in the past was comically portrayed by Will Farrell). I will not…
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I am grateful for the 23 students who completed and submitted the class questionnaire, and I am eager to get completed surveys placed in my faculty from anyone who has not yet submitted the form before 2pm on Thursday. We will be sure to discuss some of the collective "results" in class, and I really…
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As I have mentioned, on Wednesday April 2, we will have the honor and pleasure of having Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, visit our class. For basic background on this renown jurist, check out his Wikipedia entry and/or this (dated) Unofficial Judge Alex Kozinski Site…
Sentencing Class @ OSU Moritz College of Law 