HIV-positive person who did not disclose status convicted of attempted aggravated assault

On 18 September 2003, the Supreme Court of Canada released its unanimous decision in Williams. This is the first case on the issue of criminal liability for HIV exposure decided by the court since its 1998 decision in the Cuerrier case. Williams raised the issue of whether persons with HIV who have unprotected sexual intercourse without disclosing their status to a sexual partner who might already have been infected with the virus, can be convicted of aggravated assault or attempted aggravated assault. The Supreme Court decided that only a charge of attempted aggravated assault could stand. The decision is also significant because the Supreme Court's comments on two ancillary issues may lead to a significant extension of the criminal law related to HIV transmission or exposure.     

Taxi passenger accidentally stuck by syringe awarded $15,000

In January 2003, a British Columbia Supreme Court judge awarded $15,000 for mental anguish to a woman who was stuck by a syringe found in the back of a taxicab. In assessing the damages, the Court took into account the woman's possible exposure to HIV and the reasonableness of her belief that she was at risk of seroconverting.     

Punishment or treatment?

Although there is strong support among the general public for providing insanity acquittees with mental health treatment, it is also believed that insanity acquittees should be punished when they break the law. Prior studies of the lengths of confinement of insanity acquittees have yielded inconsistent results. This article draws upon a large-scale, multistate study of insanity pleas to explore the question: Is society able to withhold punishment against persons acquitted of criminal charges due to insanity? Results indicate that offense seriousness is a more important factor than mental disorder in determining the lengths of confinement of persons foundNot Guilty by Reason of Insanity and that persons found guilty are more likely to be released without ever having been confined than persons acquited by reason of insanity. Implications for invoking offense seriousness as a primary criterion in assessments of dangerousness are discussed.     

奸淫幼女构成犯罪应以明知为前提 --为一个司法解释辩护

在严格责任与罪过责任分立的基础上,奸淫幼女构成犯罪必须以明知为前提,这样才能在保护幼女和保护被告人的合法权益之间求得一种法治视野下的平衡.应当摈弃"应当知道"的传统提法,而把奸淫幼女的明知分为确切知道和推定知道两种.从最高法院关于奸淫幼女问题的司法解释出发,我国现行的刑事司法解释体制及其形式应该逐渐由抽象的司法解释过渡到个案性质的司法解释,再进一步过渡到判例制度.     

刑事訴訟法三人談: 認罪認罰從寬制度中的刑事辯護

2019年10月24日,最高人民檢察院聯合最高人民法院、公安部、國家安全部、司法部共同發佈《關於適用認罪認罰從寬制度的指導意見》,對認罪認罰從寬制度的適用作出具體規定,確保這一制度正確有效實施.認罪認罰從寬制度是刑事訴訟法修改後確立的一項重要制度,通過對認罪認罰的犯罪嫌疑人、被告人依法給予程序上從簡或者實體上從寬的處理,實現有效懲治犯罪、強化人權司法保障、提升訴訟效率等目的.     

Supreme Court of Canada's “Beautiful Mind” case

The Supreme Court of Canada's (SCC) first case involving capacity and the refusal of involuntary psychiatric treatment involved a self described “professor” who had been referred to as “Canada's Beautiful Mind”. He had been found not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder for uttering death threats. While considered incapable of making a treatment decision by psychiatrists and a review board, three levels of court, including the SCC, found him to be capable. “Professor” Starson therefore continued to refuse treatment for his psychosis and spent over seven years detained because he refused the treatment required to become well enough to be released. This refusal of treatment is permitted under Ontario law, although it is not permitted in some other Canadian provinces, and in many other countries.This article describes Starson's situation, Ontario's law with respect to consent to treatment and relevant Canadian constitutional and criminal law. It provides an analysis of the Consent and Capacity Board decision and the court appeals. Implications from Starson's case are analyzed in relation to what happened to Starson, human rights and comparative law pertaining to involuntary patients' refusal of treatment, especially their relevance to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and laws in some other countries. Many Canadian and foreign jurisdictions where laws apparently accord with human rights codes do not allow a person to refuse the treatment required to restore their liberty. We conclude that a law that allows a person with a mental illness to be incarcerated indefinitely in a “hospital” because needed psychiatric treatment cannot, by law, be provided is not justifiable in a caring democratic jurisdiction.     

From Hyderabad to Harvard: how US law schools make it worthwhile to clerk on India's Supreme Court

Since the 1990s, judges of the Supreme Court of India have hired law clerks to help them perform some of their routine tasks. However, while clerkships on the U.S. Supreme Court are considered very prestigious and are extensively written about, clerkships on India's Supreme Court are considered to be of significantly lower value by the local legal profession and teaching market in India. Instead, ironically, clerkships on the Supreme Court of India are often pursued by students interested in getting an advanced law degree (usually an LL.M.) at a U.S. law school. Relying on interviews conducted with law clerks and interns who have served on the Supreme Court of India, and using India as a case study, this paper argues that ambitious Indian law students are adopting strategies to “Americanize” themselves in order to culturally arbitrage U.S. law schools' misunderstandings of the global legal profession.     

Short-term outcomes for offenders with mental illness released from incarceration

Using data on 247 offenders with mental illness, this analysis seeks to identify characteristics that distinguish those who are returned to prison or a psychiatric hospital with those who remain in the community. Sociodemographic, mental health, criminal history, and service variables are compared across a range of outcome categories with a focus on those reinstitutionalized and those reincarcerated. Those returning to institutions have somewhat different mental health service and criminal justice histories than the engaged/community group. In particular, the group that is reincarcerated is more likely released from misdemeanor sentences, and the group being released from felony sentences is more likely to be found in a psychiatric hospital after release from correctional custody. These findings have implications regarding the cumulative effects of engagement with the criminal justice system and the process through which persons with mental illness and a criminal history cycle through institutions.     

Making sense of the case law on Ombudsman schemes

This article analyses the case law on ombudsman schemes in the UK, with the purpose of identifying some of the key trends that underpin this branch of law pre-the first Supreme Court decision in this area, JR55 v Northern Ireland Commissioner for Complaints. While the law on ombudsman schemes remains based on legislation and the various grounds of administrative law available in judicial review, distinct bespoke principles have also been relied upon. These principles are beginning to provide consistent guidance on how the law should be used and interpreted in cases involving an ombudsman scheme. One task of the Supreme Court in JR55 will be to confirm these principles, or rationalize any departure from them.     

Problems surrounding release of persons found not guilty by reason of insanity.

The problem of release from institutionalization of those not guilty by reason of insanity is a most troublesome one. Psychiatric criteria for release are to be balanced by what judges see as the needs and protection of society. In 1972, New Jersey in the Maik decision adopted an extremely stringent rule which, if strictly followed, would condemn most NGIs to life imprisonment. Judge Weintraub's demand for assurance that the underlying or latent condition was no longer present put psychiatric examiners in an untenable position. The psychiatrists of the state took the unusual step of preparing a critique of the Supreme Court decision and distributing it to the legal profession through a law periodical. In the interim, the inequities of the Maik rule were recognized and an evolutionary set of standards laid down in the Carter case which provides some flexibility and set standards for conditional release. This clarification will undoubtedly be of great assistance to both courts and psychiatrists in dealing with a complex issue which can never have simple guidelines.     

The Heathrow Case in the Supreme Court: Climate Change Legislation and Administrative Adjudication

In R (on the application of Friends of the Earth Ltd and others) v Heathrow Airport Ltd the UK Supreme Court allowed an appeal against the Court of Appeal's decision that there had been a series of legal errors in the designation of the Airport National Policy Statement. This case note analyses the case from an ‘internal’ doctrinal perspective and argues that the Supreme Court could have engaged more explicitly with the legal issues that arise from climate change legislation for administrative law adjudication. For courts to adjudicate well in such circumstances they need to be prepared to develop administrative law doctrine, particularly in light of the issues of integrating climate change into public decision-making and of scientific/policy uncertainty which lie in the background of climate change legislation.     

The supreme court and police practices: The unusually busy 2003–2004 term

The 2003–2004 term of the Supreme Court was the most important term of the Court for the law enforcement community in the last decade. The Court decided 11 cases dealing with issues concerning actions taken by police officers, the largest number of “police practices” cases decided by the Court in the last nine years. In addition, several of these cases are among the most important of the 49 police practices cases decided during this time period. The Court: 1) upheld the arrest of all the occupants of a car when drugs are found in it; 2) permitted police roadblocks seeking information from the public in certain circumstances; 3) refused to suppress physical evidence obtained from Miranda violations; 4) expanded the availability of warrantless car searches incident to arrest to include arrests of recent occupants of the car; and 5) upheld statutes requiring persons stopped on reasonable suspicion to identify themselves.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">United States v Stevens</Emphasis>: Gnawing Away at Freedom of Speech or Paving the Way for Animal Rights?

This article examines United States v. Stevens, a case recently decided by the Supreme Court, and its relation to animal law and freedom of speech issues, specifically the contention between the two, caused by the statute in question at the heart of the case. While animal rights advocates wish to frame the case through an anti-animal cruelty perspective, those seeking to protect freedom of speech have made the statute an issue of First Amendment rights. Is 18 USC § 48 an imposition on free speech or a step in the right direction towards protection of animals and promotion of their rights? It is argued here that the Supreme Court should have recognized the Stevens case as an important development in animal rights and held that the statute is narrowly tailored, based on a compelling government interest, and that the protection of animals from harm overshadows any possible speech or expression that is found in crush videos, dog fighting videos, and the like.     

Rights-based mental health legislation and the right to be treated

Following the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Persons with Mental Illness (1991), the Australian Government released the National Mental Health Policy in 1992. Pointedly, the Report of the National Inquiry into the Rights of People with a Mental Illness in 1993 was critical of the failure of a number of Australian jurisdictions to adequately protect the rights of people with mental illness. A subsequent critique of the capacity of mental health law and policy to respond to current and future challenges of community-based care suggested that while Australian legislation and policies may pass human rights scrutiny in principle, there was insufficient focus on the monitoring processes to ensure implementation and adherence to those measures. The new Commonwealth Attorney-General has foreshadowed the development of a Charter of Rights to create a framework for legislators and regulators when drafting legislation to cover "aspirations" such as the recognition of fundamental human rights. However, it is argued that the dilemma of how best to care for and protect those afflicted with mental illness as well as the public who may be affected by violence or offending by those persons with untreated mental illness, will not be resolved by resort to a didactic Charter of Rights, however idealistic or well intentioned.     

Court Order No. 3, USSR Supreme Court Plenum,March 18, 1963

Having heard and discussed the reports of the Chairman of the RSFSR Supreme Court, Comrade L. N. Smirnov, the Chairman of the Lithuanian Supreme Court, Comrade A. L. Likas, and the Chairman of the Criminal College of the USSR Supreme Court, Comrade G. Z. Anashkin, on the fulfillment by the judiciary of the USSR Supreme Court Plenum's Order No. 6 of September 12, 1961, and having examined materials summarizing the practice of the courts in cases involving antisocial parasitic elements, the Plenum of the USSR Supreme Court takes note that the judiciary of the RSFSR, Lithuania and other union republics have recently somewhat improved their consideration of such cases, and have begun to apply more correctly the legislation on intensifying the struggle against persons refraining from socially useful labor and engaging in an antisocial and parasitic way of life.     

Bus interdiction efforts by the police:<Emphasis Type="Italic">United States v. Drayton</Emphasis>

The Supreme Court recently addressed the constitutionality of police interdiction efforts when conducting bus sweeps. The Court held that law enforcement officers are not required by the Fourth Amendment to “advise bus passengers of their right not to cooperate and to refuse consent to searches” (U.S. v. Drayton, 2002, p. 2107). The decision may have implications for how the judicial branch will balance the needs of law enforcement against citizen freedoms in the post-September 11th era. This article explores the surrounding legal issues, the case opinion, and policy implications of this case.     

RACE,ETHNICITY, THREAT AND THE LABELING OF CONVICTED FELONS*

Florida law allows judges to withhold adjudication of guilt for persons who have either pled guilty or been found guilty of a felony. This provision may apply only to persons who will be sentenced to probation, and it allows such individuals to retain all civil rights and to truthfully assert they had not been convicted of a felony. This paper examines the effects of race and Hispanic ethnicity on the withholding of adjudication for 91,477 males sentenced to probation in Florida between 1999 and 2002. Hierarchical Generalized Linear Modeling is used to assess the direct effects of defendant attributes as well as the cross‐level interactions between race, ethnicity and community level indicators of threat, such as percentage black and Hispanic and concentrated disadvantage. Our results show that Hispanics and blacks are significantly less likely to have adjudication withheld when other individual and community level factors are controlled. This effect is especially pronounced for blacks and for drug offenders. Cross‐level interactions show that concentrated disadvantage has a substantial effect on the adjudication withheld outcome for both black and Hispanic defendants. The implications of these results for the conceptualization of racial/ethnic threat at the individual, situational and social levels are discussed.     

Gardner; Re BWV: resolved and unresolved issues at end of life

The Medical Treatment Act 1988 (Vic) gives statutory recognition to a patient's (or their agent or guardian if incompetent) right to refuse medical treatment. The case of Gardner; Re BWV confirmed that medical treatment as defined under the Act included artificial nutrition and hydration and as such could be withdrawn, notwithstanding that this would result in the patient's death. This article analyses Gardner; Re BWV and argues that, by deliberately dealing narrowly with the issues at hand, both the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal at first instance and the Victorian Supreme Court knowingly left BWV to die from dehydration over a period of weeks. By not addressing these issues, the tribunal, and more particularly the Supreme Court, lost an opportunity for a reform of the law, so urgently needed at end of life, which would have allowed for "mercy killing", thus sparing BWV and her family the lingering death she was given.     

司法能动性何以实现?——以最高人民法院司法解释为分析基础

司法过程中法官在法律适用中的自由裁量权体现了司法能动性.我国主要是由最高人民法院发布大量抽象性司法解释的方式来指引法官在个案审理中的法律适用,这种司法能动性的行使方式在理论界和实务界引发了一定的争议.我们应当客观地看待我国最高法院的司法解释权,而在未来的发展中,我国应当在纯化现有司法解释体制和审级制度改革的基础上,辅以判例,并逐步扩大法官在个案审理中的法律解释权.