Innocence Commissions: Due Process Remedies and Protection for the Innocent

Currently the American criminal justice system has no institutional mechanism to evaluate the conviction of an innocent person. An innocence commission would fill this gap. The commission would automatically review any acknowledged case of wrongful conviction, whether the conviction was reversed on post-conviction DNA tests, or through development of new evidence of innocence. Upon review of these cases, the commission would recommend remedies to prevent such miscarriages of justice from happening again. This paper commences with a review of the primary areas of wrongful conviction, followed by recommendations made with respect to the substantive components constituting innocence commissions. To empirically demonstrate the fiscal soundness of creating an innocence commission, data was gathered pertaining to the state of Arizona. Statements from criminal justice professionals and politicians in support of innocence commissions conclude our discussion.     

Russian Public Policy Centers: Experience and Prospects

Russia today finds itself in the midst of systemic crisis. Among the most frightening aspects of this crisis are the criminalization of society and the lumpenization of the masses.     

量刑与定罪互动论:为了量刑公正可变换罪名

现行刑法理论中定罪与量刑的关系被扭曲了,刑法理论把准确定罪置于至高无上的地位,司法机关把大量精力耗费于准确判断罪名,定罪决定量刑、量刑不可能影响罪名成为刑法公理。但是,判断罪名意义上的定罪,并非刑法的目的;对被告人和社会最有意义的是量刑,判断罪名只是为公正量刑服务的;因此,如果常规判断的罪名会使量刑失当,就可以为了公正量刑而适度变换罪名。     

Sentencing Disparity and Sentencing Guidelines: the Case of China

Asian Journal of Criminology - This study investigates sentencing disparity under the sentencing guidelines in China. Drawing upon the firsthand data of 509 criminal cases from a county-level court...     

Lawlessness in the Federal Sentencing Process: A Test for Uniformity and Consistency in Sentence Outcomes

One of the important goals of the federal sentencing guidelines was to reduce inter‐judge disparity in sentencing. In this paper, we test the assumption that structuring discretion produced uniformity in federal sentencing and consistency in the process by which judges arrive at the appropriate sentence. We also examine whether background characteristics of judges affect the sentences they impose on similarly situated offenders. We used hierarchical linear modeling, nesting the offenders in the judges that sentenced them in order to examine the sentencing decisions of federal judges in three U.S. District Courts. While we found that significant variation between judges in sentencing is largely accounted for by our level 1 characteristics, we also found that judges arrive at decisions regarding the appropriate sentence in different ways, by attaching differential weights to several of the legally relevant case characteristics and legally irrelevant offender characteristics.     

A Meta-Analysis of Race and Sentencing Research: Explaining the Inconsistencies

Numerous studies have addressed the question: Are African-Americans treated more harshly than similarly situated whites? This research employs meta-analysis to synthesize this body of research. One-hundred-sixteen statistically independent contrasts were coded from 71 published and unpublished studies. Coded study and contextual features are used to explain variation in research findings. Analyses indicate that African-Americans generally are sentenced more harshly than whites; the magnitude of this race effect is statistically significant but small and highly variable. Larger estimates of unwarranted disparity are found in contrasts that examine drug offenses, imprisonment or discretionary decisions, do not pool cases from several smaller jurisdictions, utilize imprecise measures, or omit key variables. Yet, even when consideration is confined to those contrasts employing key controls and precise measures of key variables, unwarranted racial disparities persists. Further, a substantial proportion of variability in study results is explained by study factors, particularly methodological factors.     

量刑建议制度探析——以重庆市A区检察院量刑建议工作为调查分析样本

量刑建议制度在试行过程中逐渐暴露出定罪建议权限设置低于量刑建议权、量刑建议随起诉书移送导致出现因量刑理由变化影响量刑的准确性、量刑建议在庭审中提出的阶段缺乏统一规定等制度设计上的缺陷,以及面临量刑建议与法院判决存在一定偏差、量刑建议是否被采纳受法院内部标准和刑事政策变化的影响大、法院就低采纳量刑建议、量刑建议未完全纳入判决书等制度运行中的弊端。应当建立量刑建议听取辩护人和被害人意见的制度,取消量刑建议讨论程序,实行庭前证据开示,赋予公诉人在法庭上改变或者撤回量刑建议权,将量刑建议采纳情况作为抗诉依据,设置科学合理的量刑建议考核标准。     

Ritual and racism: A Social-Historical Analysis of the Crack Sentencing Guidelines

Through the lens of ritual theory, this essay considers the pseudo-religious dimension of white supremacy in the U.S. judicial and penal systems by performing a case study analysis of the federal crack sentencing guidelines. In contrast to previous works on the war on drugs, this essay provides a more integratedunderstanding of the relationship between racism and capitalism within these systems. It achieves this by assessing the ritualistic roles people play in reenacting long-standing cultural practices that have historically been employed as a mechanism for the social and economic control of blacks. With this approach,the key issue in understanding racism becomes one of highlighting the repetition of historic patterns instead of attempting to discern the individual intentions of lawmakers. Finally, this approach also points to the complex ways in which people from different races and classes can be ironicallybound together in support of racist policies and class hierarchies.     

量刑规范化问题研究——以西安市碑林区人民法院为例

量刑规范化改革是党中央确定的重大司法改革项目,也是人民法院＂三五改革纲要＂的重要内容。量刑规范化问题的研究,对于规范司法行为,统一法律适用标准,促进社会公平正义,提高人民法院公信力,树立司法权威都具有重大意义。量刑规范化就是要进一步规范法官审理刑事案件的刑罚裁量权,将量刑纳入法庭审理程序,增强量刑的公开性与透明度,统一法律适用标准,更好地贯彻落实宽严相济的刑事政策。     

Disproportional Imprisonment of Black and Hispanic Males: Sentencing Discretion,Processing Outcomes,and Policy Structures

Disproportional incarceration of black and Hispanic men has been the subject of much critical commentary and empirical inquiry. Such disproportionality may be due to greater involvement of minority men in serious crime, to discretionary decisions by local justice officials, or to the differential impact of sentencing policies, such as mandatory minimums or sentencing guidelines, that differentially impact minority men. This study investigated the extent to which the disproportional punishment of black and Hispanic men, and local variation in such disproportionality, can be attributed to unexplained disparities in local sentencing decisions, as opposed to the extent to which such differences are mediated by sentencing policies, or case-processing and extralegal factors. We use 2005–2009 federal court and Pennsylvania state court data. Our findings suggest, particularly in Federal courts, that most disproportionality is determined by processes prior to sentencing, especially sentencing policies that differentially impact minority males.     

Evaluating the Role of Race in Sentencing: An Entropy Weighting Analysis

The current study builds on prior research examining racial disparities in sentencing. Entropy weighting is introduced as a new method for estimating racial disparities that has several advantages over traditionally used methods. Entropy weighting is compared to regression and propensity score methods in estimating Black-White disparities in incarceration sentences. Although all methods find non-significant racial disparities in incarceration sentences, regression and propensity score methods underestimate disparities in incarceration sentence lengths. Entropy weighting provides comparable estimates to propensity score methods, but assures that the samples are identical on all covariates aside from race. The method offers researchers a useful and flexible approach for estimating racial disparities in criminal justice, and its use may lead to alternative conclusions about the size and presence of racial disparities in sentencing.     

Developing Contextualized Rationales for Sentencing in International Criminal Trials: A Plea for Empirical Research

The aim of this article is to illustrate how the pervading ideologyof retributivism has affected the norms and practice of sentencingin international criminal trials. It examines the nature andoperation of international sentencing law and procedure andthe parameters set for the exercise of discretionary power,suggesting how these militate against the development of moreconstructive rationales for punishment because of their continuedemphasis on principles of consistency and proportionality. Itis argued that the rationales for international sentencing needto engage more with the aspirations for justice of victims andpost-conflict societies. This would suggest a re-evaluationof punishment and a change in the sentencing practices of internationalcriminal tribunals. The article concludes that comparative contextualanalysis could provide important insights, which would be ofgreat assistance for international sentencing.     

论传统司法对量刑规范化的启示——以刑事被告与被害人的关系为视角

当前,量刑规范化的试点工作已在全国推开。科学确定各种常见量刑情节及其对基准刑的调节幅度,为最高法院补充、完善各种量刑情节的适用提供参考,是法学理论界和司法实务部门的重要责任。本文以刑事被告与被害人的关系为视角,从中国传统司法的成功经验中,梳理出三大原则,即亲属伦理原则、责任分配原则、补偿原则,发现其对合情合理合法地处理各类刑事案件,实现量刑公正,树立司法公信力,有着重要的指导意义,是祖先留给我们的遗产和智慧。对之进行创造性转化,于当代司法的进一步完善,必大有裨益。     

Race and Ethnicity Effects in Federal Sentencing: A Propensity Score Analysis

Research has examined the role of race and ethnicity in the punishment of offenders. Narrative and meta-analytic reviews have indicated that race/ethnicity influences key sentencing outcomes, at least under certain conditions. This research relies almost exclusively on regression-based analyses for determining race and ethnicity effects. While this technique is useful, recent statistical advances may provide more accurate race/ethnicity estimates. The current study employs propensity score analysis to compare punishment outcomes across White, Black, and Hispanic offenders sentenced in US federal courts during the years 2006 through 2008. Results suggest that (a) during the in/out decision the effect of minority status is frequently smaller than that estimated by regression modeling and (b) during the sentence length decision the effect of minority status is frequently larger than that estimated by regression modeling. Consequently, the modeling strategy may produce different conclusions regarding the presence of race- and ethnic-based disparity in sentencing outcomes.