On November 14, 2013, Professor Dervan was called to testify before the United States House of Representatives' Committee on the Judiciary Over-Criminalization Task Force. Available here is his written testimony. In his written testimony, Professor Dervan examines the phenomenon of...

Our criminal codes are replete with “dead crimes”—i.e., crimes that are openly violated, have long gone unenforced, and no longer reflect majoritarian views. For example, many states still criminalize conduct as commonplace as engaging in certain innocuous behavior on Sundays, swearing,...

“Not guilty” — these two simple words elicit intense relief from any defendant at the conclusion of a criminal trial. As one harrowing ordeal ends, however, a new one inevitably takes shape: picking up the pieces of a life shattered physically, emotionally, and, for non-indigent...

This study reports the results of a survey of students in a Mexican university who were asked to rate the seriousness of 75 crimes on a scale of 1 to 100. Results are reported overall as well as by gender. In 46 of 75 cases, the male and female mean scores were not significantly different. In...

The long history of suicide as a criminal offence still has a significant contemporary effect on how it is perceived, conceptualised and adjudged. This is particularly the case within countries where suicide is largely determined within a coronial system, such as Australia, the UK and the US....

The increasingly popular practice of pre-employment checking for criminal convictions is an issue of concern given the large number of individuals who have some form of criminal record. This article provides an overview and comparison of Australian and New Zealand anti-discrimination, privacy...

Many regard the 2010–2012 Massachusetts Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI)Reform as a national model to improve ex-offenders' labor market outcomes. This reform prohibits most employers from inquiring about an individual's criminal history on the initial job application (the “ban...

This paper examines how changes in employers' access to job applicants' criminal histories affect ex-offender recidivism. We use extensive state administrative data on individual criminal histories spanning the 2010–2012 Massachusetts Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) Reform, widely...