Robinson supports the proposed "purposes" text of the New American Law Institute Report on Sentencing Reform but argues that in practice it will not mean what traditional utilitarians, like those supporting "limiting retributivism," are expecting. First, the proposed text allows reliance upon...

Does criminal law deter? Given available behavioral science data, the short answer is: generally, no. Having a criminal justice system that imposes liability and punishment for violations deters.1 Allocation of police resources or the use of enforcement methods that dramatically increase the...

This conference and symposium are important for their ability to make better known the great benefits in the use of restorative processes. Below I try to summarize some of the many promising achievements of those processes, by which I mean to include such practices as victim-offender mediation,...

This conference and symposium are important for their ability to make better known the great benefits in the use of restorative processes. Below I try to summarize some of the many promising achievements of those processes, by which I mean to include such practices as victim-offender mediation,...

The victims' rights movement has come into increasing influence in setting criminal justice policy. What can be said about where its influence should be heeded, and where it should not? With regard to substantive criminal law in particular, should the victims' rights movement have influence over...

Criminal legal codes draw clear lines between permissible and illegal conduct, and the criminal justice system counts on people knowing these lines and governing their conduct accordingly. This is the "ex ante" function of the law; lines are drawn, and because citizens fear punishments or...

Laypersons have traditionally thought of the criminal justice system as being in the business of doing justice: punishing offenders for the crimes they commit. [FN1] Yet during the past several decades, the justice system's focus has shifted from punishing past crimes to preventing future...

Mens Rea, or "guilty mind," marks a central distinguishing feature of criminal law. An injury caused without mens rea might be grounds for civil liability but typically not for criminal. Criminal liability requires not only causing a prohibited harm or evil -- the "actus reus" of an offense --...

Because they track the Model Penal Code, current criminal law formulations of risk offenses typically fail to distinguish the rule of conduct question - What risks does the criminal law prohibit? - from the adjudication question - When is a particular violator's conscious disregard of, or his...

The criminal justice system has traditionally been seen as in the business of doing justice: punishing offenders for crimes committed. Yet, the past decade has brought a shift from punishing past crimes to preventing future crimes through the incarceration and control of dangerous offenders....