Normalizing Extreme Imprisonment

Normalizing Extreme Imprisonment offers a new explanation for how penal reforms and those driving them can end up normalizing, in the sense of making the public view as acceptable, incredibly severe punitive practices. Since its introduction in 1978 as an alternative to the death penalty, there has been a dramatic increase and expansion of life without parole (LWOP) in the United States, including beyond the scope of capital crimes for which it was originally conceived. Despite this growth, limited attention has been given to this punishment and very few attempts made to narrow its scope or curtail its proliferation. Emerging scholarship suggests the punishment has been ‘normalized’, in part because of how some death penalty abolitionists have framed and used LWOP. Drawing upon a range of evidence and using the development of LWOP in the Californian death penalty context over 40 years as an example, this book significantly deepens and extends this claim to offer a new explanation for how extreme forms of imprisonment become normalized. To discuss the extent to which some opponents to the death penalty may have facilitated, participated in, or perhaps even animated the three main normalizing mechanisms (visibility, denial, and routinization), this book focuses on three sites where death penalty abolitionists have lobbied, campaigned, pled and settled, for LWOP, namely Congress, the broader political sphere, and courtrooms. The book then contrasts these representations of LWOP’s severity with prisoners’ lived experiences detailed in an exceptional set of 299 letters.

Individuals and Society

This chapter examines threats and responses to threats as they play themselves out in human interactions. One of the significant topics here is crime and punishment—notably, how criminal statutes seek to prevent crime by threatening criminals with punishment sufficient to provide an effective deterrent. There is a long and fascinating history of such efforts, with very little success. This leads to a look at the death penalty in particular and whether it has been effective in preventing capital crimes. The chapter also assesses how people turn to religion when under threat, as well as how religions have often threatened their adherents with after-death retribution for sin, which has long influenced much human anxiety and, in some cases, compliance. Moreover, the chapter reflects on the menace of death plus threats involved in the American gun culture, and race-based and economic anxieties driving the rise of right-wing national populism.

A Beautiful Life: High Risk–High Payoff in Genetic Science

This narrative is a personal view of adventures in genetic science and society that have blessed my life and career across five decades. The advances I enjoyed and the lessons I learned derive from educational training, substantial collaboration, and growing up in the genomics age. I parse the stories into six research disciplines my students, fellows, and colleagues have entered and, in some cases, made an important difference. The first is comparative genetics, where evolutionary inference is applied to genome organization, from building gene maps in the 1970s to building whole genome sequences today. The second area tracks the progression of molecular evolutionary advances and applications to resolve the hierarchical relationship among living species in the silence of prehistory. The third endeavor outlines the birth and maturation of genetic studies and application to species conservation. The fourth theme discusses how emerging viruses studied in a genomic sense opened our eyes to host–pathogen interaction and interdependence. The fifth research emphasis outlines the population genetic–based search and discovery of human restriction genes that influence the epidemiological outcome of abrupt outbreaks, notably HIV–AIDS and several cancers. Finally, the last arena explored illustrates how genetic individualization in human and animals has improved forensic evidence in capital crimes. Each discipline has intuitive and technological overlaps, and each has benefitted from the contribution of genetic and genomic principles I learned so long ago from Drosophila. The journey continues.

Rola biegłego w przeprowadzaniu oględzin w sprawach o zabójstwo

This article presents the role of an expert witness during an inspectionin capital crimes. An analysis was conducted of court and prosecutorial records which involved inspections in murder cases. The presentation is concentrated on doctrinal and judicial analyses from a detective and evidentialpoint of view in sequential stages of criminal proceedings

The Death Penalty in Malawi: An Assessment against Regional and International Human-rights Standards

Despite the global trend towards the abolition of the death penalty, Malawi has no plans to do so. However, the country is under an obligation to ensure that the use of the death penalty is restricted in line with regional and international human-rights law. A survey of the application of the death penalty in Malawi reveals that while there are some restrictions on its use, the law and practice are not fully aligned with the regional and international standards. This is particularly the case with the scope of capital crimes, the right to seek mercy and the death row phenomenon. Malawi needs to address these shortfalls and move progressively towards the abolition of the death penalty. The task of this article is to make known some findings on how Malawi fares in this regard. The paper first discusses the regional and international human rights standards for the death penalty then it considers the Malawian Constitution and the restrictions on the death penalty under Malawian law. It concludes with an assessment of the extent to which Malawi conforms to international law insofar as the death penalty is concerned.

Progress and Trend of the Reform of the Death Penalty in China

Death penalty reform is one of the most realistic major questions in the field of criminal law or even in the construction of rule of law in China. Basing itself on contemporary social, legal, and international contexts, Chinese death penalty reform pays equal attention to legislative reform and judicial reform, and stresses positive interactions between the change of public attitude and that of the legal system. Consequently, it has progressed quickly and made noticeable achievements. The overall developing trend of death penalty reform in China is to strictly limit and gradually reduce the use of the death penalty, with a view to finally abolishing the ultimate punishment. To achieve this goal, China should continue to impose strict restrictions on the scope of criminals eligible for the death penalty and reduce capital crimes, and use long-term imprisonments as an alternative to the ultimate punishment more actively than before.

A Critical Analysis of Life Imprisonment in Malawi

The abolition of the mandatory death penalty for murder in Malawi has attracted attention to life imprisonment as a possible punishment for capital crimes. This article considers the human rights challenges that life imprisonment in Malawi raises in view of the Bill of Rights and Malawi's international obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and other international and regional human rights instruments that prescribe various standards for punishment. The article argues that, in the absence of a clear statutory definition of life imprisonment and an inadequate release system, the application of life imprisonment in Malawi is inconsistent with the Bill of Rights and international standards on punishment.

Equal Justice for Irishmen and Other Foreigners

For a generation or two after 1776—perhaps longer—American nationality was not firmly established, nor was there a single “American” ethnicity. And the colonial legacy was broadly welcoming for European immigrants. So regardless of nationality, equality before the law became the policy of every state. But old ethnic and religious prejudices, reinforced by immigration from the British Isles, made equal treatment problematic. Irish immigrants, who stood out as Catholics and potential radicals, were targets of prejudice. But when they were tried for capital crimes like rape and murder, adherence to legal procedures—including talented defense counsel—blunted the effects of prejudice. Yet fear of Irish and other Atlantic immigrants led congressmen to debate the qualifications for naturalized citizenship. Representatives agreed new citizens must be white; but they argued over the length of their probation and whether they should pay for the privilege. In the Jefferson administration Congress settled on five years and minimal fees. Equal rights for white immigrants became the rule in law and largely in practice.