Epilogue

This epilogue, written after the 2020 elections and the inauguration of President Joe Biden, first looks at the refusal of former president Donald Trump to accept his electoral defeat and his incitement of his hard-core supporters to disrupt the counting of electoral votes in the Senate chamber of the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Their violent storming of the Capitol, resulting in five deaths, prompted the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives to impeach Trump for “incitement to insurrection.” However, only seven of fifty GOP senators joined all fifty Democrats to convict Trump, short of the required two-thirds majority of sixty-seven. One major consequence of Biden’s victory was his pledge, in a document entitled “Lift Every Voice: The Biden Plan for Black America,” to focus on “rooting out systemic racism” in American institutions. The epilogue then looks at the impact of Trump’s (and his followers) racism on two major social and political issues: the greater infection, hospitalization, and death rates of Blacks from the coronavirus pandemic, and racial justice and police reform after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in May 2020. Attempting to arrest Floyd, a forty-six-year-old Black man, for allegedly trying to pass a counterfeit $20 bill, Police Officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for almost ten minutes while he was handcuffed and prone on the street. The jury verdict in Chauvin’s murder trial, unknown at this writing, will play a significant role in determining how Americans will support, or oppose, programs and policies to “root out systemic racism,” as President Biden has pledged to combat. The reign of White Men’s Law must end.

Hung out to dry? Questioning the legality of Southland baby-farmer Minnie Dean's 1895 murder trial and execution

<p>In 1895 Minnie Dean became the only New Zealand woman to receive the death penalty. In the Invercargill Supreme Court she was found guilty of the murder of Dorothy Edith Carter, a child Minnie had recently adopted, who was found buried in her garden alongside two other infants. Branded a vindictive baby-farmer, Minnie Dean was widely condemned by the New Zealand press and public during the four months between her arrest and execution. This paper will assess whether, amongst the mania, Minnie was afforded a fair criminal trial and sentencing. It will be argued that while Minnie’s fate was largely predetermined from the moment of her arrest, against 1895 legal standards, correct criminal procedure was generally followed. Despite this, when comparing her trial and sentencing with contemporaneous murder trials, it is evident that Minnie Dean received no procedural clemency.</p>

Hung out to dry? Questioning the legality of Southland baby-farmer Minnie Dean's 1895 murder trial and execution

<p>In 1895 Minnie Dean became the only New Zealand woman to receive the death penalty. In the Invercargill Supreme Court she was found guilty of the murder of Dorothy Edith Carter, a child Minnie had recently adopted, who was found buried in her garden alongside two other infants. Branded a vindictive baby-farmer, Minnie Dean was widely condemned by the New Zealand press and public during the four months between her arrest and execution. This paper will assess whether, amongst the mania, Minnie was afforded a fair criminal trial and sentencing. It will be argued that while Minnie’s fate was largely predetermined from the moment of her arrest, against 1895 legal standards, correct criminal procedure was generally followed. Despite this, when comparing her trial and sentencing with contemporaneous murder trials, it is evident that Minnie Dean received no procedural clemency.</p>

Battling Bias: Can Two Implicit Bias Remedies Reduce Juror Racial Bias?

Two studies examined the effectiveness of two implicit bias remedies at reducing racial bias in Black and White mock-jurors’ decisions. Participants were recruited through a Qualtrics Panel Project. Study 1 (murder trial; N = 554): Mage = 46.53; 49.1% female; 50% Black; 50.0% White. Study 2 (battery trial; N = 539): Mage = 46.46; 50.5% female; 49.5% Black; 50.5% White. Half of the participants viewed the UBJ video. Then participants read pretrial instructions (general or UBJ), trial summary, posttrial instructions (general or UBJ), and completed measures. Mock-juror race was expected to moderate the effect of defendant race (Black vs. White) on verdicts, sentences, culpability, and credibility, with jurors being more lenient toward same-race defendants. This interaction would be moderated by the unconscious bias juror (UBJ) video and instructions, reducing bias for White jurors only. Mock-jurors’ counterfactual endorsements would mediate race effects on verdicts. In Study 1, juror race moderated the effect of defendant race on verdicts, culpability, and credibility—White, but not Black, jurors demonstrated greater leniency for Black versus White defendants. The UBJ video moderated the effect of defendant race on murder counterfactual endorsement—when the video was present defendant race did not significantly affect endorsement. This endorsement mediated the effect of defendant race on White jurors’ verdicts. In Study 2, juror race influenced verdicts and sentences—White jurors were more lenient regardless of defendant race. The effect of juror race on sentence was qualified by the UBJ video—when present the effect of race was no longer significant. The UBJ remedies increased all mock jurors’ defendant credibility ratings. In conclusion, the debiasing interventions were ineffective in reducing racial bias in jurors’ verdicts. However, they do impact aspects of juror attribution and may be effective with modification.

The Interactive Effects of Race and Expert Testimony on Jurors’ Perceptions of Recanted Confessions

We examined the effect of defendant race and expert testimony on jurors’ perceptions of recanted confessions. Participants (591 jury-eligible community members) read a first-degree murder trial transcript in which defendant race (Black/White) and expert testimony (present/absent) were manipulated. They provided verdicts and answered questions regarding the confession and expert testimony. When examining the full sample, we observed no significant main effects or interactions of defendant race or expert testimony. When exclusively examining White participants, we observed a significant interaction between expert testimony and defendant race on verdicts. When the defendant was White, there was no significant effect of expert testimony, but when the defendant was Black, jurors were significantly more likely to acquit when given expert testimony. These findings support the watchdog hypothesis, such that White jurors are more receptive to legally relevant evidence when the defendant is Black.

Jane Addams

Jane Addams (b. 1860–d. 1935) is considered one of the founding figures in American pragmatist philosophy, social work, and sociology. The daughter of a prominent American politician from Illinois, Addams grew up in a privileged environment that included graduating from college, an opportunity not afforded the majority of women at the time. Addams cofounded one of the earliest social settlements of the Progressive Era, Hull House in Chicago. The settlement began with an unfocused commitment to social amelioration and would evolve into a dynamo social projects. Living there for the remaining nearly fifty years of her life amid one of the most significant migrant influxes that the United States has known, Addams led a community of mostly women who pioneered improving community welfare in education, recreation, labor, sanitation, health, criminal justice, and the arts. An accomplished writer and speaker, Addams engaged the public through academic articles, popular articles, books, and speeches amid her community activism. She would become a friend and colleague of John Dewey, William James, and George Herbert Mead, influencing them as much as they did her. A dominant theme of her work is the idea that democracy is more than a system of government and entails a moral way of being with one another. Addams’s first book was Democracy and Social Ethics (1902), and the title reveals her abiding belief that democracy was a social morality that is in ongoing need of enrichment. A relational social democracy underpins Addams’s social analysis. Her writings address various social and political subjects, including education, peace, labor organizing, child labor laws, race, women’s rights, philanthropy, sex trafficking, and familial relations. Internationally, Addams is best known for her work on peace. She was the first American woman to receive a Nobel Peace Prize, in 1931. Able to adapt her message to audience and context, Addams also wrote about events such as the Pullman Strike of 1894 and the murder trial of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti during the 1920s, as well as about people such as Abraham Lincoln, Leo Tolstoy, and Julia Lathrop. In the spirit of American pragmatism, Addams would draw more prominent social themes from individual experiences she confronted, as she did in finding psychosocial forces at work in the proliferation of “Devil Baby” stories among immigrant populations in the summer of 1916. Consistently recognized for her outstanding activism, her intellectual work was overshadowed by prominent male figures during most of the 20th century. However, a reclamation of Addams’s unique contribution began in the 1990s, and in the 2020s, Addams studies are growing as more scholars find inspiration in her methods and writings.

Murder trial will strengthen Burkinabe president

Headline BURKINA FASO: Murder trial will strengthen president

Trial by Tabloid: Can Implicit Bias Education Reduce Pretrial Publicity Bias?

The Western District of Washington recently developed an educational video to reduce jurors’ implicit biases. Little is known regarding the effectiveness of this proposed remedy to address a range of implicit biases. This study tested whether this educational video reduces pretrial publicity (PTP) bias. A total of 330 undergraduate participants were randomly assigned to read PTP or unrelated articles. An average of 9 days later, they were randomly assigned to watch the educational video prior to viewing a murder trial. Those exposed to PTP were more likely to convict and found the defendant more culpable and less credible. The educational video did not reduce PTP bias. A more tailored debiasing strategy may be needed to overcome the biasing effects of PTP. Differences in legal decisions also emerged depending on whether participants completed the second phase in-person or online, which has implications for future data collection modes.

Exploring the use of systematic and heuristic processing in the courtroom: the effect of evidence modality on jurors’ decision-making processes

The use of technology in the courtroom is increasingly commonplace. While some research has explored how technology may influence jurors throughout the trial itself, there has been little focus on how it might influence jurors during the deliberation period, or whether it affects their verdicts. The current study assessed whether the form of evidence available during the decision-making period, along with the mock juror’s level of motivation for the task, affects how trial information is processed and how verdict decisions are made. Mock-jurors (N = 243), half of whom were explicitly informed of the task’s importance, watched a video of a murder trial. During the decision-making phase, some jurors were then given the opportunity to review the trial video, transcript, or both before rendering a final verdict. While there were no differences in verdicts as a function of review condition, the amount of content mock-jurors reviewed differed by review condition.

Technology On Trial: Facilitative And Prejudicial Effects Of Computer-Generated Animations On Jurors' Legal Judgments

The recent emergence of electronic courtrooms (i.e., courtrooms that are equipped with advanced digital technologies) has generated novel ways to present evidence to jurors. Computer-generated animations, which recreate or illustrate the alleged sequence of events in a crime, are increasingly being used by lawyers to present testimonial evidence to jurors. The current study used a 3 (modality: oral vs. static visual vs. animation) x 2 (congruence: incongruent vs. congruent) between-subjects design to investigate whether presentation modality and evidence congruence affect jurors’ ability to properly evaluate evidence and render ‘accurate’ verdicts. In a laboratory setting, mock jurors (N = 238) read a transcript from a fictitious second-degree murder trial. Participants read testimony from eight witnesses, and heard the oral testimony of the defendant with a static visual aid, a computer-generated animation, or no visual aid. Results demonstrated that mock jurors were more likely to acquit the defendant when his testimony was illustrated with a computer-generated animation compared to a static visual aid or with no additional aid. Research in this area can inform the development of evidentiary regulations which adequately govern the admissibility of computer-generated animations in the courtroom, so as ensure that they are used in a way that maintains a defendant’s right to a fair trial. Keywords: computer-generated evidence, computer animations, legal decision-making, information processing, electronic courtrooms