The Supreme Court this morning handed down a short opinion in Barnes v. Felix, No. 23–1239 (S. Ct. May 15, 2025) (available here). The unanimous ruling, authored by Justice Kagan for the Court, breaks no new ground, but
Criminal
Notable reporting on the new "wild west" of clemency in Prez Trump's second term
In this post around Thanksgiving last year at the Sentencing Matters Substack, I made the case for chief executives to make more and more regular use of their clemency powers. And I had this musing in that commentary: “I…
Menendez brothers resentenced by California judge to 50 years to life, making them parole eligible
As reported in this Los Angeles Times article, “Erik and Lyle Menendez received a chance at freedom Tuesday after more than 35 years in prison, with an L.A. County judge granting a request to resentence them after hours of…
Buddy System Gone Awry In Encinitas
As Eugene Volokh explains, it may violate the First Amendment. But why, one has to wonder, would the Encinitas Union School District believe treading along, and over, the line of constitutionally protected speech and expression was so important that…
The latest (and still limited) discussions of the great crime decline circa 2025
Tuesday Talk*: Are There Trump Judges And Biden Judges?
In a curious lapse from her attacks on the conservative wing of the Supreme Court, Linda Greenhouse raises an interesting question. Should reporting about federal judges include the president who nominated them?
Back when I was a reporter covering the…
"Confronting Uncharged Conduct"
The title of this post is the title of this new article available via SSRN and authored by Barnett Harris and Christopher Merken. Here is its abstract:
Every year, federal judges sentence tens of thousands of criminal defendants to carceral…
Latest data on death rows in US (at roughly start of second Trump Administration)
Via this post by Robert Dunham at The DP3 Substack, I see that the Legal Defense Fund has released its latest accounting of persons on death rows in the US, Death Row USA, Spring 2025. The LDF document, which…
"The Nuances of Prosecutorial Nonenforcement"
The title of this post is the title of this new article authored by Carissa Byrne Hessick and Meighan Parsh now available via SSRN. Here is its abstract:
The academic literature on prosecutors is divided: Some commentors believe that prosecutors…
Could Prez Trump's new EO on overcriminalization prompt the US Sentencing Commission to review strict liability guideline enhancements?
As flagged in this post, just a couple of days before he left the Oval Office back in 2021, Prez Trump issued an exective order titled “Executive Order on Protecting Americans From Overcriminalization Through Regulatory Reform.” I am pretty…