Featured Stories
Federal judge requires prosecution, defense, probation to address collateral consequences at sentencing
May 25, 2016 - Judge Block of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York issued… [more]


Vaclav Havel: “Hope is a state of mind …”
Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Either we have hope or we don't; it is a dimension of the… [more]


Stephen Bright wins again
Atlanta magazine reports here on Stephen Bright's victory in Foster v. Chatman, which is Mr. Bright's… [more]


Criminal Defense Posts
Fordham Law Appellate Litigation Clinic wins Fourth Amendment case in Second Circuit
September 11, 2016 By Actus Reus Leave a Comment
Students from the Fordham Appellate Litigation Clinic, supervised by Professor Ian Weinstein, recently prevailed on behalf of a client in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. After their client, Damian Cunningham, was convicted of participating in a robbery conspiracy and … [Read More...]
University of Tennessee Appellate Litigation Clinic wins habeas case in Sixth Circuit
September 10, 2016 By Actus Reus Leave a Comment
Students from the University of Tennessee Appellate Litigation Clinic, led by Professor Lucy Jewel, recently argued and won a habeas corpus petition in the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. The case, which involved a question of whether the client’s post-conviction motion was … [Read More...]
Marshall Project begins three-part series addressing underfunding of public defender offices
September 7, 2016 By Actus Reus Leave a Comment
Beginning today, the Marshall Project is publishing a three-part investigative series on underfunding in public defender systems. The first article, entitled When the Money Runs Out for Public Defense, What Happens Next?, provides a glimpse into staggering funding crises in public defender offices … [Read More...]
DOJ announces it will reduce use of private prisons
August 28, 2016 By Actus Reus Leave a Comment
Department of Justice Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates announced, in a memorandum to the Bureau of Federal Prisons, that the DOJ intended to "begin[] the process of reducing - and ultimately ending" its use of private federal prisons. Noting that private prisons do not provide the same level of … [Read More...]
Taylor Pendergrass lays bad policing at the feet of bad prosecutors
August 17, 2016 By Actus Reus Leave a Comment
Taylor Pendergrass, a self-described "decarcerator" who, among other things, has worked at the Colorado ACLU and the New York Civil Liberties Union (some of his work for the NYCLU on solitary confinement is here), and guest-lectured in Denver Law's Civil Rights Clinic, writes in Slate that our … [Read More...]
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