Sentenced without Cause

A Slower Form of Death: Implications of Roper v. Simmons for Juveniles Sentenced to Life Without Parole

Competence to be sentenced.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW Competence to be sentenced, or lack thereof, is not frequently claimed in legal proceedings. This paper reviews the concept and possible forensic psychiatric applications. RECENT FINDINGS This topic has achieved prominence because of recent rulings imposed by the US Supreme Court that prohibit execution of mentally impaired and under-age individuals. The most recent contribu...

Does Forum Sentencing reduce re-offending?

Forum Sentencing is an adult-focussed restorative justice program that operates in two NSW sites: Liverpool and Tweed. Under the scheme, young adults who meet certain eligibility and suitability criteria can have their matter dealt with by way of a community conference rather than being dealt with in a conventional court setting. The aim of the current study was to determine whether offenders w...

Rate of false conviction of criminal defendants who are sentenced to death.

The rate of erroneous conviction of innocent criminal defendants is often described as not merely unknown but unknowable. There is no systematic method to determine the accuracy of a criminal conviction; if there were, these errors would not occur in the first place. As a result, very few false convictions are ever discovered, and those that are discovered are not representative of the group as...

Mortality among a national population sentenced to compulsory care for substance use disorders in Sweden: descriptive study.

Sweden's compulsory addiction system treats individuals with severe alcohol and narcotics use disorders. Merging data from three national level register databases of those sentenced to compulsory care from 2001 to 2009 (n=4515), the aims of this study were to: (1) compute mortality rates to compare to the general Swedish population; (2) identify leading cause of mortality by alcohol or narcotic...

Direct and Indirect Influences of Defendant Mental Illness on Jury Decision Making

It is a common misconception that individuals with schizophrenia are significantly more dangerous and violent than individuals free of mental illness. This stigmatization may lead to harsher sentences when people with schizophrenia are involved in criminal activities and sentenced by a jury. This study presented four conditions to which participants were randomly assigned, alone or in a group o...