The 20th century U.S. Supreme Court advanced the Constitutional rights of adult criminal defendants. Although far reaching in their impact, these constitutional protections were not afforded to juveniles. For example, the Supreme Court held in Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) that indigent adult defendants in felony cases have a right to counsel as a matter of due process, but did not extend this ri...

During the past dozen years the original meaning of the Eleventh Amendment has become a matter of active controversy, both among legal scholars and among the justices of the Supreme Court.' Modern Eleventh Amendment doctrine remains governed by the traditional view, which in gross outline holds that the amendment is a jurisdictional bar prohibiting the federal courts from hearing unconsented su...

A survey of murder cases disposed in 1988 in the courts of large urban counties indicated that 16% of murder victims were members of the defendant's family. The remainder were murdered by friends or acquaintances (64%) or by strangers (20%). These findings are drawn from a representative sample survey of State and county prosecutors' records. The survey covered disposed charges against nearly 1...