Saturday, May 06, 2006
Final Exam
Alvernia College/Judicial Process/Final Exam
This test is due to be turned in by Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. If it is not turned in by that time, I will not accept it. You can email your answer to dfreeman@ccp.edu, but it must be timely.
This is a “thinking” exam, which will call upon many of the most important issues we have discussed. There are three questions, of which you only need to choose two.
I will expect you to use our text evaluate these two issues, drawing from the various chapters and discussions we have had during our class. Your test will be evaluated based on content, analysis of the article and issues related to it and your writing style.
Content involves your treatment of the subject matter. Have you addressed all the topics within this issue? Have you addressed all the major and minor points associated with this question?
Analysis means how the subject matter is reviewed and considered. Does your question the reasoning of the points the author has raised? Have you considered the reasoning or bias of the author or the theory?
Writing style involves organization, clarity and flow of your answer. It includes grammar and punctuation expected from a student at an elite college such as Alvernia.
Sentencing and Sensibility
By MYRON H. THOMPSON
Montgomery, Ala.
MORE than 2,500 years ago, the Athenian leader Draco codified the laws of his city-state, which was then suffering from political and social unrest. According to Plutarch, "Death was appointed for almost all offenses, insomuch that those that were convicted of idleness were to die, and those who stole a cabbage or an apple to suffer even as villains who committed sacrilege or murder."
Draco sought to replace a relatively arbitrary system of oral law that had been maintained by the nobility. His written code of crime and punishment provided more power to the state as an arbiter of justice and ensured greater uniformity in the meting out of punishments. Yet Draco's efforts to institute a one-punishment-fits-all system of sentencing eventually became viewed as barbarously severe, and his code was repealed.
Draco's example is especially relevant in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision last week, in United States v. Booker, that the sentencing guidelines federal judges have used for criminal offenders for more than 20 years were advisory, not mandatory. Since the court's holding may increase trial judges' discretion in sentencing - and since the court itself invited a legislative response - some members of Congress are sure to propose more statutory sentencing rules, like more and harsher minimum sentences.
1. Discuss the role of discretion in sentencing and the role of mandatory-minimum sentences.
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McVeigh's Legacy Remains Death and Pain
TERRE HAUTE, Ind., June 9 — His legacy, no matter how many psychiatrists and criminal experts investigate or dissect the events, relationships and disappointments that shaped him, will always be calculated in simple numbers. Timothy J. McVeigh killed, by the cowardly means of a truck bomb, 168 people — 149 adults and 19 children.
His death, until a little more than a month ago, was to be one of simple retribution, carried out in the clinical atmosphere of a prison's death chamber here after he was found guilty of the crime in a dignified federal court.
His surviving victims, both those who lost family members and the many others he scarred and maimed in Oklahoma City in April 1995, would then go on with their lives, with the satisfaction that the system — the very system that Mr. McVeigh hated and tried to destroy — still works.
But then came the Federal Bureau of Investigation's admission that it had failed to provide thousands of pages of evidence to the court and to Mr. McVeigh's lawyers, and the bomber's legacy shifted, if only slightly.
2. Discuss the issues raised in this portion of the article, and pay attention to those beyond the purposes of the death penalty.
Judge Issues Secret Ruling in Case of 2 at Mosque
By JULIA PRESTON
A federal judge issued a highly unusual classified ruling yesterday, denying a motion for dismissal of a case against two leaders of an Albany mosque who are accused of laundering money in a federal terrorism sting operation.
Because the ruling was classified, the defense lawyers were barred from reading why the judge decided that way.
The defense lawyers had asked the judge to dismiss the case, saying that they believed the government's evidence came from wiretaps obtained without a warrant by the National Security Agency.
The two mosque leaders, Yassin M. Aref, 35, and Mohammed M. Hossain, 50, were charged in August 2004 with conspiring with a government informant to take part in what they believed was a plot to import a shoulder-fired missile and assassinate a Pakistani diplomat.
The classified order by Judge Thomas J. McAvoy of United States District Court for the Northern District of New York came only a few hours after the government filed its own classified documents to the judge. Prosecutors were responding to a motion filed on Jan. 20 by Mr. Aref's lawyer, Terence L. Kindlon.
The prosecutors asked the judge to review their papers in his chambers without making them public or showing them to the defense. At midafternoon the judge issued a document announcing that he had entered the classified order denying Mr. Kindlon's request.
3. Discuss the judge’s ruling in this case considering the Sixth Amendment and due process.
This test is due to be turned in by Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. If it is not turned in by that time, I will not accept it. You can email your answer to dfreeman@ccp.edu, but it must be timely.
This is a “thinking” exam, which will call upon many of the most important issues we have discussed. There are three questions, of which you only need to choose two.
I will expect you to use our text evaluate these two issues, drawing from the various chapters and discussions we have had during our class. Your test will be evaluated based on content, analysis of the article and issues related to it and your writing style.
Content involves your treatment of the subject matter. Have you addressed all the topics within this issue? Have you addressed all the major and minor points associated with this question?
Analysis means how the subject matter is reviewed and considered. Does your question the reasoning of the points the author has raised? Have you considered the reasoning or bias of the author or the theory?
Writing style involves organization, clarity and flow of your answer. It includes grammar and punctuation expected from a student at an elite college such as Alvernia.
Sentencing and Sensibility
By MYRON H. THOMPSON
Montgomery, Ala.
MORE than 2,500 years ago, the Athenian leader Draco codified the laws of his city-state, which was then suffering from political and social unrest. According to Plutarch, "Death was appointed for almost all offenses, insomuch that those that were convicted of idleness were to die, and those who stole a cabbage or an apple to suffer even as villains who committed sacrilege or murder."
Draco sought to replace a relatively arbitrary system of oral law that had been maintained by the nobility. His written code of crime and punishment provided more power to the state as an arbiter of justice and ensured greater uniformity in the meting out of punishments. Yet Draco's efforts to institute a one-punishment-fits-all system of sentencing eventually became viewed as barbarously severe, and his code was repealed.
Draco's example is especially relevant in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision last week, in United States v. Booker, that the sentencing guidelines federal judges have used for criminal offenders for more than 20 years were advisory, not mandatory. Since the court's holding may increase trial judges' discretion in sentencing - and since the court itself invited a legislative response - some members of Congress are sure to propose more statutory sentencing rules, like more and harsher minimum sentences.
1. Discuss the role of discretion in sentencing and the role of mandatory-minimum sentences.
---------------------------------------------------------------
McVeigh's Legacy Remains Death and Pain
TERRE HAUTE, Ind., June 9 — His legacy, no matter how many psychiatrists and criminal experts investigate or dissect the events, relationships and disappointments that shaped him, will always be calculated in simple numbers. Timothy J. McVeigh killed, by the cowardly means of a truck bomb, 168 people — 149 adults and 19 children.
His death, until a little more than a month ago, was to be one of simple retribution, carried out in the clinical atmosphere of a prison's death chamber here after he was found guilty of the crime in a dignified federal court.
His surviving victims, both those who lost family members and the many others he scarred and maimed in Oklahoma City in April 1995, would then go on with their lives, with the satisfaction that the system — the very system that Mr. McVeigh hated and tried to destroy — still works.
But then came the Federal Bureau of Investigation's admission that it had failed to provide thousands of pages of evidence to the court and to Mr. McVeigh's lawyers, and the bomber's legacy shifted, if only slightly.
2. Discuss the issues raised in this portion of the article, and pay attention to those beyond the purposes of the death penalty.
Judge Issues Secret Ruling in Case of 2 at Mosque
By JULIA PRESTON
A federal judge issued a highly unusual classified ruling yesterday, denying a motion for dismissal of a case against two leaders of an Albany mosque who are accused of laundering money in a federal terrorism sting operation.
Because the ruling was classified, the defense lawyers were barred from reading why the judge decided that way.
The defense lawyers had asked the judge to dismiss the case, saying that they believed the government's evidence came from wiretaps obtained without a warrant by the National Security Agency.
The two mosque leaders, Yassin M. Aref, 35, and Mohammed M. Hossain, 50, were charged in August 2004 with conspiring with a government informant to take part in what they believed was a plot to import a shoulder-fired missile and assassinate a Pakistani diplomat.
The classified order by Judge Thomas J. McAvoy of United States District Court for the Northern District of New York came only a few hours after the government filed its own classified documents to the judge. Prosecutors were responding to a motion filed on Jan. 20 by Mr. Aref's lawyer, Terence L. Kindlon.
The prosecutors asked the judge to review their papers in his chambers without making them public or showing them to the defense. At midafternoon the judge issued a document announcing that he had entered the classified order denying Mr. Kindlon's request.
3. Discuss the judge’s ruling in this case considering the Sixth Amendment and due process.
