Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Utilizing a sample of 8,785 intimate partner violence cases processed through Sacramento County Distirct Attorney's office between 1999 and 2001, this paper seeks to identify those variables which predict the decision to go to trial and trial outcomes. A logistic regression analysis of the decision to go to trial indicates that eight variables are influential in predicting this outcome. Four variables increase the probability of a trial and, of these, two are measures of offense severity, namely, use (including threats) of a weapon, and the number of victim injuries. The presence of a child and also whether the arrest originated in a warrant (a measure of evidentiary strength) show the same positive relationship. On the other hand, suspect injury and whether or not the suspect is on probation both reduce the likelihood of trial, as do prosecutorial filing of felony charges and a cohabiting relationship. Eight variables also appear to be influential in determining trial outcomes Five variables increase, and three variables decrease, the likelihood of a conviction. Two measures of offense severity –number of injuries to the victim and a felony filing—predict conviction. If the arrest originated in a warrant, the likelihood of conviction also increases. A number of extralegal variables attain significance. Cohabitation increases the probability of conviction as does suspect employment. On the other hand, the presence of a child at the time of the incident makes conviction less likely as does injury of the suspect by the victim and victim substance use.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Political philosophers are divided over the role that courts should play beyond determining the guilt or innocence of the defendant. Hannah Arendt has argued that any attempt to add other roles to the court process, such as public education or the recording of historical truth, perverts the goal of justice as it risks politicization. In contrast, Judith Shklar has argued that it is a legal fable to argue that politics can be kept from the courtroom. What matters for Shklar is the pragmatic outcome of the trial. Does the trial lessen the likelihood that human cruelty will be perpetrated in the future? This article looks at both these arguments and more recent scholarship. Specifically, it reevaluates the legacy of the Nuremberg trial in Germany as a tool of public education.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper will look at the ways in which fears about ungovernable participants in the trial have fuelled the design of courtrooms in England and elsewhere. The use of space in the courtroom has changed significantly since custom built courthouses first began to be common in the early nineteenth century. In particular there has been a shift towards the creation of segregation zones within the court with the result that a space ostensibly designated public has in fact been transformed into a collection of private spaces. This paper will argue that the origins of this approach can be traced back to the Victorian era in which ‘gentlemanly values’ were increasingly promoted by the legal profession and spectators at trials were increasingly conceived of as threatening, ‘dirty’ and ungovernable. Accounts of trials and explanation of design principles continue to reflect an ongoing apprehension about the possibility of disorder in the court and its environs as well as an ever-present danger and fear of the imminent collapse of the social order of the court. It will be contended that increasingly sophisticated forms of organisation of space in the court employed by designers have improved the efficiency of surveillance techniques and transformed modern spectators into much more docile bodies than we might expect in a modern state in which the best test of democracy remains the respect shown to those who dissent and protest.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Violence in television programs and the negative effects that violence is supposed to have on viewers have been longstanding concerns for policymakers. Since the early days of television, congressional committees have periodically held hearings on television violence and what can be done about it. However, it took nearly forty years for legislation dealing with television violence to be enacted into law. Further, the laws that have been enacted do not appear to have been particularly effective in achieving their intended purposes.
Why has all the interest and activity in regards to television violence achieved so little in terms of results? The incremental model of policymaking provides a possible explanation. That model predicts that most policy changes are likely to be small, and offers reasons for why this might be so. This paper applies the incremental model to congressional policymaking on television violence to answer the question posed above.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Baum (2006) critiques the two dominant approaches for understanding judicial behavior (attitudinal and strategic) for failure to fully account for the effect that social environment has on the work of judges. While the strategic approach (but not the attitudinal) situates judges in a social milieu where they are required to consider the actions/reactions of others, it does so mainly to show that judges must act strategically if they are to have any hope of shaping legal policy. What is lacking in this account is any appreciation that judges might really care about the esteem held for them and their work by others for its own sake and not merely for reasons relating to making policy. Baum argues that we must consider the impact that the various judicial audiences (e.g. judicial colleagues, members of the bar, legal academics, political actors, members of the public generally) have on judicial decision making. This approach to understanding judicial behavior seems especially suited for the work of trial court judges, who we may assume have less regard for making legal policy as compared to their colleagues on the appellate bench since their decisions typically do not set legal precedent for future cases. Although Baum makes a strong theoretical case for why judicial audiences should matter, there has been little in the way of empirical research attempted so far to settle the issue one way or the other. We attempt to fill this void through administration of a survey to trial court judges in three states. The survey contains a series of questions designed to tease from the participating judges a measure of their interest and need for approval and esteem from the various judicial audiences and the impact this need has on their actions as judges. The three states selected for the survey consist of one that has appointed judges, one that has judges selected through competitive non-partisan elections, and one where competitive elections identify the political party of the candidates. Through this survey, we investigate not only the importance that judicial audiences have on judicial decision making, but also the political, social, and personality factors that are implicated in causing some judges to be more affected by judicial audiences than others.