Confronting Failures of Justice: Getting Away with Murder and Rape

Confronting Failures of Justice: Getting Away with Murder and Rape, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Forthcoming, September 2024

U of Penn Law School, Public Law Research Paper No. 24-36

39 Pages Posted: 15 Jul 2024

See all articles by Paul H. Robinson

Paul H. Robinson

University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School

Jeffrey Seaman

University of Pennsylvania

Muhammad Sarahne

University of Pennsylvania

Date Written: July 15, 2024

Abstract

Most murderers, rapists, and other serious criminals escape justice in America. Legal academia has traditionally focused on the problem of injustice, where the legal system punishes wrongly through punishing the innocent or over-punishing the guilty. But the problem of failures of justice, where the legal system fails to punish criminal offenders, has been largely ignored. This is unfortunate because, as the book discusses, the damage caused by unpunished crime is immense, and even worse, falls disproportionately on vulnerable poor and minority communities, thus damaging equity as well as justice. Regular failures of justice increase crime by undermining deterrence and the criminal justice system’s credibility with the community as a moral authority. A government that allows rampant failures of justice is ignoring one of its most basic duties. No society should allow its members to be murdered, raped, and robbed without consequence. Yet that is what the American legal system does in most cases. Confronting Failures of Justice dares to ask why getting away with murder and rape is the norm, not the exception, in America. 

The book’s seventeen chapters tour nearly the entire criminal justice system, examining the rules and practices that regularly produce failures of justice in serious criminal cases. Topics covered include flawed police investigations, inadequate financing, statutes of limitation, judicial restrictions on investigation, failures to utilize new technology, the exclusionary rule, speedy trial rules, pretrial release, plea bargaining, sentencing procedures, early release on parole, executive clemency, witness intimidation, police-community relations, non-enforcement policies, distributive principles, and more. Each chapter outlines the nature and extent of justice failures caused by the rule or practice, provides real-world examples, and describes the competing societal interests upheld or neglected by the status quo. Finally, each chapter reviews proposed or implemented reforms that could balance the competing interests in a less justice-frustrating manner and recommends one—sometimes completely original—reform to improve the system.

A systematic study of failures of justice is long overdue. Now for the first time, scholars, students, policymakers, and citizens have a comprehensive guide to the problem—and possible solutions.

Keywords: justice failures, avoiding injustice, three strikes, sentencing guidelines, sex offenders, progressive prosecutors, stop and frisk, prostitution, retail theft, hard drugs, plea bargaining, gun control, alcohol prohibition, criminal law codification, restorative justice, safe injection sites, domestic violence

Suggested Citation

Robinson, Paul H. and Seaman, Jeffrey and Sarahne, Muhammad, Confronting Failures of Justice: Getting Away with Murder and Rape (July 15, 2024). Confronting Failures of Justice: Getting Away with Murder and Rape, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Forthcoming, September 2024, U of Penn Law School, Public Law Research Paper No. 24-36, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4895209 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4895209

Paul H. Robinson (Contact Author)

University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School ( email )

3501 Sansom Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104
United States

Jeffrey Seaman

University of Pennsylvania ( email )

Philadelphia, PA 19104
United States

Muhammad Sarahne

University of Pennsylvania ( email )

Philadelphia, PA
United States

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