In the past decade, there have been a series of U.S. Supreme Court decisions interpreting the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits “cruel and unusual punishment,” as it applies to juvenile defendants.
Read More »Tag Archives: Eighth Amendment
Justices: Court-ordered psych evidence doesn’t violate 5th Amendment
Defendants who offer a diminished capacity defense cannot seek to exclude rebuttal evidence from court-ordered mental evaluations on Fifth Amendment grounds, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Kansas v. Cheever.
Read More »Court: Reduced crack sentences not retroactive
A 2010 law designed to eliminate harsher sentences for black offenders convicted of crack cocaine crimes should not apply retroactively, a federal appeals court ruled in a deeply divided decision that several dissenting judges wrote amounts to furthering racial discrimination.
Read More »ON THE DEFENSIVE: The dangerous reach of civil forfeiture laws
Law enforcement officers for years have taken advantage of overly broad civil forfeiture laws.
7th Circuit says life sentence for crack dealer doesn’t violate Eighth Amendment
The Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment does not preclude a mandatory life sentence for dealers who possess a smaller quantity of crack cocaine than the quantity of powder cocaine necessary to trigger a similar sentence, the 7th Circuit has ruled.
Read More »Civil Rights — Eighth Amendment — qualified immunity
11-3418 Miller v. Harbaugh
Read More »Civil Rights — Eighth Amendment — deliberate indifference
12-1806 Wheeler v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc.
Read More »US Supreme Court rules on juvenile life terms, immigration law
In two widely anticipated rulings, the Supreme Court ruled the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment bars juvenile homicide offenders from being sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
Read More »U.S. Supreme Court to decide constitutionality of life terms for minors
A year after holding that sentencing a juvenile to life without parole in non-murder cases violates the Constitution’s Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment, the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether imposing such a sentence on a juvenile for capital murder is unconstitutional.
Read More »High court considers ‘Bivens’ claims against private prison
At oral arguments on Tuesday, the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court seemed skeptical of a federal prisoner’s claim that he should be allowed to bring a Bivens action against private contractors who run the prison where he was housed.
Read More »Civil Rights – Eighth Amendment – medical care
09-3280 Arnett v. Webster
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