High-profile sex crime cases, including the case of former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner, have spurred a number of bills now before California Governor, Jerry Brown. Some bills would provide tougher penalties and repercussions against defendants in sex crimes cases, including a bill that would remove the statute of limitations on certain sex crimes.
New rules in Pennsylvania requiring mutual discovery at sentencing could change defendant discovery entitlements in other states.
“The death penalty is a lie, a misguided mistake born of anger and frustration. Capital punishment has become a perverse monument to inequality, to how some lives matter and others do not. It is a violent example of how we protect and value the rich and abandon and devalue the poor. The death penalty is a grim, disturbing shadow formed by the legacy of racial apartheid and bias against the poor that condemns the disfavored among us, but corrupts us all. It’s the perverse symbol elected officials use to strengthen their ‘tough on crime’ reputations and distract us from confronting the causes of violence. It is finally the enemy of grace, redemption and all of us who recognize that each person is more than their worse act.”
