Settlement is a term rarely used in criminal law. Instead, people speak almost exclusively of plea bargaining — i.e., agreements in which a defendant promises to plead guilty in exchange for a prosecutor's promise to seek leniency in charging or sentencing. But a traditional plea agreement is...

This paper investigates the relationship between the franchise and law enforcement practices using evidence from the Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965. We find that, following the VRA, black arrest rates fell in counties that were both covered by the legislation and had a large number of newly...

For over three decades, therapeutic jurisprudence (TJ) has produced rich scholarship highlighting the inseparable connection between law and personal wellbeing. Only recently, however, have TJ scholars begun to explore the influence that the law has on those practicing it. The current research...

This paper uses increases in felony larceny thresholds as a negative shock to felony conviction probability to examine the impact of punishment severity on criminal behavior. In the theft value distribution between old and new larceny thresholds ("response region"), higher thresholds cause a 2...

The main goal of this article is to clarify the nature of criminal proceedings and its relationship to civil litigation, insolvency and tax proceedings. The understanding of the purpose of the proceedings, the nature of the liability fulfilled in the proceedings and the principles on which the...

The prosecution of criminals is costly, and subject to errors. In contrast to adversarial court procedures, the prosecutor is regarded as an impartial investigator and aide to the judge in inquisitorial justice systems. We show in a sequential prosecution game of a Bayesian court that a...

Corporate Deferred Prosecution Agreements (DPAs) are contracts negotiated between the federal government and defendants to address allegations of corporate misconduct without going to trial. The agreements are hailed as a model of speedy and efficient law enforcement, but also derided as making...