Victims' Rights - Nature Of Victims' Rights Movement, Origins Of The Movement, Goals And Successes, Victim Impact Statements
prosecution justice sometimes punishment
At the end of the twentieth century, a broad movement supporting the rights of victims of crime prospered in the United States. This victims' rights movement has many facets, including both liberal and conservative components. Sometimes it conflicts with the prosecution, and sometimes it serves as the prosecution's ally.
CASES
Booth v. Maryland, 482 U.S. 496 (1987).
Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U.S. 808 (1991).
Additional Topics
The victims' rights movement includes three major elements. The first is an interest in guaranteeing victim participation in criminal proceedings. This dimension includes notice of proceedings and the right to be present and to be heard at them. This element also champions opportunities for victims to consult with prosecutors regarding whether to charge or to plea bargain with defendants. T…
The motivating force behind a movement that centers on the interests of victims in the criminal justice system has both liberal and conservative roots. Beginning in the 1960s, women's groups and feminists focused on the plight of rape victims. They brought attention to outmoded laws and attitudes toward rape and to the insensitivity of police, prosecutors, and the court system to rape victi…
The victims' rights movement cannot be understood without noting the reactions of individual victims, whose specific stories are a powerful part of the movement's message. These stories involve insensitivity and mistreatment–"a second victimization"–by the criminal justice system and a complaint that the system is designed to protect the perpetrator rather…
A major interest of the victims' rights movement has been to have the opportunity to describe at sentencing the harm caused by the crime. Victim impact evidence was quickly accepted in non-death penalty cases. The interests of victims in participating in the process and in providing information to calculate appropriate restitution are generally acknowledged as providing adequate justificati…
The first serious effort to amend the U.S. Constitution on behalf of crime victims emerged from the efforts of the President's Task Force on Victims of Crime in 1982. The group's report, which is often cited as the watershed event for the victims' rights movement, inspired Congress to create an Office of Victims of Crime in the Justice Department. The Task Force also proposed …
——. "Victim Standing." Utah Law Review no. 2 (1999): 331–348. ——. Victims in Criminal Procedure. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press, 1999. ——. "Barbarians at the Gates? A Reply to the Critics of the Victims' Rights Amendments." Utah Law Review no. 2 (1999): 479–544. ——. "Revisiting Vi…
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