Criminal
Jul. 14, 2015
Criminal Law 2.0
2014 saw a record number of exonerations. While there are many factors leading to false convictions, a few simple reforms to the jury system may help.
Alex Kozinski
Circuit Judge (retired)
9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
UCLA Law School, 1975
Judge Kozinski served as a law clerk for Justice Kennedy from 1975 to 1976, and as Justice Kennedy's colleague from 1985 to 1988 when Kennedy was a Ninth Circuit judge.
Although we pretend otherwise, much of what we do in the law is guesswork. For example, we like to boast that our criminal justice system is heavily tilted in favor of criminal defendants because we'd rather that ten guilty men go free than an innocent man be convicted. There is reason to doubt it, because very few criminal defendants actually go free after trial. Does this mean that many guilty men are never charged because the prosecution is dau...
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