An Introduction to Dram Shop LawA "dram shop" is legal term unique to the US. It refers to any establishment that serves or sells alcoholic beverages. Many states have dram shop laws, or statutes that make such an establishment responsible for any injuries suffered or inflicting by a person who has illegally purchased alcohol from them. This seems like a strange concept to many people who believe in holding everyone responsible for their own actions, even the highly inebriated. To provide some context for these laws, which may help to explain the reasoning behind them, here is a brief overview of our country's dram shop laws and their historical origins. What Exactly Do Dram Shop Laws Say? In some states a business is not automatically responsible for any damage caused by one of their intoxicated customers. In order to be held legally liable, they have to sell regulated beverages in an illegal way. The exact laws differ by state, but in general it is illegal for businesses to:
It is important to note that in some states the sale does not even have to be illegal. A bar or liquor store can be held responsible for injuries caused even by a perfectly legitimate customer. If an establishment breaks this law and the intoxicated person in question causes injury to himself or a third party, the establishment could face a lawsuit filed by the injured third party. In some states, a person can even sue for injuries he inflicted on himself while inebriated. Other states include further restrictions than the ones outlined about. In some places a business can be held liable for serving drinks to a person who is "habitually drunk." In Massachusetts a business can even be used for offensive or vulgar behavior from intoxicated customers. Where Did These Laws Come From? The origins of these laws are usually traced back to the early 20th century Temperance movement. This was a group of people, largely women, who wanted to reduce the amount of liquor consumed in their country, if not end it entirely. They were a driving force behind Prohibition, the period between 1920 and 1933 during which alcohol was illegal in the US. The Temperance movement is often misunderstood. While Prohibition ultimately failed, when one learns more about the issues these women were trying to address, their attempt becomes more understandable. Rather than hating alcohol for its own sake, they were trying to fight the parental neglect, domestic violence, and poverty often associated with drug abuse. Labels: An Introduction to Dram Shop Law A Brief History of the Insanity PleaThe insanity plea is an affirmative defense. An affirmative defense means that the defendant acknowledges the crime happened, but does not believe he or she should be held fully responsible for one reason or other. As anyone could probably guess, a person who pleads insanity is arguing that he or she should not be held responsible because he or she is legally insane, or was at the time that the crime was committed. This plea has sparked much controversy over the centuries. Some people are appalled by the idea that a murderer or other dangerous criminal could be "let off the hook" by claiming mental illness. Other people are equally repelled by the idea of punishing a person who is not capable of fully understanding or controlling his or her actions. At the center of all this debate has been the attempt to settle on a legal definition of insanity. Many different standards have been proposed and used in different courts all over the world. Within the US, the legal understanding of mental illness has evolved into several different forms over time. In chronological order, these are the rules of thumb that have been used to settle insanity pleas in the US. The earliest attempt to legally define insanity originated in England in 1843. It became known as the M'Naghten rule, after a paranoid schizophrenic who was found not guilty after shooting and killing a politician. This rule stated that a person could not be held legally responsible for criminal actions committed while suffering a mental disorder that either a) prevented them from understanding what he or she was doing, or b) prevented them from knowing his or her behavior wrong. Some people in both the US and England felt this law was too lenient, and that a person should not be excused of crimes as long as he or she is capable of controlling his or her behavior. In 1887 the Alabama Supreme Court devised the "irresistible impulse test." Under this law, people who wanted to plead insanity had to demonstrate that they were incapable of controlling their behavior when their crimes were committed. Several states adopted this law, which was criticized both for being too strict and too lenient by various parties. Although the Durham Rule was first developed in New Hampshire in 1954, it was not widely used across the US until the 1950's. This short-lived law declared that anyone whose crimes were caused by a mental illness was not responsible for his or her crimes. It should be noted that rather than being set free, people found mentally ill were incarcerated in mental hospitals, often indefinitely. Today New Hampshire is the only state still using the Durham rule. The current definition of insanity used in every other state is an inability to understand the consequences of their actions or control their behavior. This may sound broad, but today the insanity defense is rarely attempted, and extremely rarely successful. Labels: A Brief History of the Insanity Plea An Introduction to ParoleParole is the release of an inmate before he or she has served his or her full term. This is only granted to inmates who have displayed excellent behavior and who are determined unlikely to reoffend. The idea behind granting parole is to encourage good behavior within prisons while allowing a prisoner who appears to have been rehabilitated to gradually return to society. In Wisconsin, a person who has been convicted of a misdemeanor or sentenced to less than one year in prison may be eligible for parole after six months or one quarter of his or her sentence, whichever length of time is greater. A person who has been convicted of a felony or received a sentence of greater than one year cannot be granted parole under Wisconsin's Truth in Sentencing Act of 1999. If a person is eligible, he or she will have a meeting with a member of the Parole Commission (PC). This will take place at the prison where he or she is staying, probably in a small office. The meeting will consist of an interview during with the commission member will try to gather enough information to determine whether the prisoner has been rehabilitated. Specifically, the interviewer will determine if the inmate meets all eligibility requirements. Under Wisconsin law, these requirements are:
The first interview usually takes place one month before the PED determined at sentencing. If the prisoner is found to be eligible, he or she will be granted parole on that day. If parole is not granted, the interviewer will issue a defer, which is the amount of time that must pass before the inmate can request parole again. If an inmate is granted parole, he or she will be released into the community under the supervision of a parole officer (PO). There are generally stipulations that he or she must follow, such as staying out of trouble and meeting with the PO on a regular basis. If he or she fails to meet the regulations spelled out, he or she may return to prison to serve the remainder of the original sentence, as well as charges for other crimes if he or she committed any. Labels: An Introduction to Parole Domestic Violence Criminal Defense Explained Part OneLet's say there has been an incident between you and your girlfriend and someone has called the police. What was a private matter is no longer private. Now you have to explain yourself to a third party. It is often a "she said, he said" matter. Unfortunately for men, usually the police will choose to believe the woman. Who will become the victim and who will become the defendant often depends on who called the sheriff or police or who claims to have been injured. Of course, sometimes things are not that simple, and it is always best to stay out of the system to begin with. Do not let anyone tempt you into making physical contact first. If your girlfriend is hysterical and slapping you, run the other way, get out the door, drive away: do anything but let things get to the point where you do something causing the police to be contacted. If you think the other person is going to call the law enforcement, often the best defense is offense: call the cops yourself. Whatever you do: never physically attempt to stop your partner from calling the police. This will be become an additional charge. Now for some really bad news: Even if the victim later decides not to press charges, this will not help you in many California counties today. The D.A. decides to bring charges, no one else-not the court, not the police, not the victim. District Attorneys are motivated to do things that the public will perceive as punishing offenders and protecting society. Once the cops are called the process begins. The D.A. may feel the victim has been coerced into changing her (or his) story. Most D.A.'s assume the original claims are true. Despite this, it is extremely helpful to defense counsel if the assaulted or abused party indicates to the police and D.A. that she or he does not want to cooperate with the prosecution. Labels: Domestic Violence Criminal Defense Explained Part One Conduct Online Criminal Check ReviewWould you like to read a review of the Criminal Check website? Criminal check services are in high demand on the internet, with thousands of checks being conducted online every day. Most people are looking for a way to find criminal records for free. But from my experience, searching for free records can be very time consuming and frustrating, and usually yields no results at the end. After searching through multiple free criminal records search websites, I finally decided to use the premium service called Criminal Check. 1. How Does The Criminal Check Site Work? This website is a reputable background check website that specializes in criminal background search services. It maintains a database that contains records of millions of people, and provides their members with a wide range of search tools to help them find any person they want quickly. Criminal Check website helped me find complete criminal records of the people that I was looking for. For these services, users have to pay a small membership to use the quality database and search tools. 2. What Are The Benefits Of Using Criminal Check Site Over Other Free Websites? A premium site is the better choice if you cannot risk getting outdated or wrong information of the criminal records you are looking for. Premium websites like Criminal Check update their database once every day, whereas free sites do not update their records as readily. Free websites also take a longer time to search through the records as they do not have advanced search tools for their users. Labels: Conduct Online Criminal Check Review Searching Public Criminal Records the Easy WayIn the last few years, the popularity of running public criminal records searches online is skyrocketing. It is now easier than ever to accumulate public criminal records information. If you want to run a comprehensive background check on a specific person, there are some of the options online for you. First option is hiring a professional private investigator have licenses that allow them to access wide range of databases that you are allowed if you conduct a search on your own. This can be an expensive option as they charge around $100 per report. The majority of these professional private investigators usually charge fees on an hourly basis. Make sure that you have the person's correct first name, last name, exact location, as well as his/her previous residences. Different states acquire different public criminal records. For instance, if any person has been charged in one state, the public criminal record of the same person of another state may not show up. This is the main reason for why many people opt to run FBI searches. However, FBI requires the fingerprints of the person undergoing the search and this is the main problem. Sometimes you may need the permission of person whom you want to conduct the search on. The quickest and easiest option is an online background check services which pulls up public criminal records. The majority of these services pull up an extremely wide range of informative details including public criminal records, court cases, mortgages, birth and death certificates, divorce decrees. Labels: Searching Public Criminal Records the Easy Way Consensual Crimes - Not Actual CrimesWhile numerous violent criminals and white-collar criminals roam free, and innocent people rot in prison and on death row for crimes they didn't commit, law-enforcement resources are used to destroy the lives of consenting adults who do not harm anyone. One article I ready suggested that approximately four million people are arrested each year and 350,000 are in prison for consensual crimes. I am considering a "consensual crime" to be defined as a criminal act committed by two or more people, who consent to involvement, and does not involve any non-consenting individuals. The following is a non-exclusive list of criminal acts that could be considered consensual between the parties: prostitution, adultery, homosexual conduct, sodomy, gambling, some drug use (marijuana), and assisted suicide. Another name for these sort of "crimes" may be victimless crimes, because they do not harm anyone as they have no impact on a person other than those who chose to engage in the activity. Thus, there is no victim. When people are arrested for those crimes, their ability to remain employed is jeopardized. A conviction and prison sentence virtually guarantees the loss of their livelihoods. Upon release from prison, the criminal record may impede their ability to find new jobs. Even if they are not convicted of a crime, the arrest record alone can significantly harm their lives. It too can lead to loss of jobs and difficulty finding new ones, and it may interfere with other aspects of their lives, such as the ability to obtain credit, purchase a car, rent an apartment, maintain custody of children or to vote. Thus, the financial impact of either a conviction or arrest may mean these people need long-term assistance from government or charities. Or they may resort to serious crime based on what they learned from real criminals while incarcerated. This is all a huge drain on the economy and is in addition to the costs of arresting, prosecuting, and imprisoning them. To avoid conviction and prison, the accused may have to spend thousands of dollars on legal fees. For certain crimes, the amounts can run to tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars. When faced with the possibility of causing financial ruin to themselves and their families, some contemplate suicide and may see it as the only way out. If this is the action the accused takes, that impacts society from the loss of productivity, and more importantly, it impacts the family and friends of the accused. Government causes all this turmoil in the lives of consenting adults to "protect" them from possible consequences that might occur to them - and them alone - from their own freely chosen acts. Because these arrests devastate the lives of harmless people, a strong argument can be made that Christian mercy, along with the mercy taught by other religions and philosophies, is reason enough for leaving consenting adults alone, but the irony rarely seen is that often it is in the name of Christian principles that these laws exist or are pursued.... Law-enforcement resources are wasted investigating consensual acts Government's focus on consensual acts leads to more unethical conduct in another way. To the extent law-enforcement resources are used against consenting adults, there is a corresponding reduction in the resources available for apprehending criminals that pose a true threat to society-those criminals who would cause harm to others and only seek to benefit themselves. An enormous need exists to increase efforts to arrest those who harm the innocent. They victimize someone every two seconds in the United States, and five out of six Americans may someday be victims of violent crime. According to author Peter McWilliams, arrests are being made for only about 20% of crimes committed against persons or property. He also says one in six murderers gets away, eight of ten burglars aren't arrested, and only 5% of forcible rapes lead to prison time. McWilliams further reports that $10 billion in personal property is stolen each year and never recovered. Billions more are illicitly obtained through white-collar crime. Even if the person is not harmed, if the victim files an insurance claim or takes action to recover damages, this alone ties up resources and takes resources from the economy, causing an impact that was definitely undesired. Using law-enforcement resources against consensual acts also makes the U.S. more vulnerable to terrorism. According to The 9/11 Commission Report, in 2000 there were twice as many FBI agents assigned to enforcing drug laws than assigned to counterterrorism. The FBI's head of counterterrorism told the Commission he wishes he'd had "500 analysts looking at Osama Bin Ladin . . . instead of two." And former Vice President Al Gore charged that prior to the September 11 attacks, the Bush administration's Justice Department had more FBI agents investigating a suspected brothel in New Orleans than monitoring Bin Ladin and al Qaeda. There obviously is a strong need for law enforcement to improve its responses to real crimes committed against persons or property. Yet each year in the U.S., law enforcement applies some $50 billion to arrest, prosecute, and lock up persons who commit consensual crimes. Some estimates are that roughly half of all law-enforcement resources are used in connection with consensual crimes. Those resources could go a long way toward remedying the current deficiencies in law enforcement's handling of more serious crimes. Due to this misallocation of resources, many violent and sociopathic criminals are able to escape justice and continue preying on the public. The same principle applies to white-collar criminals who may never be detected... lest we forget the Enron and WorldCom scandals. |
