Describes the duel roles of prosecutors in the criminal justice system--ensuring fair trials and obtaining high conviction rates.

A groundbreaking exposé of how our legal system makes it nearly impossible to overturn wrongful convictions Thousands of innocent people are behind bars in the United States. But proving their innocence and winning their release is nearly impossible. In Barred, legal scholar Daniel S. Medwed argues that our justice system’s stringent procedural rules are largely to blame for the ongoing punishment of the innocent. Those rules guarantee criminal defendants just one opportunity to appeal their convictions directly to a higher court. Afterward, the wrongfully convicted can pursue only a few narrow remedies. Even when there is strong evidence of a miscarriage of justice, rigid guidelines, bias, and deference toward lower courts all too often prevent exoneration. Offering clear explanations of legal procedures alongside heart-wrenching stories of their devastating impact, Barred exposes how the system is stacked against the innocent and makes a powerful call for change.

Complex Criminal Litigation: Prosecuting Drug Enterprises and Organized Crime provides practitioners and others interested in the federal criminal justice system with a comprehensive analysis of the arsenal of federal laws that provide federal prosecutors the means to combat criminal organizations, their leadership (i.e. the so-called "kingpins") and their infrastructure. These statutes include the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO); the Continuing Criminal Enterprise or CCE statute; the Money Laundering Control Act; federal firearms statutes; and criminal and civil forfeiture laws that permit the seizure and forfeiture of the profits and instrumentalities of illegal enterprises. Further, the treatise includes an analysis of the principal legal issues that federal prosecutors and defense attorneys need to consider in handling long-term, complex criminal conspiracies that frequently involve multiple and diverse criminal acts from the rules relating to grand jury secrecy, granting immunity, bail, criminal discovery, and all points in between. Finally, because organized criminal activity respects no national boundaries, the treatise includes a comprehensive discussion of international criminal law, including extraterritorial jurisdiction and extradition. Criminal trial attorneys involved in litigating complex criminal cases will benefit greatly from reading this treatise.

The Model Rules of Professional Conduct provides an up-to-date resource for information on legal ethics. Federal, state and local courts in all jurisdictions look to the Rules for guidance in solving lawyer malpractice cases, disciplinary actions, disqualification issues, sanctions questions and much more. In this volume, black-letter Rules of Professional Conduct are followed by numbered Comments that explain each Rule's purpose and provide suggestions for its practical application. The Rules will help you identify proper conduct in a variety of given situations, review those instances where discretionary action is possible, and define the nature of the relationship between you and your clients, colleagues and the courts.

The vast majority of prosecution work occurs outside of courtrooms and less than 10% of all criminal cases go to trial. Courtroom performance, then, is of little import if prosecutors have not carefully investigated and prepared cases for prosecution. Courtroom performance is at its best, on the other hand, when prosecutors have thoroughly supervised the investigation and prepared the case for trial. In the end, the raw material prosecutors have to work with in courtrooms—the evidence—is a product of all of the work prosecutors perform outside the courtroom. For the Prosecution: How to Prosecute Criminal Cases seeks to provide prosecutors and those who wish to become prosecutors, including law students, guidance on how to prosecute criminal cases from investigation to appeal. This book provides guidance on how to successfully investigate and prosecute criminal cases. Thus, this book focuses on strategies and tactics involved in prosecution, and the soft skills for managing cases and people. This book examines how to think about criminal cases, guide investigations, and break down and organize complex cases in a persuasive manner. The book also examines ways to organize and prioritize caseloads, strategies for taking down criminal organizations, and tactics for turning criminals into cooperators. The book describes how to handle motions practice, prepare a case for trial, and successfully litigate sentencing hearings and appeals. This is not just another trial advocacy book. It is all of the work prosecutors perform outside the courtroom that makes it possible for them to resolve more than 90% of their cases through guilty pleas, and to prevail on the relatively few cases that go to trial. This book focuses on all the laws, duties, strategies and tactics prosecutors execute investigating and prosecuting criminal cases for those who wish to become prosecutors or further their career. Throughout C.J. Williams explores the strategies and tactics involved in prosecuting criminal cases, as well as examines the skills a successful prosecutor needs to develop in order to work with all those involved in the criminal justice system. He even brings his own experiences and lessons learned about prosecuting criminal cases into For the Prosecution, giving the reader more than the typical trial advocacy book.