Send us a text Elie Honig is CNN’s Senior Legal Analyst, and a former federal prosecutor. He is the bestselling author of Hatchet Man: How Bill Barr Broke the Prosecutor's Code and Corrupted the Justice Department (published by HarperCollins in 2021), and Untouchable: How Powerful People Get Away with It (also published by HarperCollins, in 2023). Elie is most recently the author of the recently released book When You Come at the King: Inside DOJ's Pursuit of the President, from N...
Send us a text What is the process for transferring a criminal defendant from U.S. custody to a foreign country? We learn this and more from our discussion with Bruce Zagaris, a Partner in the Washington, DC Office of Berliner, Corcoran, and Rowe, who is an expert on international prisoner transfers. Bruce is a widely known expert in the field of international criminal law, and is the co-author of International Criminal Law: Cases and Materials (now in its 4th edition), as well as...
Send us a text What do the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, zt”l, and the Chabad Chassidic movement have to do with criminal justice reform? Find out in the latest episode of the JustPod, with our guest, Rabbi Yossi Bryski, the Director of Alternative Sentencing at the Aleph Institute. Aleph was founded in 1981 at the Rebbe’s direction, and for over 40 years since, has served individuals of all backgrounds and faiths in prison programs, reentry programs, altern...
Send us a text Gianna Toboni’s book, The Volunteer: The Failure of the Death Penalty in America and One Inmate’s Quest to Die with Dignity, is a morally provocative chronicle about Scott Dozier, a former Army Ranger, who was sentenced to death, and “volunteered” for the death penalty. Dozier had been convicted of murder, sentenced to death, and ultimately demanded the state enforce its own penalty. What unfolds in Toboni’s book is a story not just about death, but also about the ...
Send us a text It was a pleasure to welcome Leonard Ambrose to the JustPod to discuss his representation of the notorious defendant Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong. Ambrose obtained an acquittal of Armstrong after she shot her boyfriend six times as he lay on a couch in 1984. But Armstrong is possibly more well known for her eventual murder conviction in the bizarre Pizza Bomber case in Erie, Pennsylvania—the subject of the Netflix series “Evil Genius.” That case arose from the Aug...
Send us a text What was it like to defend clients in prosecutions arising out of events at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021? A discussion with defense counsel Rocco Cipparone and Angie Levy. Following the events at the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, the federal government initiated one of the largest investigations and prosecutions in American history, ultimately charging nearly 1,600 defendants. Those charges resulted in about 1,270 convictions (most, for misdem...
Send us a text In Philadelphia, a city known for great trial lawyers, our next guest stands out among them. Brian McMonagle began his career in the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office where in his twenties he became one of the youngest lawyers to prosecute high profile cases in the DA’s Homicide Unit. Since then, Brian has gone on to represent actor Bill Cosby in a criminal trial, musical artist Meek Mill on a controversial probation violation proceeding, and other high-profil...
Send us a text On the morning of July 19, 2014, Florida State University Law Professor Dan Markel—a friend and mentor to Justin, and to so many others—was shot and killed in his driveway in Tallahassee, Florida. Dan was 41 years old, and the father of two little boys, ages 4 and 3, one of whom was just days away from his next birthday. The loss of Dan to his family, his friends, and colleagues, is incalculable. Dan’s Mom, Ruth, graciously shared her time to discuss Dan’s ...
Send us a text Larry Pozner is perhaps the most sought-after teacher of cross-examination strategy and tactics. In over 400 lectures, he has taught generations of lawyers how to more effectively conduct this most important of courtroom examinations—what John Henry Wigmore, the legal scholar of evidence, called the "greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of truth." Larry’s book, Cross-Examination: Science and Techniques, which he co-authored with Roger Dodd, is Amer...
Send us a text We welcomed back Elizabeth Kelley (who previously joined us on Nov 16, 2023), to talk about the recent publication of the second edition of her book, Representing People with Mental Disabilities: A Practical Guide for Criminal Defense Lawyers, published by the American Bar Association. The book is a collection of 19 essays by lawyers, scholars, and clinical experts in the field of mental health and criminal defense. Elizabeth Kelley is also the Editor of the volumes...
Send us a text Ever wondered about the mental health toll on members of a death penalty “Execution Team”? We discuss this topic and others on the JustPod with two men who are both familiar with the practice of lethal injection, but for very different reasons. Ron McAndrew is a retired Warden at Florida State Prison, where he led the Execution Team, supervised the execution of three inmates by electric chair, and observed the execution of others by lethal injection, before ...
Send us a text Earlier this year, in February 2024, the ABA launched its Prosecutorial Independence Task Force. Two of our guests, Professor Ellen Yaroshefsky (Hofstra Law School), and John Choi (Ramsey County Attorney in Ramsey County, Minnesota), are co-chairs of the Task Force. John has the distinction of being the first Korean American Chief Prosecutor in the United States. Our third guest, J. Charles (“Charlie”) Smith III, is the State’s Attorney for Frederick Cou...
Send us a text Our guest is the founding partner of the white collar criminal defense boutique Kaplan Marino, and co-host of our sister podcast, the ABA’s “White Collar Talks with Nina and Joe.” She is the recipient of the American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section's (CJS) Charles English Award, the highest accolade for excellence in criminal justice, and recently secured an unusual verdict of acquittal in a federal public corruption case in the District of Hawaii. We’re th...
Send us a text Premal Dharia is Executive Director of the Institute to End Mass Incarceration at Harvard Law School. She was previously a public defender and Director of Litigation for the Civil Rights Corps. She has been a frequent contributor to major publications such as The Washington Post, Slate, and CNN, on issues of criminal justice and racial disparities in the criminal justice system. Premal joined Justin and Geonard to discuss the recently published volume, "Dismantling Mass I...
Send us a text In 1997, Peter Heyberger was convicted of residential burglary and attempted residential burglary. It was his third conviction, and so, under California’s “Three Strikes” law, Mr. Heyberger’s minimum sentence was 25 years to life in prison. He was sentenced to 65-years to life. In 2019, California passed HB 2942—a Prosecutor-Initiated Resentencing bill that gave California prosecutors the discretion to reevaluate past cases and recommend lower sentences. And so it...
Send us a text The right to counsel in criminal cases is, by now, well established in a series of United States Supreme Court precedents. And yet, local jurisdictions have for too long found themselves under-resourced, and out-gunned in their quest to provide not just constitutionally sufficient and competent representation, but excellent representation—free of charge to indigent criminal defendants. Pennsylvania, until as recently as December 2023, was one of only two states in the na...
Send us a text Confessions by criminal defendants are regarded as the most powerful evidence of guilt. So why would an innocent person confess to a crime they did not commit? That question and the troubling issue of false confessions is at the heart of the research of Professor Saul Kassin, the author of Duped: Why Innocent People Confess – and Why We Believe Their Confessions. Professor Kassin is the distinguished Professor of Psychology at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and Profes...
Send us a text The prospect of long-term solitary confinement, being housed alone in custody for months and sometimes even years, is daunting for criminal defendants and their counsel. In May 2023, two public interest organizations, The Italian Association Antigone and the Israeli organization, Physicians for Human Rights Israel, proposed the International Guiding Statement on Alternatives to Solitary Confinement. We are pleased to have with us two guests: Professor Keramet Reiter & Oneg ...
Send us a text On September 26, 2020, then-President Donald Trump nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the United States Supreme Court. Upon confirmation, Justice Barrett took the seat of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who had passed away one week before Justice Barrett's nomination. Writing in the Fall 2023 issue of the Criminal Justice Magazine, Daniel Kaplan observes that Justice Barrett's voting pattern in the court's criminal cases has been notably Scalia-esque. That's perhaps not surprisi...
Send us a text Our guest is Professor Lucian Dervan, the founding Director of the Plea Bargaining Institute and a Professor of Law and Director of Criminal Justice Studies at Belmont University College of Law in Nashville, TN. Professor Dervan is co-chair of the ABA's Criminal Justice Section Plea Bargaining Taskforce and co-author of the forthcoming book, "The Cost of Bargains: Reflections and Recommendations" from the Section's Plea Bargaining Task Force. Read the Fourteen Principles...