In the pending case Myriad Genetics v. Association for Molecular Pathology, the U.S. Supreme Court will consider the patentability of human genes under the “product of nature” doctrine. Patentable subject matter is generally held to encompass materials and artifacts created by humans, and not that which exists independently in nature. However, it is not clear that this is a meaningful or helpful...
Discovery From the Trenches: The Future of Brady
The so-called “due diligence” rule, which excuses prosecutors’ compliance with Brady v. Maryland if the defense could have obtained the exculpatory evidence on its own, is only a symptom of the greater problem ailing the American criminal justice system. The real problem is that prosecutors and defense counsel generally do a terrible job collaborating because of the basic nature of our...
Forthcoming Symposium [UPDATE]: Twenty-First Century Litigation: Pathologies and Possibilities A Symposium in Honor of Stephen Yeazell
We are now accepting RSVPs to the 2013 UCLA Law Review Symposium, "Twenty-First Century Litigation: Pathologies and Possibilities, A Symposium in Honor of Professor Stephen Yeazell." The Symposium will be held on Thursday, January 24, and Friday, January 25, 2013 at UCLA School of Law. This year’s topic will explore the state of modern civil litigation, and how the substantive areas of both...
Second Amendment Challenges to Student Housing Firearms Bans: The Strength of the Home Analogy
Public colleges and universities or state governments often ban the possession of firearms on public university or college property. These bans typically extend to student housing. While much has been written about campus bans on the carrying of concealed firearms, the topic of gun bans in the student housing context has been largely unaddressed in Second Amendment literature. This Comment seeks...
In Need of a Fix: Reforming Criminal Law in Light of a Contemporary Understanding of Drug Addiction
This Comment challenges the assumption that actions associated with drug addiction can be easily classified as either voluntary or involuntary. As an alternative to this black-and-white distinction, this Comment advances the concept of a semi-voluntary act category to describe more accurately a drug addict’s choice to use drugs. When limited appropriately to drug addicts rather than all drug...
Decomposing the Precarious Future of American Orchestras in the Face of Golan v. Holder
Last term in Golan v. Holder, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of section 514 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, which extended copyright protection to millions of foreign works of art, literature, and music previously in the public domain. This decision will likely have a deleterious impact on America’s faltering symphony orchestras. By removing important staples of the...
Disaggregating Disasters
In the years since the September 11 attacks, scholars and commentators have criticized the emergence of both legal developments and policy rhetoric that blur the lines between war and terrorism. Unrecognized, but equally as damaging to democratic ideals—and potentially more devastating in practical effect—is the expansion of this trend beyond the context of terrorism to a much wider field of...
Real Women, Real Rape
There are several reasons to find rape shield laws troubling. From the point of view of many defense lawyers and civil libertarians, rape shield laws, by curtailing a defendant’s ability to offer evidence of an accuser’s prior sexual conduct, unfairly circumscribe a defendant’s right to confront witnesses and present relevant evidence in his defense. By contrast, rape shield proponents argue that...