What makes a court proceeding fair? Explore the principles of impartiality, notice, meaningful hearings, evidence, reasoned decisions, consistent law, and judicial review.
Court-ordered community service is supposed to require actual service. But documented schemes have sold certificates claiming defendants completed hours they never worked, turning a sentencing requirement into a piece of paper.
Operation Nightingale: Inside the South Florida Nursing Diploma Scheme That Put Thousands of Questionable Credentials Into Circulation
Why do courts follow earlier decisions? Learn how precedent and stare decisis promote consistency, when prior decisions are binding, and why courts sometimes overturn established precedent.
From the early web to smartphones, social media and computer databases, courts have repeatedly decided how old constitutional protections apply to technologies their authors could never have imagined.
A fish, an airplane, a tomato and some of the biggest civil-rights and regulatory disputes in America have turned on the meaning of a word or short phrase. These cases show how much can depend on the language Congress chose.
A witness gives one account immediately after an event and another months later. Changed stories can reshape a case—but the reason for the change may matter as much as the inconsistency itself.
Some cases turn on evidence that was there from the beginning but seemed unimportant at first. A receipt, photograph, timestamp or forgotten record can take on an entirely different meaning once a case reaches trial.
Phones and apps can create detailed records of where a device has traveled. In a criminal investigation, location history can place a phone near a crime scene—or help show that its owner was somewhere else.
Screenshots of texts, social media posts and websites appear in court every day. But a screenshot does not prove itself. Courts still have to determine what it shows, where it came from and whether it is authentic.
Facial recognition and other automated systems can give police powerful investigative leads. When the technology makes a mistake, however, an innocent person can suddenly become the focus of an investigation.
Facial recognition is turning the human face into a searchable identifier used by phones, airports, businesses and law enforcement, raising lasting questions about privacy, accuracy and identity.
The person who knows the most about a case may never testify. Death, disappearance, privilege, the Fifth Amendment and strategic decisions can leave jurors deciding what happened without hearing from a crucial witness.
A case can have strong evidence and still unravel because of a missed deadline, lost record, inconsistent statement or procedural mistake. Some of the most consequential failures in litigation have little to do with who was originally right.
AI systems increasingly help make decisions about employment, credit, insurance, housing and other opportunities. When an automated decision causes harm, the law still has to determine who is responsible.
Modern cars can record location, speed, braking, diagnostics and driving behavior. As vehicles become computers on wheels, a growing legal fight is developing over who can collect, use, share and control that data.
DNA can identify more than the person who provided it. Genetic genealogy can use biological relationships to generate investigative leads, raising lasting questions about crime solving, family privacy and genetic data.
Modern cars can generate location, navigation and driving data long after a trip ends. When police investigate a crime, information created by the vehicle itself can become evidence.
