Criminal Law and the Constitution

Criminal Law and the Constitution takes a learning-as-doing approach to the study of criminal rights and the justice system. Rather than simply emphasize criminal process, case law, or interactions with police, the textbook takes as its primary theme the delicate balance between the power of the state to create and maintain order and the rights of individuals to exercise liberty free from unreasonable government constraints. The text requires students to confront difficult criminal rights matters and craft solutions to unique legal problems. Because the best way to learn about the law is to make an argument, the text primarily relies on hypotheticals and moot court simulations to encourage application of knowledge to unique factual and legal situations that reveal how malleable, adaptive, circumstantial, and uncertain the law can be. 

Incorporating perspectives from the disciplines of political science, history, sociology, and criminology, the text opens by presenting basic knowledge of the history of police powers, social attitudes toward crime and criminal justice, and a broad overview of the criminal process. In its second section, the text steps students through 4th Amendment basics, emphasizes distinctive elements such as reasonable suspicion and probable cause, and breaks down differences between warrantless searches of persons and places. In its third section, the text turns to 5th, 6th, and 8th amendment topics including right to counsel, interrogations and confessions, pre-trial processes, and punishments. The text closes with chapters on current and emerging issues in criminal justice including racial bias, predictive policing, mental illness, police brutality, and sentencing reform. 

Features of this text include instruction in how to write case briefs, hypotheticals, and judicial opinions, excerpts from relevant appellate court case opinions, and a case study on criminal accountability. In chapter resources include chapter outlines, student learning objectives, key terms and core concepts, most important cases, personal progress checks that serve as in chapter assignments, review questions, questions for discussions, and an end of chapter enrichment that focuses on people or events providing context to chapter topics. 

Criminal Law and the Constitution comes with a full range of instructor resources including test bank questions, and rubrics for grading in chapter assignments and hypotheticals.