The COVID-19 pandemic has initiated lasting changes in a traditionally staid and inert court
system. This study employs a courtroom communities perspective to examine how …

An inhabited institutions perspective views institutions from the bottom up, as “inhabited” by
individual and organizational actors who have agency, rather than as static, top-down …

This review collects and critiques the academic literature on criminal defense lawyering, with
an emphasis on empirical work. Research on criminal defense attorneys in the United States …

Objective: Prior research consistently demonstrates that defendants convicted at trial are
sentenced more harshly than those who plead guilty. Additionally, a vast literature has …

Judging and Emotion investigates how judicial officers understand, experience, display,
manage and deploy emotions in their everyday work, in light of their fundamental …

Objectives We examine the relationship between political and religious context and juvenile
court dispositions, including whether case-level indicators of focal concerns are moderated …

Most criminal court cases are resolved through a plea, yet the plea decision-making process
remains largely unexplored in comparison to other phases of case processing. With …

With the changing landscape of women in policing, the representation of female police
officers has increased. However, there is limited understanding of how these encounters …

Monetary sanctions are a ubiquitous part of court systems. Previous studies have focused
largely on these sanctions at the state level or solely on large urban jurisdictions. However …

Courtrooms operate as unique microcosms—inhabited by courtroom personnel, legal
actors, defendants, witnesses, family members, and community residents who necessarily …