Samuel Gross, J.D., Professor of Law, U-M, will discuss the intersection of two contemporary facets of criminal justice in the United States: our cooling love affair with capital punishment, and our increasing awareness that innocent people are convicted of serious crimes with disturbing regularity. He will review the empirical context of these issues, and discuss how the Supreme Court has failed to come to terms with the implications of the many recent exonerations of defendants who had been sentenced to death, and the near certainty that other innocent defendants have been put to death.

This is the last of 6 lectures in the series, “The Supreme Court: Impact of Current Decisions on Our Society.”