UF College of Law experts available to comment on recent U.S. Supreme Court decision

May 18, 2010

GAINESVILLE, Fla., May 18, 2010 – University of Florida Levin College of Law faculty are available to discuss the recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions in Graham v. Florida and Sullivan v. Florida; and the ramifications of the court’s verdict.

The University of Florida has a broadcast studio equipped for live or live-to-tape interviews through our KU digital satellite uplink. For radio networks, we also have an ISDN live for clean audio interviews. To contact the UF College of Law Communication’s Office, call 352-273-0650 or e-mail mlwalker@law.ufl.edu.

May 17, 2010 – Graham v. Florida (08-7412) and – Sullivan v. Florida (08-7621)
The decision: The court decided that the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishments prohibits the imprisonment of a juvenile for life without the possibility of parole as punishment for the juvenile’s commission of a non-homicide crime.

John Stinneford – Stinneford is an assistant professor of law and a cited authority in an amicus brief for Graham v. Florida. He is a former federal prosecutor with expertise in criminal law and sentencing. His current scholarship focuses on the historical underpinnings of the Eighth Amendment’s Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause, as well as the Due Process Clause of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Stinneford’s research is an effort to determine whether a deeper understanding of the original meaning and context of these constitutional provisions might help to make the Supreme Court’s current jurisprudence concerning constitutional limitations on punishment clearer and more practically effective. He can be reached at jstinneford@law.ufl.edu.
View his faculty page at http://www.law.ufl.edu/faculty/stinneford/.

Nancy Dowd – Dowd is the David H. Levin Chair in Family Law and director of the Center on Children and Families. The center signed one of the amicus briefs for these cases. Dowd’s expertise includes constitutional law, family law and civil rights. She can be reached at 352-273-0930 or dowd@law.ufl.edu.
View her faculty page at http://www.law.ufl.edu/faculty/dowd/.