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Punishment, Democracy, and Victims

Passage of the Crime Victims' Rights Act of 2004 marked the latest in a series of political successes by the victims' rights movement, offering to victims an enforceable right to be reasonably heard at sentencing and other stages of criminal litigation. The CVRA can be seen, in at least two respects, as a manifestation of a broader, long-term trend that might be referred to as the democratization of sentencing. First, the rhetoric surrounding the CVRA presented victims' rights as a counterweight to defendants' rights, suggesting that passage of the statute owed much to strong public feelings of hostility to defendants. Second, the statute's recognition of a more robust, independent role for victims at sentencing embodies a skepticism of the traditional lawyer- and judge-dominated model. However, to the extent that legal professionals and criminal justice insiders see victims' rights laws as merely symbolic expressions of anti-defendant sentiment, the victims' rights movement will have difficulty in achieving meaningful operational changes in the criminal justice system.