American Law’s Worst Moment—2020

AUSTIN SARAT

Austin Sarat—Associate Provost and Associate Dean of the Faculty and William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence & Political Science at Amherst College—explains why the police murder of George Floyd was the worst moment of 2020 in American law. Professor Sarat proposes that we remember the event and that date—May 25—as “infamous,” a word reserved for rare and atrocious events like the bombing of Pearl Harbor, in an attempt to capture the brutality and inhumanity of the act.

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Commonwealth v. Montarvo

Docket: SJC-12905

Opinion Date: December 29, 2020

Judge: Lowy

Areas of Law: Criminal Law

The Supreme Judicial Court held that Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 279, 25(a) of the habitual offender statute allows sentencing judges to impose probation on defendants who fall within its ambit. Defendant was convicted of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and armed assault with intent to murder. The trial judge found that section 25(a)'s enhancements applied to Defendant but rejected Defendant's argument that the statute allowed the judge to impose probation. The judge then sentenced Defendant to a term of imprisonment. The Supreme Judicial Court disagreed and vacated Defendant's sentence, holding that section 25(a) provides sentencing judges with the discretion to impose probation.