Nancy J. King
Lee S. and Charles A. Speir Professor of Law
Voice: (615) 343-9836
Fax: (615) 322-6631
Email: nancy.king@vanderbilt.edu
Office: Room 248
View curriculum vitae (.pdf)
Links
- Program in Law and Government
- Cecil D. Branstetter Litigation & Dispute Resolution Program
- Criminal Justice Program
- "Habeas for the Twenty-First Century" book site
- "Justice: Too Much and Too Expensive," opinion piece, New York Times, April 17, 2011
Research Interest(s)
Post-investigation criminal procedure, plea bargaining, trials, sentencing, appeals, habeas corpus, juries
Education
J.D. University of Michigan
B.A. Oberlin College
Biography
Nancy King is an expert in criminal procedure. Her latest book, Habeas for the Twenty-First Century: Uses, Abuses, and the Future of the Great Writ (University of Chicago Press, 2011) coauthored with Joseph Hoffmann of the University of Indiana, offers important recommendations for habeas reform. She and two researchers from the National Center for State Courts led a national study of habeas litigation in U.S. District Courts funded by an award from the National Institute of Justice and completed in 2007, upon which some of the reforms recommended in Habeas for the Twenty-First Century are based. Her most recent article revisits the cases in the study, reporting the outcomes four years later, including cases that had been pending, appealed, or remanded. Over the course of her academic career, she has authored or co-authored two leading treatises on criminal procedure, the leading criminal procedure casebook, and more than two dozen articles and book chapters. Her work focuses on the post-investigative features of the criminal process, including plea bargaining, trials, juries, sentencing, appeals, double jeopardy and post-conviction review. Professor King is an assistant reporter for and former member of the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, a member of the American Law Institute, and a member of the American Bar Association's Criminal Justice Standards Committee. She has been a visiting professor at Michigan Law School and a visiting scholar at Northwestern University Law School. She served as Vanderbilt's associate dean for research and faculty development from 1999 to 2001, and was the FedEx Research Professor in 2001-02. In 2005, she received the Chancellor's Award for Research at Vanderbilt for her research on jury sentencing, "Jury Sentencing in Practice: A Three-State Study" (with Rosevelt Noble, published in 57 Vanderbilt Law Review 885, 2004). In 2010, Professor King received the university's Alexander Heard Distinguished Service Professor Award, given each year to a single faculty member whose research has made distinctive contributions to the understanding of contemporary society.
Media Mentions
"Justice: Too Much and Too Expensive," opinion piece in the New York Times, April 17, 2011
Representative Publications
Books
Habeas for the Twenty First Century: Uses, Abuses, and the Future of the Great Writ (University of Chicago Press 2011) (with Joseph Hoffmann) Vanderbilt Law School hosted a discussion of the book on April 21, 2011.
Modern Criminal Procedure (12th ed. 2008 & Annual Supps.) (with Yale Kamisar, Wayne LaFave, Jerold Israel & Orin Kerr). Text also published annually in two paperback volumes: Basic Criminal Procedure and Advanced Criminal Procedure
Criminal Procedure (West, 3d ed. 2007) (7-volume treatise covering state and federal criminal procedure) (with Wayne LaFave, Jerold Israel & Orin Kerr) (WESTLAW database CRIMPROC)
Habeas Litigation in U.S. District Courts: Final Report (monograph supported by Award No. 2006-IJ-CX-0020, National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, United States Department of Justice) (August 2007) (with Fred Cheesman & Brian Ostrom)
Federal Practice and Procedure, Criminal (3d ed. 2003) (edited with Charles Wright & Susan Klein) (WESTLAW database FPP)
"Procedure at Sentencing," in The Oxford Handbook of Sentencing and Corrections (2011) (J. Petersilia and K. Reitz, eds.)
Articles
"Non-Capital Habeas Cases after Appellate Review: An Empirical Analysis," 24(4) Federal Sentencing Reporter 308 (2012) (follows cases from the 2007 study)
Post-Padilla, 23 Fed. Sent. Rep. 239 (2011) (with G. Proctor)
"Rethinking the Federal Role in State Criminal Justice," 84 New York University Law Review 791 (2009) (with Joseph Hoffmann)
"Appeal Waivers and the Future of Sentencing Policy," 55 Duke Law Journal 209 (2005) (with Michael O'Neill)
"Jury Sentencing in Non-Capital Cases: Comparing Severity and Variance with Judicial Sentences in Two States," 2 Journal of Empirical Legal Studies 331 (2005) (with Rosevelt Noble)
"The Story of Duncan v. Louisiana," in Criminal Procedure Law Stories (Carol Steiker ed., 2005), reprinted in Issues on Trial: Rights of the Accused (2007)
"Apprendi and Plea Bargaining," 54 Stanford Law Review 295 (2001) (with Susan Klein) (cited in Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004))
"The American Criminal Jury," 62 Law & Contemporary Problems 41 (1999), reprinted in World Jury Systems (Neil Vidmar, ed. 2000) and in The Jury System: Contemporary Scholarship (Valerie Hans, ed. 2006)
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