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Due Process Institute advocates for limiting the growth of criminal laws that punish regulatory or non-culpable conduct. This work focuses on strengthening intent requirements, improving clarity in criminal statutes, and preventing ordinary people from facing criminal penalties for conduct they did not know was illegal.
Learn about our advocacy on the Hill to address broad and vague federal laws.
Discover our amicus work to reign in overly broad federal statutes that threaten due process rights.
Interested in learning about how overcriminalization impacts regular Americans?
The House passed the Count the Crimes to Cut Act (H.R. 2159) by voice vote. This bipartisan bill would require a report identifying all federal crimes and the number of prosecutions in the past 15 years. This would enable Congress to eliminate dead-letter offenses, reduce regulatory clutter, and refocus resources. It is commonsense reform that restores accountability, enhances public safety, and makes the federal government more transparent.
In Ruan v. United States, we argued to curtail the increasing exposure to criminal penalties faced by physicians when they treat patients in good faith. Due to the lack of clear guidelines, prosecutors are left to develop their own standards on unlawful dispensing and physicians are left without adequate notice of what conduct may conceivably subject them to decades of imprisonment.
The Supreme Court agreed with Due Process Institute that the mens rea “knowingly or intentionally” applies to the statute’s “except as authorized” clause. You can read the 9-0 decision here.
We thank Andrew Prins, Cherish Drain, and Joseph Sitzmann of Latham & Watkins for their pro bono work on this issue.