Author Description

Johnson's CRIMINAL PROCEDURE has a number of distinctive features. It covers the filed in a manageable 900 pages. Despite the relatively limited number of pages, the coverage is broad and all the major subjects are included. The book also includes historical and comparative materials; in order to combine broad coverage within strict page limitations the author has prepared "commentaries" to accompany the cases and materials. These commentaries provide students with background material and analysis so that the student can come to class with many of the preliminary questions answered, permitting class discussion to focus on the most important areas of controversy or uncertainty; a major goal of Johnson's CRIMINAL PROCEDURE is to keep the students' attention focused on the forest rather than the trees. Criminal Procedure is such a detailed subject, with such an enormous amount of case law, that it is very easy to become lost in the minutiae. The best way to prevent that is to introduce students to the "big picture" at the beginning and then to show them continually how each detailed issue relates to the major themes that were introduced at the start.