64 CASSELL ET AL. [Vol. 104 court proceedings, and ultimately to any parole or other release of the criminal. The Task Force then made a series of recommendations for all criminal justice agencies, including the police, prosecutors, and the courts.!! The recommendations were designed to allow crime victims to receive information about, and to participate in, criminal cases. In its most far-reaching recommendation, the Task Force proposed amending the U.S. Constitution to protect victims’ rights.'? The proposed amendment would have built on existing constitutional rights for criminal defendants by extending similar rights to crime victims." After the publication of the report, crime victims’ advocates secured the passage of a series of state constitutional and legislative reforms. These measures guaranteed victims’ rights in the criminal process, such as the right to be notified of court proceedings, to attend those proceedings, and to speak at appropriate points in the process, such as plea bargaining and sentencing. The measures were embodied in state statutes and, in more than thirty states, state constitutional “bills of rights” for crime victims.'* While many of the measures had narrow participatory rights,'> some of the amendments also contained more open-ended language, promising victims a right to fair treatment “throughout the criminal justice process.”'° After successfully passing many state constitutional amendments, crime victims’ rights advocates sought to achieve the Task Force’s broadest recommendation: to secure protection for victims’ rights in the U.S. Constitution. In 1996, victims’ advocates proposed a Victims’ Rights Amendment in a Rose Garden ceremony attended by President Bill Clinton.'’ The proposed amendment contained a list of rights for crime victims, largely paralleling the rights contained in state victims’ rights "" See id. at 56-82. 1? Td. at 114. '3 Td. at 114-15. '4 For a map depicting the states with (and without) such amendme