Anticipating organized and transnational crime

This paper seeks to identify ways in which governments and lawenforcement agencies might enhance the effectiveness of their efforts toanticipate organized crime. It starts by defining what is meant byanticipation, and differentiating it from the much more difficult task ofprediction. The analysis then identifies some of the methods and modelsthat are generally accepted as part of the existing knowledge base onorganized crime and highlights how these can be used to anticipate futuredevelopments and to develop warnings about how criminal organizationsmight evolve and behave in the future. The knowledge base includespolitical, economic, sociological, strategic, and composite models and showshow they provide a foundation for anticipating future developments inorganized crime. The models are either models about the kind ofenvironment in which organized crime flourishes or models about the waysin which organized crime behaves. What we do, in effect, is to identifyand elucidate `models' in ways that provide propositions about the kindsof developments, innovations or changes we might see in organized crime(both domestic and transnational) in the future. Underlying indicators provide warning about future manifestations of organized crime. Anticipating these manifestations provides a basis for appropriatepreventive, defensive or mitigating strategies. Finally, the article providessome examples of specific techniques of information collection andintelligence analysis that might assist in this task of anticipation.     

Municipal Debt Issues in Foreign Markets: Managing Currency and Interest Rate Risk

Since the mid-1980s, there has been an acceleration of state and local government interest in the taxable bond market as a source of capital. This has resulted from, among other factors, restrictions imposed on economic and industrial development loan programs resulting from the passage of the Tax Reform Act of 1986. Increased state and local government involvement in the taxable bond markets has increased competition for such capital between the public and the private sectors. In turn, the developing capital competition has expanded into overseas securities markets. Private sector corporations have frequently accessed foreign capital markets to take advantage of lower interest rates and reduced financing costs. By contrast, state and local governments have accessed such markets only recently. This article discusses the policy issues considered by a state or local government entity when it decides to borrow funds in foreign markets and discusses the issues involved in managing currency and interest rate risk when issuing municipal bonds in foreign markets. It includes a review of the hedging techniques used by the Kentucky Development Finance Authority (KDFA) to protect against changes in the Yen/Dollar exchange relationship on a recent Samurai bond issue sold by KDFA as an example of such a transaction.     

Alcohol and Parasomnias: The Statistical Evaluation of the Parasomnia Defense in Sexual Assault,Where Alcohol is Involved

Sleep sex may be a defense for alleged sexual assault. The International Classification of Sleep Disorders (ICSD3) states: “Disorders of arousal should not be diagnosed in the presence of alcohol intoxication… The former [alcohol blackouts] are exponentially more prevalent.” A panel member of ICSD3, quoting ICSD3 asserts: “alcohol intoxication should rule out a sleep-walking defense”. This implies extremely strong support for a prosecution hypothesis (H_p) over a defense hypothesis (H_d). I use Bayesian methodology to evaluate the evidential probity of alcohol intoxication. The likelihood ratio, LR, measures the amplification of prior odds of guilt, . By Bayes' theorem, . I use data from cross-sectional studies of sexual assault and prevalence of alcohol use, in college students, with data from longitudinal studies, and data from the epidemiology of parasomnias to evaluate LR (alcohol). LR ~1.5 or 5, depending whether alcohol does, or does not, increase the risk of parasomnias. The proposition of extremely strong support for H_p implies a LR ~1,000,000, so the proposition in ICSD3 is not supported by formal analysis. The statistical reasoning in ICSD3 is unclear. There appears to be inversion of the Bayesian conditional (confusing intoxication given assault, and assault given intoxication) and failure to evaluate alcohol intoxication in H_d. Similar statistical errors in R. v Sally Clark are discussed. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine should review the statistical methodology in ICSD3.