Persecution of Jewish forensic pathologists

Not even forensic pathologists were spared by the anti-Jewish laws of the Third Reich. Fritz Strassmann and Paul Fraenckel were among more than 140 faculty of the Berlin Department of Medicine persecuted by the national socialist dictatorship. It was because of their Jewish background that Georg Strassmann was expelled from university in Breslau, and Leone Lattes was forced to leave in Pavia. Miklós Nyiszli was deported from Oradea to Auschwitz and forced to perform forensic autopsies. Stefan Jellinek in Vienna, Ludwik Hirszfeld in Warsaw and Friedrich Schiff in Berlin were other medical professionals whose achievements had enriched legal medicine before they became victims of anti-Jewish persecution.     

Case reports of suicide with an electric drill

In this report, three cases of suicide by an electric power drill are described. In the first case, a man aged 51 was found with four penetrating wounds of the head and chest. The second case involves a 56-year-old man who suffered a penetrating craniocerebral injury and the third case involves a 53-year-old man who suffered one head injury and two chest injuries. In the first two cases, the victims were found dead. In the third case, the victim survived his injuries for 28 hours. The case histories and the post-mortem examinations revealed no evidence of homicide.     

Fiscal Consolidations: Quality,Economic Conditions,and Success

Recent research has demonstrated theimportance of good quality of fiscaladjustments for the success of governmentbudget consolidations. We extend thisapproach to analyze the importance of theeconomic conditions in which fiscalconsolidations are started for theirsuccess. The cyclical positions of thedomestic and international economy, theinitial debt level and the stance of fiscalpolicy in the OECD are all importantdeterminants of the likelihood of fiscalconsolidations. They also affect thegovernment's choice of consolidationstrategy, making them importantdeterminants of the success of fiscalconsolidations. In contrast, the monetarypolicy stance plays only a negligible rolefor fiscal consolidations. We use theanalysis to test for any Maastricht effectson the performance of European governmentsduring the 1990s. Such effects are weak atbest and occurred only during the firsthalf of the decade.     

Homicides in East Berlin from 1980 to 1989. Part I: victimology and phenomenology

At the Institute of Legal Medicine of the Humboldt-University in Berlin 8,580 autopsies were carried out in the period of analysis from 1980 to 1989 - including 139 homicides (= 1.6 %). The first part of this study deals with the victim-related analysis. Furthermore, the criminologically relevant aspects of the phenomenology of crime are described. Apart from the low frequency, the mainly short latency period and the low rate of homicides with removal of the victim are noteworthy.     

Fatal electric arc accidents due to high voltage

The frequency of electric arc accidents has been successfully reduced owing to preventive measures taken by the professional association. However, the risk of accidents has continued to exist in private setting. Three fatal electric arc accidents caused by high voltage are reported with reference to the autopsy findings.     

Homicides in East Berlin from 1980 to 1989. Part II: results of investigations and legal consequences

The second part of the study on homicides in East Berlin from 1980 to 1989 describes the solving of crimes, the usual features of offenders and the legal assessment according to East German law. Of the 139 homicides 126 crimes (= 90.6%) could be solved. Most of the offenders had a low social background and often belonged to the victim's circle of friends or family. Situational homicides and elimination crimes were the most common crimes. In the legal assessment sentences for murder were predominant.     

Latency problems with smothering using soft cover

Smothering by covering the respiratory orifices with soft material is one of the rarely established forms of mechanically induced death by asphyxia. An important reason of latency is that this kind of homicide leaves almost no traces. The two described cases from the autopsy material of the Institute of Legal Medicine in Berlin (CCM) show the limits of medico-legal interpretation and the resulting special responsibility of the investigator. In the first case the defendant denied the offence and was acquitted of the charge, while in the second case the self-confessed offender was convicted.     

Zukunftsfähige Agrarlandschaften in Deutschland – Ziele und Anforderungen aus ökologischer, ökonomischer und rechtlicher Sicht

Natur und Recht - Die global steigenden Treibhausgase verändern in zunehmenden Maße auch in Deutschland die klimatischen Verhältnisse. Betroffen sind insbesondere hiesige...     

Some thoughts on the use and misuse of statistical inference

The abuse of techniques of statistical inference resulting from inadequate attention to the relationship between the model used and the real world problem being addressed, and inappropriate interpretation of conclusions in the light of that relationsip, are discussed. The basic principle underlying all statistical inference is that we attempt to distinguish between alternatives by comparing observed behavior with that predicted by predictive models of those alternatives. The use of predictive models which do not describe the behavior of the alternatives between which we wish to distinguish is a clear violation of that principle. The principle is illustrated in a discussion of sampling from an urn. The technique of causal inference through partial correlation analysis is discussed as an example of the violation of this principle. On the surface this technique appears to have wide applicability in analyses in support of policy studies, but further examination shows its applicability to be somewhere between highly questionable and totally specious.