Juvenile justice reform and the courtroom workgroup: Issues of perception and workload

Criminal justice policies may be enacted, but the actual implementation of those policies depends upon those working on the frontline. Policies that affect how cases are processed in the courtroom can be thwarted by the efforts of courtroom workgroup members. The present study analyzed how courtroom workgroups adjusted to a new juvenile justice policy. Qualitative interviews demonstrated that while there was widespread agreement on the basic tenets of the reform, perceptions of the reform varied by confidence in workgroup membership. Further, the reform inherently increased the workload for some and decreased the workload for others. Those whose workload increased discussed subverting the reform effort in order to continue with business as usual. These findings demonstrated that effective policies must consider the needs of workgroups as adaptation of policies in actual practice depend upon workgroup members' support.     

The need to know versus the right to know: privacy of patient medical data in an information-based society

"Whatever, in connection with my professional practice, or not in connection with it, I see or hear, in the life of men, which ought not to be spoken of abroad, I will not divulge, as reckoning that all such should be kept secret."(1) "Safeguards to privacy in individual health care information are imperative to preserve the health care delivery relationship and the integrity of the patient record."(2) As early as the fourth and fifth centuries B.C., Hippocrates contemplated the importance of medical information to the care and treatment of patients. His oath suggests that privacy of a patient's medical information creates the foundation upon which a patient reposes trust in his or her physician. While defining the earliest version of the physician-patient privilege, the oath does not envision the extent of modern day access to healthcare information. A patient's relationship with the modern healthcare delivery system often includes a team of physicians, nurses, and other clinical support personnel. This relationship extends beyond direct caregivers and may include healthcare administrators, payor organizations, and persons unfamiliar with a patient's identity, such as researchers and public health officials. Accessing a patient's medical information links these participants to the patient's healthcare delivery relationship. The Hippocratic Oath does not contemplate such broad access, nor does it contemplate the emerging privacy crisis resulting from the application of computer technology to medical record storage and retrieval. The combination of broad access, individual privacy rights, and computer technology requires a rethinking of measures designed to protect the realities of the modern medical information society.     

A review of recent developments affecting COBRA rights

Due to the high cost of health care claims and COBRA's status as remedial legislation, COBRA has generated a significant amount of litigation in recent years. While the early COBRA decisions tended to broaden the law in order to provide a remedy to an otherwise uninsured qualified beneficiary, the recent trend in the case law has been to limit the expansion of COBRA rights based on a narrower construction of the statute. Even so, COBRA still represents a legal minefield for employers. As a result, a careful employer will minimize its exposure by monitoring changes in the law and its interpretation and making appropriate modifications to its COBRA documentation and administration. This article discusses some of the more significant recent changes in the law affecting qualified beneficiaries' COBRA rights--and therefore, employers' exposure.     

Reassessing Portia: The Iconic Potential ofShakespeare's Woman Lawyer

This paper considers the adoption ofPortia, the heroine of The Merchant ofVenice, by feminist legal scholars as ametaphor for the woman lawyer. It suggests thatPortia has both captured and is captured by thefeminist legal scholar's imagination, becomingat once an idol, myth and icon. She is to somethe personification of the woman lawyer'sperceived difference, a mouthpiece for mercyand `the different voice' and to others, a shamor myth, her idolised reputation sullied, her`difference' rejected. Yet ultimately thisconstant and simultaneous idolisation andvilification of Portia threatens not only tosilence and constrain conversations about thewoman lawyer, but also to eclipse her promiseand potential. Thus in the final section of thepaper, Portia is established as an icon. Assuch her story, understood as a myth or fairytale, is seen to reveal previously unimaginedpossibilities for change, as an iconicunderstanding of Portia becomes a windowthrough which feminist legal scholars can lookonto alternative understandings of lawyeringand adjudication.     

Beyond ‘Revenge Porn’: The Continuum of Image-Based Sexual Abuse

In the last few years, many countries have introduced laws combating the phenomenon colloquially known as ‘revenge porn’. While new laws criminalising this practice represent a positive step forwards, the legislative response has been piecemeal and typically focuses only on the practices of vengeful ex-partners. Drawing on Liz Kelly’s (Surviving sexual violence. Polity Press, Cambridge, 1988) pioneering work, we suggest that ‘revenge porn’ should be understood as just one form of a range of gendered, sexualised forms of abuse which have common characteristics, forming what we are conceptualising as the ‘continuum of image-based sexual abuse’. Further, we argue that image-based sexual abuse is on a continuum with other forms of sexual violence. We suggest that this twin approach may enable a more comprehensive legislative and policy response that, in turn, will better reflect the harms to victim-survivors and lead to more appropriate and effective educative and preventative strategies.