“Schrems II”: The return of the Privacy Shield

On 16 July 2020, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice rendered its landmark judgment in Case C-311/18 Data Protection Commissioner v. Facebook Ireland Ltd and Maximillian Schrems (“Schrems II”). The Grand Chamber invalidated the Commission decision on the adequacy of the data protection provided by the EU-US Privacy Shield. It however considered that the decision of the Commission on standard contractual clauses (“SCCs”) issued by the Commission for the transfer of personal data to processors established in third states was legally valid.The legal effects of the judgment should first be clarified. In addition, it has far-reaching implications for companies which transfer personal data from the EU to the US. The judgment of the Grand Chamber has also far-reaching implications for transfers of personal data from the EU to other third states. Last, it has far-reaching implications for the UK in the context of Brexit.© 2020 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.     

An exploratory study of women arrested for intimate partner violence: violent women or violent resistance?

With the advent of mandatory and pro-arrest laws for incidents of intimate partner violence, there has been an increase in the number of women arrested for domestic violence. Several explanations are posed in the literature that attempt to explain such a rise, including the hypothesis that women are being arrested not for offensive violence but rather for defensive violence. Few studies, however, have used empirical data to support such arguments. This exploratory study examines the characteristics of women arrested for intimate personal violence. Particular attention is paid to women arrested with their partner (i.e., dual arrestees) and the contextual characteristics of dual arrestee incidents. Important differences are uncovered in the context and consequences of arrest for dual arrestees (n = 21) compared to women arrested alone as the offender (n = 49). Implications of these findings and further research directions are discussed.     

When Does a Battered Woman Seek Help From the Police? The Role of Battered Women’s Functionality

This study explores how women’s functional limitations resulting from domestic violence lead to police involvement. Examining functionality is a broader approach to exploring domestic violence outcomes than looking at injuries or impairments, and in this study we look at the social participation aspects of social functioning. One hundred eleven battered women in four metropolitan cities in the U.S. participated in anonymous telephone surveys. Approximately 80% of the battered women in the sample were involved with the police due to their experiences of domestic violence. Women’s functionality was significantly associated with battered women’s police involvement after controlling for socio-demographic and violence-related covariates. The current study identifies one aspect of women’s functioning–social participation–as a critical predictor of their seeking of help from the police, and suggests implications for practice, including the need for police and domestic violence agencies to have awareness of the concept of functional limitations within a broader context of understanding disability.     

The violent and sexual victimization of college women: is repeat victimization a problem?

Little attention has been given to repeat violent and sexual victimization among college women. Using two national-level data sets, the authors find that a small proportion of college women experience a large proportion of violent and sexual victimizations. Women are more likely to experience repeat sexual victimization than repeat violence incidents. Repeat victimization tends to happen in the same month of the initial victimization, and the most likely next type of victimization is by far the same type of victimization. Comparing incident-level characteristics of repeat incidents to single incidents, there are few differences, with the exception that, in a larger proportion of single incidents, women took self-protective action. Implications for prevention and educational programs are discussed.     

“Nerve” and violent encounters: An assessment of fearlessness in the face of danger

The findings from a large body of research on the ecology of violence indicate that individuals demonstrate a willingness to engage in violence to reduce their risk for violent victimization. Scholars have suggested that a reputation for toughness and aggression acts as an informal signal that deters mistreatment. Anderson (1999), in his street code thesis, in particular, argued that adherence to the street code functions as a signal that reduces violent victimization risk. Other research findings, however, reveal that the street code leads to an increase in victimization risk; moreover, violent offenders are routinely victimized at high rates given their lifestyle and routine activities. The evidence, therefore, does not show support for the position that a reputation for toughness or aggression effectively reduces violent victimization. In the current study, we operationalize the concept of nerve, which findings from criminological studies indicate is an important mechanism for protecting adolescents from victimization. Using data from the second national evaluation of the Gang Resistance Education and Training Program, we test this operationalization of nerve to determine whether the concept is associated with later violent offending and violent victimization in ways consistent with theory and research on the ecology of youth violence. Our results demonstrate support for the notion that nerve is positively associated with violent offending, whereas those at the highest levels of this construct experience fewer violent victimizations.     

Organised Criminals as “Agents of Obligation”: The Case of Ireland

Relying on Brown's (2005a, b) thesis that contemporary shifts in penal policy are best understood as a reprisal of colonial rationality, so that offenders become “non-citizens” or “agents of obligation”, this article argues, firstly, that this framework (with certain important refinements and extensions) finds support in developments in Irish criminal justice policy aimed at offenders suspected of involvement in “organised crime”. These offenders have found themselves reconstituted as “agents of obligation” with duties to furnish information about their property and movements, report to the police concerning their location and, importantly, refrain from criminal activity or face extraordinary sanctions. Secondly, it is submitted that this draconian approach to the control of organised crime is built on false premises; specifically the idea that “organised crime” as such exists and is best controlled through restrictions on the freedom of key groups or “core nominals”.     

Assessing the Risk of Future Psychological Abuse: Predicting the Accuracy of Battered Women’s Predictions

Building on a handful of studies demonstrating battered women’s accuracy in assessing their risk of being physically reabused, this study examined how accurately victims assess their risk of future psychological abuse. Participants’ ratings of the likelihood that their partner would engage in controlling/dominance behaviors or efforts to humiliate/degrade them in the coming year and their reports 18 months later of whether this had actually occurred were used to create a four category version of accuracy (true positive, false positive, true negative, false negative). Victims were more likely to be right than wrong in their assessments of risk; PTSD symptoms, the recency of physical violence, and the degree of stalking and psychological abuse in the relationship predicted membership in the four accuracy categories. These findings overlap considerably with those examining victim accuracy in predicting physical abuse and inform ongoing debates about the value of incorporating victims’ insights into risk assessment efforts.

The Case of the “Offering of Life” in the Causes for Canonization of Catholic Saints: The Threshold of Self-Sacrifice

International Journal for the Semiotics of Law - Revue internationale de Sémiotique juridique - Catholic legal and doctrinal tradition defined two main cases for the canonization of saints:...     

“Virgins–Widows–Spouses”: On the language of moral distinction as applied to women and men in the Middle Ages

The focus of this paper is on the meaning enshrined in the rhetorical formula “Virgins–Widows–Spouses,” according to which women could expect to receive a 100-, 60-, or 30-fold reward, respectively, in the life hereafter. Initially formulated around 400 A.D., the formula rapidly became an abbreviation for an understanding of society that was used to conceptualize and legitimize religious practices and the political–social order. Although used especially to define a normative standard for women, it was also frequently lauded as a model for men. The idea of widow, applied to men and women, represented the connection between penance and asceticism. Since the 13th century, however, references to virgins, widows, and spouses ceased for the most part to denote a moral standing based on merit regardless of sex and instead came to designate women according to their stage in life. Men, by contrast, were ranked according to their occupations.     

The Trial of Joseph Dotterweich: The Origins of the “Responsible Corporate Officer” Doctrine

This article analyzes the origins of the “responsible corporate officer” doctrine: the trial of Joseph Dotterweich. That doctrine holds that an officer may be personally liable for the criminal act of a subordinate if the officer was, in some indefinite way, able to prevent the violation. Applying this doctrine, the prosecution of Dotterweich entailed strict liability for a strict liability offense. The underlying offenses—the interstate sale of one misbranded and adulterated drug and one misbranded drug—were said to be strict liability offenses. And then, with respect to Dotterweich as the corporation’s general manager, the government argued that he was strictly liable because he stood in “responsible relation” to the company’s acts. The government never tried to prove that the company, Buffalo Pharmacal, was negligent, nor did it try to prove that Dotterweich was negligent in his supervision of the employees of Buffalo Pharmacal. The prosecutor and judge were candid about this theory throughout the trial, although the judge conceded that it seemed bizarre and unfair. The defense lawyer repeatedly sought to inject what became known throughout the trial as the “question of good faith,” but was circumvented at almost every turn. What would thus seem to be the crux of any criminal trial—the personal fault of the defendant—was carefully shorn from the jury’s consideration. The government’s theory was so at odds with intuitive notions of liability and blame that, as one probes into the case, and looks at the language used in the government’s appellate briefs, imputations of moral fault inevitably crept in. Yet the government was not entitled to make such accusations, as it had pruned moral considerations from the trial. The article argues that the responsible corporate officer doctrine can never enjoy a secure place in our legal system. First, the doctrine is at a minimum in tension with, and often in direct opposition to, basic principles of the criminal law; and second, the doctrine fails, when followed to its logical conclusions, to accord with basic notions of fair play. The article concludes that the responsible corporate officer doctrine is either unnecessary, in cases in which the evidence establishes personal fault, or unjust, in cases in which it creates liability in the absence of personal fault through the unspecified notion of “responsibility.” The Dotterweich case illustrates what is contemplated by the latter possibility, and why it is problematic in any judicial system that purports, in the words of the Model Penal Code, “to safeguard conduct that is without fault from condemnation as criminal.”     

National wealth and private poverty through civil law? a review of the book “The Code of Capital” by Katharina Pistor

European Journal of Law and Economics -     

The Dynamics of Staying and Leaving: Implications for Battered Women’s Emotional Well-Being and Experiences of Violence at the End of a Year

Much of the discourse on intimate partner violence assumes that women must end their relationship with their abusive partner to increase their safety and emotional well-being. Few studies, however, exist to support this assumption. Equally problematic, those studies that do exist have failed to distinguish women who leave and stay out from those who leave only to later return. Comparing emotional well-being and experiences of violence for 206 low-income, primarily Black battered women following different relationship trajectories, this longitudinal study found that women both separated from and together with their partner for the entire year of the study fared best at the end of that year compared to women “in” and “out” of the relationship over time. Beyond challenging common assumptions, these findings highlight the importance of considering the larger context within which an individual instance of leaving occurs.

The perspective of “justice” of international law in the global context

After the Cold War and the quick development of globalization, non-state acts by international organizations, transnational corporations and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), etc., are becoming more active. Global issues with regard to, inter alia, environment, human rights, terrorism are constantly emerging, which bring great challenge to the Westphalia System that is based on state sovereignty and centered on the national state. At the same time, the values, which include “individualism” and “global justice,” are constantly casting impact on international legal system. Doubtlessly, in the current context of international relations, “justice among states” is still the reasonable positioning of the value of modern international law. However, making “individualism” and “global justice” compatible and modifying “justice among states” is an inevitable trend. At the same time, the rule brought about by the modification on the value of justice must be handled properly.     

A “meeting of the minds” — The greater illusion

Conclusion Despite a superficial similarity in circumstance, the dynamics of the judicial process of contract interpretation are not equivalent to the circumstances giving rise to the Primacy Dilemma. The Primacy Dilemma involves two parties; the judicial process involves a third: the court. This distinction is critical for while Wittgenstein's exposé of the Primacy Dilemma as illusion does not require that centuries of refinements to theories of contract interpretation be scrapped, it does require an abandonment of the ideal that courts do not and cannot make contracts; courts merely enforce agreements that the parties themselves have reached.Copyright ©1995 by Samuel C. Damren. All rights reserved.     

Treated sex offenders as “paraprofessional” co-workers in the treatment of the sex offender

This paper will briefly review the utilization of the paraprofessional in a community-based sex offender treatment programme in Merseyside, UK. The paraprofessionals are treated paedophiles in the role of treatment co-facilitators. Further thoughts on the role dynamic, training issues and supervision are discussed. This is an example of service-user involvement in practice.     

The “Trump Factor” and the Changing Face of Globalization

The victory of Donald Trump’s administration not only meant a change in domestic socioeconomic policy, but also in the sphere of U.S. foreign ties; it has had a strong influence on the development trend of the world economy and trade. Taking the path of protectionism and confrontation with key trade and economic partners in Latin America, Asia, and Europe, Washington has attempted to break the status quo and transform the existing character of the globalization process. The “Trump factor” has become a key element in the formation of a new global order.