Radiographic demonstration of esophageal and tracheal fistulas at autopsy using a contrasting medium that vulcanizes at room temperature

Esophageal and tracheal fistulas, which occur in 0.05% of medicolegal autopsies, were demonstrated in three cases by a postmortem radiographic technique using silicone rubber/lead oxide as a contrasting medium that vulcanizes at room temperature. In one 83-year-old male, a tracheoesophageal fistula was detected, which had developed after surgical repair of an esophageal rupture caused by a flexible fiberoptic endoscope. In a second case, carcinoma of the esophagus in a 78-year-old male had eroded the trachea and arcus of the aorta creating a fatal tracheoesophagoaortic fistula. In a third case, 55-year-old female developed a tracheobrachicephalic artery fistula as a result of an infiltrating cystic adenocarcinoma of the trachea, resulting in a fatal hemorrhage into the trachea. The results of this study indicate that diagnostic radiologic methods using a vulcanized contrasting medium are useful in supplementing normal dissection in autopsy cases with suspected fistulas of the esophagus or trachea.     

Case report of accidental stab wound to the heart

A 33 year-old Polish field-worker was found by his colleagues kneeling in front of his trailer, with a bloody stab wound in the heart region. In spite of prompt surgical intervention, the man died from his injury a few hours later. Upon examination of the dead man's trailer a blood-smeared vegetable-knife was found in the sink, and on the floor, a pullover with a slit-like cut. On the wall hung a jacket on a hook with a cut in the inner surface of the left breast pocket but not in the outside layer. The examination of the clothes, the autopsy and a reconstruction of the sequence of events led to the following conclusion: The knife had been placed into the breast pocket of the jacket with the tip facing downwards. As the man put down a sack of potatoes, the knife hooked into a pre-existing gap in the sack and was driven into the chest cavity by the pressure weight of the heavy sack.     

Withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment from a patient in a minimally conscious state

This column reports on a recent decision, the first in England in which a court was asked to authorise the withdrawal of artificial nutrition and hydration from a patient in a "minimally conscious state". Since the seminal decision in 1993 in Airedale NHS Trust v Bland [1993] AC 789, in which the House of Lords authorised withdrawal of artificial nutrition and hydration from a patient in a persistent vegetative state, the relatively new diagnosis of a "minimally conscious state" has been recognised. In deciding whether it was in the patient's best interests that artificial nutrition and hydration be withdrawn and withheld, the court made a key legal determination, with precedential effect, as to whether the so-called "balance sheet" approach to determining a patient's best interests, as opposed to the (discredited) "futility" principle, applies to a patient in a minimally conscious state. The merit of the former approach is that it forces explicit consideration of quality-of-life assessments in favour of and against withdrawing life-sustaining treatment. A significant pitfall of the English position, as it is currently developing, is the premium it places on accurate diagnosis, whether of vegetative state or minimally conscious state. These issues will have to be faced sooner or later by Australasian courts.     

An explanation for camera perspective bias in voluntariness judgment for video-recorded confession: Suggestion of cognitive frame

Three experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis that difference in voluntariness judgment for a custodial confession filmed in different camera focuses ("camera perspective bias") could occur because a particular camera focus conveys a suggestion of a particular cognitive frame. In Experiment 1, 146 juror eligible adults in Korea showed a camera perspective bias in voluntariness judgment with a simulated confession filmed with two cameras of different focuses, one on the suspect and the other on the detective. In Experiment 2, the same bias in voluntariness judgment emerged without cameras when the participants were cognitively framed, prior to listening to the audio track of the videos used in Experiment 1, by instructions to make either a voluntariness judgment for a confession or a coerciveness judgment for an interrogation. In Experiment 3, the camera perspective bias in voluntariness judgment disappeared when the participants viewing the video focused on the suspect were initially framed to make coerciveness judgment for the interrogation and the participants viewing the video focused on the detective were initially framed to make voluntariness judgment for the confession. The results in combination indicated that a particular camera focus may convey a suggestion of a particular cognitive frame in which a video-recorded confession/interrogation is initially represented. Some forensic and policy implications were discussed.     

The effect of the ageing of crime scene objects on the results of scent identification line-ups using trained dogs

In a scent identification line-up, a trained dog matches the scent trace left by a perpetrator at the crime scene to the odour of a suspect in a line-up of different odours. The procedures are strictly defined and the results are routinely used by the police and as evidence in court in a number of European countries. This paper describes the effect of ageing of the odour trace collected at the crime scene on the performance of the dogs in recognising the perpetrator in a line-up. The results show that whilst the dogs perform faultlessly in matching odours collected on the same day, the results drop to a lower level and become more variable in the period studied (2 weeks to 6 months). However, the results do not show a systematic decrease in performance. A possible explanation is the development of a steady state in the glass jars containing the perpetrator odour trace after initial differential evaporation of components of the residue or break down of unsaturated components into saturated ones. Prevention of this initial change may prevent the drop in performance observed in this study, thus increasing the reliability of these scent identifications.     

Murder and robbery by vehicular impact: true vehicular homicide

True vehicular homicides are defined as those occurrences in which a motor vehicle is intentionally used as a weapon in taking of a life. A case is presented in which the deceased was traveling in the front passenger seat of a motor car that was deliberately rammed by a heavy jeep that came in the opposite direction, resulting in a serious frontal collision. Immediately after the impact, while the occupants of the car were lying in a dazed condition, the two persons riding in the jeep escaped with a bag containing money that was in the car, leaving the jeep behind. The impact mainly involved the driver's sides of both vehicles. The driver of the car sustained serious injuries but was found to be alive, whereas the front-seat passenger, who did not show any serious external injuries, was found to be in a collapsed state and was pronounced dead on admission to the hospital within 30 minutes of the accident. The autopsy revealed that death was caused by closed hemopericardium from a ruptured right atrium. The evaluation of the external and internal injuries confirmed that the fatal injury and a few serious internal injuries were caused by the seat belt (tertiary-impact injuries). The ruptured right atrium was attributed to blunt abdominal trauma by impacting against the lap belt. The case was a true vehicular homicide in which a motor vehicle had been used as a weapon to kill a person. Various aspects pertaining to road accidents, the safety of the occupants, and the advantage and disadvantage of the safety devices are discussed.     

Identification of acepromazine in hair: an illustration of the difficulties encountered in investigating drug-facilitated crimes

After a drug-facilitated sexual assault (DFSA), a woman was found in a drowsy state at home. She remembered having drunk an unknown beverage by the accused. Blood samples (collected 8 hours after the DFSA), two glasses, and a teaspoon seized by the police were analyzed. Acepromazine, a phenothiazine tranquilizer used in human and veterinary medicine, was detected in the residue of one of the glasses. In spite of acepromazine absence in the victim's blood, the possible use of acepromazine in the DFSA was reported to the police. Two weeks later, a suspect admitted having orally administered acepromazine to the victim. Using a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry method, this compound was subsequently detected (31 pg/mg) in a sample of the victim's hair collected a month and a half after the DFSA. A potential short elimination half-life in humans and/or the well-known in vitro degradation of acepromazine could explain the negative blood result. DFSA toxicological investigations are challenging and can be complicated when a rather unusual substance is concerned. In particular, special care should be taken when interpreting the results, taking into account elimination and/or instability data, when available.     

Damages for Mental Distress and Bad Faith in Disability Claims

This article examines recent changes in the law in Canada in relation to the court’s willingness to acknowledge the significance of, and award compensation for, intangible loss arising from breach of contract. When a claim for benefits is wrongly refused in a disability contract, a primary goal of the contract, which is to provide peace of mind, is unrealized. Where this causes mental distress, Canadian courts are now willing to award compensation. Similarly, if an insurer conducts itself in such a manner as to attract a punitive damages award, a consideration in assessing the quantum of the award is the vulnerability of the insured. The evidentiary basis for these claims will often include expert psychological opinion. Various considerations for determining the existence, nature, and scope of the psychological issues relevant to a claim for damages for mental distress and/or punitive damages are covered in this article.     

Strikes: strategy and tactics for managers

The threat of a strike is a powerful weapon in the union's arsenal. Management, caught off-guard when a strike hits, can be faced with insurmountable problems regarding maintenance of business operations and may be put in a position of capitulating to labor's demands. To avert these problems and to be able to effectively cope with the impact of a walkout, management must have a plan of action well in advance of the strike. In the following article, the authors provide a detailed strategy for strike preparation and discuss the issues management must address in dealing with a potential strike.     

Violence against Women in Scandinavia: a Description and Evaluation of two new Laws Aiming to Protect Women

Violence against women by a present or former male partner has over the last decade been given a higher priority in the political discussion in all of the Scandinavian countries. Increasingly, violence in intimate relationships is viewed as a public rather than a private matter in these countries. With this change in attitudes and levels of political interest, higher expectations are placed on official authorities, including the criminal justice system, to deal actively with this social problem. In all of the Scandinavian countries it may, for example, be decided by a prosecutor that a woman should be protected from a man by issuing a restraining order. Moreover, a new offence called ‘gross violation of a woman's integrity’ was introduced into the Swedish penal code in 1998. With this offence, less serious but repeated violent acts committed by a man against a present or former female partner are to be judged as one serious offence. The stipulated sanction for this offence is imprisonment between 6 months and 6 years. The purpose of this article is to evaluate how the police, the prosecutors and the courts deal with this new offence. The article also present results from an evaluation of restraining orders in Sweden.     

试论中国当前宗教管理法制化的二元模式

我们都知道，当代中国正处于一个剧烈的社会转型时期，所谓“三千年未有之变局”，在今天依然如此，这个变局正在发生的过程之中。因此，考察中国的政法事务，我们要有这样一个历史时代的背景关照，我们面临的一系列政法问题是一个从旧体制向新体制转变的复杂过程中催生的问题。具体到中国当前的宗教法治化问题，我认为首先要有这样一个历史演变的视角。说起来今年是一个特殊的年份，     

The Collision of Islam and Terrorism in Central Asia

The five Central Asian republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan gained independence in 1991 following the collapse of the Soviet Union. The rapid disintegration of the Soviet Union and the subsequent unexpected independence of Central Asian states in 1991 resulted in a renewal of nationalistic feelings and, in some quarters, a desire to re-establish a Caliphate. Some terrorist groups in Central Asia see the future of the region as being a Caliphate. The question arises whether adherence to Islam and its ideology in Central Asia is significant enough to be a foundation for the formation of a Caliphate. This paper proposes an answer to this question by analyzing the potential connection between terrorism and the revival of Islam in Central Asia.     

论和谐社区建设中的政府角色定位

本文以城市和谐社区建设中的地方政府角色为着眼点,分析了和谐社区建设中政府角色错位的原因.提出在构建和谐社区过程中,政府应与社区之间建立分工合作的新型关系,应扮演好社区建设的服务者和保障者、社区组织的培育者、社区建设的谋划者和组织者、社区关系的协调者等新角色,发挥政府在建设和谐社区中的作用,以期实现社区和谐的战略目标.     

Massive systemic silicone embolism: a case report and review of literature

Subcutaneous injections of inert or quasi-inert plastic material designed to smooth out wrinkled skin or to create a more esthetically sought appearance have become very popular with the American public in general, and, in particular, with certain groups highly focused on their physical image. The case of the injection procedure has attracted into the field of plastic medicine a substantial number of illegal, incompetent, and unscrupulous operators. Their ignorance of involved medical risks and procedures not uncommonly results in severe complications, disfigurement, and death of patients. We report the typical pathological and chemical findings of a systemic fatal silicone embolism in a 53-year-old heterosexual woman following illegal chronic injections of silicone in her hips and buttocks. The injected subcutaneous silicone apparently migrated rapidly from the interstitial subcutaneous tissue into the general blood stream resulting in a fatal systemic silicone embolism. An analysis of the presented case in conjunction with a review of the pertinent medical literature, including a recent article, revealed a marked similarity in the clinicopathologic findings between silicone embolism and fat embolism.     

Revisiting the decline in remarriage in early-modern Europe: The case of Rheims in France

Many were the European towns where remarriage frequency declined, especially for widows, in the 17th and 18th centuries. This article investigates how remarriage models evolved in France, basing our analysis on vital events collected for the fourteen parishes of the town of Rheims in Champagne. A large set of Family Reconstitution Forms for the period 1668-1802 allows the study of remarriage among urban widows and widowers. Through four successive periods of time, we observe changes in remarriage behaviour in this preindustrial center as a case study, in a gender comparative perspective. In urban surroundings, in the late 18th century, strategies of remarriage may have been more flexible than in rural areas. Women were less exposed to family and social pressure preventing them to remarry, discouraging or delaying a new union. The presence of dependent children was always a problem when a widow tried to choose a new partner. It was easier for a man to remarry. A widower used to take a new wife quickly and a younger one, if possible without children at charge. A specific aspect of the urban context was population geographical turn-over and changing labour markets. It would explain, at least partly, the decreasing proportion of remarriages in Rheims. Female urban surplus was a constant, affecting the chances for remarriage, particularly in large European cities.     

Plurality of the Good? The Problem of Affirmative Tolerance in a Multicultural Society from an Ethical Point of View

Starting from the problem of tolerance in a multicultural society, the author undermines the limits of a classical-liberal foundation (negative tolerance) and suggests the need for a new meaning: a positive concern of tolerance implying appreciation of a variety of social cultures and value traditions. On an ethical level, positive tolerance can be grounded in the Discourse Theory, developing the classical Kantian deontological ethics in a transcendental-pragmatic and in a transcendental-hermeneutic sense. In this way, discourse ethics can answer two questions posed by tolerance in a multicultural society: the duty to support all in the pursuit of their ideals and realize positive tolerance as well as its restrictions.     

International disaster identification report. Investigative and dental aspects

This meeting, held in October 1980 in Apeldoorn, Netherlands, was a very serious effort to begin international cooperation in a much needed area: disaster investigation and identification. Under the leadership of Col. Arie van den Bos of the Royal Police of the Netherlands, the work was accomplished with representatives and observers from many major countries represented. Efforts were made to solve the enigma of international cooperation. A plane crash of an airline of a major country in a distant country can be properly investigated only with the cooperation of the carrier and the country in which the tragedy occurred. The International Academy of Legal Medicine and Social Medicine devoted a 3-day program to the study of this problem during their last international meeting in Lyon, France, and it will be discussed further in Vienna in 1982 under the leadership of Prof. Wilhelm Holczabek. The experience of Norwegian investigators is mentioned as an example of the type of problems encountered with foreign nationals involved in a crash in the country, or a disaster involving a ship or a oil platform where foreign nationals are working, or in a tragedy such as the propylene explosion in Tarragona, Spain, which resulted in more than 200 tourists from many countries dying in the fire, many bodies burned beyond recognition.     

Sensemaking in prison: Inmate identity as a working understanding

This study examines some of the ways in which correctional officers construct, communicate, and defend a shared account of inmate identity in a maximum-security prison. Through sensemaking activities embodied in informal conversational routines, correctional officers produce a working understanding of the prisoner that is a central element in the reproduction of social control in the prison. The data suggest that challenges to the dominant assumptions embodied in key sensemaking categories may be met by a variety of defensive strategies. These strategies are embedded in the informal conversational routines of the group. Through the selective use of official records, by reframing tolerance as a social control strategy, and through participation in acts of ritual insubordination, correctional officers maintain a working understanding of the inmate that is demeaning, derogatory, and ultimately stereotypical. This research contributes to our understanding of occupational culture in the justice system, and to a fuller appreciation of sensemaking processes in formal organizations.     

中国传统司法思维模式的文化分析

中国古代法官在审判过程中,为追求实质正义-无讼与和谐,往往会舍法而取情理,依情理进行审判。这种法律思维模式与西方的严格形式主义相对,被称为实质性思维模式,它是中国古代审判文化的一个特质。其产生的文化根源是中国人对和谐、无讼理想社会的追求及越过事物的形式追求实质内容的思维模式,以实质性思维处理案件亦可达至息讼止争的社会目的,但这种思维模式也造成了中国人法治观念的淡漠,同时阻碍了中国法治社会的建立。然而,无论如何它作为中国传统法律文化的一部分又是无法抛弃的,只能期待我们现代人对其进行创造性的转化。     

Comparison of modern techniques for saliva screening

Saliva stains present a unique challenge in the forensic setting, often challenging the analyst to weigh the value of presumptive indication of the fluid versus the potential for DNA analysis to yield identification information. There are many situations in which determining the presence of a body fluid is probative and further corroborates DNA evidence. That said, even a minute portion of sample consumed by a screening test could mean the difference between a full, partial, or null profile obtained through DNA analysis. The basis of presumptive testing or screening of saliva has historically been based on the presence of amylase, a component found in relatively high concentrations in human saliva versus other body fluids and substances. Though the current available methods for the screening of saliva in a forensic application have grown in number, the popularity of these methods seemingly has not. This study attempts to identify a specific and sensitive saliva screening test by comparing three modern techniques--the recently released SALIgAE, Phadebas, and starch-iodine mini-centrifuge test--on the basis of sensitivity, specificity, mixtures, and simulated casework samples while also considering sample consumption. The Phadebas method for presumptive saliva testing detected dilutions of neat saliva down to 1:200 versus considerably less sensitive results with SALIgAE and the starch-iodine mini-centrifuge test. Utilizing a screening test with a high degree of sensitivity, such as Phadebas, allows an analyst to gain a maximum amount of information in the form of body fluid indication and DNA results because of the consumption of a small portion of sample.