BBC性侵风波,“一哥”吉米的黑暗面孔

一座墓碑隔开了人们对英国BBC已故著名电视节目主持人吉米·萨维尔情感的两重天.他在生前备受人爱戴和追崇,却在死后被人唾骂和厌弃.他戴着巨星和慈善家的面具逍遥一生,唯有死后,受害者才能够成为撼动大树的蚂蚁.这种极端的讽刺同时意味着:在英国民众的心中,随着吉米倒下的,还有包括BBC在内的标榜"公开、公信"的英国主流媒体.     

阿根廷:勇敢的“打拐母亲”苏珊娜

在阿根廷,一女孩儿遭拐卖身陷卖淫集团,警方却百般推托无所作为。母亲苏珊娜十年如一日,冒着危险扮作卖淫女或老鸨深入一家家妓院寻找女儿的下落,上演了真实版的《飓风营救》(法国影片,讲述一位父亲拯救遭遇黑帮卖淫团伙拐骗的女儿的故事)。在这个过程中,苏珊娜解救了数百名性奴。由此,在阿根廷掀起一场打拐运动,她也成为民众心目中的英雄。但悲情的是,她至今仍未找到女儿。更让人失望的是,她费尽心力送上法庭的13名绑架嫌犯竟被法庭无罪开释。     

搜寻失踪孩子的“安珀警报”

安珀警报是美国和加拿大一种专门针对儿童绑架案的全国紧急警报系统。当有确认的儿童绑架案发生时,这套系统就会启动,并使用美国紧急警报系统(EAS)通过所有途径向社会大众发布。(图/CFP)2013年8月5日晚间,美国加州很多手机用户都收到了一条不寻常的短信,显示AMBERAlert字样,内容称有一名犯罪嫌疑人正驾驶一辆蓝色尼桑轿车,车牌号为6WCU986,让大家注意。这条短信直接弹出,显示在屏幕正中位置,五分钟内连续跳出两次,且每次都伴有短促的蜂鸣声。这是一条典型的安珀警报,虽然短信并没有     

两个女人的“网聊”官司

两个30出头的少妇，一个是公司白领，一个是电视台节目主持人，她们通过QQ聊天相识，但不久却反目成仇，女白领通过语言刺激和威胁恐吓，将女主持人整出了严重精神障碍。弄出病来的女主持在协商解决问题不成后。将对方告上法院索赔8万余元。 这两个少妇到底聊了什么？     

Can feminist judges make a difference?

Many of the expectations and aspirations about the ‘difference’ that women judges would make have proved unrealistic, given the inevitable diversity and often conservatism of women appointed as judges. On the other hand, we might reasonably expect feminist judges to ‘make a difference’. This essay focuses on feminist judges, and seeks to identify what it is that we might reasonably expect of them. This in turn requires consideration of who counts as a feminist judge, what might be included in a feminist approach to judging, and what institutional norms inherent within the judicial role might constrain the adoption of a feminist approach. The essay concludes that feminist judges both can and ought to make a difference across a wide range of judicial activities.     

Linking confidence in the police with the performance of the police: Community policing can make a difference

The existing literature of community policing was silent on the linkage between police performance and confidence in the police. This study argued that broader measures of police performance were an inevitable result of the shift from the traditional model of police to community policing. Consequently, confidence in the police could be used profitably by police management as one alternative measure of officers’ effectiveness. Data from a northwest city were used to find out the sources of confidence in the police. The results indicated that volunteers involved in community crime prevention programs showed higher confidence in the police and informal collective security bred confidence in the police. Furthermore, victimization and traffic tickets reduced confidence in the police. These results and their implications for police management are discussed within the limitation of data.     

TMT contracts: Avoiding termination and achieving positive realignment: How legal counsel can make a difference - A UK perspective

“The task of a leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been” Henry A. KissingerWith stuttering growth in the Western economies where major sourcing and TMT (Technology, Media & Telecoms) contracts are pervasive, it is perhaps not surprising that internal and external legal counsel are increasingly being called upon to advise clients on termination options and strategies to effect or oppose a threatened termination for breach of contract. This short paper considers why this has happened and the other factors which are in play which have meant that advice on termination and the renegotiation of contracts in this context has become more common. Expertise in this area is part of an IT lawyer’s tool kit and we consider that this is an area where internal and external legal counsel can make a substantial difference in delivering solutions to their clients.In this paper I talk about termination and renegotiation interchangeably. The reason for this as will become clear is that all forms of termination, whether they are consensual or contested, will involve some form of renegotiation of the terms of the contract between the parties. This is because it is almost impossible except perhaps in the simplest of installations to predict the nature in which a supplier or a customer may wish to change the services provided, and consequently even the most carefully crafted of exit and transition clauses, schedules and plans will require some form of post-contract negotiation between the customer, the outgoing supplier and potentially a new supplier or suppliers. This will necessarily involve some form of renegotiation of the terms of the contract between the parties.This paper looks at renegotiation in the context of a termination scenario rather than dealing with renegotiation during the normal course of operation of the contract.     

Access to health care: what a difference shades of color make

Professor Majette's timely article examines an age-old problem: the effect of race and ethnicity on a patient's receipt of health care. Her article analyzes some of the major health care access issues, with a focus on barriers confronting African Americans, Asians, Hispanics, and Native Americans. Some of the barriers include inability to pay, cultural insensitivity, a shortage of health care providers, and discrimination. She also examines some of the unsuccessful legal solutions and remedies designed to eliminate these barriers. Given the complexity of the access barriers encountered by people of color, Professor Majette concludes that only an interdisciplinary approach can eliminate them. Her proposed approach requires business, legal, and medical professionals to collaborate in developing a health care system that meets the needs of aracially and ethnically diverse population.     

Reassessing the family-delinquency association: Do family type, family processes, and economic factors make a difference?

The present study drew on four competing theoretical perspectives to examine the relationship between family structure and juvenile delinquency. Using data from the Add Health Study, the authors examined nonserious and serious delinquent behavior across youth from different types of households and also considered how the association between family structure and delinquency might be conditioned by family processes and economic factors. Results from negative binomial regression analyses indicated that, in general, type of household was not a significant predictor of nonserious or serious delinquency. Rather, maternal attachment emerged as the most important determinant of delinquent behavior among youth from all family types. The results are discussed within the context of Hirschi's original interpretation of social control theory and future directions for research are suggested.     

Legal aspects of sexual violence—Does forensic evidence make a difference?

A survey was done of 307 alleged victims of sexual violence reported to the police departments in Greater Aarhus, Denmark, in 1999–2004. The legal disposition was ascertained and related to victim and assault characteristics together with the forensic medical and laboratory findings. The police pressed charges in more than half of the cases and 11% turned out to be false allegations. Nineteen percent of all cases ended with sentencing of the defendant. Sperm was detected in 35% of the examined and analysed cases, and in 46% consumption of alcohol prior to the assault was reported. Information in the forensic report regarding injury documentation, intoxication, and detection of sperm and DNA match between victim and alleged assailant did not aid in the prosecution of the case. Severe coercion used by the assailant increased the likelihood of conviction. Intoxication estimation and sperm detection suffered from low sensitivity compared with laboratory analyses. Results suggest the need for new research and optimising the sexual assault examination protocol to strengthen the legal impact of forensic evidence.     

Regulating motor vehicle safety maintenance: can we make it cost-effective?

Our analysis suggests that a properly designed and implemented safety inspection program for motor vehicles would probably produce benefits in excess of costs, whereas most existing state programs probably produce costs well in excess of benefits. That these findings are somewhat inconclusive is both regrettable and unnecessary: the data required to carry out a satisfactory evaluation of alternative safety inspection program designs are obtainable. Unfortunately, serious policy-relevant empirical research is costly; for that reason, more conclusive findings may never be available.