Suicide by multiple blunt head traumatisation using a stone

Apart from collisions with road or rail vehicles and falls from height, self inflicted blunt force is a rare suicide method and mainly seen in psychiatric patients. The paper presents a rare case of suicide by active blunt force. A 68-year-old man committed suicide by repeatedly hitting his head with a stone. He sustained a craniocerebral trauma and finally died from hypothermia due to the low outdoor temperature. According to the relatives, the man was not diagnosed with a mental disorder or suicidal tendencies. Uncommon manners of self-harm are challenging for those involved in the investigation, and a differentiation between suicide, accident and homicide can only be made in synopsis of all findings.     

Detection and validated quantification of 21 benzodiazepines and 3 "z-drugs" in human hair by LC-MS/MS

A method for detection and quantification of 21 benzodiazepines and the pharmacologically related "z-drugs" in human hair samples was developed and fully validated using liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). After methanolic and methanolic/aqueous extraction, the analytes were separated using two different LC-MS systems (AB Sciex 3200 QTRAP and AB Sciex 5500 QTRAP). Separation columns, mobile phases and MS modes for both systems were: Phenomenex Kinetex, 2.6 μm, 50/2.1; 5mM ammonium formate buffer pH 3.5/methanol, total flow 0.75 mL/min; electrospray ionization (ESI), multiple reaction monitoring (MRM), information dependent acquisition (IDA), enhanced product ion scan (EPI). The assays were found to be selective for the tested compounds (alprazolam, 7-aminoclonazepam, 7-aminoflunitrazepam, bromazepam, chlordiazepoxide, clonazepam, N-desalkylflurazepam, diazepam, flunitrazepam, flurazepam, alpha-hydroxymidazolam, lorazepam, lormetazepam, midazolam, nitrazepam, nordazepam, oxazepam, phenazepam, prazepam, temazepam, triazolam, zaleplon, zolpidem and zopiclone), all validation criteria were in the required ranges according to international guidelines, except for bromazepam. Matrix effects, and process efficiencies were in the acceptable ranges evaluated using the post-extraction addition approach. Lower limits of quantification were between 0.6 and 16 pg/mg of hair. The LC-MS/MS assay has proven to be applicable for determination of the studied analytes in human hair in numerous authentic cases (n=175).     

Identity-Lineup Location Influences Target Selection: Evidence from Eye Movements

Eyewitnesses often have to recognize the perpetrators of an observed crime from identity lineups. In the construction of these lineups, a decision must be made concerning where a suspect should be placed, but whether location in a lineup affects the identification of a perpetrator has received little attention. This study explored this problem with a face-matching task, in which observers decided if pairs of faces depict the same person or two different people (Experiment 1), and with a lineup task in which the presence of a target had to be detected in an identity parade of five faces (Experiment 2). In addition, this study also explored if high accuracy is related to a perceptual pop-out effect, whereby the target is detected rapidly among the lineup. In both experiments, observers?? eye movements revealed that location determines the order in which people were viewed, whereby faces on the left side were consistently viewed first. This location effect was reflected also in observers?? responses, so that a foil face on the left side of a lineup display was more likely to be misidentified as the target. However, identification accuracy was not related to a pop-out effect. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

The (Limited) Space for Justice in Social Animals

While differentialists deny that non-linguistic animals can have a sense of justice, assimilationists credit some animals with such an advanced moral attitude. We approach this debate from a philosophical perspective. First, we outline the history of the notion of justice in philosophy and how various facets of that notion play a role in contemporary empirical investigations of justice among humans. On this basis, we develop a scheme for the elements of justice-relevant situations and for criteria of justice that should be fruitful in studying both humans and animals. Furthermore, we investigate the conceptual connections between a sense of justice, on the one hand, and various other mental powers, on the other, and indicate which of the latter may be beyond the ken of animals. Next, we consider recent empirical research on justice-related phenomena in animals. We argue for an intermediate position: While animals can at least in principle satisfy some preconditions of justice (intentional action, rule-following), others are problematic, notably possessing a notion of desert. A space for justice in social animals exists, yet it is rather limited compared to the rich cultures of justice in humans. Finally, we reflect on some actual or alleged implications of research on animal justice. As regards justice in humans, one should avoid a simplistic image of ??natural justice?? as boiling down to equal allocation of goods. As regards justice for animals, one should be weary of the contractualist assumption that only those capable of justice themselves are deserving of ??just?? treatment.     

The Targeted Killing Judgment of the Israeli Supreme Court and the Critique of Legal Violence

The targeted killing judgment of the Israeli Supreme Court has, since it was handed down in December 2006, received a significant amount of attention: praise as well as criticism. Offering neither praise nor criticism, the present article is instead an attempt at a ‘critique’ of the judgment drawing on the German-Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin’s famous essay from 1921, ‘Critique of Violence’. The article focuses on a key aspect of Benjamin’s critique: the distinction between the two modalities of ‘legal violence’—lawmaking or foundational violence and law-preserving or administrative violence. Analysing the fact that the Court exercises jurisdiction over these killings in the first place, the decision on the applicable law as well as the interpretation of that law, the article finds that the targeted killing judgment collapses this distinction in a different way from that foreseen by Benjamin. Hence, the article argues, the targeted killing judgment is best understood as a form of administrative foundational violence. In conclusion Judith Butler’s reading of Benjamin’s notion of ‘divine violence’ is considered, particularly his use of the commandment, ‘thou shalt not kill’, as a non-violent violence that must be waged against the kind of legal violence of which the targeted killing judgment is exemplary.     

Procompetitive dual pricing

We analyze the procompetitive effects of dual pricing, that is, input market price discrimination. An upstream firm has an incentive to maintain competition downstream which is realized by selling at an advantageous price to an inefficient downstream firm when discrimination is possible while it would exit under uniform pricing. We augment the exit issue into existing frameworks of Katz (Am Econ Rev 77:154–167, 1987), DeGraba (Am Econ Rev 80:1246–1253, 1990), and Yoshida (Am Econ Rev 90:240–246, 2000) which allows us to show that price discrimination in intermediary goods markets tends to have positive effects on allocative, dynamic and productive efficiency, respectively. In contrast, a discrimination ban tends to facilitate exit of relatively inefficient firms, thereby strengthening downstream market concentration.     

Gerhard oder Helmut? ‚Unpolitische’ Kandidateneigenschaften und ihr Einfluss auf die Wahlentscheidung bei der Bundestagswahl 1998

This article examines to what degree the voting decision in 1998 was affected by personal, ‘nonpolitical’ qualities of the two chancellor candidates, i.e. Gerhard Schroeder and Helmut Kohl: personal integrity, physical attractiveness, and family life. Drawing on the German national post election study 1998, it is demonstrated that the two candidates’ personal qualities had in fact a significant impact on the voting decision. Differentiating between several personal attributes, personal integrity proves to be somewhat more important than truly nonpolitical attributes such as the physical attractiveness or the candidates’ family life. All in all, hypotheses on personalization receive support from the analyses presented in this article.