Defining a Moment in History: Parent Communication with Adolescents About September 11, 2001

Parents play an important role in helping their children process and interpret significant sociohistorical events. However, little is known about how parents frame these experiences or the specific social, cultural, and civic messages they may communicate about the event. In this study, we examined self-reported communication of parents from six communities in the United States with their adolescents about the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Parents’ (N = 972) open-ended responses about September 11th were analyzed to assess whether communication with their adolescents occurred and for thematic content. Results revealed marked variability in parents’ communication and suggest that many parents used September 11th as an opportunity to impart sociocultural, emotional, and civic messages. Identifying the diversity in parents’ responses aligns with the tenets of Terror Management Theory and provides insights into the roles of parents in translating pivotal historical moments. Collectively, these findings yield important implications for civic socialization.     

Geographies of Crime and Justice: Contemporary Transitional Justice and the Creation of 'Zones of Impunity'

This article explores some of the challenges that transnationalcrimes pose to the operation of transnational justice. By transnationalcrimes, we mean serious violations of international human rightsand humanitarian law that transcend national borders and areperpetrated by state or non-state actors. Many national andinternational legal mechanisms may only address a segment ofthese crimes, creating what we refer to as ‘zones of impunity.’This article examines how these dilemmas are unfolding in threeAfrican contexts: the possibility that Charles Taylor is triedfor crimes in Sierra Leone but not in Liberia; that only Congolese,and not Rwandans or Ugandans, face prosecution for crimes inIturi or elsewhere in the Democratic Republic of Congo; or thatJoseph Kony escapes prosecution in Uganda through being allowedamnesty or exile in Sudan. Our analytic framework considershow geography and politics affect legal responses to transnationalcrimes.     

EU update

This is the latest edition of Baker & McKenzie’s column on developments in EU law relating to IP, IT and telecommunications. This article summarises recent developments that are considered important for practitioners, students and academics in a wide range of information technology, e-commerce, telecommunications and intellectual property areas. It cannot be exhaustive but intends to address the important points. This is a hard copy reference guide, but links to outside websites are included where possible. No responsibility is assumed for the accuracy of information contained in these links.     

The effect of post-identification feedback, delay, and suspicion on accurate eyewitnesses

We examined whether post-identification feedback and suspicion affect accurate eyewitnesses. Participants viewed a video event and then made a lineup decision from a target-present photo lineup. Regardless of accuracy, the experimenter either, informed participants that they made a correct lineup decision or gave no information regarding their lineup decision. Immediately following the lineup decision or after a 1-week delay, a second experimenter gave some of the participants who received confirming feedback reason to be suspicious of the confirming feedback. Following immediately after the confirming feedback, accurate witnesses did not demonstrate certainty inflation. However, after a delay accurate witnesses did demonstrate certainty inflation typically associated with confirming feedback. The suspicion manipulation only affected participants' certainty when the confirming feedback created certainty inflation. The results lend support to the accessibility interpretation of the post-identification feedback effect and the erasure interpretation of the suspicion effect.     

Corporal Punishment and Kids: How Do Parent Support and Gender Influence Child Adjustment?

Previous research on corporal punishment has failed to consider the interaction of parent support and parent gender in predicting child outcomes. The current study examined whether parental support moderated the effects of corporal punishment on child outcomes (i.e., depression and aggression), and more specifically, whether the gender of the supportive parent moderated the effects of punishment from the opposite-sex parent. Results differed depending on the gender of the punishing and supportive parents, suggesting that parental support can be a protective factor in child outcomes but only under certain conditions. Mother support moderated the effects of father punishment on child depression but not child aggression. High corporal punishment by father was related to more child depression at both high and low levels of mother support. High levels of mother support only seemed important (i.e., children were less depressed) at low levels of father corporal punishment. In contrast, father support moderated the relationship between mother corporal punishment and child aggression but not depression. Children with high father support showed less aggression across all levels of mother corporal punishment. At low levels of father support, child aggression increased as mother corporal punishment increased. For depression, mother corporal punishment was positively related to child depression regardless of level of father support. These findings suggest differential effects for mother and father support and have implications for the treatment and prevention of negative outcomes in children who are physically punished by their parents.

Severity of intimate partner violence and occurrence and frequency of police calls

This article evaluates whether female victims of severe physical, psychological, or sexual intimate partner violence (IPV) call police more often than other abused women. Abused women (431) reported frequency of contacting police (dependent variable), nature and severity of IPV experienced, and characteristics of themselves and their perpetrator (explanatory variables). A two-part regression model estimated likelihood of police contact among all participants and rate of contact among callers. Women with severe physical or psychological IPV or injury were more likely to call police than were other abused women. Among callers, women made 96% more calls if a weapon was involved, 58% more if they were severely sexually abused, and 40% more if they were severely physically abused. Women with children at home made 32% more calls. These results delineate the level and types of IPV and other characteristics of homes that make single and repeat calls to police.     

Rapid and high-throughput forensic short tandem repeat typing using a 96-lane microfabricated capillary array electrophoresis microdevice

A 96-channel microfabricated capillary array electrophoresis (muCAE) device was evaluated for forensic short tandem repeat (STR) typing using PowerPlex 16 and AmpFlSTR Profiler Plus multiplex PCR systems. The high-throughput muCAE system produced high-speed <30-min parallel sample separations with single-base resolution. Forty-eight previously analyzed single-source samples were accurately typed, as confirmed on an ABI Prism 310 and/or the Hitachi FMBIO II. Minor alleles in 3:1 mixture samples containing female and male DNA were reliably typed as well. The instrument produced full profiles from sample DNA down to 0.17 ng, a threshold similar to that found for the ABI 310. Seventeen nonprobative samples from various evidentiary biological stains were also correctly typed. The successful application of the muCAE device to actual forensic STR typing samples is a significant step toward the development of a completely integrated STR analysis microdevice.     

High urine ethanol and negative blood and vitreous ethanol in a diabetic woman: a case report, retrospective case survey, and review of the literature

Several studies have shown that ethanol can be produced in urine infected with yeast or bacteria in vitro. We present the unusual case of a diabetic woman in whom ethanol was produced in her urine in vivo. The decedent was a 19-year-old woman who was noncompliant with her diabetes treatment. She presented to a local hospital in severe diabetic ketoacidosis and died shortly thereafter. Upon arrival at the hospital, a blood glucose of 553 mg/dL was detected. A urinalysis was positive for ketones (> 80 mg/dL), glucose (> 1000 mg/dL), and large budding yeast forms. A drug screen performed on the urine was positive for ethanol. At the coroner/medical examiner office, an autopsy was negative for significant anatomic findings. Toxicology analysis revealed a urine ethanol level 0.32 g/dL, although no ethanol was detected in blood or vitreous samples. A urine gram stain and culture identified Candida glabrata. A retrospective case review of all deaths related to diabetes examined at the coroner/medical examiner office from 1986 to 2003 did not reveal other cases with similar findings. This case of a noncompliant, juvenile-diabetic woman illustrates a rare finding of apparent in vivo glucose fermentation by C. glabrata to form ethanol in the urine. This case also highlights a potential difficulty in toxicologic analysis and interpretation using urine only.     

Fatal intravenous fentanyl abuse: four cases involving extraction of fentanyl from transdermal patches

The transdermal fentanyl system delivers a specific dose at a constant rate. Even after the prescribed application time has elapsed, enough fentanyl remains within a patch to provide a potentially lethal dose. Death due to the intravenous injection of fentanyl extracted from transdermal patches has not been previously reported. We present 4 cases in which the source of fentanyl was transdermal patches and was injected. In all of these cases, the victim was a white male who died at home. Case 1 was a 35-year-old with no known history of drug use, who was found by his wife on the floor of his workshop. Police recovered a fentanyl patch, needle, and syringe at the scene. Case 2 was a 38-year-old with a known history of drug use whose family claimed that he was in a treatment program that used fentanyl patches for unknown reasons. His brother found him dead in bed, and law enforcement officers found a hypodermic needle beside the body; a ligature around his left hand, and apparent needle marks between his first and second digits were also noted. Case 3 was a 42-year-old with a recent attempted suicide via overdose who was found dead at his home. An empty box of fentanyl patches, Valium, Ritalin, and 2 syringes were found at the scene. Case 4 was a 39-year-old found by his mother, who admitted to removing a needle with attached syringe from the decedent's arm. Medications at the scene included hydrocodone, alprazolam, zolpidem, and fentanyl patches. All reported deaths were attributed to fentanyl intoxication, with blood concentrations ranging from 5 to 27 microg/L.