Armed,and Dangerous (?): Motivating Rule Adherence Among Agents of Social Control

A key concern within democracies is effectively regulating the behavior of societies' agents of social control, who have coercive power and considerable discretion over their use of that power. This can result in failures to adhere to the rules, policies, and laws dictating appropriate and lawful behavior. This article explores the effectiveness of motivating rule adherence among law enforcement officers and soldiers by focusing upon whether they believe that organizational authorities are legitimate or that rules and policies are morally right or wrong. The results suggest that both values have an important influence upon rule adherence. Further, aspects of organizational culture that encourage such values are identified and shown to be influential in this setting. Results show that the procedural justice of the organization is central to rule adherence. These findings support the argument that encouraging self-regulation via appeals to the values of law enforcement officers and soldiers is a viable strategy for minimizing misconduct, and they suggest how to effectively implement such approaches.     

“Our People in General Have a High Degree of Freedom”

This article considers the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in National Federation of Independent Business et al v Sebelius, which questioned the constitutionality of President Obama’s signature healthcare reforms of 2009, which have become colloquially known as ‘Obamacare’. Although the Supreme Court upheld the Act as constitutional, this article contends that the Supreme Court’s reasoning can be read as another battle in the long-standing debate in American politics over the correct size and limits of the Federal Government. In upholding the healthcare reforms as a tax, rather than under the Constitution’s Commerce Clause, the Supreme Court has endorsed a view of limited government in line with the principles of classical liberalism. This has the potential to greatly restrict the scope of the Federal Government to pursue large scale expansive social welfare programmes in the future.     

Dextromethorphan abuse leading to assault, suicide, or homicide

Abstract: Dextromethorphan is a commonly encountered antitussive medication which has found additional therapeutic use in the treatment of pseudobulbar disorder and as an adjunct to opiate use in pain management. Dextromethorphan at high doses has phencyclidine‐like effects on the NMDA receptor system; recreational use of high doses has been found to cause mania and hallucinations. The toxicology and pharmacology of the drug in abuse are reviewed, and the historical literature of adverse psychiatric outcomes is assessed. Five new cases of dextromethorphan intoxication that resulted in assault, suicide, and homicide are reported, together with the corresponding toxicology results. Blood concentrations ranged from 300 to 19,000 μg/L. These results are compared with typical concentrations reported in therapeutic use and impaired driving cases. Based on these findings, dextromethorphan should be considered as a potential causative agent in subjects presenting with mania, psychosis, or hallucinations, and abusers are at risk for violent and self‐destructive acts.     

Building and Sustaining Academic Researcher and Criminal Justice Practitioner Partnerships: A Corrections Example

Bringing researchers and practitioners together in partnerships has substantial benefits. Partnerships can inform research questions and provide researchers with data to further their academic dialogues. Collaborative research provides practitioners with a better appreciation for research, and its integration into the provision of service. Published examples of successful partnerships in the criminological field offer insight into navigating the relationship building and maintenance process. The current paper discusses a partnership between researchers and practitioners at a corrections institution. The benefits and challenges to partnerships and recommendations for building and sustaining researcher-practitioner partnerships are discussed.     

‘Not always logical’: binational/biracial marriages in Britain, 1900–1940

ABSTRACT

This essay explores the intersection of race, religion, and nationality in marriage by concentrating on unions between Britons and ‘Arabs’ (those from North Africa and the Middle East) in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Focusing on this area, most of which was not in the British Empire, allows an analysis of the intersection between the empire and the larger world. Marriage was a nexus in the intertwined prejudices of race, empire, class, and religion. Though the British primarily blamed polygamy for any marital problems, their own gendered law of nationality was equally at fault. Indeed, the centrality of gender was clearest in three circumstances. First, many women refused to be ‘white women in peril,’ instead exercising agency in their relationships. Second, British men who moved to the Middle East, converted to Islam, and married Muslim women, became legal hybrids who struggled to pass on British nationality to their wives and children. Third, British-born women married to Middle Eastern Christians faced similar problems, despite marrying other monogamists. In the 1930s, the British government formed a committee to address these issues, but the committee failed to find solutions, in part because the members, like the British state, supported racial/national coverture for women and thus refused to consider granting women equal rights in nationality. As a result, women married to men of different races and nations remained vulnerable to desertion and divorce in the interwar period. Such issues both confirmed the importance of an imperial frame of mind, but also the fact that the dilemmas went well beyond the formal empire.     

Investigation of morphine and morphine glucuronide levels and cytochrome P450 isoenzyme 2D6 genotype in codeine-related deaths

Compared to morphine and morphine-6-glucuronide (M6G), codeine and its other major metabolites codeine-6-glucuronide and norcodeine have weak affinity to opioid μ-receptors. Analgesic effects of codeine are thus largely dependent on metabolic conversion to morphine by the polymorphic cytochrome P450 isoenzyme 2D6 (CYP2D6). How this relates to toxicity and post-mortem whole blood levels is not known. This paper presents a case series of codeine-related deaths where concentrations of morphine, M6G and morphine-3-glucuronide (M3G), as well as CYP2D6 genotype, are taken into account. Post-mortem toxicological specimens from a total of 1444 consecutive forensic autopsy cases in Central Norway were analyzed. Among these, 111 cases with detectable amounts of codeine in femoral blood were identified, of which 34 had femoral blood concentrations exceeding the TIAFT toxicity threshold of 0.3mg/L. Autopsy records of these 34 cases were retrieved and reviewed. In the 34 reviewed cases, there was a large variability in individual morphine to codeine concentration ratios (M/C ratios), and morphine levels could not be predicted from codeine concentrations, even when CYP2D6 genotype was known. 13 cases had codeine concentrations exceeding the TIAFT threshold for possibly lethal serum concentrations (1.6 mg/L). Among these, 8 individuals had morphine concentrations below the toxic threshold according to TIAFT (0.15 mg/L). In one case, morphine as well as M6G and M3G concentrations were below the limit of detection. A comprehensive investigation of codeine-related fatalities should, in addition to a detailed case history, include quantification of morphine and morphine metabolites. CYP2D6 genotyping may be of interest in cases with unexpectedly high or low M/C ratios.     

The Dynamic Relationship between Unhealthy Weight Control and Adolescent Friendships: A Social Network Approach

Although adolescence marks a vulnerable stage for peer influence on health behavior, little is known about the longitudinal and dynamic relationship between adolescent friendship and weight control. The current study aims to explain these dynamic processes among a sample of 1156 American adolescents in grades 9–11 (48.6% girls, 23.4% European American, 25.2% African American) from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Stochastic actor-oriented models were fit to examine changes in friendship networks and unhealthy weight control across two waves. The findings support a bidirectional relationship where weight control predicts future friendship seeking and friendship seeking predicts future weight control. The findings also indicate that adolescents prefer friends with similar weight control patterns. Taken together, the results of the current study indicate that adolescent friendships play an integral role in the development of unhealthy weight control and thus can be used to identify adolescents at risk and serve as targets within preventive interventions.