Preserving Community Assets: Do Foreclosure Sales Need to Negatively Impact the Neighborhood?

Research has linked concentrated foreclosures with negative neighborhood outcomes; for instance, increased crime and decreased property values. These outcomes drain community asset holdings and impact the longer term trajectory of the neighborhood. However, data reported in this article from a Boston study challenge the assumption that negative neighborhood outcomes are a foregone conclusion in the face of foreclosures. Analysis of interviews with real estate agents and other foreclosure professionals, neighborhood ethnographic observation, and citywide sales and foreclosure sales documents demonstrate that the distinct nature of the foreclosure sales process creates market disruptions heightening the risk for documented negative neighborhood outcomes. Attempts by the seller to reduce financial risks in the sale increase the likelihood of vacancy and create a market oriented toward investor–buyers. Understanding the risk preferences of key decision makers in the foreclosure sale process reveals new intervention points—such as intervening at the short sale, or expanding and updating foreclosure laws to reflect current foreclosure sales markets—to reduce market disruptions and preserve community assets in the face of foreclosures.     

Medical and legal aspects of genital mutilation and circumcision part I: female genital mutilation (FGM)

Female genital mutilation (FGM) is considered to be against the law and against morality not only in Western countries, although a woman of age and able to consent may sometimes think differently. The procedure may have serious physical and emotional consequences for the girl or woman. Nevertheless there are attempts to justify the procedure with medical and hygienic pseudoarguments, ideology, freedom of religion, cultural identity and social adequacy. Outside the Western world, some people claim that religion and culture alone justify the practice. In Germany, parents can lose the right to determine the residence of their daughter, if she is faced with the risk of genital mutilation in order to prevent that the child or girl is taken to her home country. Genital mutilation as a gender-specific threat is recognized as a reason to grant asylum or prevent deportation. Proposals to make genital mutilation a separate punishable offence are presently discussed by the legislator.     

Is There a Relationship Between Bladder Outlet Obstruction due to Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia and Pulmonary Thromboembolism?

Benign prostatic hyperplasia with chronic bladder outlet obstruction has been associated with deep venous thrombosis (DVT) and fatal pulmonary thromboembolism (PTE). To evaluate this further, 60 autopsy cases of men with PTE were compared with 60 age-matched controls. The criteria for outlet obstruction were macroscopic prostatic enlargement with bladder trabeculation and benign prostatic hyperplasia on microscopy. Ten of the 60 men (16.7%) with fatal PTE had evidence of bladder outlet obstruction (age 57-78 years; mean 71.4 years). Of the 60 controls, 12 had evidence of bladder outlet obstruction (20%) (age 67-86 years; mean 75.5 years). No significant relationship could be demonstrated between bladder outlet obstruction and fatal PTE cases (p = 0.8). Given reports of this association, however, it is possible that bladder distension with venous compression may act as a risk modifier in certain individuals in association with other significant comorbidities, but this risk appears low.     

Budgeting for Federal Capital

This article examines the issues involved in federal investment budgeting and planning for the acquisition of federally-owned assets. It describes the unique role of the federal government and examines the different issues and reforms prompted by differing types of capital and investment sponsored at the federal level. It suggests that meaningful changes can be instituted in our budgeting practices that can make a difference for our budgetary choices without adopting a full-scale capital budget. It also presents a framework for improving federal agency capital decision making based on a study of practices used by leading state and local and private sector organizations. The article is based on testimony delivered before the President's Commission to Study Capital Budgeting.     

Affective Development from Middle Childhood to Late Adolescence: Trajectories of Mean-Level Change in Negative and Positive Affect

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - Adolescence has long been purported to be a period of emotional upheaval, yet relatively little is known regarding normative patterns of change in youth positive...     

Estimating Crime Laboratory Efficiency in the Testing of Sexual Assault Kits,

Over the past decade, the large numbers of untested sexual assault kits (SAKs) have been highlighted as a systematic problem that jeopardizes or delays justice for victims. Considering the benefits of testing SAKs, researchers have worked to shed light on why sexual assault evidence has not been effectively submitted to and processed by crime laboratories. Missing from this discourse has been an understanding of the types of practices or qualities that encourage efficiency in the testing of SAKs in crime laboratories. We analyzed results of a national survey administered to all publicly funded state and local crime laboratories (N = 132 respondents) to provide critical information about (i) the extent to which laboratories are testing all of the SAKs possible given the resources they have available; and (ii) the impact that staffing, equipment, policies, and other practices have on SAK testing efficiency. We find that the average laboratory tests only about 69% of the SAKs possible given the resources available to them. However, although technical inefficiencies explain a large proportion of the number of untested SAKs, the accumulation of untested SAKs must also be attributed to laboratories having insufficient resources (e.g., too few forensic analysts). Moreover, results from stochastic frontier models show that doubling the number of forensic analysts in the typical laboratory would allow them to expand their SAK testing capacity by nearly 50%. Implications of these findings are discussed as they relate to the prioritization of resources for crime laboratories, which often operate under strict budgetary realities.     

Identifying Miscarriages of Justice: Why Innocence in the UK is Not the Answer

This article examines two contrasting proposals for the reform of criminal appeals: the government's recent proposal that the guilty should no longer have their convictions quashed on 'technicalities'; and calls by campaigners for the Court of Appeal to consider innocence rather than the 'safety of the conviction,' together with their associated attempts to establish Innocence Projects in the UK. Despite the rhetorical power of 'innocence' as a campaigning tool, it is contended that to import such a standard into the legal system would be retrogressive and counter-productive, both as a safeguard against wrongful convictions and in protecting the integrity of the system. In order to be meaningful, due process protections must apply to all. The government's proposals attack this principle directly; innocence campaigners risk unwittingly assisting their endeavours.