Specific Patterns of Canine Scavenging in Indoor Settings

Postmortem animal mutilations due to domestic dogs in isolated domestic deaths are taphonomic modifications regularly observed by forensic pathologists. They are rarely described in the literature; however, even though they present specific patterns. Through 41 cases, 10 at the forensic institute in Lille (France) and 31 at the New York City Office of Chief Medical Examiner (USA), plus 22 cases from the literature, specific locations and patterns of postmortem scavenging lesions are proposed. These lesions are mainly distributed in three locations: the face, especially the nose and the mouth (73.1%), the neck (43.1%), and the arm (shoulder/upper limb [29.2%], hand [26.8%]). We discuss the time span between death and scavenging, the consequences on identification, and comparison with outdoor settings. Outdoor scavenging lesions are mainly located on the trunk and limbs usually sparing the head, which strongly differs from indoor distribution and imply different animal motivations.     

Assessing the Possibility of a Pedophilia Panic and Contagion Effect Between France and the United States

In the early and mid-1990s, the United States experienced what could be called a societal sex crime crisis. This led to the passage of specific types of legislation aimed at addressing what was perceived by the public to be a major social problem. In the mid- and late-1990s, Europe (mainly Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and Germany) found itself in the same predicament as the United States. Legislation was passed, varying in its nature, in order to provide the public with an answer to its panic. According to a social constructionist approach, a moral panic occurs when certain types of behaviors or individuals are thought to be utterly harmful to the fabric of the social body. The present article aims at assessing whether there is a pedophilia/moral panic and whether it goes beyond the borders of one country. In order to identify potential contagion effects or parallel trends between France and the United States, the historical evolutions of legislation, reported incidence of child sexual abuse, and written media coverage of the events are triangulated into a multilevel analysis including the years 1990 thru 2005. Differences in intensity and in the dynamics are then established between the two sexual abuse moral panics.     

Identification and Comparison of Electrical Tapes Using Instrumental and Statistical Techniques: II. Organic Composition of the Tape Backing and Adhesive*

Abstract: The microtexture and elemental composition of the backing of electrical tapes have been shown to be highly discriminating. In this study, the organic composition of electrical tape was evaluated as a complementary means of distinguishing tape brands. The backing and adhesive of 72 rolls of electrical tape were analyzed via Attenuated Total Reflectance Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (ATR FTIR) and discriminant analysis was used to classify all samples by brand. Generally, the accuracy for FTIR data (88–99%) was higher than that for elemental data (86–94%). FTIR spectra from the adhesive layer were the most discriminating. In separate studies, two fragments of blast-damaged tape were correctly assigned to their brand of origin and discriminant analysis was used to quantitatively associate or exclude tape samples from two bombing cases.     

Assessing the interaction between offender and victim criminal lifestyles & homicide type

Purpose

This study examined the interaction between homicide victim and offender criminal lifestyles and the situational characteristics of homicides that occurred in the city of Newark, New Jersey from 1997 through 2007. Three research questions were explored: (1) what are the lifestyles exhibited by homicide victims and offenders; (2) are there different types of homicide actors (i.e., victim and/or offender) based on their criminal lifestyle; (3) do varying homicide actor (i.e., victim and/or offender) types influence the characteristics of homicide incidents?

Methods

Five hundred and thirteen homicide incidents was used to answer the three research questions. Hierarchical Agglomerative Cluster and Logistic Regression Analyses were employed to answer the research questions.

Findings

The findings showed that criminal lifestyles were indeed very common among homicide victims and offenders, and that they resemble each other. The findings also showed that there were two types of homicide victims and offenders, and that these types influenced the etiology of homicide incidents.

Conclusion

Overall, the results suggest that researchers and practitioners should take into account the criminal lifestyles of potential victims and offenders when tailoring homicide prevention strategies.     

Forensic Informativity of ~3000 bp of Coding Sequence of Domestic Dog mtDNA

The discriminatory power of the noncoding control region (CR) of domestic dog mitochondrial DNA alone is relatively low. The extent to which the discriminatory power could be increased by analyzing additional highly variable coding regions of the mitochondrial genome (mtGenome) was therefore investigated. Genetic variability across the mtGenome was evaluated by phylogenetic analysis, and the three most variable ~1 kb coding regions identified. We then sampled 100 Swedish dogs to represent breeds in accordance with their frequency in the Swedish population. A previously published dataset of 59 dog mtGenomes collected in the United States was also analyzed. Inclusion of the three coding regions increased the exclusion capacity considerably for the Swedish sample, from 0.920 for the CR alone to 0.964 for all four regions. The number of mtDNA types among all 159 dogs increased from 41 to 72, the four most frequent CR haplotypes being resolved into 22 different haplotypes.     

Depressive Symptoms in Low-Income,Urban Adolescents: Cognitive and Contextual Factors

This study examined the relationships among cognitive variables, family immigration history, negative life events, and depressive symptoms in a sample of 306 low-income, urban fifth- and sixth-grade children. Explanatory style and negative automatic thoughts were the cognitive variables examined. There were three key findings. First, children who were immigrants reported significantly more depressive symptoms, more negative life events, and more negative automatic thoughts than children who were not immigrants. Second, both explanatory style and negative automatic thoughts were significantly associated with depressive symptoms above and beyond the effects of child immigration history and negative life events. Finally, negative automatic thoughts mediated the relationship between child immigration history and depressive symptoms. We discuss the clinical and research implications of these findings.     

DHHS wisely proposed to remove the "consent" requirement from the HIPAA privacy standards. Department of Health and Human Services

The author contends that requiring advance written consent to use and disclose health information interferes with patient care, is unnecessary in view of other rigorous privacy protections, and imposes an unwarranted burden on healthcare providers. Consequently, the author commends DHHS for taking the "practical and apolitical step" of removing this requirement.     

Few convictions in rape cases: Empirical evidence concerning some alternative explanations

This paper examines several explanations for the low rate of conviction for rape arrests made in the District of Columbia from 1971 to 1976. Discrimination against female victims does not appear to be a major cause of the problem, nor do rape victims appear more likely than victims of other serious crimes to cause case attrition due to their own unwillingness to continue. Questioning of the victim's credibility, on the other hand, does seem to be more of a reason for case dismissal for rape cases than for other serious crimes. A multivariate analysis of the types of rape cases that do result in conviction yielded eight statistically significant variables. A new perspective on rape cases emphasizing the issues of consent and credibility is presented.