“I (can) see myself… But what for?” On Live Camera Feeds in Courtrooms (from the Perspective of Witnesses)

The paper’s aim is to present and critically discuss a peculiar practice noticed and studied in courtrooms in the Lower Court in Kraków, Poland. In courtrooms where different hearings take place, two cameras are installed on the wall or on the stand near the judge’s bench. One camera is aimed at the center of the courtroom, where non-professional participants such as witnesses or plaintiffs stand while being questioned by judge. The second camera’s view is more general—it covers the rest of the courtroom, including the benches for plaintiffs, claimants, defendants, and their legal representatives, and most notably the general public. Naturally, the mere presence of cameras in the modern courtroom is not surprising. What raises some questions is the presence of TV screens in the Kraków Lower Court’s courtrooms (and in Poland’s courts in general), which display the feed from both cameras during the hearing. Consequently, people gathered in the courtroom, especially people questioned by the judge (such as witnesses), can see themselves “live” in the TV screen. Even without raising the subtle details and differences between individual courtrooms, the system of displaying, in real time, live video feeds from a courtroom into the same courtroom begs for more detailed, critical analysis. For instance, one should address the system’s (presumably intended) functions (e.g. transparency, behavior control, and correction of time perception) and the real consequences for the dynamics during hearings, which are not assumptions or hypotheticals. The paper distinguishes the issues connected with the system and addressees them through the perspective of witnesses who participate in the hearings, using the collected opinions of witnesses.

     

Hierarchical,Three‐Dimensional Measurement System for Crime Scene Scanning

We present a new generation of three‐dimensional (3D) measuring systems, developed for the process of crime scene documentation. This measuring system facilitates the preparation of more insightful, complete, and objective documentation for crime scenes. Our system reflects the actual requirements for hierarchical documentation, and it consists of three independent 3D scanners: a laser scanner for overall measurements, a situational structured light scanner for more minute measurements, and a detailed structured light scanner for the most detailed parts of tscene. Each scanner has its own spatial resolution, of 2.0, 0.3, and 0.05 mm, respectively. The results of interviews we have conducted with technicians indicate that our developed 3D measuring system has significant potential to become a useful tool for forensic technicians. To ensure the maximum compatibility of our measuring system with the standards that regulate the documentation process, we have also performed a metrological validation and designated the maximum permissible length measurement error E_MPE for each structured light scanner. In this study, we present additional results regarding documentation processes conducted during crime scene inspections and a training session.     

Regional Disparities in Central and Eastern European Countries: Trends,Drivers and Prospects

Growth in Central and East European countries (CEE) is territorially unbalanced, more so than in most other parts of the EU. The benefits of transformation in these countries have been unequally distributed among particular social groups and territories—with the emergence of highly educated and internationally successful professionals and entrepreneurs located mainly in metropolitan areas on the one hand, and structural unemployment, persistent poverty and social exclusion in peripheral regions on the other. These regional imbalances are characterised by a process of metropolisation that has privileged a handful of dynamic urban centres while exacerbating the structural problems of old industrial regions, vast rural areas and regions located on borders, and especially the EU's eastern borders. Different as they are in social, cultural and geographical terms, these declining or stagnating regions share general problems of economic peripherality and many negative effects of structural change, such as rural depopulation, ‘brain drain’, disinvestment and, frequently, below-average levels of socio-economic well-being. This polarised economic and territorial development within CEE poses challenges not only for the respective countries, but also for European cohesion.     

The double helix of rule of law and EU competition law: An appraisal

By discussing the experiences of Hungary and Poland, this article aims to demonstrate that there are three layers of the rule of law which are relevant for EU competition law. The first one is external: it relates to the legal system of EU Member States of which competition law is a part. In national legal systems, rule of law safeguards need to be put in place in order to provide an adequate legal environment for the competition law system to perform its role. The second one is internal: it concerns rule of law safeguards in relation to the Member States' competition authorities, in particular their independence. The third one is consequential: the weakening of the rule of law within the external and internal layers affects the proper functioning of the competition law system. As a result, the effectiveness of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU is endangered, and a vicious circle of mutually reinforcing competition law and rule of law crises unfolds.     

A Quest for Feminist Space and Time

Abstract

This article offers an investigation of practical and political aspects of new materialism on the basis of texts accepted for publication in Women: A Cultural Review. The authors emphasize various political strategies that appear in the collected essays; above all they stress the practical aspects of theory itself. Theory as praxis is a concept inspired by contemporary philosophers such as Georges Canguilhem, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault and Donna Haraway. It can also be the basis for a politics of location and it highlights the importance of being situated in specific sociocultural, historical, local and geographical contexts. The authors raised the question of the potential alliances between their specific, Polish context and the possibility of participating in and creating a broader feminist movement, which proves to be possible thanks to a variety of perspectives that are considered important and worth considering in new materialism. In the article, the Polish Kongres Kobiet (‘Women's Congress’) initiative is presented as a platform for feminist activity which combines various kinds of political, social and cultural interests, concerns and goals. Along with the importance of space for feminist politics, the authors consider time as a crucial constituent of feminist activism. Both rethinking the past—tradition, heritage, history—and directing reflection towards the future hopes, possibilities, politics and theories, constitute important characteristics of the new materialism approach. The authors conclude by introducing the notion of the ‘politics of squatting’, which serves as a metaphor for a feminist quest for space and time.     

Stakeholder citizenship: the complexities of Polish migrants’ citizenship attachments in the context of the Scottish independence referendum

This article focuses on the experiences of Scotland’s largest foreign-born minority group, namely Poles, in the run-up to the Scottish independence referendum in 2014. We draw on 20 in-depth interviews to explore our participants’ intentions and justifications for voting (or not) in the referendum. We found that our participants tended to emphasise the jus domicili principle when justifying their eligibility to vote in the referendum. However, our participants extended the jus domicili principle in their justifications to also include the intention to stay in Scotland as a central aspect of their continuing stake in (and right to vote in the referendum to determine) Scotland’s future. Through exploring our participants’ justifications for voting in the referendum, we were able to examine and better understand how migrants constitute their citizenship through articulating their substantive attachments (social, economic and relational or familial) in their adoptive country and in their country of origin.     

Electoral context,habit-formation and voter turnout: A new analysis

Drawing on the concept of habitual voting (Plutzer, 2002), Franklin (2004) argues that the effects of electoral context on voter turnout will be largely limited to the cohorts who have experienced few elections in their lifetime. Those with more electoral experience would thus remain unaffected. Testing the above hypothesis is a way of a feasible indirect examination of the concept of habitual voting. Such tests have so far focused primarily on the impact of electoral competitiveness on turnout. I propose a new superior analysis of Franklin's hypothesis that, I claim, approaches the standards of a natural experiment. My test – focusing on the national election cycles as a contextual trait of the European Parliament elections – delivers new evidence supporting this hypothesis.     

Iatrogenic Burns of the Neckline in a Patient with Tetraparesis During Tracheotomy

The paper presents a case of an atypical iatrogenic complication after tracheotomy analyzed on the basis of the case dossier materials submitted to the authors by the court of justice to prepare a forensic medical opinion concerning the correctness of the medical procedure. A 37‐year‐old woman was brought by the ambulance service to the hospital with acute respiratory failure due to post‐tracheostomy tracheal stenosis. Tracheotomy was performed on an emergency basis. The patient suffered severe burns of the chest and neck. The experts concluded that the most probable cause of the incident was electrocautery‐induced ignition of the disinfectant used for cleaning the skin before the surgery. It was established that with correct handling of the procedure, the aforementioned incident should not have taken place. Therefore, it cannot be regarded as a normal complication inherent in the risk associated with the procedure, but as a consequence of a medical error.     

Characteristics of Bone Injuries Resulting from Knife Wounds Incised with Different Forces

The aim of this research was to experimentally determine the characteristics of incised bone wounds, which are commonly found in defense injuries. A specially constructed pivoting arm device was used to inflict wounds with controlled forces and direction. Five knives were selected to inflict the wounds on porcine forelimbs. Eight incised wounds were made per knife per force. A larger knife and a greater force caused longer and wider bone wounds. Comparisons of individual knives at the two forces produced varying results in the bone wounds. A correlation was seen between the force and the length (r = 0.69), width (r = 0.63), and depth (r = 0.57) of bone wounds. Serrated‐edge and nonserrated knives can be distinguished from the appearance of the wound. The outcomes may be applicable in forensic investigations to ascertain the forces associated with incised wounds and identify the specific knife used.