Police interviews with suspected child sex offenders: does use of empathy and question type influence the amount of investigation relevant information obtained?

The use of the criminal justice system to force offenders to receive psychological treatment is one of the most controversial aspects of service provision for offenders. Coerced treatment needs to be distinguished from pressured treatment, both having objective and subjective dimensions. In this paper some arguments for and against coerced offender rehabilitation are discussed. We suggest that coercing offenders into attending rehabilitation programmes (or placing legal pressure on them to attend) is unlikely by itself to lead to poorer outcomes. Rather, the individual's perception of coercion will be more influential in determining how an offender approaches treatment. Even when offenders perceive they are being coerced, it is likely that pre-treatment anti-therapeutic attitudes can change over the course of a programme, such that therapeutic gains (risk reduction) can occur. Coercion and its effects on treatment engagement and rehabilitation outcomes require further empirical research and conceptual analysis.     

Evidence for a heritable brain basis to deviance-promoting deficits in self-control

Purpose

Classic criminological theories emphasize the role of impaired self-control in behavioral deviancy. Reduced amplitude of the P300 brain response is reliably observed in individuals with antisocial and substance-related problems, suggesting it may serve as a neurophysiological indicator of deficiencies in self-control that confer liability to deviancy.

Methods

The current study evaluated the role of self-control capacity—operationalized by scores on a scale measure of trait disinhibition—in mediating the relationship between P300 brain response and behavioral deviancy in a sample of adult twins (N = 419) assessed for symptoms of antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 brain response.

Results

As predicted, greater disorder symptoms and higher trait disinhibition scores each predicted smaller P300 amplitude, and trait disinhibition mediated observed relations between antisocial/addictive disorders and P300 response. Further, twin modeling analyses revealed that trait disinhibition scores and disorder symptoms reflected a common genetic liability, and this genetic liability largely accounted for the observed phenotypic relationship between antisocial-addictive problems and P300 brain response.

Conclusions

These results provide further evidence that heritable weaknesses in self-control capacity confer liability to antisocial/addictive outcomes and that P300 brain response indexes this dispositional liability.     

WHISTLEBLOWING WITHOUT TEARS: THE EXPOSURE OF BRISBANE'S KING GEORGE SQUARE CAR PARK FRAUD

Abstract: This is essentially a “now it can be told” account of a massive fraud perpetrated on the Brisbane City Council in the mid-1970s by six attendants in a council car park, who manipulated bundy clocks to falsify departure times on parking tickets surrendered by departing motorists. Because of bitter personal rivalry between two senior council officials, which was complicated by (i) strong support for one official at elected member level, (ii) the subsequently discovered domestic liaison of the latter official with one of the prime suspects, and (iii) bungling in the crown prosecutor's office leading to a judge's decision to throw out the initial conspiracy charge against the car park attendants, it seemed that they might be reinstated and resume stealing on a massive scale. A method of dealing effectively with the issue, involving “blowing the whistle” while protecting the identity of the whistleblowers, was therefore devised. As a result, the thieves were eventually charged and convicted individually. The senior official who advised against police investigation of the suspected fraud while concealing his relationship with a prime suspect was also punished. The paper concludes with a defence of the deception perpetrated by whistleblowers to protect themselves from possible retribution.     

Tissue distribution of lidocaine after fatal accidental injection

The accidental death of a 64-year-old heart patient as a result of the injection of an incorrect dose of lidocaine is presented. The attending nurse inadvertently administered an intravenous bolus of 10 mL of 20% lidocaine (2g). The patient should have received 5 mL of 2% lidocaine (0.1 g). Such iatrogenic overdoses of lidocaine arise from confusion between prepackaged dosage forms. Lidocaine concentrations (mg/L or mg/kg were: blood, 30; brain, 135; heart, 106; kidney, 204; lung, 89; spleen, 115; skeletal muscle, 20; and adipose, 1.3. The results indicate that even during cardiopulmonary resuscitation as much as 38% of the administered dose of lidocaine may be found in poorly perfused tissue such as skeletal muscle and adipose.