The Views of Psychologists,Lawyers, and Judges on Key Components and the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations in Australia

This study aimed to understand the expectations of and the agreement between professional groups regarding the quality of single‐expert reports written by psychologists (known as child custody evaluations in the United States). 13 psychologists, 18 family lawyers, 26 children's lawyers, and 8 judges (N = 65) in New South Wales, Australia, rated the overall quality of reports and the quality of various components of them. Interprofessional congruence on importance ratings allowed key components to be derived. The results revealed that the overall quality of reports was rated positively, however, significant discrepancies were found between importance and quality ratings on the various components, indicating that reports fall short of expectations in many areas.     

Banking in the cloud: Part 3 – contractual issues

This paper looks at EU banks' use of public cloud computing services. It is based primarily on anonymised interviews with banks, cloud providers, advisers, and financial services regulators. The findings are presented in three parts. Part 1 of this paper explored the extent to which banks operating in the EU, including global banks, use public cloud computing services. Part 2 of this paper covered the main legal and regulatory issues that may affect banks' use of cloud services.Part 3 looks at the key contractual issues that arise in negotiations between banks and cloud service providers, including data protection requirements, complexities caused by the layering of cloud services, termination, service changes, and liability. It also presents the overall conclusion derived from the studies conducted, as set out in the three parts of the paper.All three parts of the paper can be accessed via Computer Law and Security Review's page on ScienceDirect at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/02673649?sdc=2. The full list of sources is available via the same link and will be printed at the end of this part of the article.     

The Adaptation of License-plate Readers for Investigative Purposes: Police Technology and Innovation Re-invention

Scholarship has focused on the use of license plate readers by patrol officers as a rational instrument for accomplishing key policing goals, including recovering stolen vehicles. In contrast, this paper applies the theoretical framework of innovation reinvention to explain how license plate readers are being used by criminal investigators in more novel ways. This perspective provides insights into the practical benefits of an enhanced version of this technology. More significantly, it helps illuminate the innovation attributes and the organizational determinants that contribute to its adaptation. In our case study of an agency with extensive deployment of license plate readers, we found that factors contributing to their reinvention included their widespread availability and compatibility with other information systems, their lack of complexity, the characteristics of their users, and the role of leadership in promoting their use. These findings have implications for advancing knowledge about the complex nature of the innovation process.     

Assessing the Effects of Court Date Notifications within Pretrial Case Processing

Jurisdictions at every level throughout the U.S. are paying an increasing amount of attention to pretrial case processing. The primary areas of attention appear to be on risk assessment development and classification, the effects of pretrial detention, and the effectiveness of various strategies that may impact a defendant’s failure to appear for their assigned court dates. The current study is a randomized experimental trial designed to test the effects of court notification strategies, using failure to appear (FTA) as the primary outcome of interest. Our findings do not reveal a palpable effect for court notification strategies (telephone calls, and text messaging, with other conditions layered in), but do indicate and reinforce the utility of an actuarial method of risk classification when predicting likelihood of FTA.     

Self-image of adolescents with cystic fibrosis

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a lethal genetic disease, yet improved care has extended the mean age of survival into the young adult years. Many of the surviving adolescents have respiratory and digestive problems which delay growth and sexual development. It has been suggested that the specter of fatal disease interferes with adjustment to adolescence. We administered the Offer Self-Image Questionnaire to three groups with mean height less than the fifth percentile: CF males aged 12–19 (n=16); CF females aged 12–19 (n=8); and otherwise healthy males with short stature and/or delayed puberty aged 13–19 (n=34). The values obtained were compared to published normative data for a large number of normal adolescents and a smaller number of adolescents actively undergoing treatment for emotional disorders. CF males showed an abnormal pattern of adjustment that could be considered comparable to disturbed males and to growth-delayed and sexually delayed males. The CF female group was concordant with the normal population, rather than with the emotionally disturbed population. Thus CF and pubertally delayed males have a self-perception of maladjustment to the psychologic problems of adolescence. This suggests that adjustment problems of the CF male may be related to growth retardation and pubertal delay, the social stigma of which may be more easily disguised in the female. This is important in health care, since recent evidence suggests that exemplary attention to medical compliance and nutrition may ameliorate some of the growth lag both in pubertal delay and CF.Postdoctoral medical research fellow in allergy, immunology, and respiratory disease at Children's Hospital at Stanford. Received his M.D. from the University of Southern California and pediatric training at Stanford University Hospital. Main research interests are clinical nutrition and behavioral intervention in adolescents with chronic disease.Received his M.D. from Stanford University and pediatric training at Stanford University Hospital. Main research interests are growth disorders and adolescent development.Studied psychology at Dartmouth College and Oxford University before coming to Stanford University, where he is currently completing his Ph.D. in social psychology. Main research interests are the social determinants of motivation.Chief of the Allergy and Pulmonary Disease Service at Children's Hospital at Stanford and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Stanford University. Received his M.D. from University of Iowa; pediatric training at Yale-New Haven Hospital and Stanford University Hospital; and allergy, immunology, and respiratory postdoctoral training at Stanford University Hospital. Main research interest is cystic fibrosis.     

Specificity of sibship determination using the ABI Identifiler multiplex system

Fifty known siblings and fifty unrelated pairs were genotyped using the ABI Identifiler STR system and sibship indices computed for each pair. Combined sibship indices (CSIs) for the known siblings ranged from less than 10 to greater than 1 billion. CSIs for the unrelated pairs ranged from 4.5 x 10(-8) to 0.12. In the known sibling group the percentage of loci where both alleles matched was approximately 40%, while the percentage of loci where neither matched was approximately 10%. In the non-sibling group, the percentage of loci where both alleles matched was approximately 6%, while the percentage of loci where neither matched was approximately 45%. Interestingly, the percentage of loci where a single allele matched was the same in both the known siblings and unrelated pairs, approximately 50%.     

No Five-Finger Exercise: Digital Law to Manage Legal Complexity

This article considers the following. Digital coding of information is far less extensive than the complexity and much less radical than the digital coding of selection among information which establishes the legal system. Niklas Luhmanns theory is the principal example of an appreciation for the latter. Luhmann presented the design for understanding law as autopoietic, a law legitimated and sustained by legal procedure.