“Flashburning” — Interpreting the presence of heat damage to a suspect's clothing and footwear in the investigation of fires

When volatile flammable vapours are released, they can mix with surrounding air and form a vapour cloud. Ignition of this fuel/air mixture will produce a flame front that will flash through the vapour. Items exposed to the flame front, including a suspect's clothing and footwear, may sustain superficial heat damage. At The Forensic Science Service Ltd this is referred to as flashburning. This paper describes the concept of flashburning, the laboratory methodology used to identify it and how an assessment on the overall distribution of that damage may allow a scientist to evaluate its evidential significance. Two anonymised casework examples are used to demonstrate how this information has been interpreted and used in evidence in United Kingdom courts of law.     

A New U.S.-Colombian Relationship: Transnational Crime and U.S. National Security

To fight transnational crime, the United States needs to strengthen its cooperation with Colombia. This initiative, according to the authors, will not only be cost-effective for the United States, it will also signal U.S. willingness to work “by, with and through” other states, and may make possible an expanded regional framework to act against the criminal cartels.     

On the Right to Have Nationality Rights: Statelessness,Citizenship and Human Rights

Netherlands International Law Review - This article considers contemporary predicaments of nationality rights against the background of reflection on Arendt’s phrase ‘the right to have...     

Innovation capital

In this paper we compare the relationship between a firm’s innovation capital and the likelihood that a firm will commercialize an invention. Our index of innovation capital is the product of the firm’s human capital, social capital, and reputational capital. We find from our empirical experiment, which uses Small Business Innovation Research data, that innovation capital is a statistically more important entrepreneurial input to the innovation output of commercialization than any of its components.     

The suitability of visual taphonomic methods for digital photographs: An experimental approach with pig carcasses in a tropical climate

In the context of increased scrutiny of the methods in forensic sciences, it is essential to ensure that the approaches used in forensic taphonomy to measure decomposition and estimate the postmortem interval are underpinned by robust evidence-based data. Digital photographs are an important source of documentation in forensic taphonomic investigations but the suitability of the current approaches for photographs, rather than real-time remains, is poorly studied which can undermine accurate forensic conclusions. The present study aimed to investigate the suitability of 2D colour digital photographs for evaluating decomposition of exposed human analogues (Sus scrofa domesticus) in a tropical savanna environment (Hawaii), using two published scoring methods; Megyesi et al., 2005 and Keough et al., 2017. It was found that there were significant differences between the real-time and photograph decomposition scores when the Megyesi et al. method was used. However, the Keough et al. method applied to photographs reflected real-time decomposition more closely and thus appears more suitable to evaluate pig decomposition from 2D photographs. The findings indicate that the type of scoring method used has a significant impact on the ability to accurately evaluate the decomposition of exposed pig carcasses from photographs. It was further identified that photographic taphonomic analysis can reach high inter-observer reproducibility. These novel findings are of significant importance for the forensic sciences as they highlight the potential for high quality photograph coverage to provide useful complementary information for the forensic taphonomic investigation. New recommendations to develop robust transparent approaches adapted to photographs in forensic taphonomy are suggested based on these findings.     

The effective design,implementation and enforcement of socio-economic equality duties: lessons from the pupil premium

Abstract

The UK has extremely high levels of socio-economic inequality, which are predicted to rise over the next five years. Traditionally, equality law was seen as inappropriate to address socio-economic inequality but in the last decade, a growing number of equality duties have been introduced to address this persistent form of inequality. There is, however, little research on the principles that underpin these duties. This article seeks to address this gap through the use of data from interviews conducted with primary school personnel implementing the pupil premium. The article explores understandings of socio-economic inequality by individuals in schools; policy conflicts; the wider context of action to address socio-economic inequality; different decision-making processes; and accountability mechanisms. On the basis of the findings of this study, broad principles are outlined to inform the design, implementation and enforcement of socio-economic equality duties in the future.     

Trials and Miscarriages: an evolutionary socio-historical analysis

Periodically miscarriages of justice become newsworthy and inform not only those who may have some responsibility for their occurrence and rectification, but the general public as well. At those times proposals for reform tend to ensue, and reforms occur. But such occasions are rarely considered historically or understood from an evolutionary perspective. This article undertakes to offer that missing feature. It attempts to inform the periodic highly charged discussion of miscarriages of justice with an understanding of their ingredients illustrated by both some recent and some much older history. The article presents the thesis that miscarriages of justice are a component of the workings of all criminal justice systems, part of their operations, rather than their malfunction. It shows how miscarriages of justice are the criminal justice system’s answer to a prior problem, the functional need to convict more persons than can be shown, with certainty, to have committed the crimes of which they have been charged. This thesis has the implication of inserting some modesty into proposals for reform, not to decry their attempts, but to inspire less naivety. The article focuses on the changing methods of the criminal trial, throughout the second millennium and up to the present day, as an expression of the underlying problématique that represents its thesis.