Government Promotion of Corporate Social Responsibility: Evidence from the EU Eco‐Management and Audit Scheme

Governments play an active role in promoting corporate social responsibility and specifically environmental management system (EMS) programs, but few studies have examined the impact of such support on the decision of businesses to adopt EMS programs. We ask two questions in this paper: how does government support for EMS programs affect adoption of such programs? Second, what effect does this government support have on the pace of adoption of such programs? The answer to the first question can reveal how effective government programs are in boosting membership in EMS programs. The answer to the second reveals to what extent businesses within EU member states are converging upon particular EMS standards. We examine these questions in the context of the European Union’s Eco‐Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS), 2010–2014. There is significant variation in government support of EMAS across the EU and at the same time, EMAS competes for business attention with the more established ISO 14001. Our quantitative and qualitative analyses therefore reveal the effectiveness of government programs in boosting adoption, but also to the extent to which such programs cause convergence upon EMAS in the face of a competing standard such as ISO 14001.     

Utilizing a magnetic locator to search for buried firearms and miscellaneous weapons at a controlled research site

Forensic personnel generally use basic all-metal detectors for weapon searches because of their ease of use and cost efficiency. For ferromagnetic targets, an alternative easy to use and low-cost geophysical tool is a magnetic locator. The following study was designed to demonstrate the effectiveness of a common, commercially available magnetic locator in forensic weapon searches by determining the maximum depth of detection for 32 metallic forensic targets and testing the effects of metallic composition on detection. Maximum depth of detection was determined for 16 decommissioned street-level firearms, six pieces of assorted scrap metals, and 10 blunt or bladed weapons by burying each target at 5-cm intervals until the weapons were no longer detected. As expected, only ferromagnetic items were detected; weapons containing both ferromagnetic and nonferromagnetic components were generally detected to shallower depths. Overall, the magnetic locator can be a useful addition to weapon searches involving buried ferromagnetic weapons.     

Substance abuse treatment for juvenile offenders: A review of quasi-experimental and experimental research

Purpose

The purpose of this systematic literature review is to assess the effectiveness of substance abuse treatment on alcohol and marijuana use for juvenile offenders based on existing quasi-experimental and experimental research. Additionally, a secondary aim is to compare the effects of individual-based interventions to family-based interventions.

Methods

A systematic search of literature and electronic databases through 2010 generated five experimental or quasi-experimental studies that assessed alcohol outcomes for juvenile offenders and five experimental or quasi-experimental studies that assessed marijuana outcomes for juvenile offenders.

Results

Overall, substance abuse treatment appears to have a small to moderate effect on alcohol and marijuana reduction for juvenile offenders. Interventions that showed the most promise were Multisystemic Therapy, Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care, Teaching Family, and Life Skills Training. Individual-based interventions and family-based interventions had similar small to moderate effects on alcohol and marijuana use.

Conclusion

This review highlights several promising interventions for this high-risk population; however, further rigorous study is desperately needed to provide a better understanding of what works best in reducing substance use among juvenile offenders.     

How Successful and Distinctive is the Human Rights Act? An Expatriate Comparatist's Assessment

This article first assesses the success and distinctiveness of the Human Rights Act 1998 from the perspective of its status as an exemplar of ‘the new Commonwealth model of constitutionalism.’ This new, intermediate model attempts to straddle the dichotomy of parliamentary sovereignty and judicial supremacy by protecting rights through a reallocation of powers between courts and legislatures that brings them into better balance than under either of these two traditional, more lopsided models. As part of its assessment, the article critically examines an influential strand of commentary claiming that in practice the HRA has proven to be less distinctive from US‐style constitutionalism than initially claimed or hoped. The second part of the article seeks to contribute to current debates about reform of the HRA by proposing ways to address its main structural weaknesses, especially the problem of remedial distortion.     

Skeletal identification by radiographic comparison: blind tests of a morphoscopic method using antemortem chest radiographs

This study investigated the value of antemortem (AM) and postmortem (PM) radiographs of the claviculae and C3-T4 vertebrae to identify skeletons of missing U.S. soldiers from past military operations. In total, 12 field-recovered skeletons and AM chest radiographs of 1460 individuals were used. For each skeleton, examiners analyzed an array of AM chest radiographs (up to 1000 individuals) and attempted to identify the correct PM/AM radiographic match. When examiners were able to compare all images within a single test, only true-positive identifications were made. When AM radiographs were presented one-at-a-time, in sequential order, and without examiners having knowledge of array size, erroneous identifications resulted but they were almost exclusively made by untrained examiners (accuracy = 35% vs. 90% for trained examiners). This study demonstrates the value of chest radiographs for the identification of disarticulated and even eroded skeletons, but only when methods are wielded by trained examiners.     

The effect of ionizing gamma radiation on natural and synthetic fibers and its implications for the forensic examination of fiber evidence

Circumstances of criminal activities involving radioactive materials may mean fiber evidence recovered from a crime scene could have been exposed to materials emitting ionizing radiation. The consequences of radiation exposed fibers on the result of the forensic analysis and interpretation is explored. The effect of exposure to 1-1000 kGy radiation doses in natural and synthetic fibers was noticeable using comparative forensic examination methods, such as optical microscopy, microspectrophotometry, and thin-layer chromatography. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy analysis showed no signs of radiation-induced chemical changes in any of the fiber structures. The outcome of the comparative methods highlights the risk of "false negatives" associated in comparing colors of recovered fibers that may have been exposed to unknown radiation doses. Consideration of such results supports the requirement to know the context, including the environmental conditions, as much as possible before undertaking a forensic fiber examination.     

The Dud Effect: Adding Highly Dissimilar Fillers Increases Confidence in Lineup Identifications

Recent research in decision-making has demonstrated the “dud-alternative effect”—the tendency to become more confident that a chosen response option is correct if it is surrounded by implausible response options (Windschitl & Chambers, J Exp Psychol 30:198–215, 2004). This finding may be applicable to a lineup task: The presence of duds (i.e., highly dissimilar fillers) may increase a witness’s confidence that an identified (non-dud) lineup member is the criminal. Four studies (N = 665) demonstrate that the mere presence of highly dissimilar fillers inflates witnesses’ confidence in a mistaken identification (Studies 1–4), provides evidence that this confidence inflation is due to the duds inflating the perceived similarity of the other lineup members to the criminal (Studies 2, 3), and delineates some conditions under which the effect holds (Studies 3, 4). The addition of highly dissimilar lineup members, far from being inert, as is often implicitly assumed, can bias witnesses’ confidence reports.     

Visualisation of fingermarks and grab impressions on fabrics. Part 1: gold/zinc vacuum metal deposition

Vacuum metal deposition (VMD) is a highly sensitive technique originally introduced for detecting latent fingermarks on smooth non-porous surfaces such as carrier bags, plastics and glass. The current study explores whether VMD can be used in the examination of clothing from physical and sexual assault cases in order to visualise identifiable fingermark ridge detail and/or palmar flexion crease detail, thus allowing potential areas to be indicated for DNA swabbing and/or to determine the sequence of events. Four different fabrics were utilised during this study - nylon, polyester, polycotton and cotton, along with 15 donors who ranged in their age and propensity to leave fingermarks, from good to medium to poor as determined by results obtained from test runs using paper and plastic carrier bags processed with VMD. Once samples were collected they were kept for a determined time (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 14, 21 or 28 days) and then treated using the gold/zinc metal VMD process. From the results, it appears that greater ridge detail is visible on the smoother non-porous fabrics, such as nylon whereas on rougher porous fabrics, such as cotton, only empty prints and impressions, rather than any ridge details, were visible. All fabrics did however allow the development of touch marks that could be targeted for DNA taping thus potentially leading to a DNA profile and possible identification of a suspect.     

How Do Police Respond to Stalking? An Examination of the Risk Management Strategies and Tactics Used in a Specialized Anti-Stalking Law Enforcement Unit

How do police respond to and manage complaints of stalking? To answer this question, we conducted a 3-phase study. First, we reviewed the literature to identify risk management tactics used to combat stalking. Second, we asked a group of police officers to review those tactics for completeness and group them into categories reflecting more general risk management strategies. The result was 22 categories of strategies. Finally, we used qualitative methods to evaluate the files of 32 cases referred to the specialized anti-stalking unit of a metropolitan police department. We coded specific risk management tactics and strategies used by police. Results indicated that a median number of 19 specific tactics from 7 general strategies were used to manage risk. Also, the implementation of strategies and tactics reflected specific characteristics of the cases (e.g., perpetrator risk factors, victim vulnerability factors), suggesting that the risk management decisions made by police were indeed strategic in nature. Qualitative analyses indicated that some of the strategies and tactics were more effective than others. We discuss how these findings can be used to understand and use stalking risk management more generally, as well as improve research on the efficacy of risk assessment and management for stalking.