Experimental design for acquiring relevant data to address the issue of comparing consecutively manufactured tools and firearms

The comparison of consecutively manufactured tools and firearms has provided much, but not all, of the basis for the profession of firearm and toolmark examination. The authors accept the fundamental soundness of this approach but appeal to the experimental community to close two minor gaps in the experimental procedure. We suggest that “blinding” and attention to appropriateness of other experimental conditions that would consolidate the foundations of our profession. We do not suggest that previous work is unsound.     

Die (neue) Haftung für Schäden an der Biodiversität

Zusammenfassung  Mit dem Umweltschadensgesetz wird im deutschen Umweltrecht eine neuartige Haftung für Sch?den an der Biodiversit?t eingeführt. Die n?here juristische und naturwissenschaftliche Bestimmung dieser Umweltsch?den sieht sich jedoch mit mehreren Problemfeldern konfrontiert. Ausgehend von der gesetzlichen Schadensdefinition als erhebliche nachteilige Auswirkungen auf den günstigen Erhaltungszustand bestimmter Lebensr?ume oder Arten behandelt der Beitrag die Frage, wann solche Auswirkungen erheblich nachteilig sein k?nnen. Um den Begriff der “Erheblichkeit” einzugrenzen, wird die Rechtsprechung und Literatur zu ?hnlich unbestimmten Rechtsbegriffen aus anderen Bereichen des Umweltrechts auf ihre Verwertbarkeit und Anwendbarkeit überprüft. Im Ergebnis kann allein auf die im Rahmen der FFH-Vertr?glichkeitsprüfung anerkannten Kriterien zurückgegriffen werden.     

Is There an Association Between the Body Mass Index and Interpersonal Violent Behavior?

An inverse relationship between the body mass index (BMI) and the risk of completed suicide was shown in several studies. Furthermore, it is suggested that obesity might be associated with a lower risk for violent criminality. Therefore, the aim of this study was to analyze whether a higher BMI is associated with a lower risk for being arrested due to violent behavior in a sample of 43,992 male offenders. Multinomial logistic regression analysis was applied to assess the relationship between different BMI categories and categories of committed crime as outcome variable by including various covariates. Our results indicated that compared to a normal BMI a higher BMI was associated with a significantly lower risk for being arrested in different crime categories associated with interpersonal violence, such as crimes against life and limb (for example: odds ratio = 0.60, CI 95%: 0.52–0.69 for 30–34.9 kg/m²).     

Comment on Andreas von Hirsch: The Roles of Harm and Wrongdoing in Criminalisation Theory

Whereas liberals tend to emphasize harm as the decisive criterion for legitimizing criminalisation, moralists take a qualified notion of wrongfulness as sufficient even when no harm is at hand. This comment takes up Andreas von Hirsch’s “dual element approach” requiring both harm and wrongfulness as necessary conditions for criminalisation and argues that Joel Feinberg’s account of harming as violation of moral rights is perfectly compatible with it. Subsequently, two issues from the liberalism-moralism debate on criminalisation are examined: The difficulty of how to determine wrongfulness beyond the scope of harming, and the so far disregarded question of whether the democratic legislator is free within the framework of constitution to criminalise whatever conduct he wants to prevent irrespective of philosophical constraints.     

Some stylised facts about cash and black economies in Germany

The currency approach assumes black economies to entail larger cash volumes than those needed for transactions in the official economy. Estimates of this hypothesis use e.g. overall cash data. But, for the case of Germany, the growing DM cash amounts in circulation did not only accompany transactions in the national economy, they also disseminated in hoards and in international uses. A series of adjusted cash figures is derived which shows the maximum dimension of national cash uses either for official or black activities. The adjusted cash figures in general grew less fast than overall cash, private consumption, GDP or M1 respectively. They even diminished relative to sales figures which often are accused of being a basis for black activities. This enhances the presumption that, contrary to some contentions in the literature, black activities during the times of the DM-regime played a minor or even decreasing role in Germany.     

Verfassungsfragen einer Reform des österreichischen Bundesheeres

Die Diskussion über eine Abschaffung der Wehrpflicht und einen Umbau des österreichischen Wehrsystems muss auch die verfassungsrechtlichen Rahmenbedingungen mit in den Blick nehmen. Die Bundesverfassung verankert nicht nur die allgemeine Wehrpflicht und das Milizsystem als Organisationsmaximen des Bundesheeres, sondern trifft auch eine abschließende Regelung der Aufgaben des Bundesheeres. Darüber hinaus ergeben sich aus der Neutralität Österreichs und aus dem in Art 4 EMRK normierten Verbot von Zwangs- und Pflichtarbeit verfassungsrechtliche Kriterien, die bei der Entscheidung für ein bestimmtes Wehrsystem zu beachten sind.