Children's street connections in a Canadian community

Preteen children's street activities in a small southern Ontario city were examined for understandings about how children on the street affiliate with one another and with adults after school. The everyday connections between children, shopkeepers, and municipal workers demonstrate that the municipal workers and merchants can offer caring, support, and sanctions to children when parents or teachers are not accompanying them. This provides children on the street with a form of guidance from extrafamilial mentors. The findings point to community-based potentials for naturally occurring crime prevention strategies, a significant aspect of Canada's new law: Youth Criminal Justice Act. 2003.     

Study of the diagnostic value of iron in fresh water drowning

The aim of our study was to test the diagnostic value of iron (Fe) in fresh water drowning by investigating the postmortem levels of hemodilution in drowning cases compared to control cases. Twenty-six typical fresh water drowning cases were selected from 128 immersion cases autopsied in our Department of Forensic Pathology between 1998 and 2004. The exclusion criteria were a long postmortem interval and other causes of death than drowning. For all selected cases, the diagnosis of drowning was based on the presence of autopsy findings and positive diatom test. A control population of 12 cases was also selected. For each drowning and control case, iron blood levels were measured in the left ventricle (LV) and right ventricle (RV) of the heart. The mean difference of iron concentration (RVFe-LVFe) between the drowning group and the control group was statistically compared. Furthermore, iron measurements were performed in 19 drowning cases showing advanced putrefaction. The mean difference of iron concentration was significantly higher in the drowning cases compared with controls (P<0.001). All drowning cases showed hemodilution. No overlap was found in the RVFe-LVFe levels between the two groups. Resuscitation attempts seemed to have no effect on the results. In cases of drowning showing advanced putrefaction, the iron test was not reliable because biochemical iron measurement was often prevented by no sufficient blood in the heart or postmortem clots. In conclusion, according to our results, iron seems to be a good biochemical marker in fresh water drowning with a short postmortem interval.     

Psychological profiling of sexual murders: an empirical model

Psychological profiling represents the investigative technique of analyzing crime behaviors for the identification of probable offender characteristics. Profiling has progressively been incorporated into police procedures despite a surprising lack of empirical research to support its validity. Indeed, in the study of sexual murder for the purpose of profiling, very few quantitative, academically reviewed studies exist. This article reports on the results of a 4-year study into Australian sexual murders for the development of psychological profiling. The study involved 85 cases of sexual murder sampled from all Australian police jurisdictions. The statistical procedure of multidimensional scaling was employed. This analysis produced a five-cluster model of sexual murder behavior. First, a central cluster of behaviors was identified that represents common behaviors to all patterns of sexual murder. Next, four distinct outlying patterns--predator, fury, perversion, and rape--were identified that each demonstrated distinct offense styles. Further analysis of these patterns also identified distinct offender characteristics that allow for the use of empirically robust offender profiles in future sexual murder investigations.     

Will the Truth Come Out? The Effect of Deception,Age, Status,Coaching, and Social Skills on CBCA Scores

The impact of Veracity, Age, Status (witness or suspect), Coaching (informed or uninformed regarding CBCA), and Social Skills (social anxiety, social adroitness, and self-monitoring) on Criteria-Based Content Analysis scores was examined. Participants (aged 5–6, 10–11, 14–15, and undergraduates) participated in a rubbing the blackboard event. In a subsequent interview they told the truth or lied about the event. They were accused of having rubbed the blackboard themselves (suspect condition) or were thought to have witnessed the event (witness condition), and were or were not taught some CBCA criteria prior to the interview. CBCA scores discriminated between liars and truth tellers in children, adults, witnesses, and suspects. However, truth tellers obtained higher CBCA scores than liars only when the liars were uninformed about CBCA. CBCA scores were correlated with social skills. It is argued that these findings should caution those who believe that the validity of CBCA has been conclusively demonstrated.     

Spontaneous clostridial myonecrosis.

Spontaneous, nontraumatic clostridial myonecrosis is a rare infection with an insidious onset and usually fatal outcome. Spontaneous clostridial myonecrosis has a frequent association with colon carcinoma, leukemia, diabetes mellitus, and drug-induced immunosuppression. We present the case of a 73-year-old diabetic man who died of spontaneous Clostridium septicum myonecrosis, who had presented with fulminant gangrene of the right thigh. Clostridium septicum was cultured from the quadriceps muscle postmortem. At autopsy, in addition to the gangrene, there was a Duke's A adenocarcinoma of the cecum, which had not been diagnosed during life. When spontaneous nontraumatic clostridial myonecrosis is diagnosed at autopsy, investigation should include through exam and the obtaining of past medical history in order to elucidate predisposing factors.     

Reviews

G. N. Khanin, Sovetskii ekonomicheskii rost: analiz zapadnykh otsenok. Novosibirsk: 1993, 156 pp.

William Moskoff, Hard Times: Impoverishment and Protests in the Perestroika Years. The Soviet Union 1985–1991. Armonk, NY and London: M. E. Sharpe, Inc., 1993, xii + 244 pp., $59.95 h/b, $24.95 p/b.

Simon Clarke, Peter Fairbrother, Michael Burawoy & Pavel Krotov, What About the Workers? London: Verso, 1993, 248 pp., £34.95 h/b, £11.95 p/b.

Kazimierz Z. Poznanski (ed), Stabilization and Privatization in Poland: An Economic Evaluation of the Shock Therapy Program. Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1993, vii + 269 pp.

Norbert Zmijewski, The Catholic‐Marxist Ideological Dialogue in Poland, 1945–1980. Alder‐shot: Dartmouth Publishing Company, 1991, 179 pp., £37.50.

Andrzej K. Kozminski, Catching Up? Organizational and Management Change in The Ex‐Socialist Block. New York: State University of New York Press, 1993, viii + 236 pp., $16.95.

Don van Atta (ed), The ‘Farmer Threat’. The Political Economy of Agrarian Reform in Post‐Soviet Russia. Boulder, CO, and Oxford: Westview Press, 1993, xiii + 221pp., £25.50.

Malcolm R. Hill & Caroline M. Hay, Trade, Industrial Cooperation and Technology Transfer‐Continuity and Change in a New Era of East‐West Relations. Aldershot: Avebury Publishing, 1993, vii + 123 pp.

J. Arch Getty & Roberta T. Manning (eds), Stalinist Terror. New Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993, viii + 294 pp., £35.00, $39.95 h/b, £13.95, $17.95 p/b.

Vladimir Andreff, La crise des economies socialistes. Grenoble: Presses Universitaires de Grenoble, 1993, 447 pp., 140 francs.

Alexander J. Motyl, Dilemmas of Independence. Ukraine After Totalitarianism. New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1993, xv + 217 pp., $17.95 p/b.

John Dunstan (ed), Soviet Education under Perestroika. Papers from the IV World Congress for Soviet and East European Studies, Harrogate, UK, 1990. London: Routledge, xii + 230 pp., £35.00.

Deming Brown, The Last Years of Soviet Russian Literature. Prose Fiction 1975–1991. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993, x + 208 pp., £35.00, $54.95.

Carmelo Mesa‐Lago (ed), Cuba—After the Cold War. Pittsburgh, PA, and London: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1993, 383 pp., $49.95 h/b, $19.95 p/b.     

Measuring party orientations towards European integration: results from an expert survey

Some observers have held that political parties have been minor players in the process of European integration due to the low salience of the issue and the prevalence of intra party disagreement over European questions. Although recent scholarship and the rising salience of European issues have brought increased attention to the role of political parties, the study of the relationship between party positions and both public opinion and policy outcomes has been hampered by an absence of comparable data on party positions. This research note presents the findings of an expert survey on party positions on the issue of European integration. In addition to estimates of the parties' positions on the issue itself, this survey provides information on the importance of the issue of European integration to each party, and the extent of internal dissent within parties. The data also indicate that parties have, on average, become increasingly pro–European over the period 1984–1996. Both the salience of the issue of integration and the extent of intra–party disagreement have increased during this period. However, deep intra–party divisions appear less prevalent than commonly believed.