Parker's Modern Wills Precedents, 5th edn * By Michael Waterworth MA (Cantab)

Trusts set up by will, will trusts, are governed by similarconsiderations to those affecting inter vivos trusts. Frequentlyin trust textbooks the authors do not tell us that will trustshave some significant difference from inter vivos trusts. Thelatter may be set up quite informally by a mere declarationof intention and the transfer of the trust property to the trustees.But will trusts can only come about if the law relating to makinga valid will has been complied with. This tends to get overlookedunder the shadow of possible inheritance tax     

Nothing to Lose: An Insurance Company's Duty of Good Faith and Fair Dealing,Punitive Damages,and The Legacies of Campbell

This article explores the potential evisceration of the deterrence function of punitive damages, one of the only economic incentives that deters insurance companies from opportunistically breaching their insurance policies. Readers will gain an understanding of why large punitive damages awards are essential in the insurance coverage field and how such awards may implicate due process standards. The article explains the constitutional limitations set forth by the U.S. Supreme Court in imposing punitive damages, and provides a roadmap of how lower courts and practitioners are presently applying these rules.     

Drafting Trusts and Will Trusts in the Channel Islands, James Kessler QC and Paul Matthams

This is the latest in the series of book based upon James Kessler'swell-known book on the simplification of trust drafting. Theco-author of this publication is Paul Matthams, Advocate ofthe Royal Court of     

Clinically Significant Trauma Symptoms and Behavioral Problems in a Community-based Sample of Children Exposed to Domestic Violence

This study assessed the associations of characteristics of domestic violence incidents with clinically significant levels of traumatic symptoms and behavioral problems in a socio-economically and ethnically mixed sample of 687 children participating in a community-service program for children witnessing violence. Study predictors included child/family demographic characteristics, type and chronicity of exposure, and child’s perceptions of control over the event and threat to personal safety. Outcomes consisted of traumatic symptoms and behavior problems. Results showed that perceived threat and control were associated with greater odds of clinically significant levels of several trauma symptoms (and behavior problems in the case of perceived threat) after adjusting for effects of demographic factors and violence characteristics. Child co-victimization increased odds of reaching clinically significant levels of traumatic symptoms compared to children who witnessed the event but were not victimized. Female sex and White ethnicity increased odds of specific trauma symptoms and behavior problems. Increasing age reduced odds of some trauma symptoms. Associations between predictors and one outcome measure did not generalize across the other outcome measure. Implications of study findings, and directions for future research are discussed.     

Latinos/as in the criminal and juvenile justice systems

With few exceptions, prior explanations of racially disparate punishment have followed a dichotomous approach (i.e., African American versus Caucasian), due in part to the limitations of existing data. Researchers have either excluded Latino/a, defendants or treated them as a monolithic group. Consequently, there is not much on Latinos/as, whose experiences with the criminal and juvenile justice systems differ from those of African American and Caucasian. This article expands on current literature by providing a thorough overview of existing literature on Latino/as. It critiques this body of literature and lists ten common methodological flaws that may contribute to findings of equal treatment. Finally, it provides a concise summary of the main subgroups within the umbrella term ‘Latino/a’ to highlight the heterogeneity within this classification.     

Taxation and trusts

It really is necessary that people, resident and taxable inEngland, should die earlier. Long life is an anti-social activity.It denies the government taxation to which it feels it is trulydue. Early deaths, particularly amongst the wealthy, are necessary:it is the patriotic duty of those with wealth to shuffle offtheir mortal coil as soon as possible and to allow the governmentas much inheritance tax as possible. Ghoulish though this mayseem, it is clearly a view of the current British Government. Why do we say this? The Paymaster General, in explaining thenew rules for inheritance tax treatment of settlements, justifiedher policy in the term ‘Because trusts do not die,     

Assessing Readiness to Change among Perpetrators of Intimate Partner Violence: Analysis of Two Self-report Measures

Recent interest in the construct of motivation to change among male perpetrators of intimate partner violence (IPV) has led to development of two self-report measures of this construct: the University of Rhode Island Change Assessment for Domestic Violence (URICA-DV; Levesque et al. 2000) and the Safe at Home Inventory (SAH; Begun et al. 2003). We examined the internal structure of these instruments using confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses in a sample of 199 male IPV perpetrators waiting to begin court-mandated batterer intervention programs. Results indicated that the scales had adequate internal consistency. However, using confirmatory factor analyses, the hypothesized structural models of each instrument fit the data poorly. Subsequent models suggested by a series of exploratory factor analyses failed to improve model fit substantially for both scales. For the URICA-DV, a 3-factor model including items from the Precontemplation, Contemplation, and Action subscales fit the data adequately. No acceptable model fit could be found for the SAH. Intercorrelations among similar subscales across the two inventories suggested only a modest degree of intercorrelation (r’s = 0.16–0.52), and a factor structure more dependent on scale of origin than item latent content, suggesting that the scales assess different facets of the readiness to change construct. These results suggest that before the stages of change construct can be fully applied to the IPV area, more research and evaluation are needed on how to accurately assess abuser readiness to change.