Examining the constitutionality of Internet filtering in public schools: a US perspective

The use of Internet filters in public classrooms in the USA has been intensely debated, both in terms of its effectiveness and legality. The debate pits concerns to protect students from indecent material against issues of unconstitutional censorship. This paper examines the legal issues addressed in various rulings by the US Supreme Court pertinent to issues raised in the debate over the constitutionality of filtering in the classroom. The rulings and opinions offer valuable insights into the legal issues raised in this debate.     

Intellectual disability and mental illness in the NSW criminal justice system

There has been increasing international, national and local recognition of the need for more appropriate responses and services for individuals who come in contact with the criminal justice system and who have an intellectual disability and mental health issues. This article provides an overview of prevalence data that indicates a significant over representation of people with intellectual disabilities in correctional facilities and reviews the problems facing this population. Findings from two specific evaluation studies undertaken by the Centre for Developmental Disability Studies are presented, along with recommendations for future provision based on these results. One of these projects trialled a case management approach to supporting offenders with an intellectual disability upon their release from prison. The 20-month follow-up found that a number of serious barriers were encountered within the overall system of provision for this population; the most serious of which related to lack of adequate accommodation upon release. The second project involved a two-stage evaluation of one model of provision for individuals with intellectual disabilities who are sex offenders, only some of whom were on parole. This service provided both residential and therapy services in a small group home located in the community. Residents were found to have high levels of emotional and behavioural difficulties, in addition to offending behaviour, that continue to require support and supervision. Critical issues, including guardianship involvement, restrictive practices and retrieval, therapy provision, and risk management issues are discussed in relation to overall clinical and lifestyle outcomes.     

What Space for Unions on the Floor of Rights? Trade Unions and the Enforcement of Statutory Individual Employment Rights

The recent development of statutory individual employment rightsalters the balance between legal regulation and collective bargaining.Union influence in the workplace has declined and workers aremore reliant on individualised procedures culminating in claimsto employment tribunals. There is potential, though, for unionsto play a role in enforcing statutory employment rights, todemonstrate the efficacy of representation to potential membersand to augment collective bargaining agenda. Union engagementwith the law is explored in this article through detailed casestudies conducted in two unions. Findings highlight sustainedcommitment to strategic legal challenges, but also some substantialobstacles to the broader use of the law to mobilise workersand potential members.     

The Importance of Contract Design

This article examines the contract design decisions of three federal agencies—the Departments of Health and Human Services, Defense, and Homeland Security—using five years of data from the Federal Procurement Data System. Three basic contract design elements are charted—type (fixed price versus cost reimbursement), length, and value—across simple to complex products. All three agencies use short‐term, fixed‐price contracts for the majority of the purchases that they make. This basic contract design allows agencies to tap the benefits of competition: innovation and cost‐efficiency. However, the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security often dramatically increase the length and value of contracts through modifications to initial agreements. This approach forgoes the benefits of competition and may expose the agency to the risk of cost overruns, delivery delays, and diminished product quality.     

Punishing Sex: Sex Offenders and the Missing Punitive Turn in Sexuality Studies

At precisely the same time that gay and lesbian activists were securing marriage rights for same‐sex couples nationwide, courts and “tough on crime” state legislatures were devising new ways to regulate sex. Despite recent estimates that over 750,000 Americans are registered sex offenders, few sexuality scholars have examined the growth of punitive policies regulating sex offenders. In this article, I draw on a unique set of data on the population of sex offenders in the United States to analyze: (1) whether recent trends in sex offender registration mirror those of corrections more generally, and (2) whether these policies disproportionally impact racial minorities. Findings reveal that sex offender registries grew dramatically between 2005 and 2013; that this growth is out of step with concurrent trends in corrections; and that black communities are disproportionately impacted. I conclude by considering whether these data reveal a new mode of “governing through crime” specifically targeting sex.

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Traumatic Brain Injury Alters Word Memory Test Performance by Slowing Response Time and Increasing Cortical Activation: An fMRI Study of a Symptom Validity Test

The Word Memory Test (WMT) is an established symptom validity test that relies on verbal memory performance to make inferences about “effort.” Previous studies, using a functional MRI (fMRI) adaptation of the WMT with healthy controls, have shown that successful completion of the WMT relies on a widespread network of neural systems associated with high cognitive effort. Additional studies using the same fMRI paradigm with patients with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) suggest that increased activation of cortical regions associated with cognitive load are recruited to meet the cognitive challenges that the WMT places on a compromised neural system. This study builds on previous findings as a result of highly uncommon circumstances in which fMRI data on the WMT task were made available from the very same individual both 1 year before and 1 year after sustaining a TBI. Interestingly, the effect of TBI did not appear to impair performance on the WMT in terms of standard accuracy measurements, though response times were notably slower. The main fMRI finding was a significantly stronger and more widespread pattern of activation post-injury, particularly in the frontal and parietal brain regions, suggesting that stronger engagement of these networks was necessary to sustain accurate WMT performance compared to pre-injury testing. This unique source of data, together with previous findings, suggests a more complex relationship between effort and performance levels on the WMT than what is commonly assumed.     

Analysis of Pigmented Inkjet Printer Inks and Printed Documents by Laser Desorption/Mass Spectrometry*,†

Abstract: Anyone with a computer, scanner, and color printer has the capability for creating documents such as identification cards, passports, and counterfeit currency. Laser desorption mass spectrometry (LDMS) has been demonstrated as a powerful tool for colorant analysis. Inkjet printers are now moving largely toward the use of pigments as colorants; their insolubility makes analysis by simpler methods such as thin‐layer chromatography no longer an option. Recent developments in pigmented inkjet printer inks, such as gloss optimizers that coat pigment particles, may prohibit colorant analysis by LDMS. We demonstrate here that pigments used in inks from two Epson printers can be detected and analyzed by LDMS. Also, LDMS spectra of various colors created using a 4‐cartridge (cyan/magenta/yellow/black, CMYK) inkset are evaluated, to begin to develop an approach for unraveling LDMS data from real samples, to determine the number of inks used by a printer, and the chemical composition of the colorants.     

Modalities of Violence in Development: structural or contingent,mythic or divine?

This paper examines the relationship between violence and development. It explores whether violence is an intrinsic (structural) part of development, or a contingent result of poor or mistaken policies and practices that might be corrected. The issue of how far an element of violence might be desirable for development is also considered. These two issues are debated in the context of a variety of approaches to development and in light of various accounts of violence offered by analysts such as Fanon, Benjamin, Critchley and Zizek. In conclusion it is argued that an emancipatory conception of development may be reconciled with Benjamin’s idea of divine violence in the form of a Badiouan event—with the proviso that the Derridian conception of the economy of violence is also applied in such a way as to minimise, or at least limit violence.     

Utility of immunoassay in drug screening in skeletal tissues: sampling considerations in detection of ketamine exposure in femoral bone and bone marrow following acute administration using ELISA

Detection of ketamine exposure in skeletal tissues by automated enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and gas chromatography with electron capture detection (GC-ECD) is described. Rats (n = 18) received 0, 15, 30, or 75 mg/kg ketamine hydrochloride acutely (i.p.), and were euthanized within 15 min or 1 h. Ketamine was extracted from ground femoral bone by methanolic incubation followed by liquid-liquid extraction (LLE), while marrow was homogenized in alkaline solution, and then underwent LLE. Extracts were analyzed by ELISA, and subsequently by GC-ECD following derivatization with trifluoroacetic acid anhydride. The effect of tissue type (i.e., diaphyseal bone vs. epiphyseal bone vs. bone marrow) on the immunoassay response was examined through determination of binary classification test sensitivity (S) and measurement of the relative decrease in absorbance (%DA, drug-positive tissues vs. drug-free controls) in each tissue type. The %DA varied significantly between different tissues examined under a given dose condition, and generally decreased in the order marrow > epiphyseal bone > diaphyseal bone, at all dose levels examined. Measured S values for marrow, epiphyseal bone, and diaphyseal bone were 100%, 77%, and 23%, respectively (75 mg/kg dose). These results suggest that the type of skeletal tissue sampled and position sampled within a given bone (diaphyses vs. epiphyses) are important parameters in drug screening of skeletal tissues.