Providing eyewitnesses with initial retrieval support: what works at immediate and subsequent recall?

The effect of retrieval support on eyewitness recall was investigated in two experiments. Based on the outshining hypothesis, Experiment 1 tested whether retrieval support enhances witness performance (compared to free recall) especially when witnessing conditions are suboptimal (e.g., because witnesses were distracted during the crime). Eighty-eight participants watched a videotaped crime with either full or divided attention and subsequently received retrieval support with the Self-Administered Interview© (SAI) or completed a free recall (FR). One week later (Time 2 – T2) all participants completed a second FR. Unexpectedly, retrieval support did not lead to better memory performance than FR under divided attention conditions, suggesting that retrieval support is not effective to overcome adverse effects of divided attention. Moreover, presence of retrieval support at Time 1 (T1) had no effect on memory performance at T2. Experiment 2 (N = 81) tested the hypothesis that these T2-results were due to a reporting issue undermining the memory-preserving effect of T1-retrieval support by manipulating retrieval support (SAI vs. FR) at T1 and T2. As expected, T1-retrieval support led to increased accuracy at T2. Thus, the beneficial value of T1-retrieval support seems greatest with high-quality T2-interviews. Interviewers should consider this when planning a subsequent interview.     

‘I'm a photographer,not a terrorist’: the use of photography to detect deception

When planning large-scale incidents or bombing campaigns, terrorists often conduct reconnaissance research to identify key targets. This may include taking photographs of potential target locations. Identifying an effective real-time method to distinguish between genuine photographers and those with more sinister intent may be beneficial for law enforcement and security agencies. Participants took photographs in a public place with a genuine intent (truth tellers) or sinister intent (liars). After taking these photographs, the participants were approached by an undercover interviewer (a mime artist) who asked them whether he could see the photographs. Later, the participants discussed their photographs in a formal interview. First, liars were less cooperative in their interaction with the undercover interviewer than truth tellers. Second, in the formal interview, liars mentioned some security features that appeared in the photographs more than truth tellers. The findings suggest that ‘using photographs to detect deception’ is a subject that could prove important to explore to benefit forensic and counter-terrorist practice.     

Eyewitness identification procedures for multiple perpetrator crimes: a survey of police in Sweden,Belgium, and the Netherlands

ABSTRACT

A considerable proportion of crimes involve multiple perpetrators. Yet, little is known about how police officers construct, administer, and record eyewitness identification procedures for multiple suspects. An online survey of law enforcement agents in Sweden, Belgium, and the Netherlands (N?=?51) was conducted to obtain an initial understanding of police perceptions of prevalence and characteristics of multiple perpetrator crimes, and to examine identification procedure practices given the little to no guidance provided for police. Practice converged when it came to the use of sequential, photographic lineups, but diverged between and within countries on whether or not suspects of multiple perpetrator crimes should be placed in separate lineups. Results specifically highlight contextual cuing as one critical area for future research in identification for multiple perpetrator crimes (i.e. placing multiple suspects in the same lineup or asking eyewitnesses to look for a specific suspect).     

The sins of the father: The destruction of the Republican family in Franco's Spain

The postwar years in Spain were little more than the perpetuation of the Civil War on an ideological terrain, as the Franco Regime consistently vilified the memory of the Second Republic and remorselessly persecuted the defeated Republicans. In fact, nationalist diatribes against communism and its attendant ills of separatism and laicism were invariably expounded in medical terminology, referring as they did to the “cancer” and “virus” which had devastated the nation during the Civil War. This empirically unverifiable theory sustained that a large scale extermination (the Civil War) had to be carried out to rid Spain of this “virus” thus preempt the contagion of this fervently Catholic and patriotic nation. Horkheimer affirms that the family is the microcosm of the fascist state, as the relationship between siblings and parents replicates the obedience of the citizen to the fascist state. As Republican traits were at antipodes to the prescribed national attributes, the Francoist State sought to destroy the Republican family by a myriad of measures such as the inculcation of a zealous National Catholicism in their children, which in turn precipitated both selfhatred and the children's outright rejection of their parents. However, the social persecution of the defeated transcended indoctrination: in the postwar years, the horrendousness of life for the Republicans was compounded by the State's quasi reconversion policy, which resulted in Republican children being forcibly removed from their homes, and been adopted by pro-Francoist families, or in many cases, rehoused by religious orders which, within a decade, witnessed a huge increase in the number of supposed orphans becoming seminarists. In this article, I intend to elaborate on both the means by which the Francoist State eradicated the Republican family, and its long-term consequences.     

Just When You Thought You Understood New Jersey Allocation Law: Implications,Limitations, and Complications in Applying Farmers Mutual Fire Ins. Co. of Salem v. New Jersey Property-Liability Ins. Guar. Ass’n

The New Jersey Supreme Court's recent decision in Farmers Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Salem v. New Jersey Property-Liability Insurance Guaranty Association holding that a 2004 statutory amendment requires all solvent triggered liability policies be exhausted before the Guaranty Association pays statutory benefits for an insolvent's share has created many uncertainties in allocating long-tail liabilities. This article discusses the implications and the significant limitations of the Farmers Mutual decision and the questions it leaves unanswered, and responds to arguments that the decision supports revisiting other situations where New Jersey's Owens-Illinois methodology allocates losses to the insured.     

The power of policing partnerships: sustaining the gains

Objectives

Third Party Policing (TPP) involves partnerships between police and third parties where the legal powers of third parties are harnessed to prevent or control crime problems. This paper explores the characteristics and mechanisms of TPP as a crime control strategy, focusing on how the partnership approach in policing can help sustain crime control gains over the long run. Using the ABILITY Truancy Trial as an example, I examine how policing can contribute to long-term social change for high-risk young people living in poor-performing school districts and high-risk communities.

Methods

The ABILITY Trial includes 102 young truants randomly allocated to a control (business-as-usual) or an experimental condition. The experimental condition activates the key theoretical components of Third Party Policing (TPP): a partnership between police and participating schools that activates and escalates (where needed) jurisdictional truanting laws (the legal lever).

Results

The paper presents a theoretical discussion of TPP and uses the ABILITY Trial to highlight the way TPP works in practice. Baseline data are presented for the ABILITY Trial. Outcome results are not presented.

Conclusions

Third Party Policing partnerships rest on the capacity of police to build relationships with third parties who have a stake in the crime problem, who possess responsive regulation legal levers, and who have a clear mandate to offer long-term solutions and help sustain the crime control gains. Partnerships, I argue, offer long-term solutions for police because they activate latent mechanisms, building the capacity for third parties to both maintain short-term gains and sustain the crime control gains beyond the lifespan of the initial police intervention.     

Fat embolism syndrome associated with atraumatic compartment syndrome of the bilateral upper extremities: An unreported etiology

Fat embolism syndrome (FES) is a potentially life-threatening condition that develops when fat embolism leads to clinical symptoms and multisystem dysfunction. The classic triad of respiratory distress, neurologic symptoms, and petechial rash are non-specific, and the lack of specific laboratory tests makes the diagnosis of FES difficult. Although FES is most common after long bone fractures, multiple conditions some of which are atraumatic have been associated with the development of FES. We report a case of FES that occurred in the setting of a non-traumatic compartment syndrome of the upper extremities. The pathologic and clinical findings, pathophysiology, diagnostic challenges, and pathologic methods to properly diagnose FES are discussed with a review of the relevant literature. This case highlights the importance of the autopsy in making a diagnosis of FES in cases where death could otherwise be incorrectly attributed to multi-organ system failure, shock, or sepsis.     

The Relationship between Meteorological Conditions and Homicide,Suicide, Rage,and Psychiatric Hospitalization

This study focuses on the relationship between the incidence of homicide, rage, suicide, and psychiatric hospitalization as violent behaviors with temperature, humidity, and air pressure as specific meteorological variables in the city of Mashhad, in the northeast of Iran. The data were obtained from Iran Meteorological Organization, official registry of Legal Medicine Organization and the local psychiatric hospital, March 2009 to Feb 2010 daily and were analyzed with SPSS‐14 using Pearson correlation coefficient, ANOVA, and post hoc analysis tests. The rates of rage and psychiatric admission had a significant relationship with the daily mean air temperature, minimum relative humidity, maximum relative humidity, minimum daily pressure, and maximum daily air pressure (p < 0.0001). There was no significant correlation between homicide and suicide rates with any meteorological variables (p > 0.05). We concluded that, the possibility of nonfatal violence and psychiatric hospitalization would increase in hot and arid weather with low air pressure.     

Financial crisis, effective policy rules and bounded rationality in a New Keynesian framework

This paper extends a standard open-economy New Keynesian model to include a third-generation “balance sheet effect” which is made operational through an endogenous risk premium impacting on investment. Using rational expectations and adaptive learning solutions, the efficiency of alternative monetary policy rules is examined during a period of financial crisis. We find that the Taylor rule is the welfare superior policy, questioning the idea of an “information encompassing” inflation-forecast based rule. Under adaptive learning we find additional policy traction and less instrument variability in rules augmented with the exchange rate. All rules, however, advocate a sharp initial interest rate response to the crisis.