A survey of image processing techniques and statistics for ballistic specimens in forensic science

This paper provides a review of recent investigations on the image processing techniques used to match spent bullets and cartridge cases. It is also, to a lesser extent, a review of the statistical methods that are used to judge the uniqueness of fired bullets and spent cartridge cases. We review 2D and 3D imaging techniques as well as many of the algorithms used to match these images. We also provide a discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of these methods for both image matching and statistical uniqueness. The goal of this paper is to be a reference for investigators and scientists working in this field.     

Application of the clinical polygraph examination to the assessment,treatment and monitoring of sex offenders

Abstract

Post Conviction Clinical Polygraph Examination Testing (Lie Detector Testing) offers significant opportunities for assessing, treating and monitoring sex offenders. This article briefly reviews the historical development of polygraph techniques including the physiological measures employed, the administration of the polygraph and the interpretation of data collected. Criticisms of polygraphy are explored and information concerning the scientific acceptability of these procedures is given. The current influence of polygraphy in sex offender work is reviewed. Evidence is given of the utility of polygraphy in reducing denial, improving treatment outcomes and more effectively supervising sex offenders on probation or license. Cost benefit considerations are examined, as well as the need for further controlled research and future regulation of the polygraph, if it is to be introduced in Britain. Planned UK Trials are described.     

A randomized test of initial and residual deterrence from directed patrols and use of license plate readers at crime hot spots

Objectives

To test the effects of short-term police patrol operations using license plate readers (LPRs) on crime and disorder at crime hot spots in Mesa, Arizona.

Methods

The study employed a randomized experimental design. For 15 successive 2-week periods, a four-officer squad conducted short daily operations to detect stolen and other vehicles of interest at randomly selected hot spot road segments at varying times of day. Based on random assignment, the unit operated with LPRs on some routes and conducted extensive manual checks of license plates on others. Using random effects panel models, we examined the impact of these operations on violent, property, drug, disorder, and auto theft offenses as measured by calls for service.

Results

Compared to control conditions with standard patrol strategies, the LPR locations had reductions in calls for drug offenses that lasted for at least several weeks beyond the intervention, while the non-LPR, manual check locations exhibited briefer reductions in calls regarding person offenses and auto theft. There were also indications of crime displacement associated with some offenses, particularly drug offenses.

Conclusions

The findings suggest that use of LPRs can reduce certain types of offenses at hot spots and that rotation of short-term LPR operations across hot spots may be an effective way for police agencies to employ small numbers of LPR devices. More generally, the results also provide some support for Sherman’s (1990) crackdown theory, which suggests that police can improve their effectiveness in preventing crime through frequent rotation of short-term crackdowns across targets, as it applies to hot spot policing.     

One voter and two choices: The impact of electoral context on the 2011 UK referendum

There is a debate in the literature on referendum voting as to whether these occasions are opportunities for voters to express issue preferences in the absence of partisan politics or whether they simply serve as referendums on the current government. In part, this latter, second order account is assumed to be driven by the amount and content of media coverage, and hence information about the referendum, that is available to voters. In this paper, we address the second order question and demonstrate that holding elections concurrently both reduces the amount of media attention to the second order contest—the AV referendum in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland where national elections were held—and moderates media priming, thereby affecting the salient cues in the decision making of voters in those contexts.     

The Joys and Sorrows of Diversity: Changes in the Historical Profession in the Last Half Century

The evolution of the historical profession in the United States in the last 50 years provides much reason both for celebration and sorrow. An unprecedented amount of scholarship and teaching is being devoted to regions outside of the traditional American concentration on itself and Europe. New subjects of study—gender, race and ethnicity—have developed. At the same time, political correctness has both narrowed and distorted enquiry. Traditional fields demanding great intellectual rigor, such as intellectual and economic history, are in decline. Even worse, education about Western civilization and the Enlightenment has come to be treated with increasing disdain at colleges and universities. There has instead been a considerable expansion of cultural and women’s studies, including women’s and gender history. These have contributed greatly to the holy trinity of gender, race and class that seems to dominate history departments today. Affirmative action hiring for greater racial, ethnic and gender “diversity” has had an equally great effect on the historical profession. Many of those who were hired preferentially on the basis of past and present discrimination (either real or imagined) continue to emphasize that theme in their research and teaching, since it is their chief claim to professional legitimacy. As a purely intellectual movement, oppression studies cannot last. Any school that leaves out too much about the past is not something to hold serious minds for long. But since it in a small way supports a nationally based political spoils system of racial and ethnic preferences upon which the futures of many politicians rest, it might be expected to have a long life. This is one of the greatest challenges facing historical scholarship today. Even this pales into insignificance in the face of the looming changes in liberal arts education. History is in the process of being reduced from a requirement to an elective on many campuses. This is part of a national trend to move away from the acquisition of knowledge in favor of more broadly based skills. In this way history will suffer the same sorry fate as so much of traditional education in America.     

Plato in WeimarWeber revisited via Foucault: two lectures on legitimation and vocation

Abstract

The text that follows brings together two papers about resonances between late lectures: Weber's lectures of 1918 on science and politics as vocations, and Foucault's final courses (1980–84) on subjectivity, truth and the political. The title alludes to Foucault's 1983 discussion of Plato's political experiences in Sicily, as narrated in his Seventh Letter, juxtaposed to Weber's public interventions in Germany at the time of the foundation of the Weimar Republic. Linked to this is an exploration of the centrality in the work of both Weber and Foucault of an historical ethnography and ethology of the political, and of the forms of connectivity in our cultures between ethics, truth and government.     

From the headscarf to the burqa: the role of social theorists in shaping laws against the veil

Abstract

Opposition to the burqa is widespread in Europe but not in the United States. What explains the difference? Focusing primarily on the French case and its Belgian facsimile, we seek to underscore the role of social theorists in legitimizing bans on the full veil. Ironically, this role has been largely disregarded by Anglophone theorists who write on the veil, and who often oppose its prohibition. This article suggests that Europe tends to be more repressive towards full veils because its political process is more open to multiple theoretical representations of the phenomenon of veiling. Conversely, the United States is more open to the provocative display of religious symbols in public because the political process is pre-structured by legal conventions that tend to filter out social theory. The push to ban the burqa in France principally derives from its brand of republicanism rather than being a product of racism and Islamophobia. Of particular significance in the French case is the emphasis on reciprocity as a political principle, a principle that is elongated into an ideal of sociability by French theorists in different disciplines. The arguments of these theorists are described, their rationale is explained and the impact of their intervention on the policy process is documented. The French case, where the popular press and legislature play a major role in shaping policy towards the burqa, is contrasted with that of the United States, where the judiciary, defending religious freedom, remains the most influential collective actor. Each country has correspondingly different attitudes to democracy. In France, the mission of democracy is to extend political equality to the social realm whereas in the United States it is religion that is prioritized so as to protect that which is deemed most sacred to the individual.     

Neoliberalism by other means: the “war on terror” at home and abroad

This paper offers a theoretical framework for understanding both the invasion of Iraq and the “war on terror” in the context of neoliberal globalization. I argue that both the foreign and domestic policy pursued by the Bush administration under the rubric of the war on terror are in fact best understood as strategies for advancing the neoliberal agenda, in large part by seeking to undo gains made by the labor movement during the 1990s. I argue that for this ambitious and aggressive administration, the post‐9/11 atmosphere offers the prospect of permanently restructuring both popular expectations of government and the ability of working people to challenge corporate prerogatives.