Spuriousness or mediation? Broken windows according to Sampson and Raudenbush (1999)

In 1999, Sampson and Raudenbush published an influential article in the American Sociological Review on the link between disorder and crime in urban neighborhoods. The present article offers a reinterpretation of their 1999 article based on the contentions that: (1) their interpretation of the broken windows thesis is imprecise, and (2) there is an alternative interpretation of their findings that was not considered. Based on these contentions, and contrary to Sampson and Raudenbush's (1999) assertions, the authors conclude that the results of Sampson and Raudenbush's study are not inconsistent with the broken windows thesis and therefore should not be used as empirical evidence against it.     

Flualprazolam distribution in postmortem samples

The constant emergence of novel psychoactive substances is troubling to both public health officials and legislators. Additionally, sufficient data collection for each new compound can take months up to years. Flualprazolam, a triazolobenzodiazepine, quickly garnered attention as a sedative drug that likely expresses adverse reactions similarly to alprazolam. This study focuses on the distribution of flualprazolam in multiple common postmortem matrices. Central blood, vitreous humor, liver homogenate, brain homogenate, gastric contents, and urine samples from death investigation cases were quantitated when available. Samples were screened with liquid chromatography quadrupole time-of-flight with limit of detection set at 4 ng/ml and quantitated on liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry, with concentration range from 4 to 256 ng/ml. From August 2018 to September 2020, 24 central blood samples were quantitated for flualprazolam. Central bloods of 22 cases had concentrations above the limit of quantitation. The average flualprazolam central blood concentration was 16.3 ng/ml with a median of 9.95 ng/ml (4.24–48.0). Additional analyses for unconjugated flualprazolam were performed on at a total of 15 urine samples ( = 14.4, 4.07–36.1 ng/ml), 23 brain homogenates ( = 23.2, 3.99–69.3 ng/g), 23 liver homogenates ( = 50.7, 13.6–156 ng/g), five vitreous humor samples ( = 7.70, 4.03–12 ng/ml), and 12 gastric contents samples ( = 0.36, 0.02–2.51 mg). The cause of death for 13 of the 24 cases listed flualprazolam as a contributing factor of death.     

Governance as multiplicity: the Assemblage Thinking perspective

Policy Sciences - Governance, the process of steering for collective action, is being theorized and empirically explored on a variety of subjects, private and collective issues and spatial levels....     

The Right to Buy,the Leaseholder,and the Impoverishment of Ownership

Right to Buy is one of the most successful schemes devised to extend home ownership to those otherwise excluded. Its introduction by Margaret Thatcher and endorsement by New Labour provide a critical indicator of those governments' neo‐liberal credentials. This article suggests that one of the key achievements of the Right to Buy was to obscure inequalities inherent in a project of democratization via property ownership. It examines New Labour's political reform of local authority landlordism and leaseholder rights and exposes the vulnerability of Right to Buy lessees and their successors in title. It argues that the promise of inclusion via home ownership is a more conditional promise than generally recognized, in some cases impoverishing rather than enriching. It concludes by reflecting on the importance of scrutinizing schemes which purport to democratize ownership, observing that the position of Right to Buy leaseholders is unlikely to improve following the abandonment of social reform projects by the coalition government.     

Children's experiences of domestic violence: developing an integrated response from police and child protection services

Police notifications of incidents of domestic violence to child protection services constitute an acknowledgement of the harm that domestic violence inflicts on children. However, these notifications represent a substantial demand on child welfare services and the outcomes for children and victims of domestic violence have been questioned. This paper presents findings from the first UK study to examine these notifications in depth and examines the interface between the police and child protection services in responding to domestic violence incidents. The research reports on police interventions in 251 incidents of domestic violence involving children; the communication of information to child protection services and the subsequent filtering and service response. Social workers found that notifications conveyed little information on children's experiences of domestic violence. Forty per cent of families notified had had no previous contact with child protection services in that area, but those cases most likely to receive social work assessment or intervention were those where the case was already open. Notifications triggered a new social work intervention in only 5% of cases. The study also identified a range of innovative approaches for improving the co-ordination of police and child protective services in relation to children's exposure to domestic violence. Arrangements that maximized opportunities for police and social workers to share agency information appeared to offer the best option for achieving informed decisions about the appropriate level of service response to children and families experiencing domestic violence.     

Chemical enhancement of footwear impressions in blood on fabric — Part 2: Peroxidase reagents

This study investigates the optimisation of peroxidase based enhancement techniques for footwear impressions made in blood on various fabric surfaces. Four different haem reagents: leuco crystal violet (LCV), leuco malachite green (LMG), fluorescein and luminol were used to enhance the blood contaminated impressions.The enhancement techniques in this study were used successfully to enhance the impressions in blood on light coloured surfaces, however, only fluorescent and/or chemiluminescent techniques allowed visualisation on dark coloured fabrics, denim and leather. Luminol was the only technique to enhance footwear impressions made in blood on all the fabrics investigated in this study.     

The National Ballistics Imaging Comparison (NBIC) project

In response to the guidelines issued by the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors/Laboratory Accreditation Board (ASCLD/LAB-International) to establish traceability and quality assurance in U.S. crime laboratories, a NIST/ATF joint project entitled National Ballistics Imaging Comparison (NBIC) was initialized in 2008. The NBIC project aims to establish a National Traceability and Quality System for ballistics identifications in crime laboratories within the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) of the U.S. NIST Standard Reference Material (SRM) 2460 bullets and 2461 cartridge cases are used as reference standards. 19 ballistics examiners from 13 U.S. crime laboratories participated in this project. They each performed 24 periodic image acquisitions and correlations of the SRM bullets and cartridge cases over the course of a year, but one examiner only participated in Phase 1 tests of SRM cartridge case. The correlation scores were collected by NIST for statistical analyses, from which control charts and control limits were developed for the proposed Quality System and for promoting future assessments and accreditations for firearm evidence in U.S. forensic laboratories in accordance with the ISO 17025 Standard.     

EU update

This is the latest edition of Baker & McKenzie’s column on developments in EU law relating to IP, IT and telecommunications. This article summarises recent developments that are considered important for practitioners, students and academics in a wide range of information technology, e-commerce, telecommunications and intellectual property areas. It cannot be exhaustive but intends to address the important points. This is a hard copy reference guide, but links to outside websites are included where possible. No responsibility is assumed for the accuracy of information contained in these links.     

Chemical enhancement of footwear impressions in urine on fabric

A range of chemical techniques were utilised for the enhancement of footwear impressions deposited on a variety of fabric types of different colours with urine as a contaminant. A semi-automated stamping device was used to deliver test impressions at a set force to minimise the variability between impressions; multiple impressions were produced and enhanced by each reagent to determine the repeatability of the enhancement. Urine samples from different donors were analysed using a spectrofluorophotometer revealing differences between individuals. Results indicated that the enhancement of footwear impressions in urine was possible using amino acid staining techniques whereas protein stains failed to achieve successful enhancement.