MALTREATED CHILDREN'S ABILITY TO ESTIMATE TEMPORAL LOCATION AND NUMEROSITY OF PLACEMENT CHANGES AND COURT VISITS

Research examining children's temporal knowledge has tended to utilize brief temporal intervals and singular, neutral events, and is not readily generalizable to legal settings in which maltreated children are asked temporal questions about salient, repeated abuse that often occurred in the distant past. To understand how well maltreated children can describe temporal location and numerosity of documented, personal experiences, we assessed 167 6- to 10-year-old maltreated children's temporal memory for changes in their living arrangements and prior visits to court. Small percentages of children were capable of providing exact temporal location information (age, month, or season) regarding their first or last placement or court experience, or numerosities for placements or court visits. Greater knowledge of current temporal locations did not predict better performance. However, older children's performance for several temporal judgments was better than chance, and their reports were not largely discrepant from the truth. Findings suggest caution when questioning maltreated children about when and how many times prior events occurred.     

Intoxicated eyewitnesses: Better than their reputation?

According to law enforcement, many witnesses are intoxicated either at the time of the crime, the interview, or both (Evans et al., Public Policy Law 15(3):194-221, 2009). However, no study to date has examined whether intoxicated witnesses' recall is different from sober witnesses' and whether they are more vulnerable to misinformation using an ecologically valid experimental design. Intoxicated, placebo, and sober witnesses observed a live, staged theft, overheard subsequent misinformation about the theft, and took part in an investigative interview. Participants generally believed they witnessed a real crime and experienced a real interview. Intoxicated witnesses were not different from placebo or sober witnesses in the number of accurate details, inaccurate details, or "don't know" answers reported. All the participants demonstrated a misinformation effect, but there were no differences between intoxication levels: Intoxicated participants were not more susceptible to misinformation than sober or placebo participants. Results are discussed in the light of their theoretical and applied relevance.     

An Examination of Defendant Sex Disparity in Capital Sentencing: A Propensity Score Matching Approach

Although much prior work has examined the influence of extralegal factors on jury capital sentencing decision-making, the influence of defendant sex has been largely omitted from previous investigations. Using propensity score matching methods, the current study analyzes data from the North Carolina Capital Sentencing Project to examine whether “sex matters” in capital sentencing. Findings demonstrated that prior to matching there was a significant difference in the likelihood of receiving the death penalty for female and male defendant cases; however, after matching cases on an array of legal and extralegal case characteristics, these differences were no longer significant. Further results revealed that male defendants’ cases included different aggravating and mitigating factors than female defendants’ cases and that female defendants had limited “paths” to capital trials. Findings suggest that any apparent sex effects that are observed in capital sentencing stem from real differences in the case characteristics found in female and male defendants’ cases rather than any direct effects of defendant sex on jury decision-making. Study limitations and implications for death penalty research are also discussed.     

Fragility within stability: the state,the clan and political resilience in Somaliland

Abstract

Even in the context of a relatively flourishing state, fragility can be an enduring feature of a political system, particularly in the case of recently established or unrecognised states. This article examines the nature of state-building in a specific context to question the assumption that forms of hybrid governance or pre-existing forms of governance are a necessary evil to be tolerated but which needs ultimately to be overcome during state-building. It does this by adopting the language of resilience and focusing on the case of Somaliland to highlight the role of clan governance as a mechanism of political resilience and as a means of promoting the flexibility required for state-building. Yet, at the same time, the process of state-building often involves formalising governance and limiting the role of traditional social-political forms of governance such as clans, ignoring their role in legitimating and stabilising the political system. However, as this article argues, stability and fragility are inextricably linked; while the clan system has been an important force in stabilising the state, it has also become a pressure point for the state’s latent fragility. By contextualising fragility and stability within the language of resilience, though, this symbiotic relationship can be better analysed.     

The Diffusion of the Concept of Public Figure in China

This article considers how and why the legal concept of public figure, which holds public figures to a higher standard that makes it more difficult for them to recover damages when suing for libel, has been diffused in China. The public figure concept developed in the U.S. context as an extension of New York Times v. Sullivan from public officials to public figures, reflecting the deeply embedded value of freedom of expression. Despite authoritarianism in China, the concept was adapted in the rulings of some local courts to define the limits of the right to reputation. The diffusion was a response to a stream of litigation against media organizations. In the process of diffusion and adaptation, courts have acted strategically to reshape the public figure concept and refashion its justifications. Given the political constraints on courts in authoritarian China, they have been careful to avoid applying the concept to public officials, and instead have applied the concept to public figures such as celebrities. The diffusion of the concept in China sheds light on theories of legal diffusion more broadly, by illustrating how the process of diffusion can be bottom‐up and open‐ended, and how it can occur even in a counter‐intuitive case in which there are significant political and ideational differences between the two countries.     

Reviving Social Rights in Latin America: The Potential Role of International Human Rights Documents

Social rights are essential to our ability to fully participate in society. In Latin America, these rights are increasingly marginalized as neoliberal policies take hold. At the same time, the related concepts of civil society and social capital are often incorporated into strategies aimed at alleviating the problems of the Latin American poor. It is expected that by strengthening people's civic capacity, their sense of mutual responsibility and ability to self-provide certain services will be enhanced. In the context of the current policy environment, however, such strategies are unlikely to be entirely successful. Lack of economic resources may preclude the Latin American poor from effective civic participation. More importantly, the promotion of civil society and social capital on the part of aid agencies and governments may represent an implicit threat to social rights, in as much as the organizations advocated are not likely to actively struggle for expansion of rights. Nevertheless, human rights documents such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child provide a base upon which rights-based movements can be constructed.     

Homicidal Ideation and Individuals on the Autism Spectrum

Interest in the relationship between autism and violence has increased in recent years; however, no link has clearly been established between them. Researchers remain curious if autistic people with certain traits (e.g., a history of trauma) are at greater risk of violence than those individuals with autism alone. In this article, we detail two individuals with homicidal ideation (HI) admitted to inpatient psychiatric units who were found to have a diagnosis of autism without language impairment. These cases illustrate the need for mental health providers to consider autism in their differential diagnosis when evaluating an individual with HI. Broadly, we consider how an autistic individual could be susceptible to developing HI and explore treatments specific to autistic individuals that may be helpful in such cases.