Reducing Domestic Violence and Improving Outcomes for Children: Funding Civil Legal Aid to Maximize Impact

Domestic violence survivors and children in foster care often experience significant unmet civil legal needs. Legal aid services, when adequately funded, can help close the justice gap for these two populations while improving safety, stability, and court efficiencies. However, despite ample literature demonstrating how legal aid can improve outcomes, almost half of those seeking legal aid services are turned away due to lack of resources. This article reviews the research and data about how legal aid can improve outcomes for people in the domestic violence and child welfare contexts. It also discusses how several state‐administered federal funding opportunities—including the Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) Victim Assistance Formula Grant Program, Title IV‐D child support funds, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) basic block grants—can fund the needed civil legal help.     

Finding a Safer Harbor: Mandating Health Care Clinics to Intervene in Child Sex Trafficking by Amending the Safe Harbor Act

When it comes to child sex trafficking, health care clinics have become spaces of duality. While these facilities provide medical care to child victims, many argue that this facilitates traffickers in concealing evidence of child sex trafficking. This Note proposes an amendment to New York's Safe Harbor Act and various sections of the Social Services Law to cure legislative ambiguity with respect to health care clinics. The amendment will mandate that all state‐run health care clinics implement a uniform process, utilizing mental health professionals and a standardized interview process, to identify and report instances of potential child sex trafficking.     

PROTECTING LIVES,CAREERS, AND PUBLIC CONFIDENCE: FLORIDA'S EFFORTS TO PREVENT OFFICER‐INVOLVED DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Florida's innovative Law Enforcement Families Partnership (LEFP) was created to reduce and prevent officer‐involved domestic violence in the state. Administered by the Institute for Family Violence Studies at Florida State University and supported by the criminal justice and victim's advocacy communities, the LEFP is the first statewide project of its kind. It includes several components, the cornerstone of which is an online curriculum that teaches officers about the dynamics and consequences of domestic violence perpetrated by officers. This article describes the project and early data from the surveys attached to the curriculum.     

论被害人谅解对量刑的影响

犯罪是对被害人的直接侵害,在遭受犯罪行为侵害的过程中,被害人对犯罪行为给自己带来的伤害有着切身的体会和直观的感受。法院在审理案件过程中应该听取被害人的意见,并在量刑时加以考虑。但被害人谅解是否对于法院有必然的约束力则不能一概而论。笔者从被害人谅解影响量刑的依据、限度、条件及监督保障等方面对被害人谅解与刑罚适用的关系进行了讨论,并提出只要从制度上加以规范和保障,将被害人谅解作为量刑的酌定从轻或者减轻处罚情节,是可以促进社会的和谐与稳定的。     

论《服务贸易总协定》的投资协定性质

《服务贸易总协定》在性质上是各国签订的国际投资协定,并非贸易协定,这是由服务本身的性质造成的。从《服务贸易总协定》的性质和宗旨看,发达国家有意搭多边贸易体制的便车,以服务贸易之名行对外投资之实;从《服务贸易总协定》对服务的分类看,商业存在和自然人流动无疑要伴随着跨国投资;从《服务贸易总协定》对最惠国待遇和国民待遇的规定看,这里的待遇实际上是给予服务的提供者而不仅仅是给予作为商品的服务;从《服务贸易总协定》对市场准入的规定看,市场准入允许服务提供者在他国进行投资设业,这涉及东道国对外资的审批。《服务贸易总协定》的签订,不仅丰富了世界贸易组织的议题,也为世界贸易组织的运行带来了新的挑战。     

Reduced payer's liability for unauthorized payment transactions under the second Payment Services Directive (PSD2)

In 2015, the European legislator enacted the second Payment Services Directive, which, among other things, determines the payer's liability for unauthorized payment transactions. This paper will show that PSD2 has widened its scope and further reduces the payer's liability for unauthorized transactions, for example by making it impossible to hold the payer liable in case no strong customer authentication has been applied, by requiring supporting evidence to prove the payer's fraud or gross negligence and by applying the same rules when unauthorized transactions are initiated through a payment initiation service.     

Understanding Victim Support as Crime Prevention Work: The Construction of Young Victims and Villains in the Dominant Crime Victim Discourse in Sweden

Starting from the observation that a new victim category has emerged in the form of the ‘young crime victim’, this article explores the notion of support to young crime victims as crime prevention work, considering it as an important constituent of the dominant crime victim discourse among support professionals. In the context of the support work, the (young) ‘victim’ and the (young) ‘villain’ provide mutually necessary counterparts constructed in relation to each other. Corresponding to this division, two approaches in criminal and crime prevention policy and practice are then analysed using Garland's notions of ‘the criminology of the self’ and ‘the criminology of the other’. The first of these strategies is generally associated with rehabilitative measures (with the resulting normalization of the crime, its victims, and villains), while in the second punitive measures remain the norm (with the crime, its victims, and villains becoming ‘Otherized’). Yet, as shown within the context of rehabilitation organized as support to young crime victims, both of these (at first glance mutually contradictory) discourses are drawn upon and operationalized by the professional support staff constructing images of young victims and villains in their daily work. Help-seeking youths resistant to identifying as victims remain represented as (possible future) villains.     

复行为理论下对轮奸“共同正犯说”之反思

我国刑法将轮奸定位为强奸犯罪的加重情节,而非独立的罪名。因强奸犯罪属复行为犯,复行为中的强制行为之上可成立共同正犯,而奸淫行为具有亲手性和排他性,不能成立共同正犯,各犯罪人只能轮流地、各自地实施奸淫行为。轮奸不是典型意义上的共同正犯,而是数个独立意义上的强奸犯罪之叠加,也只能在宏观上被拟制成为"共同正犯",即多犯罪人"在实现各自轮流奸淫被害人的目的支配下"通过参与实施"团体性"强制行为而实现每个犯罪人对被害人的奸淫行为。     

试论北京奥运会志愿服务的德育功能

当前,高校德育的实效还没有达到社会的期望。提高高校德育实效性的重要环节就是要改变传统“灌输式”的德育模式,结合时代背景和社会热点,构建大学生德育教育体系。奥运会具有国际化和全民性的特征,是高校开展德育的重要契机,奥运期间及奥运后的大学生志愿服务活动具有特殊的德育功能。