Repeatability and reproducibility of comparison decisions by firearms examiners

In a comprehensive study to assess various aspects of the performance of qualified forensic firearms examiners, volunteer examiners compared both bullets and cartridge cases fired from three different types of firearms. They rendered opinions on each comparison according to the Association of Firearm & Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) Range of Conclusions, as Identification, Inconclusive (A, B, or C), Elimination, or Unsuitable. In this part of the study, comparison sets used previously to characterize the overall accuracy of examiners were blindly resubmitted to examiners to assess the repeatability (105 examiners; 5700 comparisons of bullets and cartridge cases) and reproducibility (191 examiners of bullets, 193 of cartridge cases; 5790 comparisons) of firearms examinations. Data gathered using the prevailing AFTE Range were also recategorized into two hypothetical scoring systems. Consistently positive differences between observed agreement and expected agreement indicate that the repeatability and reproducibility of examiners exceed chance agreement. When averaged over bullets and cartridge cases, the repeatability of comparison decisions (involving all five levels of the AFTE Range) was 78.3% for known matches and 64.5% for known nonmatches. Similarly averaged reproducibility was 67.3%% for known matches and 36.5% for known nonmatches. For both repeatability and reproducibility, many of the observed disagreements were between a definitive and inconclusive category. Examiner decisions are reliable and trustworthy in the sense that identifications are unlikely when examiners are comparing non-matching items, and eliminations are unlikely when they are comparing matching items.     

信息不对称下公务员考录的机制设计

本文运用信息经济学理论来解释和分析在公务员考录过程中存在的信息不对称问题,如逆向选择、道德风险和"学历高消费"等。针对这些信息不对称问题,本文提出:保证政府部门能经济、有效地吸收录用广大社会优秀人才,一方面,要在职位分类的基础上,建立分类分级考试制度和实行专业技术岗位聘任制以克服逆向选择问题;另一方面,设计合理有效的考试录用机制,大力加强政府部门的信息化工作,扩大考任制实施范围等以减少道德风险和"学历高消费"的问题。     

强化顶层设计规划 提升公安信息化建设水平

公安信息化的现状已不能满足新时期警务信息化发展的需求,原有的公安信息化条块化的建设模式需要向统一、集约、高效的方向发展。公安信息化的顶层规划,即统筹建设成为下一步信息化建设的重点和基础,需要以业务规划为核心,注重信息资源规划和业务协同并强化制度的基本建设思路和实际公安信息化建设中应遵循的方法。     

物之遗失与丧失占有——兼论具体公共空间内的拾得人判定

遗失物须为丧失占有的非无主动产。基于遗失物拾得的立法目的,在遗失物的范畴内排除了无主物,即所有权人主动放弃占有的物。除此之外,遗失物的丧失占有无须考察占有人或者遗失人的主观意思。遗失之丧失占有的判断是管领力的事实判断,不以当事人的主观认识为准,而强调客观上控制力是否及于物。此外,拾得人的权利义务产生于对物的占有取得,因此遗失物之丧失占有与其说是原权利人的丧失占有,不如说是物上丧失占有。而物上是否存在第三人的占有是判断遗失物是否丧失占有的难点。在私宅中私宅主人基于对房屋的控制力而对物有管领力;但是在具体的公共空间内丢失的物,因为人员流动性和不确定性,因此不能基于所有人对空间的管领而认为其对物有实际管领力。换言之,具体公共空间内丢失的物,在被拾得或者被工作人员等取得占有以前亦为遗失物。但是工作人员基于其身份的特殊性而不能取得拾得人的权利。     

中国司法鉴定乱象之因

在某种程度上,其他证据已经无法取代司法鉴定在目前司法实践中的作用,其也是保障司法公正的重要手段。但是,自司法鉴定制度改革实施以来,司法鉴定服务乱象丛生,不仅与其本该具有的功能不相符合,甚至适得其反,成为导致错案发生的一大诱因,引起各界关注。在此从制度设计缺乏科学性、司法鉴定管理问题突出、市场化运行环境更是雪上加霜等三个方面讨论“乱象”产生的原因,以期能够鉴定制度能从这些方面得到完善。     

Proposing Problem-Based Learning for teaching future forensic speech scientists

In the last 10–15 years, Masters programmes and undergraduate modules have emerged in the UK that teach forensic speech science. Forensic speech science is the forensic subdiscipline concerned with analysing speech recordings, such as telephone calls of unknown speakers, when they arise as evidence. In order to answer questions surrounding the identity of the speakers in these recordings, forensic speech analysts draw on their expertise in phonetics and acoustics. Even though existing UK forensic speech science programmes do not claim to train students to a level where they are in a position to carry out real-life forensic casework, a proportion of the graduates from these programmes do go on to fill discipline-specific roles in security organisations or for private providers of forensic speech analysis. It is therefore surely in the community’s interests to review educational approaches to capitalise on the current training opportunities. This paper specifically proposes to explore the potential of a Problem-Based Learning (PBL) approach to forensic speech science teaching. PBL is a student-centred learning approach that heavily relies on the students’ independence in the solving of ill-structured problems. PBL has shown to be beneficial to programmes that directly lead on to discipline-specific professional roles, and has even become the standardised teaching approach in some of those areas (medicine being the flagship example). Given its reported success in other disciplines, the question arises as to whether PBL could bring similar benefits to prospective forensic speech practitioners and to forensic speech science as a whole.     

便衣警察战术训练内容设计研究

便衣警察行动具有隐蔽性与快速性相结合的打击优势,许多城市开展的便衣警察行动收效甚好,而且有许多警务工作必须由便衣警察来完成。因此,探索便衣警察的战术训练内容具有重要的现实意义,通过对便衣警察的跟踪战术、抓捕战术、沟通战术、伪装战术等进行探索,从中总结出行之有效的训练方法和原则,从而能够使便衣警察的训练有的放矢,以提高便衣警察的执法能力。     

辽宁沿海经济带中心城镇的辐射带动作用

城镇化是指农村人口向城镇人口转化的过程,同时具有人口持续集聚的特性,是中国在工业化过程中必然经历的历史阶段。在发展辽宁沿海经济带城镇化进程中,出现顶层设计的缺失、中心城镇的示范作用不明显、有城无业导致人口集聚难等不和谐音符,该文从中心城镇的设计与建设角度,多角度论述了中心城镇打造成要素集聚区,实现对周边卫星城镇的辐射带动作用。     

All Tögethé® now: the recontextualization of branding and the stylization of diversity in EU public communication

This article examines the EU Birthday Logo Competition, which was launched jointly by the major European Union (EU) institutions to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome in 2007. As the first public communication initiative by the European Commission's newly restructured Directorate General for Communication, the logo competition is a particularly rich micro-textual “site” for a critical investigation of the recontextualization of corporate communication discourses and practices into institutional approaches to the communication of EU identity. Through an analysis of policy documents, on-site observations, textual artifacts, and in-depth interviews with policy-makers and design professionals I argue that the tensions and challenges that characterized the EU Birthday Logo Competition and related EU communication policy as a site of recontextualization may have led to the communication of a much more stylized, rather than complex and nuanced, version of European identity. In particular, I argue that the dialectic between the “professional/corporate” and “institutional/political” cultures that interacted in the selection, production and implementation of the anniversary logo may have contributed to obscuring key principles of corporate branding at work in the design, and may have in fact worked to produce a highly generic, decontextualized and ultimately also bland, although certainly problematic, “vision” of EU diversity.