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The "witness anonymity" and "investigation anonymity" provisions
This article offers an analysis of the creation of statutory powers to allow witnesses to give evidence anonymously. The latest provisions are those in the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 replacing the emergency temporary legislation: Criminal Evidence (Witness Anonymity) Act 2008. Consideration is given to that Act, its legislative history and case law. Examination of the new powers for investigation anonymity orders suggests that these are likely to be of symbolic rather than practical significance
Analysing decision logs to understand decision-making in serious crime investigations
Objective: To study decision-making by detectives when investigating serious crime through the examination of Decision Logs to explore hypothesis generation and evidence selection.
Background: Decision logs are used to record and justify decisions made during serious crime investigations. The complexity of investigative decision-making is well documented, as are the errors associated with miscarriages of justice and inquests. The use of decision logs has not been the subject of an empirical investigation, yet they offer an important window into the nature of investigative decision-making in dynamic, time-critical environments.
Method: A sample of decision logs from British police forces was analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively to explore hypothesis generation and evidence selection by police detectives.
Results: Analyses revealed diversity in documentation of decisions that did not correlate with case type, and identified significant limitations of the decision log approach to supporting investigative decision-making. Differences emerged between experienced and less experienced officers’ decision log records in exploration of alternative hypotheses, generation of hypotheses, and sources of evidential enquiry opened over phase of investigation.
Conclusion: The practical use of decision logs is highly constrained by their format and context of use. Despite this, decision log records suggest that experienced detectives display strategic decision-making to avoid confirmation and satisficing that affect less experienced detectives.
Application: Potential applications of this research include both training in case documentation and the development of new decision log media that encourage detectives, irrespective of experience, to generate multiple hypotheses and optimize the timely selection of evidence to test them
The statistical laws of popularity: Universal properties of the box office dynamics of motion pictures
Are there general principles governing the process by which certain products
or ideas become popular relative to other (often qualitatively similar)
competitors? To investigate this question in detail, we have focused on the
popularity of movies as measured by their box-office income. We observe that
the log-normal distribution describes well the tail (corresponding to the most
successful movies) of the empirical distributions for the total income, the
income on the opening week, as well as, the weekly income per theater. This
observation suggests that popularity may be the outcome of a linear
multiplicative stochastic process. In addition, the distributions of the total
income and the opening income show a bimodal form, with the majority of movies
either performing very well or very poorly in theaters. We also observe that
the gross income per theater for a movie at any point during its lifetime is,
on average, inversely proportional to the period that has elapsed after its
release. We argue that (i) the log-normal nature of the tail, (ii) the bimodal
form of the overall gross income distribution, and (iii) the decay of gross
income per theater with time as a power law, constitute the fundamental set of
{\em stylized facts} (i.e., empirical "laws") that can be used to explain other
observations about movie popularity. We show that, in conjunction with an
assumption of a fixed lower cut-off for income per theater below which a movie
is withdrawn from a cinema, these laws can be used to derive a Weibull
distribution for the survival probability of movies which agrees with empirical
data. The connection to extreme-value distributions suggests that popularity
can be viewed as a process where a product becomes popular by avoiding failure
(i.e., being pulled out from circulation) for many successive time periods. We
suggest that these results may apply to popularity in general.Comment: 14 pages, 11 figure
EPOCHS VI: The Size and Shape Evolution of Galaxies since z ~ 8 with JWST Observations
We present the results of a size and structural analysis of 1395 galaxies at
with stellar masses
9.5 within the JWST Public CEERS field that overlaps with the HST CANDELS
EGS observations. We use GALFIT to fit single S\'ersic models to the rest-frame
optical profile of our galaxies, which is a mass-selected sample complete to
our redshift and mass limit. Our primary result is that at fixed rest-frame
wavelength and stellar mass, galaxies get progressively smaller, evolving as
up to . We discover that the vast
majority of massive galaxies at high redshifts have low S\'ersic indices, thus
do not contain steep, concentrated light profiles. Additionally, we explore the
evolution of the size-stellar mass relationship, finding a correlation such
that more massive systems are larger up to . This relationship breaks
down at , where we find that galaxies are of similar sizes, regardless
of their star formation rates and S\'ersic index, varying little with mass. We
show that galaxies are more compact at redder wavelengths, independent of sSFR
or stellar mass up to . We demonstrate the size evolution of galaxies
continues up to , showing that the process or causes for this
evolution is active at early times. We discuss these results in terms of ideas
behind galaxy formation and evolution at early epochs, such as their importance
in tracing processes driving size evolution, including minor mergers and AGN
activity.Comment: Submitted to MNRA
Interventions for hidradenitis suppurativa: a Cochrane systematic review incorporating GRADE assessment of evidence quality
Background
More than 50 interventions have been used to treat hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) and so therapy decisions can be challenging.
Objectives
To summarise and appraise randomised controlled trial (RCT) evidence for HS interventions in adults.
Materials and methods
Searches were conducted in MEDLINE, EMBASE, CENTRAL, LILACS, five trials registers and abstracts from eight dermatology conferences until 13 August 2015. Two review authors independently assessed study eligibility, extracted data and assessed methodological quality. Primary outcomes were quality of life and adverse effects of the interventions.
Results
Twelve trials, from 1983 to 2015, investigating 15 different interventions met our inclusion criteria. Median trial duration was 16 weeks and the median number of participants was 27. Adalimumab 40mg weekly improved the Dermatology Life Quality Index by 4.0 points, which equates to the minimal clinically important difference for the scale, compared to placebo (95% confidence interval (CI) -6.5 to -1.5 points). Evidence quality was reduced to ‘moderate’ because results are based on only a single study. Adalimumab 40mg every other week was ineffective in a meta-analysis of two studies comprising 124 participants. Infliximab 5mg/kg improved DLQI score by 8.4 points after eight weeks in a moderate quality study completed by 33 of 38 participants. Etanercept 50mg twice weekly was ineffective.
Inclusion of a gentamicin sponge prior to primary closure did not improve outcomes. Other interventions including topical and oral antibiotics, were investigated by relatively small studies, preventing treatment recommendations due to imprecision.
Conclusions
More, larger RCTs are required to investigate most HS interventions, particularly oral treatments and surgical therapy. Moderate quality evidence suggests that adalimumab given weekly and infliximab are effective whereas adalimumab every other week is ineffective
Corporate governance and financial constraints on strategic turnarounds
The paper extends the Robbins and Pearce (1992) two-stage turnaround response model to include governance factors. In addition to the retrenchment and recovery, the paper proposes the addition of a realignment stage, referring specifically to the re-alignment of expectations of principal and agent groups. The realignment stage imposes a threshold that must be crossed before the retrenchment and hence recovery stage can be entered. Crossing this threshold is problematic to the extent that the interests of governance-stakeholder groups diverge in a crisis situation. The severity of the crisis impacts on the bases of strategy contingent asset valuation leading to the fragmentation of stakeholder interests. In some cases the consequence may be that management are prevented from carrying out turnarounds by governance constraints. The paper uses a case study to illustrate these dynamics, and like the Robbins and Pearce study, it focuses on the textile industry. A longitudinal approach is used to show the impact of the removal of governance constraints. The empirical evidence suggests that such financial constraints become less serious to the extent that there is a functioning market for corporate control. Building on governance research and turnaround literature, the paper also outlines the general case necessary and sufficient conditions for successful turnarounds
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