Policing the Police: The Role of the Courts and the Prosecution

This Article focuses on how, and whether, the component parts of the courts - judges, court administrators, and prosecutors - promote justice by actively and critically monitoring or overseeing the police. The author focuses on one of the most common forms of police corruption facing the criminal justice system - what has been termed falsifications which includes testimonial perjury, documentary perjury and falsification of police records. The author reflects on what judges and prosecutors have done to combat this form of police corruption and offers ways in which the actors within the criminal justice system can be more effective

CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR: TOUGH QUESTIONS, HONEST ANSWERS, AND INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO APPOINTIVE JUDICIAL SELECTION

This Essay, informed in significant part by personal experience, examines in greater detail some of the common features of appointive systems, and in the process raises issues, concerns, and questions. Every step of the way the goal remains the same—to devise an appointive system most likely to yield as outstanding a judiciary as possible

Structure Learning in Coupled Dynamical Systems and Dynamic Causal Modelling

Identifying a coupled dynamical system out of many plausible candidates, each of which could serve as the underlying generator of some observed measurements, is a profoundly ill posed problem that commonly arises when modelling real world phenomena. In this review, we detail a set of statistical procedures for inferring the structure of nonlinear coupled dynamical systems (structure learning), which has proved useful in neuroscience research. A key focus here is the comparison of competing models of (ie, hypotheses about) network architectures and implicit coupling functions in terms of their Bayesian model evidence. These methods are collectively referred to as dynamical casual modelling (DCM). We focus on a relatively new approach that is proving remarkably useful; namely, Bayesian model reduction (BMR), which enables rapid evaluation and comparison of models that differ in their network architecture. We illustrate the usefulness of these techniques through modelling neurovascular coupling (cellular pathways linking neuronal and vascular systems), whose function is an active focus of research in neurobiology and the imaging of coupled neuronal systems

A history of emerging domestic markets

The Milken Institute’s Center for Emerging Domestic Markets has been a leader in researching and writing about the issue of expanding investment in traditionally undervalued and undercapitalized entrepreneurs, enterprises and communities, including women and ethnic business owners, urban cores, rural areas and low-income populations. This article traces the evolution of the emerging domestic market concept and provides a guide to the existing literature.Business enterprises ; Markets

Rotten Social Background and Mass Incarceration: Who Is a Victim?

Despite the theoretical right to be heard at different junctures in the criminal legal system, in practice, the right is unsecured for many accused and convicted of various offenses. Criminal defendants are rarely heard at trial, upon sentencing, or at parole board interviews to determine eligibility for release. Consequently, these individuals are not able to offer explanations for their behavior. This is particularly harmful given the role that “severe environmental deprivation” or, sometimes controversially referred to as “rotten social background,” plays in criminal behavior. Research now indicates that societal shortcomings, including a lack of healthcare, education, and employment opportunities, combined with hyperaggressive policing and draconian sentencing for law violations, play a significant role in criminality. In other words, individual traits are not the driver of criminal behavior. Yet, the inability of those involved in the system to share evidence of their social background, and the refusal of actors in the system to view these factors as significantly mitigating, if not excusing, means that the problem is only swept under the rug. This essay aims to expose the explicit and implicit silencing of criminal defendants and the concomitant erasure of societal fault in criminal behavior and thus, in mass incarceration