Interpreting “Knowingly” to Establish Criminal Liability in Environmental Law: A Modified Public Welfare Approach

Now, more than ever, environmental disasters occur on an unprecedented scale. The main objective of environmental law is to protect the environment and human health from harm. In recognition of the role that businesses and corporations play in causing such harm, many environmental laws have been amended to criminalize their harmful conduct. Focusing on the criminal provisions in the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act that target offenders who engage in conduct “knowingly,” this Note addresses the split regarding the intent required for a criminal conviction, and the resultant weight accorded these statutes. Courts should interpret “knowingly” to require proof that a defendant only had a general awareness of the harmful conduct—rather than knowledge of the law or additional facts—by adopting a modified public welfare approach. This approach is proper, as it is derived from the Supreme Court case United States v. International Minerals, and necessary, considering the plain meaning of the statutory text, statutory purpose, legislative history, and general principals of criminal law. This Note contends that the modified public welfare approach is correct because it classifies the above statutes as dealing with public welfare offenses, which in turn permits application of the Responsible Corporate Officer Doctrine to hold corporate officers responsible and deter future violations. It also provides safeguards to ensure that the “knowingly” standard of intent is accorded proper weight. Since statutes are not interpreted in a vacuum, this Note holistically evaluates the propriety of the approach based on the ordinary meaning of the statutes’ text, which ultimately advances congressional intent

Leveraging Large Language Models for Sequential Recommendation

Sequential recommendation problems have received increasing attention in research during the past few years, leading to the inception of a large variety of algorithmic approaches. In this work, we explore how large language models (LLMs), which are nowadays introducing disruptive effects in many AI-based applications, can be used to build or improve sequential recommendation approaches. Specifically, we devise and evaluate three approaches to leverage the power of LLMs in different ways. Our results from experiments on two datasets show that initializing the state-of-the-art sequential recommendation model BERT4Rec with embeddings obtained from an LLM improves NDCG by 15-20% compared to the vanilla BERT4Rec model. Furthermore, we find that a simple approach that leverages LLM embeddings for producing recommendations, can provide competitive performance by highlighting semantically related items. We publicly share the code and data of our experiments to ensure reproducibility.Comment: 9 page

Investigating the prevalence of problematic substance use and mental disorders in a large sample of prisoners with mental illness: network analysis

Background The relationship between psychopathology and criminal offending has been the subject of many studies. Co-occurring substance use seems to increase the risk of offending in those with mental illness. Aims To present data on the prevalence of mental disorders and demographics of prisoners with mental illness, and investigate associations between diagnoses and substance use from a network perspective. Method Data used in this study are part of a cohort study within the four penitentiary psychiatric centres in The Netherlands. It includes data of 4956 incarcerated male patients. Prevalence rates of mental disorders and demographic variables were compared between individuals with and without problematic substance use. A network of diagnoses, including three categories of substance use, was constructed with regression coefficients. Results Most patients showed prior problematic substance use (72.2%) in more than one category of substances (58.7%). Problematic substance use was associated with diagnoses of schizophrenia spectrum disorders (χ2(1) = 37.52, P < 0.001, V = 0.09) and cluster B personality disorders (χ2(1) = 56.39, P < 0.001, V = 0.11). Three major findings of the network are discussed in detail: the role of antisocial personality disorder, impulsivity and psychotic disorders in combination with problematic substance use. Conclusions Problematic substance use is highly prevalent among prisoners with mental illness, and should always be taken into account in research on this topic. Treatment should target substance use to reduce the risk of recidivism. Further differentiation in categories of substances is needed for the development of risk profiles

Interpreting “Knowingly” to Establish Criminal Liability in Environmental Law: A Modified Public Welfare Approach

Now, more than ever, environmental disasters occur on an unprecedented scale. The main objective of environmental law is to protect the environment and human health from harm. In recognition of the role that businesses and corporations play in causing such harm, many environmental laws have been amended to criminalize their harmful conduct. Focusing on the criminal provisions in the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act that target offenders who engage in conduct “knowingly,” this Note addresses the split regarding the intent required for a criminal conviction, and the resultant weight accorded these statutes. Courts should interpret “knowingly” to require proof that a defendant only had a general awareness of the harmful conduct—rather than knowledge of the law or additional facts—by adopting a modified public welfare approach. This approach is proper, as it is derived from the Supreme Court case United States v. International Minerals, and necessary, considering the plain meaning of the statutory text, statutory purpose, legislative history, and general principals of criminal law. This Note contends that the modified public welfare approach is correct because it classifies the above statutes as dealing with public welfare offenses, which in turn permits application of the Responsible Corporate Officer Doctrine to hold corporate officers responsible and deter future violations. It also provides safeguards to ensure that the “knowingly” standard of intent is accorded proper weight. Since statutes are not interpreted in a vacuum, this Note holistically evaluates the propriety of the approach based on the ordinary meaning of the statutes’ text, which ultimately advances congressional intent

Prison brain? Executive dysfunction in prisoners

A better understanding of the functioning of the brain, particularly executive functions, of the prison population could aid in reducing crime rates through the reduction of recidivism rates. Indeed, reoffending appears to be related to executive dysfunction and it is known that executive functions are crucial for self-regulation. In the current paper, studies to executive functions in regular prisoners compared to non-offender controls were reviewed. Seven studies were found. Specific executive functions were found to be impaired in the general prison population, i.e. attention and set-shifting, as well as in separate subgroups of violent (i.e. set-shifting and working memory) and non-violent offenders (i.e. inhibition, working memory and problem solving). We conclude that the limited number of studies is remarkable, considering the high impact of this population on society and elaborate on the implications of these specific impairments that were found. The current findings call for further research

Choline and Choline Metabolite Patterns and Associations in Blood and Milk during Lactation in Dairy Cows

Milk and dairy products are an important source of choline, a nutrient essential for human health. Infant formula derived from bovine milk contains a number of metabolic forms of choline, all contribute to the growth and development of the newborn. At present, little is known about the factors that influence the concentrations of choline metabolites in milk. The objectives of this study were to characterize and then evaluate associations for choline and its metabolites in blood and milk through the first 37 weeks of lactation in the dairy cow. Milk and blood samples from twelve Holstein cows were collected in early, mid and late lactation and analyzed for acetylcholine, free choline, betaine, glycerophosphocholine, lysophosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylcholine, phosphocholine and sphingomyelin using hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, and quantified using stable isotope-labeled internal standards. Total choline concentration in plasma, which was almost entirely phosphatidylcholine, increased 10-times from early to late lactation (1305 to 13,535 µmol/L). In milk, phosphocholine was the main metabolite in early lactation (492 µmol/L), which is a similar concentration to that found in human milk, however, phosphocholine concentration decreased exponentially through lactation to 43 µmol/L in late lactation. In contrast, phosphatidylcholine was the main metabolite in mid and late lactation (188 µmol/L and 659 µmol/L, respectively), with the increase through lactation positively correlated with phosphatidylcholine in plasma (R2 = 0.78). Unlike previously reported with human milk we found no correlation between plasma free choline concentration and milk choline metabolites. The changes in pattern of phosphocholine and phosphatidylcholine in milk through lactation observed in the bovine suggests that it is possible to manufacture infant formula that more closely matches these metabolites profile in human milk