Being Easy to Communicate Might Make Verdicts Based on Confessions More Legitimate

In many judicial systems, confessions are a requirement for criminal conviction. Even if confessions are intrinsically convincing, this might not entirely explain why they play such a paramount role. In addition, it has been suggested that confessions owe their importance to their legitimizing role, explaining why they could be required even when other evidence has convinced a judge. But why would confessions be particularly suited to justify verdicts? One possibility is that they can be more easily transmitted from one individual to the next, and thus spread in the population without losing their convincingness. 360 English-speaking participants were asked to evaluate the convincingness of one of three justifications for a verdict, grounded either in a confession, eyewitnesses, or circumstantial evidence, and to pass on that justification to another participant, who performed the same task. Then, 240 English-speaking participants evaluated the convincingness of some of the justifications produced by the first group of participants. Compared to the other justifications, justifications based on confessions lost less of their convincingness in the transmission process (small to medium effect sizes). Modeling pointed to the most common forms the justifications would take as they are transmitted, and results showed that the most common variant of the justification based on a confession was more convincing (small to medium effect sizes).

Theoretical Aspects of the Legislation Dealing with Proceedings Regarding Criminal Property

The research deals with problems relating to proceedings regarding criminal property, as a result of which property may be recognised as criminally derived and be forfeited. It should be noted that matters at hand are interdisciplinary and require a systemic approach. The research focuses on procedural aspects of criminal property forfeiture in the context of an individual’s right to property. The forfeiture of criminal property by way of special proceedings before a court judgement resulting in criminal conviction becomes final is an adequate means of criminal proceedings, whose main goal is to restore justice between parties to criminal proceedings by returning criminal property to the lawful owner as soon as possible. However, it should be considered that this type of property forfeiture has a dual nature, namely: the legislation should also secure the rights of persons having opposite interests, such as the alleged offender, the property owner affected by criminal proceedings and the victim.

Socioeconomic correlates of incident and fatal opioid overdose among Swedish people with opioid use disorder

Background Opioid overdose (OD) and opioid OD death are major health threats to people with opioid use disorder (OUD). Socioeconomic factors are underexplored potential determinants of opioid OD. In this study, we assessed socioeconomic and other factors and their associations with incident and fatal opioid OD, in a cohort consisting of 22,079 individuals with OUD. Methods We performed a retrospective, longitudinal study based on Swedish national register data for the period January 2005–December 2017. We used Cox proportional hazard models to investigate the risk of incident and fatal opioid OD as a function of several individual, parental and neighborhood covariates. Results Univariate analysis showed that several covariates were associated with incident and fatal opioid OD. In the multivariate analysis, incident opioid OD was associated with educational attainment (Hazard ratio [HR] 0.96; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.94–0.97), having received social welfare (HR 1.31; 95% CI 1.22–1.39), and criminal conviction (HR 1.53; 95% CI 1.42–1.65). Fatal opioid OD was also associated with criminal conviction (HR 1.93; 95% CI 1.61–2.32). Conclusion Individuals with low education and receipt of social welfare had higher risks of incident opioid OD and individuals with criminal conviction were identified as a risk group for both incident and fatal opioid OD. Our findings should raise attention among health prevention policy makers in general, and among decision-makers within the criminal justice system and social services in particular.

ANALISIS YURIDIS BUKTI DIGITAL (DIGITAL EVIDENCE) DALAM PEMBUKTIAN PERKARA TINDAK PIDANA UJARAN KEBENCIAN PADA PUTUSAN PENGADILAN NEGERI MEDAN NO. 3168/PID.SUS/2018/PN.MDN

Law No. 8 of 1981 concerning the Criminal Procedure Code (hereinafter referred to as the Criminal Procedure Code), has set the evidence that can be done in front of the trial. Article 183 of the Criminal Procedure Code implies that a minimum of 2 (two) valid evidence are required. Article 184 paragraph (1) of the Criminal Procedure Code regulates valid evidence, namely: witness statements; expert statements; letter; instructions; and the statement of the defendant. However, since the trial of Jesica Kumala Wongso which was broadcast on television almost every day, it turns out there is one more proof that is not contained in the Criminal Procedure Code, namely: digital evidence. The object of this study is the Medan District Court Decision No. 3168/Pid.Sus/2018/PN.Mdn., Dated May 23, 2019, concerning the use of digital evidence An. Defendant HDL Alias ​​Himma for alleged "criminal acts of hate speech". Law No. 11 of 2008 as amended by Law No. 19 of 2016 concerning Amendments to the Information and Electronic Transaction Law which governs electronic evidence. The problems in this study, namely: the position of proof of digital evidence before the trial is associated with criminal conviction; use of digital evidence in criminal acts of hate speech on social media; and juridical analysis of digital evidence in proving criminal acts of hate speech in Medan District Court Decision No. 3168/Pid.Sus/ 2018/PN.Mdn.

Prevalence of criminal convictions in Norwegian adult ADHD outpatients and associations with ADHD symptom severity and emotional dysregulation

Objectives Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) often co-occurs with antisocial behaviour. Several studies have shown high rates of ADHD among prisoners. However, the prevalence of crime among individuals with ADHD is less known. The aim of the present study was to estimate the prevalence of lifetime criminal conviction (CC) in a clinical sample of adults with ADHD, and the associations with the severity of ADHD and emotional dysregulation (ED). Methods Patients were admitted to a private psychiatric outpatient clinic in Oslo between 2014 and 2018. Of the 656 patients diagnosed with ADHD, 629 (95.9%) agreed to participate in the study. CC was determined based on self-reporting of the lifetime history of criminal behaviour. ADHD was diagnosed according to the DSM-5 criteria, and ADHD severity was measured using the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS). ED was assessed by the eight-item version of Barkley’s Current Behaviour Scale - Self-Report (CBS-SR). Results The prevalence of self-reported CC in this clinical sample was 11.7% among women and 24.5% among men. CC was associated with hyperactive-impulsive severity (p < 0.001) and ED (p = 0.006). Conclusions The prevalence of self-reported lifetime criminal conviction was high for both genders. CC was associated with symptom severity of hyperactivity-impulsivity and emotional dysregulation. The findings suggest the need for greater research efforts on the avoidance of criminal activity in people with ADHD and targeted intervention for ADHD treatment and CC prevention.

Prosecutors and Sentencing

Prosecutorial decisions play an important, and sometimes a decisive, role in a defendant’s ultimate sentence. They begin with the selection of charges and may end with a recommendation on clemency or expungement of a criminal conviction. The influence of prosecutors over the sentence, therefore, is far more extensive than that of any other official. The charging decision sets the starting point for the sentence range. The prosecution tends to control entry into diversion programs that may spare an offender a criminal record after complying with a set of requirements. Plea bargains, which have become more frequent even in Europe’s civil law countries, usually focus on the type and scope of the criminal justice sentence. Mandatory minimum sentences, mandatory aggravators, and stacked charges provide prosecutors with overwhelming bargaining power, causing many defendants to waive their right to a trial. Judges tend to follow the parties’ agreements and impose the recommended sentence. In many states prosecutors routinely weigh in on parole decisions and determine whether to proceed against defendants for supervision violations. Even in clemency decisions, they frequently submit a recommendation.

Confessions make verdicts more legitimate because they are easy to communicate

In many judicial systems, confessions are a de facto or even de jure requirement for criminal conviction. Even if confessions are intrinsically convincing, this cannot explain why they should play such a paramount role. Instead, it has been suggested that confessions owe their importance to their legitimizing role. But why would confessions be particularly suited to justify verdicts?Justifications grounded in confessions might make better legitimizing tools because they can be more easily transmitted from one individual to the next, and thus spread in the population without losing their convincingness. 360 English-speaking participants were asked to evaluate the convincingness of one of three justifications for a verdict, grounded either in a confession, eyewitnesses, or circumstantial evidence, and to pass on that justification to another participant, who then had to perform the same task. In a second experiment, 240 English-speaking participants evaluated the convincingness of some of the justifications produced by the first group of participants. Compared to the other justifications, justifications based on confessions lost less of their convincingness in the transmission process (small to medium effect sizes). Modeling pointed to the most common forms the justifications would take as they are transmitted, and results showed that the most common variant of the justification based on a confession was more convincing than those of justifications based on eyewitnesses or circumstantial evidence (small to medium effect sizes). These results suggests that justifications for verdicts based on confessions are more easily transmitted, and thus can more easily legitimize verdicts.