Digital Commons Network^™

Called "Out" At Home: The One Strike Eviction Policy And Juvenile Court, Wendy J. Kaplan, David Rossman

Faculty Scholarship

One of the harshest collateral consequences of a juvenile delinquency case is the prospect of eviction from public housing. Under the federal government’s One Strike policy, public housing authorities are encouraged to evict families for any criminal act by their children, no matter how trivial. This politically popular policy creates more social ills than it cures. There is no evidence that it reduces crime in public housing, but there is abundant evidence that it makes families homeless, puts children out on the street, leads police departments to breach laws concerning confidentiality of juvenile proceedings, and creates conflicts of interest between …

Network Accountability For The Domestic Intelligence Apparatus, Danielle K. Citron, Frank Pasquale

Faculty Scholarship

A new domestic intelligence network has made vast amounts of data available to federal and state agencies and law enforcement officials. The network is anchored by “fusion centers,” novel sites of intergovernmental collaboration that generate and share intelligence and information. Several fusion centers have generated controversy for engaging in extraordinary measures that place citizens on watch lists, invade citizens’ privacy, and chill free expression. In addition to eroding civil liberties, fusion center overreach has resulted in wasted resources without concomitant gains in security.

While many scholars have assumed that this network represents a trade-off between security and civil liberties, our …

Why Is The Japanese Supreme Court So Conservative?, Shigenori Matsui

All Faculty Publications

The Constitution of Japan, enacted on November 3, 1946, and effective as of May 3, 1947, gave the judicial power to the Supreme Court and the inferior courts established by the Diet, the national legislature, and gave the power of judicial review to the judiciary. Equipped with the power of judicial review, the Japanese Supreme Court was expected to perform a very significant political role in safeguarding the Constitution, especially its Bill of Rights, against infringement by the government. Yet, it has developed a very conservative constitutional jurisprudence ever since its establishment. This article examines why the Japanese Supreme Court …

Constitutional Precedents In Japan: A Comment On The Role Of Precedent, Shigenori Matsui

All Faculty Publications

Japan is a civil law country, and the precedent of the Supreme Court is not binding on either the Supreme Court itself or lower courts. Judges are supposed to return to the text of the statute for each legal dispute and apply the rules to specific cases. Judicial decisions are not law to be applied by the courts. However, since judges have followed the precedent of the Supreme Court most of the time, these precedents have a de facto binding power even though they are not legally binding. In this Comment, the author focuses on constitutional law precedents to illustrate …

Efficacy Of Genres In Training Videos For Emergency First Responders, Kerry Jenkins

LSU Master's Theses

The actions of emergency first responders directly affect the safety of our society, and their expertise relies upon the training they receive in preparation to react to emergency events. The use of training videos has become more prevalent in recent years as a method of teaching vital response skills to first responders. Most of these videos are made in the expository mode,with little or no attempt to introduce elements or conventions from other modes of non-fiction or fiction film genres. This project extends the range of the training video in order to explore the potential impact of using conventions from …

Perceptions Of Faculty And Staff Of The Positive Behavior Process Utilizing Team Process And Staff Satisfaction Survey, Kara L. Hill

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

There is a great need in education to find innovative ways to increase the amount of instructional time spent in classrooms. One way this can be accomplished is by improving the school climate through the use of Positive Behavior Interventions and Support (PBIS). Teachers can improve upon their own behaviors towards students, so that student problem behaviors do not escalate to the point of suspensions and expulsions. The PBIS philosophy embraces the idea that while humanistic values should not replace empiricism, these values should inform empiricism. Science tells us how we can change things, but values tell us what is …

The Times-Picayune Coverage Of Three Incidents Resulting In Capital Trials, Sean Seosop Muggivan

LSU Master's Theses

Death penalty cases are truly the most unique cases in the criminal justice system. Much research has been done showing that the death qualification process venripersons must undergo results in jurors un-empathetic to the kind of information used to mitigate the death penalty, as well as creating a jury that is more susceptible to pretrial publicity. This study reviews this research and analyzes the content of a New Orleans’ newspaper’s coverage of three incidents resulting in capital trials. It was found that, similar to a study done in California that was the model for this study’s content analysis, the newspaper …

Cognitive Radio Network With A Distributed Control Channel And Quality-Of-Service Solution, Urban Terrell Wiggins

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The proliferation of wireless access and applications to the Internet and the advent of a myriad of highly evolved portable communication devices; creates the need for an efficiently utilized radio spectrum. This is paramount in the licensed and unlicensed radio frequency bands, that spawn an exponential growth in Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) research, Cognitive Radio (CR) and Cognitive Radio Networks (CRN) research. DSA research has given way to the paradigm shift toward CR with its dynamic changes in transmission schemas. This paradigm shift from a fixed and centralized frequency spectrum environment has morphed into a dynamic and decentralized one. CR …

A Look At The Integration Of Wetlands And Hazard Mitigation Planning In Coastal Louisiana, Kathleen Melissa Bowers

LSU Master's Theses

Due to the destruction of the damaging hurricanes of 2005, Katrina and Rita, more effort has gone into the rebuilding and prevention of future disasters along the Louisiana coast than ever before. This research focuses on the use of wetlands, in the ten coastal parishes of Louisiana, as a mitigation effort aiding in the protection of coastal communities. Using content analysis and decision support software, a wetland ranking was created that represents how wetlands are utilized and protected within each parish. Criteria gathered from the plans include how many times wetlands were mentioned, collaboration with the state and other agencies, …

Toward A Richer Shade Of Blue: The Impact On Oregon Police Officer Perceptions Of Racial Minorities After Anti-Racial Profiling Training, David Andrew Kline

Dissertations and Theses

Four fatal shootings, during police interactions, of unarmed people-of-color occurred in the Portland, Oregon Metro Area from 2003 to 2010 calling into question from members of the community whether or not the officers involved and hence their representative police departments had been racially profiling. Of interest in this study is whether or not cutting edge anti-racial profiling police officer trainings have an impact on how officers in Oregon perceive members of racial minority groups. A review of literature found that previous inquiries into racial prejudice among police officers may be present and that previous efforts to address racial ethics in …

Investigating Future Variation Of Extreme Precipitation Events Over The Willamette River Basin Using Dynamically Downscaled Climate Scenarios, Andrew Jason Halmstad

Dissertations and Theses

One important aspect related to the management of water resources under future climate variation is the occurrence of extreme precipitation events. In order to prepare for extreme events, namely floods and droughts, it is important to understand how future climate variability will influence the occurrence of such events. Recent advancements in regional climate modeling efforts provide additional resources for investigating the occurrence of extreme events at scales that are appropriate for regional hydrologic modeling. This study utilizes data from three Regional Climate Models (RCMs), each driven by the same General Circulation Model (GCM) as well as a reanalysis dataset, all …

Prestructuring Multilayer Perceptrons Based On Information-Theoretic Modeling Of A Partido-Alto-Based Grammar For Afro-Brazilian Music: Enhanced Generalization And Principles Of Parsimony, Including An Investigation Of Statistical Paradigms, Mehmet Vurkaç

Dissertations and Theses

The present study shows that prestructuring based on domain knowledge leads to statistically significant generalization-performance improvement in artificial neural networks (NNs) of the multilayer perceptron (MLP) type, specifically in the case of a noisy real-world problem with numerous interacting variables.

The prestructuring of MLPs based on knowledge of the structure of a problem domain has previously been shown to improve generalization performance. However, the problem domains for those demonstrations suffered from significant shortcomings: 1) They were purely logical problems, and 2) they contained small numbers of variables in comparison to most data-mining applications today. Two implications of the former were …

Criminal Justice Policy Research Institute Newsletter, Portland State University. Criminal Justice Policy Research Institute

Criminal Justice Policy Research Institute Newsletters

Newsletter provides information on:

• Latest research results
• Projects and studies underway
• Research awards and distinctions
• Recent research publications

The Commerical Speech Doctrine In Health Regulation: The Clash Between The Public Interest In A Robust First Amendment And The Public Interest In Effective Protection From Harm, David Orentlicher

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Olde Towne St Helens Historic Design Guidelines, Sadie Carney, Caitlin Francis, Drew Meisel, Victor Sanders

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

Throughout the northwest, portside communities are capitalizing on their rich cultural heritage by concentrating investment in their historic districts and waterfronts. From Astoria to Port Townsend, historic communities are benefiting from renewed economic vitality based on heritage tourism and the increased numbers of new businesses drawn to the district. As a former center of industry and manufacturing, Olde Towne St Helens boasts a rich heritage in its collection of buildings along the Strand and First Street. These structures offer a glimpse into the working-class, industrial past of the town and the era of shipbuilding and raw goods manufacturing that shaped …

Reimagining Weston, Nathan Emerson, Zach Gustafson, Holly Howell, Carrie Pipinich, Matthew Rohrbach

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

Weston was once a prosperous city, home to pioneers, farmers, and an active downtown. Today however, Weston faces many challenges common to communities throughout rural Oregon. The key question for this small city is: How can Weston capitalize on homegrown and regional assets in order to revitalize downtown and maximize the well-being of the community as a whole? Reimagining Weston provides a blueprint for the community to answer this question. This plan is a proactive effort by Weston residents to shape the livability and prosperity of their community over the next 20 years. Reimagining Weston consists of three primary parts: …

Ecolopolis 5.0: High Speed Rail In Cascadia, Portland State University

Regional Planning and Metropolitan Growth Management Research Projects

This is a working document and is the fifth report in this series. This report is the product of term-long projects conducted by graduate students from the two universities, and taught by Professor Daniel Carlson and Professor Ethan Seltzer. The courses engaged the questions of identifying the impacts, maximizing the benefits, and exploring implementation options for high speed rail development in the Cascadia corridor. Though passenger rail has long been a shared interest in the corridor, the recent U.S. initiative proposed by the Obama administration have accelerated high speed rail activity and discussions in Cascadia. The seven papers developed by …

Fair Trespass, Ben Depoorter

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Roles Unions Play In Collective Bargaining Processes And Their Impact On Negotiations For Blue-Collar Vs White-Collar Employees, Deoram Persaud

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Collective bargaining processes, plays an important role in employee employer relations and has significant impact on the dynamics and operations of organizations. The presence of unions poses challenges to management and appeases employees. The present study examined the roles unions plays in the collective bargaining process and their impact on negotiations for white-collar versus blue-collar workers. The study investigated, whether white-collar employees receives preferential treatment over blue-collar employees, during the collective bargaining process, and whether management concessions towards white-collar employees will be perceived to be more favorable than those of blue-collar employees and correlations between job satisfaction and collective bargaining …

The Black Poor, Black Elites, And America's Prisons, James Forman Jr.

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Threat To Democracy In Brazil's Public Sphere, Daniel Nettuno

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis looks at the nature of violence with its endemic, and increasingly epidemic presence in Brazil. I analyze the structure of the justice system, police force, and the many governmental security programs in order to better explain why Brazil is so violent and its government has been unable to control this violence. Living under violent conditions, Brazil has become a society where the efficient functioning of the public sphere has been undermined. This public space, shared by citizens, is what many academics believe to be a critical component of a robust and functioning democracy. In Brazil, it is shown, …

Drug Courts Work, But How? Preliminary Development Of A Measure To Assess Drug Court Structure And Processes, Blake Barrett

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The high prevalence of substance use disorders is well-documented among criminal offenders. Drug courts are specialty judicial programs designed to: 1) improve public safety outcomes; 2) reduce criminal recidivism and substance abuse among offenders with substance use disorders; and 3) better utilize scarce criminal justice and treatment resources. Drug courts operate through partnerships between the criminal justice, behavioral health and public health systems. Offenders participate in an intensive regimen of substance abuse treatment and case management while under close judicial supervision. Drug courts' effectiveness in reducing criminal recidivism and drug use has been documented through numerous primary studies as well …

Constitutional Rights In The Balance: Modern Exclusionary Rules And The Toleration Of Police Lawlessness In The Search For Truth, Stephen C. Thaman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article explores the tension in modern criminal procedure between the goal of ascertaining the material truth of the criminal charge and the respect for important human rights of criminal suspects during the investigation of the alleged criminal responsibility. It examines two major areas where police run the risk of violating and often do violate the constitutional rights of criminal suspects during interrogations and during invasions of privacy in the form of dwelling searches and interception of confidential communications. The approaches of modern democracies to this dilemma run from the strict exclusion of all direct and indirect evidence (fruits of …

'The Mess We’Re In': Five Steps Towards The Transformation Of Prison Cultures, Lynn S. Branham

All Faculty Scholarship

Few dispute that conditions in prisons need to be improved – that, for example, prisoners with mental-health problems need to have those problems addressed, and addressed effectively, while they are confined. But the more fundamental question is whether prisons can be, not just improved, but transformed. Transformation in this context means deep and sustained changes in the ethos of those who work and live in prisons. That ethos would reflect at least four precepts: (1) hope as an imperative; (2) the viability of renewal; (3) the catharsis that attends personal responsibility and accountability; and (4) the duty and call, extending …