Digital Commons Network^™

Statistical Abstract Fiscal Year 2024, Tennessee. Department Of Correction.

Annual Statistical Abstract

No abstract provided.

Climbing The Family Tree To Solve Crime: The Statutory Regulation Of Investigative Genetic Genealogy In Wisconsin, Margaret B. Mullican

Marquette Benefits and Social Welfare Law Review

Investigative Genetic Genealogy ("IGG") has emerged as a groundbreaking

tool that law enforcement agencies across the United States

are using to solve their most notorious criminal cases. IGG has led to

remarkable outcomes, such as identifying unknown victims, solving

decades-old violent crimes, and exonerating the innocent. While IGG

has transformed criminal investigations for the better, the tool has

also sparked concerns with the public regarding its haphazard regulation

and its constitutional implications. Despite the tool being

widely used by law enforcement, it remains relatively unregulated,

which has raised concerns about potential misuse, as well as a lack

of transparency and …

High “Status”: Reforming Employment Protections For Medical Cannabis Users Based On Status, Benjamin P. Sheppard

Marquette Benefits and Social Welfare Law Review

This paper explores the inconsistencies in employment protections for medical cannabis users, with a focus on the divergent interpretations of protections based on “status” across different jurisdictions. The analysis begins with an overview of federal and state laws, followed by an examination of varying court approaches to the scope of protections afforded to medical cannabis users. Courts differ in interpreting whether "status" protections extend to cover positive drug test results, leading to significant variations in employment rights depending on jurisdiction. To address these disparities, this paper proposes two model statutes tailored to the level of protection each state may choose …

Leveraging The History And Tradition Framework In Support Of Transgender Americans’ Fundamental Right To Choose A Name, Abigail Franke

Marquette Benefits and Social Welfare Law Review

Transgender people are facing waves of new legislation limiting their right to exist. However, there is an enormous amount of preexisting state laws which limit transgender people’s right to choose a gender affirming name on their own terms. Many current state laws severely restrict the ability of transgender people with prior felony convictions to change their name. These laws limit the ability of people with felony convictions from changing their name: based on the offense, pursuant a time limit, or force transgender people to out themselves. In this note I argue that these state-level laws place an unconstitutional barrier between …

Operational Energy Education: A Thematic Analysis Of Knowledge Area Needs And Educational Gaps, Nana Hene

Theses and Dissertations

Operational Energy (OE) education is vital for national security, military readiness, and fuel energy efficiency. This thesis analyzes the current landscape of OE education and identifies key gaps in awareness, energy knowledge, and curriculum structure. Through a reflexive thematic analysis of interviews with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), the study underscores the necessity of integrating OE concepts into both educational and professional training programs. A framework is proposed to enhance OE education across various levels in the Air Force, aiming to cultivate a more energy-conscious and strategically prepared force. The findings highlight the critical need for targeted training, curriculum enhancements, and …

Participatory Defense And Three Pillars Of Criminal Injustice, Isis Misdary

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Deputization And Privileged White Violence, Ekow N. Yankah

Articles

A number of high-profile and racially charged killings, such as Trayvon Martin’s, Kenneth Herring’s, Ahmaud Arbery’s, and Jordan Neely’s, have been at the hands of civilians declaring themselves the law. These deaths stemmed from a phenomenon best described as “deputization.” Deputization describes a latent legal power that has empowered White people throughout American history to claim authority to enforce the law, as they see it, upon racial minorities generally and Black people in particular. This power turned the ancient common law duty to police all felons in England into a specific American common law duty to police Blacks. From the …

A Scalable Architecture For Visualizing And Analyzing Crime Data In La, Sangwhan Cha, Devyani Patra, Linging Jiang, Shamita Manvi, Wen Shi, Yi Chao

Harrisburg University Other Works

This paper presents the design and implementation of a scalable data pipeline and interactive dashboards for analyzing crime patterns in Los Angeles using data from the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). The pipeline was built on Amazon Web Services (AWS), where data was ingested through Python scripts, stored in Amazon S3, processed with AWS Glue, and loaded into Amazon Redshift. Tableau was integrated for real-time visualization, enabling exploration of geographic, temporal, and demographic trends. Analysis revealed that the Central, 77th Street, and Pacific divisions consistently report the highest crime rates, with vehicle theft, battery/simple assault, and burglary as the most …

Examining The Relationship Between Police Officers’ Characteristics And Police Shootings, Denise D. Brown

Dissertations (2016-Present)

Police deviance, specifically police shootings, has been an ongoing issue and topic of discussion. Prior research has primarily focused on victim characteristics such as age, race, and gender, with limited exploration of police officer characteristics in relation to shootings. This study aims to understand the relationship between police officer characteristics and officer-involved shootings (OIS) and killings. Using state-level data collected over a 5-year period, this research examined how officer demographics correlate with shooting incidents. Findings indicated that officers' age and gender are not significant predictors of police shootings or killings, whereas officer race is a significant predictor of involvement in …

Exploratory Study Of The Relationship Between Housing Affordability And Violent Crime, Larence Budrich Snowden

Dissertations (2016-Present)

This dissertation investigates the complex relationship between violent crime and affordable housing through a mixed-methods approach. It merges quantitative crime data with qualitative insights from residents of public housing developments and areas concentrated with housing choice vouchers in Houston, Texas. The study aims to understand the statistical dimensions of crime and the subjective perceptions of residents living within areas of affordable housing and adjacent to these communities. The backdrop of this research focuses on Houston's metropolitan area housing landscape. The city is characterized by clusters of significant concentrations of affordable housing, primarily through traditional public housing developments and the allocation …

Individual Liberty, Safety And Police Liabilities Under The Mental Health (Care And Treatment) Act, Gary Kok Yew Chan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

How should a society strike a balance between the objective of ensuring safety from dangers that may be posed by individuals believed to have a mental disorder and the deprivation of their liberty? How should police officers discharge their duties in apprehending such individuals with a view to conveying them to a medical practitioner at a psychiatric institution? These legal issues took centrestage in the Singapore High Court decision of Mah Kiat Seng v Attorney-General in which the apprehended individual brought claims in false imprisonment against a police officer. The decision examined the underlying purposes of the Singapore Mental Health …

Mainstreaming Parafamily, Elizabeth F. Emens

Faculty Scholarship

In Parafamily, Chen and Mulligan have managed to cover vast terrain, to catalogue important developments in law, to canvass insights from generations of thinkers, and to propose an ambitious yet pragmatic approach to the laws that govern human relationships, directly and indirectly. They do all this in a relatively short article composed of unusually readable prose. Quite a feat.

The focus of the piece is Chen and Mulligan’s contribution to the field of legal scholarship dedicated to relationships that go beyond the traditional nuclear family. As their title reveals, the authors contribute a new term and concept to this …

Examining The Value Of Industry-Recognized Certifications In Illinois Secondary Career And Technical Education Programs, Nancy Awdziejczyk

Dissertations

The goal of career and technical education (CTE) is to equip students for success in postsecondary education and the workforce. This study investigated the integration and impact of industry-recognized certifications (IRCs) within CTE programs in Illinois, particularly within the framework of Perkins V legislation. The research aimed to determine how IRCs enhance employability, increase starting salaries, and support career advancement for high school students through aligning CTE curricula with the demands of the current labor market.

The study was initiated due to difficulties in identifying valuable certifications for CTE programs stemming from the excessive number of certifying organizations and unclear …

Assessing Alexithymia In Law Enforcement: The Role Of Service Tenure And Sex, Elfego J. Gallardo Jr

Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Alexithymia, characterized by difficulties in identifying and expressing emotions, has significant implications for professions requiring emotional intelligence and trauma-informed response. Law enforcement officers routinely navigate high-stress encounters that demand emotional regulation, clear communication, and empathy, yet those with alexithymic traits may struggle in these areas, potentially affecting interactions with victims, suspects, and the community. This study examined the prevalence of alexithymia among front-line police officers in suburban municipal agencies within the Chicago metropolitan area, using the Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20 (TAS-20) as a standardized assessment. The research addressed three questions: (1) What proportion of officers exhibited normative or elevated levels …

Abolition By Algorithm, Peter N. Salib

Michigan Law Review

In one sense, America’s newest abolitionist movement—advocating the elimination of policing and prison—has been a success. Following the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, a small group of self-described radicals convinced a wide swath of ordinary liberals to accept a sweeping claim: Mere reforms cannot meaningfully reduce prison and policing’s serious harms. Only elimination can. On the other hand, abolitionists have failed to secure lasting policy change. The difficulty is crime. In 2021, following a nationwide uptick in homicides, liberal support for abolitionist proposals collapsed. Despite being newly “abolition curious,” left-leaning voters consistently rejected concrete abolitionist policies. Faced with the difficult …

March 2025, Office Of Sustainability

Office of Sustainability Newsletter

No abstract provided.

The Roddey Mcmillan Record - March 2025, Winthrop University

The RMR 2020-2029

The Roddey McMillan Record (RMR) is Winthrop’s monthly multicultural student publication. The RMR has been a significant voice of the minority population of the Winthrop community since its creation by Gail Harris in April 1986. It promotes awareness and understanding of issues concerning minorities for the prosperity of the entire Winthrop community. The purpose of the RMR is to shine light on the many diverse cultures at Winthrop, focusing on issues, concerns and happenings of those who represent the multicultural community on campus. The Roddey McMillan Record is named after Dr. Cynthia Roddey and Atty, Sheila McMillan. Cynthia Roddey was …

Generative Ai And Llms For Critical Infrastructure Protection: Evaluation Benchmarks, Agentic Ai, Challenges, And Opportunities, Yagmur Yigit, Mohamed Amine Ferrag, Mohamed C. Ghanem, Iqbal H. Sarker, Leandros A. Maglaras, Christos Chrysoulas, Naghmeh Moradpoor, Norbert Tihanyi, Helge Janicke

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Critical National Infrastructures (CNIs)—including energy grids, water systems, transportation networks, and communication frameworks—are essential to modern society yet face escalating cybersecurity threats. This review paper comprehensively analyzes AI-driven approaches for Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP). We begin by examining the reliability of CNIs and introduce established benchmarks for evaluating Large Language Models (LLMs) within cybersecurity contexts. Next, we explore core cybersecurity issues, focusing on trust, privacy, resilience, and securability in these vital systems. Building on this foundation, we assess the role of Generative AI and LLMs in enhancing CIP and present insights on applying Agentic AI for proactive defense mechanisms. Finally, …

Mired In Meyer’S Mischief A Century After Fabrication Of Constitutional Parents’ Rights, James G. Dwyer

The Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues

The seminal Supreme Court decisions Meyer v. Nebraska and Pierce v. Society of Sisters, now commemorated on their centenary anniversary, are odd doctrinal ducks. They are both still routinely cited as the foundation for ascribing to persons on whom the state has conferred legal parent status a right under the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause of the United States Constitution. (According to Westlaw, judicial citation count for Meyer now nears 3000, and secondary-source citations have surpassed 7000.) It is a constitutional right to force states to confer on them greater legal power than the state is otherwise inclined to …

Meyer, Pierce, And Everything After, Michael Bindas

The Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues

For a century, the U.S. Supreme Court has provided substantive protection, through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, to a parent’s liberty interest in directing the education and upbringing of her children. The seminal cases for this protection—Meyer v. Nebraska and Pierce v. Society of Sisters—are widely considered part of the Court’s canon, and the Court has long referred to the liberty interest, or right, that they recognized as “fundamental.” But despite the long pedigree and significance of this right—and despite the Court’s common application of strict scrutiny to laws that restrict or draw classifications impacting …

Landlord Licensure: A Pathway To Improved Rental Housing In New Mexico, Stefanie N. Jock

New Mexico Law Review

Over a thousand different professions throughout the United States are subject to occupational regulations for the purpose of protecting public health, safety, and welfare. Yet, few professions are as crucial to public health, safety and welfare as the business that controls access to rental housing. The availability of rental housing is critical to the people of New Mexico due to the state’s high percentage of low-income households and the shortage of affordable housing units available in recent years. Thus, low-income renters in New Mexico are often left dealing with substandard housing conditions or paying a significant portion of their income …

Should Tort Law Care About Police Officers?, Ellen M. Bublick, Jane R. Bambauer

UF Law Faculty Publications

Should police officers be able to file tort lawsuits for injuries that they suffer while on duty? In this article, written in response to Professor Sarah L. Swan's The Plaintiff Police, Professors Ellen M. Bublick and Jane R. Bambauer contend that racial equality is not served by complete immunities for civilian misconduct any more than “law and order” is served by complete immunities for police officers who abuse their power. Rather, they argue that the common law has expanded, and should continue to expand, the civil legal rights of wrongfully injured people, including people wrongfully injured while employed as police …

Annual Comprehensive Financial Report, Hamilton County, For The Year Ended June 30, 2025, Tennessee. Comptroller Of The Treasury.

Tennessee County Audit Reports

No abstract provided.

Board Of Trustees Minutes, Feb. 28 2025, Indiana State University Board Of Trustees

Board of Trustees

No abstract provided.

Board Of Trustees Agenda, Feb. 28 2025, Indiana State University Board Of Trustees

Board of Trustees

No abstract provided.

Retention Of Volunteer Firefighters In A Combination Department, Timothy J. Tieperman

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This researcher embarked on a doctoral journey to study an existential problem impacting the recruitment and retention of volunteer firefighters in suburban Philadelphia, where he serves as municipal manager. The purpose of the study was to gain insightful answers to the specific problem of volunteer firefighters declining at a seemingly precipitous rate, especially in combination departments where paid and volunteer firefighters must work together to respond to emergencies in a timely manner. Using a flexible design multiple case study approach, the researcher studied two combination units located within the suburban collar counties of metropolitan Philadelphia. They were Upper Providence Township …

Marijuana Legalization Policy And Federal Drug Task Force Programs: A Study Of Drug Control Federalism, Kendal D. Johnson

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this multiple case study was to examine and understand the influence of state cannabis legalization measures on the drug enforcement function of federal and state-local investigators working in the DEA Task Force Program operating in states that have legalized marijuana. Since America is experiencing an ongoing drug epidemic, phenomena like state cannabis legalization measures may impact the efficacy of national drug control policy and worsen the crisis. This study and its findings are therefore important because federal drug task force programs underpin the conduct of America’s national drug control policy. Federalism and intergovernmental relations are used in …

Testimony Of The District Task Force On Jails & Justice Before The Committee On The Judiciary And Public Safety Of The Council Of The District Of Columbia Performance Oversight Hearing For The Department Of Corrections February 27, 2025, Katherine S. Broderick

D.C. Council Testimony

No abstract provided.

Finance Committee Meeting - Open Session Book 02/27/2025, Uc Law Sf

2025 Board of Directors Agenda and Materials

No abstract provided.

Debtor's Objection To Committee Motion Re: Credibly Accused List

Catholic Dioceses in Bankruptcy

No abstract provided.