Research Methodology for Director Elections Analysis

Research Methodology for Director Elections Analysis The director and board performance from the perspectives of voting shareholders, the implementation of majority-approved shareholder proposals provide a more specific and tighter measure for the actions boards take to do their jobs. For this comprehensive exam paper, I will focus on votes withheld for director elections because implementation of majority-approved shareholder proposals requires non-trivial hand collection and might decrease the sample size significantly. This measure has several important merits in multiple directorships setting compared with commonly used measures. First, it has been well documented that reputational concerns from the director labor market, the increasing prevalence of vote-no campaigns, and increased prevalence of corporates voluntary adoption of Majority Voting standards makes votes withheld from director elections a good proxy for shareholder general evaluation of director, committee, and board performance. (Georgeson 2000-2016). Second, while uncontested shareholder voting rarely remove specific directors, the voting outcomes of director elections are associated with subsequent board conduct, governance changes and firm performance (Del Guercio, Seery, and Woidtke [2008], Cai, Garner, and Walkling [2009], Fischer, Gramlich, Miller, and White [2009], Ertimur, Ferri, and Muslu [2011], Ertimur, et al. [2015]). Third, academics and practitioners have consensus that the threshold of 20% of votes withheld represents s ubstantial shareholder dissatisfaction. (Del Guercio et al. [2008], Cai et al. [2009], Fischer et al. [2009], Ertimur, et al. [2011], Ertimur et al. [2015]). Fourth, data for this measure on individual director level is directly available, and can be easily aggregated to get measures on committee level and board level. For the aggregate level, I can use either the average percentage of votes withheld per director, or the percentage of directors with substantial shareholder dissatisfaction (at least 20 % votes withheld) of committees, or boards. In sum, to better measure the effort exerted by directors and the value added by boards, I use a comprehensive list of complementary performance metrics: voting outcome of director election, serving on committees and attendance rate at board meetings on individual director level; voting outcome, CEO turnover sensitivity to performance, excessive CEO pay, and financial reporting misstatement on committee level, and voting outcome, market-to-book ratio (M/B) and return on sales (ROS) on firm level. 3. Sample, data, empirical results, and additional analyses 3.1. Sample and data To answer these questions, I study the multiple directorships policies for SP 1500 firms for the period from 2000 to 2016. First, I construct a dataset of director-level data for SP 1500 firms from the Institutional Shareholder Services ((formerly MSI, IRRC, and RiskMetrics) Directors Database from 2000-2016. I restrict my sample to SP 1500 firms to make the data collection manageable. This dataset contains information on director attendance and a range of other director characteristics (e.g., name, age, tenure, gender, committee memberships, independence classification, primary employer and title, number of other public company boards serving on, shares owned, etc.) which are collected by ISS from company proxy statements, annual reports or company websites. My first multiple directorships measure, Multiple Directorships_traditional, are retrieved from this database directly.ÂÂ   Based on the directors total number of meetings required to attend and whether they attended fewer than 75%, I also construct a measure, Current Distraction, to better capture the time demand and the distraction effect of multiple directorships. To test H1 and H2, we need to know director attendance immediately before and immediately after firms adopt overboarding rules. However, only annual attendance data is publicly available. In addition, many overboarding policies set grace periods explicitly or implicitly. Therefore, I use the director attendance the year before adoption year to test H1, and the director attendance the year after adoption year to test H2. Next, I require these firms to have accounting data from Compustat, stock return and pricing data from CRSP, corporate-governance provisions data from ISS Governance database, director elections voting data from ISS Voting Analytics (VA) database, and financial reporting restatement data from AuditAnalytics database. (access?) For firm performance, I measure the market-to-book ratio (M/B) and return on sales (ROS), measured at the lagged fiscal year-end, to compare with previous literature (Fich and Shivdasani [2006], Field, et al. [2013]). Then I use BoardEx database, which includes profiles of executives and directors (demographics, education and career history, compensation, board and committee memberships, etc.) and the connections among them, to construct my second sets of measures of multiple directorships, Multiple Directorships_public, Multiple Directorships_private, and Multiple Directorships_total. Using BoardEx database, I also construct two measures of director qualification, Accumulated Directorships Experience and General Qualification, which reflect director qualification but are not necessarily associated with their current busyness. BoardExs coverage of U.S. public companies is extremely limited prior to 2000, causing serious survivorship bias (see, Fracassi and Tate [2012], Engelberg, Gao, and Parsons, [2013]). Similar to previous literature which also uses the BoardEx database, I focus on the period after 2000 to mitigate these concerns. It needs to be noted that while BoardEx database suffers survivo rship bias and some other issues, using BoardEx provides several important merits for my research. First, it provides information about directors seats on significant private firms and gives a better measure of directors total workload. Second, it allows me to test directors seats choices between public firms and private firms. Third, it provides information to construct a measure of directors resources/talent which is not necessarily connect with their current busyness. Finally, I hand-collect information on firms overboarding policies for this sample. Normally, firms overboarding policies are disclosed in their governance principles/governance guidelines. I retrieve firms current overboarding policies from their websites, and their historical overboarding policies from the Internet Archive library, which archives over hundreds of billion historical web pages on the Internet. ( https://archive.org/web/)

Causes of Stalking and Experiences

Causes of Stalking and Experiences Stalking is an issue that affects 1.5 million people each year. While women are commonly the general target, men can become victims of stalkers as well. Stalkers share similar traits, each of which fuel what they do. Oftentimes a stalkers motives are as easily profiled as their traits. Stalkers commonly share similar personality characteristics as well as reasons for doing what they do (Michele, 2002). Stalking has been around since the beginning of time. Men and women alike have been accused of such a crime because they either cant get it out of their head that the other person does not want to have anything to do with them, or they are just obsessed with a stranger. It is just recent that the UK Government has decided to make stalking a crime in it self. This type of crime was labelled as harassment, annoyance, or domestic violence. It wasnt until the 80s and 90s that stalking cases were brought to the attention of the media and high political policy makers (Michele, 2002). Discussion Many stalkers are loners. Because of the lack of other relationships, they become severely attached to the idea of possessing a relationship with the person who they are stalking (Paul, 2000). In many cases, the lack of ability to form relationships starts at a young age. Some stalkers are neglected by their parents, and in turn are unable to form attachments with other people later on in life. This causes them to be extremely lonely, which is a main characteristic of a stalker. This lack of personal relationships, combined with a low self-esteem creates a feeling of worthlessness (Michele, 2002). They feel like without a connection with the person they are stalking, they have no purpose in life. This is one reason for most celebrity stalking. The idea of establishing a connection with a person of high status becomes appealing, because these stalkers believe that they will acquire a higher level of importance. When this does not happen, stalkers can often become extremely angry, even violent toward that person. Frustration builds up, and they do not know how to deal with the situation. This can sometimes lead to stalker related deaths. A common characteristic shared by most stalkers is their lack of anxiety, and even shame in a stalking scenario (Paul, 2000). In most situations, a person would be absolutely beyond embarrassed to be caught snooping around in another persons personal belongings. Rummaging through someones garbage in order to find personal information would be so inappropriate that the average person would not even consider it. Beyond that, if they were, in fact, caught in the act, most people would be completely mortified. Stalkers, on the other hand, do not think this way. No action is too out of line. Stalkers see it as an attempt to gain the love of the person that they are stalking. These people seem to be immune to anxiety and discomfort, and in turn they have no trouble continuing in their pursuit. Some of the tasks that are carried out by stalkers are quite difficult. Stalkers need way more intelligence than one would assume that they have. But although many of them have mental disorders, most stalkers are much smarter than the average person. Obtaining information about a person is not usually the easiest task, but stalkers may go as far as changing jobs in order to do so. Stalkers sometimes learn how to tap into phone conversations, hack into computers, and spend thousands of dollars to find a particular person, or information about that person. Psychologists have long puzzled over the way in which individuals may act differently in identical situations, resulting in various strands of personality theory to have emerged within the realm of psychology each attempting to explain personality traits at various levels , these being experimental, psychometric and clinical (Michele, 2000). Butt (2004) notes how Eysencks theory although presented as a clinical approach to understanding individual difference, was fundamentally rooted within the psychometric tradition which emerged from within the mainstream paradigm in the early twentieth century. Most famously to appear from this era was the Likert scale- a graded style response questionnaire which had been engineered for attitude measurement. For Eysenck however psychometric testing aided the process of assessing and predicting individual levels and likelihood of extroversion or neuroticism by reducing dimensions of personality ranging on a bipolar scale from unstable to stable to either being classified as a typical extrovert or introvert. According to Eysneck the reduction of variables in personality traits to either extroversion or neuroticism could be biologically explained by differences in the cortical and autonomic arousal systems . According to Eysnecks Personality Inventory individuals who were perceived with introspective, quiet, reserved and generally unsociable traits were classified as having a high N score whilst those who appeared optimistic, talkative, sociable and outgoing were prescribed a high E score. This lies in contrast to Eysencks model of a fixed personality which appears to be unaffected by external circumstance . In addition, Salmons re- working and application of theories in the context of educational learning has shown how her intervention of the Salmon Line provides a basis for facilitating change (Jens, 2008). Salmons intentions in developing the Salmon Line were aimed at providing a tool that could stretch beyond diagnostic mo del and assist the learning process. The success of technique has been attributed to the ways in which behaviour change and learning is enhanced through eliciting pupils and teachers experiences and identifying areas of conflict and collaboration. The approach is rich in subjective experience captivating the diversity that exists amongst individuals and allowing for reflexivity in its approach. In summary for PCT theorists, differences in personality is viewed as a reflection of the complex ways in which individuals build constructions of their world rather than a simply reflection of innate biological forces. Having contrasted Eysnecks theory with others people shall now explore to what use and purposes such theories can apply as well as their validity in either upholding an agency-structure dualistic approach or seeking to dissolve it (Jens, 2008). Stalkers often also possess the ability to manipulate friends and family members of the person who they are stalking (Thomas, 2003). They will find ways to trick the people into giving away information about the person they are harassing. This involves a higher level of intelligence than that of an average person. Often, people who stalk celebrities suffer from a condition called erotomania, which is also known as de Clerambaults syndrome. Stalkers fall deeply in love with a person and in their own mind, that person is in love with them as well. Stalkers will watch the actions of the person very closely, and even if they have never met the person before in their life, they believe that that person is in love with them as well. Stalkers may dream up an entire relationship, such as Margaret Ray did when she told people that she was David Lettermans wife. Not only did she claim to be married to Letterman, but one day she showed up at his house carrying a baby which she demanded was his (Letterman stalker killed by train in apparent suicide)(Thomas, 2003). Sometimes people will stalk celebrities simply because they desire the fame and status of those people. Michael Lewittes article Serial Celebrity Daters describes the lives of Lisa Chiafullo and Jennifer Young-two girls who are obsessed with being obsessed (Joseph, 2001). Each of these girls began dating the stars at young ages. While Jennifer grew up in luxury in Beverly Hills, Lisa was on welfare and in bad financial shape. While Jennifer enjoyed the high life and luxury of dating celebrities, Lisa sometimes counted on meals, shelter and money from celebrities to keep her head above water. The desire is summed up perfectly by Lisa (Joseph, 2001). She always wanted to be somebody so if she couldnt be somebody; she wanted to date someone who was. This type of thinking is what causes many fans to turn into fanatics. They obsessed over people simply because of whom they are and how famous they are. Stalking is not only limited to celebrities, however average people are in danger of being stalked just as well (Thomas, 2003). In the case of simple obsession stalkers, victims arent chosen based on celebrity status or popularity, rather their past relationships with the stalker. Simple obsession stalkers harass people who they have been involved with in previous relationships, most of the time; the victim puts an end to the relationship, which seems to be tragic to the stalker. Suddenly, the stalker feels that his or her life has been destroyed, and that they simply cannot live without having that person back. The reasoning behind the stalking is that they feel like they have no self worth in the world and that its a necessity to have the person back in order to regain their identity and power that they once had. The person falls into a deep state of denial, refusing to accept the idea that they will have to go on in life without that person. Stalking is not always based on positive feelings and desire to by love. Some people stalk to seek revenge or simply out of pure hatred for a person. Sometimes stalking can occur in the workplace. A large number of murders due to stalking are carried out by people who have recently been fired from a job and who want to get revenge on the person who fired them. Psychotherapists sometimes become targets of stalking as well. They are severely harassed by former patients of theirs. Dissatisfaction, anger, and hatred are a few reasons that can fuel stalkers to harass and sometimes abuse- or even kill their victims (Thomas, 2003). Taking charge and admitting there is a domestic abuse problem is the key to starting to take back ones life, but the legal system must also be utilized to ensure individual rights are preserved and protected (Joseph, 2001). While great strides have been made in recent years to strengthen laws and educate judges on how to address domestic violence cases effectively, there is still work to be done. Some domestic violence cases have languished in district circuit courts for years. Because there are weak justices and numerous loop holes in the written law, there are criminals who will return to society un-rehabilitated seeking revenge or to target another to abuse. The feminist movement during the 1970s fundamentally changed societys attitude towards domestic violence (Logan, 2006). Women who formerly had been battered and abused developed services for domestic violence victims. They also lobbied for government support of these services and raised awareness of domestic violence. Since then, numerous changes have taken place to address the problem of domestic violence. Class action lawsuits and civil-damage suits forced law enforcement agencies to revise their policies and adapt processes to better address domestic violence. Domestic violence incidents were, in many states, established as crimes against the state, resulting in the victim no longer having to press charges. Law enforcement officers today are often trained on how to respond to domestic violence incidents. The medical community also felt the need to act in response to domestic violence. In Delaware, for example, the Delaware Coalition against Domestic Violence together with Delaware s medical community and the Domestic Violence Coordinating Council (DVCC) developed a manual for healthcare providers addressing how to respond to domestic violence (Stephen, 2002). The DVCC also trains hospitals and clinics, police officers, prosecutors, judicial officers, court personnel, executives, faith-based personnel, social workers, advocates, probation officers, and therapists throughout the First State on domestic violence. While most laws pertaining to domestic violence are on the state level, the federal government also responded to domestic violence. For example, it is a federal offence to travel from one state to another to commit domestic violence or to force an intimate partner to cross state lines in an attempt to commit domestic violence. Additionally, the federal government passed interstate stalking legislation making it a federal offence to cross state lines in an attempt to stalk a victim, and also barred offenders from carrying and owning weapons. The Violence against Women Act (VAWA) further protects victims of domestic violence and provides funding for services. VAWA also requires that the victim, if so desired, be heard at a bail hearing with regard to the danger posed by the defendant. VAWA also stipulates that the victim be reimbursed for costs occurred to the victim in obtaining a restraining order and other costs connected to a domestic violence conviction. Another important aspect o f VAWA is the ability for battered and abused spouses and children of citizens and lawful permanent residents to self-petition for independent legal residency. Before VAWA, immigrant victims had to fear deportation when leaving an abusive relationship (Logan, 2006). Since the late 1970s, states took an active role in domestic violence prevention. About a third of domestic violence outreach and services are funded from state level (Stephen, 2002). Most states have laws that allow prosecutors to charge abusers without having to involve the victim. Many times victims are no longer are required to testify against their abusers. In 1997, a total of seven states and the nations capital had mandatory arrest laws on the books that required law enforcement to make an arrest if there is evidence of an assault. Even more states encouraged such arrests. A 1984 study showed that arresting abusers lowered the re-arrest rate within the next 6 months for domestic violence to 10%. However, more studies are needed to replicate these findings (Stephen, 2002). According to the study, most intimate partner abuse is not reported to law enforcement, making it difficult to know exactly how many men and women are abused. Only about 20 percent of all rapes, 25 percent of physical assaults, and 50% of stalking incidents against women were reported to law enforcement. The number of victimizations of men by intimate partners reported to police is even smaller. A general belief that the police cannot help or would not do anything keeps victims from reporting abuse or stalking incidents (Stephen, 2002). Many positions related to domestic violence are held by social workers. Social workers often help clients build s support system by referring them to resources they need and by helping them gain access to such services. Social workers may also be involved in crisis and long term counselling to help victims make significant decisions. Additionally, social workers may develop and co-lead support groups for victims, lobby on a national or state level for funding, and perform advocacy work. Advocacy work may include fund raising, training, explaining domestic violence, speaking to the media about domestic violence, developing materials to give to battered women, and community education. These are only a few of the essential functions performed by social workers in the domestic violence field. In 1993, following the murder of a woman by her ex-lover, who violently harassed her in breach of a protection order before killing her , the New South Wales Parliament responded by enacting a separate offence of Stalking which is now part of the Crimes Act. Stalking is conduct that is harassing or threatening, directed at a person with the intention to cause intimidation or fear. It is a form of non-physical violence, causing psychological and emotional abuse (Logan, 2006). The awakening of concern about this type of behaviour was caused by its prevalence in domestic violence cases. Firstly, the nature of the offence of stalking makes it inappropriate to prosecute under the current law of criminal assault. Related to this is the severe impact that stalking behaviour inflicts on its victims. The current law of assault is simply not broad enough to deal with the complexities that arise from an offence such as stalking. Assault is an act, which intentionally or recklessly causes another to apprehend immediate and unlawful personal violence, charged under s61 of the Crimes Act. At the essence of the offence of assault is a requirement that the threat created by the offender must cause a fear of imminent violence in the victim. Stalking involves instances where a person does not explicitly threaten their victim but silently follows them around or sits outside their dwelling. When placed in this context, such behaviour is dangerous beyond its immediate significance. Although, it is difficult to charge this as assault since it is not sufficient that the threat raises apprehension that violence will be inflicted at some time in the future. The inability to prosecute an offence that is of a similar nature to stalking under the law of assault was apparent in the case of Knight. Knight had made a series of phone calls threatening to kill or injure those involved his prior conviction, including a policeman, a magistrate and to a judge who later dismissed his appeal (Logan, 2006). On appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeal, his conviction for these offences was quashed on the basis that the requirement of a threat of immediate violence was not satisfied. Even though his behaviour caused fear and was dangerous, it fell short of the necessary accuses and hence could not be sanctioned under the law of criminal assault (Paul, 2000). Alternatively, the case of Ireland demonstrates an instance where an offence with characteristics that can be likened to stalking was successfully prosecuted under assault. The accused had proceeded to harass a woman whom he had a prior social relationship with, by making both silent and abusive phone calls, frequenting her place of work and home and taking photographs of the victim and her family. While fearful of personal violence the victim was also diagnosed with suffering a severe depressive illness. The offenders behaviour amounted to assault. This reasoning was founded on the fact that the victims fear of the caller arriving at her door could be seen as imminent since he may be making the calls in close proximity to her home and able to arrive at her door within minutes. However the legal reasoning in this case, has been criticised for being rather artificial by stretching assault beyond its natural legal meaning. As shown in Knight, most stalking cases are not suitable for pr osecution under the elements of criminal assault. The main area of assault also poses difficulty for the prosecution of stalking. It is constituted by intention to either affect an unlawful contact or to create an apprehension of imminent unlawful contact in the mind of the victim (Larry, 2000). Despite that the common law of assault is now more accommodating to the offence of stalking, through developing an interpretation of harm to include psychiatric as well as physical injury (Logan, 2006). It is still difficult to prove the imminence requirement in both of most stalking cases where the threat of harm is protracted rather than immediate (Sandra, 2007). Therefore, there is more rationale in treating stalking as a separate offence with its own specific elements rather than distorting the elements of assault to accommodate for the manifestations of stalking. The wide-ranging and severe impact of stalking further necessitates the need for a separate offence of stalking to deal with this crime. The psychological responses caused by stalking such as anxiety, fear, paranoia and often symptoms of post- traumatic stress disorder have been acknowledged in a study as emotions induced by stalkers. This research has found that 94% of victims have made changes to lifestyle patterns such as temporary or permanent relocation, changing personal contact information and even identities. Perhaps more compelling is that victims of a recent psychopathological study indicated that they might have coped better with more tangible damage of physical assault than with a stalkers constant intrusion and menace (Paul, 2000). Furthermore, stalking is often a precursor to severe and fatal physical violence as demonstrated in the case of Thomas v Burk. In this instance the applicant had been in a previous relationship with the complainant. After they separated, the complainant experienced many incidents of stalking such as receiving harassing telephone calls at work and being followed on a vacation trip. These incidents eventually escalated to physical abuse when on one occasion, the applicant stroked the complainant with such force across the face with an open hand that it caused injury to her eye. This is one of many cases that reflect the statistic that 80% of women who report being stalked by an intimate partner are eventually physically assaulted (Sandra, 2007). It therefore becomes apparent that there is a need to take preventative action. Such as prosecuting this behaviour under an offence of stalking at its early stage, rather than waiting until the situation amplifies and the victim is physically a ssaulted and only then taking action by prosecuting for assault. Sexual Harassment is defined as a continuum of behaviours that intimidate, demean, humiliate or coerce (Diane, 2006). These behaviours range from the subtle forms that can accumulate into a hostile working, learning, or worshipping environment to the most severe forms of stalking, assault or rape. For many businesses, preventing sexual harassment, and defending its managerial employees from sexual harassment charges, has become key goals of legal decision making. In contrast, many scholars complain that sexual harassment in education remains a forgotten secret, with educators and administrators refusing to admit the problem exist in their schools, or accept their legal and ethical responsibilities to deal with it. Previously stalking behaviour has been prosecuted as offensive conduct under s4 of the Summary Offences Act. An artificial reasoning was drawn by the courts that stalking was offensive from the fact that it was continued or repeated. While offensive conduct carries a light maximum penalty of three months this may be satisfactory for minor instances of stalking but it is a clearly an inappropriate reflection of the magnitude of behaviour that amounts to intimidation and harassment. The protracted nature of stalking and the serious implications on its victims necessitates the need for a specific offence of stalking with its own appropriate penalty in order to capture the severity of the offence. This is arguably more effective than collapsing this offence into the category of offensive conduct or treating it as criminal assault. The offender would then, also have to bear the stigma of being labelled a stalker (Larry, 2000). In 2006 study on sexual harassment at colleges and universities, it was reported that 62% of female college students and 61% of male college students report having been sexually harassed at their university, with 80% of the reported harassment being peer-to-peer. Fifty-one percent of male college students admit to sexually harassing someone in college, with 22% admitting to harassing someone often or occasionally (Diane, 2006). Thirty-one percent of female college students admitted to harassing someone in college. Sexual harassment can occur in a variety of circumstances. The harasser can be anyone, such as a supervisor, a client, a co-worker, a teacher or professor, a student, a friend, or a stranger. The victim does not have to be the person directly harassed but can be anyone who finds the behaviour offensive and is affected by it. While adverse effects on the victim are common, this does not have to be the case for the behaviour to be unlawful. The victim can be a male or female. The harasser can be male or female. The harasser does not have to be of the opposite sex. The harasser may be completely unaware that his or her behaviour is offensive or constitutes sexual harassment or may be completely unaware that his or her actions could be unlawful. There are however, some instances where a criminal sanction may not constitute an effective strategy of deterring further stalking even though the impact on the victim is traumatic. This mainly applies to the category of stalkers classified as erotomaniacs who are mentally ill. It would be more appropriate to deal with these stalkers through the mental health system as they are impervious to judicial sanctions and thus require assertive psychiatric management. The inefficacy of using stalking legislation to punish a perpetrator who has a psychiatric condition was illustrated in the case of Strong v The Queen. The appellant had been sentenced to imprisonment for the offence of stalking a female contrary to s562ABof the Crimes Act 1900(NSW) (Paul, 2000). Whilst serving his sentence in prison, the accused began writing sexually suggestive letters to another female with whom he had no prior relationship. After his release, he continued with his stalking behaviour by following and watchin g her and subsequently moved to live opposite her home. This conduct became the basis of another substantive charge of stalking for which he was again imprisoned. On appeal of this conviction the issue was raised that he had been diagnosed with suffering symptoms of psychosis. The Criminal Court of Appeal agreed that in cases such as this, the offenders condition should be managed under mental health legislation rather than sanctioned under the criminal law. This case demonstrates the inability of the criminal law to deter psychiatrically ill stalkers as the rate of recidivism of people in this category suggests. However, it is important to note that the majority population of stalkers are from the intimate category of non- psychotic ex partners and are not mentally ill at the time of committing the offence. Courts can issue an Apprehended Domestic Violence Order under s562AE of the Crimes Act 1900(NSW) or an Apprehended Personal Violence Order under s562AI of the Crimes Act 1900(NSW). Unfortunately this method of dealing with stalking offences is often criticised for having little effect on serious obsessive behaviours exhibited by some offenders. A recent study has shown that after issuance of an apprehended violence order, stalking and physical violence was reduced in the first six months only to reoccur in over half the cases of women who undertook the study. This shows that these orders are an inappropriate long-term prevention tool. Helen Katzen reported in her study that of the 22,556 apprehended violence orders granted in New South Wales in 1998, 9,647 breaches were recorded by the police (Joseph, 2001). The ease with which these orders are breached and the fact that they are not taken seriously is reflected in the case of Long field v Glover. The appellant had been in a relation ship with the complainant. When the relationship ended she obtained an apprehended domestic violence order, which prohibited the appellant contacting her. He disregarded this order and persisted calling her at home and at work, making threatening statements such as I control your life (Michele, 2002). Similarly in the case of R v Powell, the appellant had broken into the victims premises in breach of an apprehended violence order and maliciously wounded her by stabbing her twice in the back. Both these cases demonstrate the inability of these orders to deter offenders which highlights how inefficient a mechanism they, are for dealing with such behaviour. Furthermore, apprehended violence orders were found in many cases to be aggravating factors, which exacerbate the likelihood of violence (Paul, 2000). This was exemplified in the case of Igbinoba v Commissioner of New South Wales Police Service, where a court issuance of an apprehended domestic violence order aroused further anger in the defendant towards the complainant, which resulted in a threat being made towards her that he was going to get her (Paul, 2000). Shortly after receiving the order, the defendant started a campaign of harassment against her and physically assaulted her. Recent research shows that incarceration has a sobering effect on stalkers and allows them to adjust their lives. This supports the idea that a more preventative approach would be to immediately prosecute this behaviour under an offence of stalking with a prison sentence, rather than wait for breach of an order to occur by which time the situation may have escalated to a degree of violence. While, it is impractical to contain all stalking offences by criminalising them, it is also inefficient for the court to proceed with prosecuting minor nuisances under the stalking legislation. Many of these cases would not lead to any conviction due to the lack of the requisite intent necessary to prove the offence. In 1998, two example cases were given by the model criminal code committee where stalking legislation was used inappropriately (Joseph, 2001). In the first case a fourteen year old girl had stalked her teacher, by following him around school and singing a mocking song about the teacher. In the later case Yugoslavian parents had stalked their teenage daughters because they had moved away from home in violation of family traditions. These stalking incidents are more commonly known as conformist who is the stalking falls within the acceptable range of social behaviour rather than criminal stalking. Neither of these cases led to convictions. In circumstances such as these, a pplicants are more likely to succeed in obtaining apprehended violence orders since they would only be required to prove on the balance of probabilities, that they are in fear of the other person and that these fears could culminate into an act of personal violence or harassing conduct (Sandra, 2007). With advances in technology people see new and scary ways criminals commit crimes. With the introduction of cell phones and scanners years ago, criminals could listen to police radio traffic and see where and how we police were responding. No need for look outs, technology became the look out. Now in the computer age people see crimes from identity theft and hacking into computers to steal personal and corporate confidential information to cyber stalking and sexual predating to cell phone cloning. Criminals have a whole new playground and the playground as technology advances (Lorraine, 2008). But technology is not just for criminals. Law enforcement agencies are using technology to make police work more effective and efficient. Also police and communities are also using technology to make their communities safer. Cyber stalking is described as the procedure or offense of deliberately and constantly irritating another person in situation that would cause a sensible person to panic harm or death because of articulated or obscured fears is a comparatively latest trouble. Annoying others over the Internet is a little that usually happens, but the word constantly placed in front of that report can make a huge distinction. If someone is causing a nescience that interferes with ones professional or individual life it is measured stalking. Catching the criminals of computer is the tough part. There are Computer Crime Stopper groups, hackers turned excellent, whose only intention and job is to track down and catch criminals of computer (Keith, 2002). Activity of tracking computer is a hard thing to do, particularly over the Internet. There is no track left for the criminal to be followed through. Generally the only things crime-stoppers have to go on are the IP addresses and telecommunication lines to trace to find the source of the signal, but the performer is generally long gone through the time authorities arrive. Anticipation is a vital part in defending the computers of these days. Through secure servers, which are particular c

Free Essays - Along Came A Spider :: spider

  James Patterson wrote Along Came A Spider.   The genre is adult fiction.   It is a good novel because it has a great mystery in it.   This novel also has a lesson in it.   The lesson is not to tie your family up with your work.   The setting in this novel takes place in Washington DC from 1932-1934.   Gary Soneji, (a.k.a. Gary Murphy) is a serial killer who kidnapped two children, Maggie Rose, the golden-haired daughter of a famous movie actress.   The other child was Shrimpie Goldberg, the son of the Secretary of the Treasury.   Gary Soneji dragged these two kids from place to place all over Washington.   When Gary is Gary Soneji, he commits crimes all the time.   When Gary is Gary Murphy, he is the perfect little angel who loves his family.   When he’s one Gary, he can’t remember the other Gary.   Gary Soneji kidnapped these two kids for a ransom of 3 million dollars.   Alex Cross is a detective who is out to get Gary.   Gary Soneji went after Alex’s kids, so Alex chased Gary around Washington and killed him in cold blood.   This novel shows person vs. person (Gary Soneji vs. Everyone) and person vs. self (Gary Soneji vs. Gary Murphy).   The setting in this novel takes place in the USA, mostly Washington DC.   The time period was from 1932-1934.   The setting is important because it took place in the projects, where lots of crimes were being committed all the time.   One minor character in this novel is Sampson.   Sampson knows Alex Cross better than his own two kids.   This is because Sampson is Alex’s partner in the police force.  Ã‚   Sampson hates Gary Soneji just as much as the next person, but unlike Alex, Sampson is afraid of Gary.   Sampson doesn’t have a wife or kids, so he hangs out at Alex’s house a lot.   Another minor character is Jezzie Flanagan.   She is Alex and Sampson’s boss at the police station.   She supports them 100%.   Jezzie had an affair with Alex at the end of the novel.   They went to Cuba for two months for â€Å"POLICE BUISNESS.†   I would say that the main character is Alex Cross.   I say this because from start to finish, he’s in every chapter.   Alex has two kids and he is divorced.   He works as the head at the police department.   His partner is Sampson and his boss is Jezzie Flanagan.

Tess Of The D Urbervilles - Finding A Place In Life :: essays research papers

Finding A Place In Life By human nature, people need a sense of belonging to be happy and fulfilled in life. It is more difficult for some to achieve this goal than others. Having friends and being loved is an important part of life for most people, yet if this is difficult for them to achieve, this goal could consume their life. This is true in Thomas Hardy's novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles, where Tess, a descriptively pretty young girl goes to great lengths to find her place in the world. She moves from town to town searching for her place in society. She first settles in the city of Marlott where she leads a simple life. "Tess at this time of her life was a mere vessel of emotion untinctured by experience" (Hardy 11). Tess continues to travel to different towns in hopes she will improve her life by finding the person she wishes to spend the rest of her life with. Throughout all this disruption in her life, "she is an ambitious woman in search of a new sensation" (Hardy 15). She continues to travel because she wants more from life and has the ambition to attempt to find her place. Tess had to cope with many threatening, dangerous, and sad situations during her search. The first occurs when she arrives in the growing town of Tantridge. There she worked as a dairymaid on the Flintcomb-Ash Farm. Even with her dislike for this job she continues to work at it for over two years until she knows for certain that this is not her place in the world. As she "progresses (she) wonder whether it would be wiser to return home. The resolve, however had been taken, and it seems Vacillating†¦ to abandon it now, unless for graver reasons" (Hardy 67). As she continues to live in Tantridge, she gets into fights, drinks, and ends up being raped and impregnated. Alec is the man who attempts to convince Tess that she belongs with him, and that they were meant to be together. In her heart Tess realizes Alec is not the man she wishes to be with. Unfortunately she continues on in the one-sided relationship which leads to Alec raping Tess. She does not yet know how s evere the consequences are for not being a pure woman. This idea of being a pure woman is so important in this period of time that Tess keeps it a secret even from Angel, who is her new love and the man she wants to spend the rest of her life with.

To Miss C.O. Y R.

To Miss C. O. y R. by Jose Rizal (A Translation from the Spanish by Nick Joaquin) Why ask for those unintellectual verses that once, insane with grief, I sang aghast? Or are you maybe throwing in my face my rank ingratitude, my bitter past? Why resurrect unhappy memories now when the heart awaits from love a sign, or call the night when day begins to smile, not knowing if another day will shine? You wish to learn the cause of this dejection delirium of despair that anguish wove?You wish to know the wherefore of such sorrows, and why, a young soul, I sing not of love? Oh, may you never know why! For the reason brings melancholy but may set you laughing. Down with my corpse into the grave shall go another corpse that's buried in my stuffing! Something impossible, ambition, madness, dreams of the soul, a passion and its throes Oh, drink the nectar that life has to offer and let the bitter dregs in peace repose! Again I feel the impenetrable shadows hrouding the soul with the thick veils of night: a mere bud only, not a lovely flower, because it's destitute of air and light Behold them: my poor verses, my damned brood and sorrow suckled each and every brat! Oh, they know well to what they owe their being, and maybe they themselves will tell you what. Translated from the Spanish by Nick JoaquinSource http://joserizal. info/Writings/Poetry/poetry. lwp. htm#To%20Josephina%20%28To%20Miss%20C. O. %20y%20R. %29

Disorder/Illness of hand

The hand of a man is one of most active organs of the body. It consists of various parts such as bones, muscles, fingers, thumbs, nerves and skin all of which can be affected by different forms of ailments. Common disorders in the hands include injuries, ganglia, and infections, ailments of the nerves, blood vessels, skin, osteoarthritis and tendonitis. Injuries can result to fractures on part of the bone, rupturing of ligaments and even dislocations (David, 2004). The largest part of the hand is composed of fingers.Disorders in this part of the hand may occur on the joints as a result of strained activity or due an infection of arthritis. The curling of the fingertip which leads to failure of the fingertip to straighten is known as the mallet finger. In most cases, this disorder results from an injury which leads to tearing of the tendon from the bone. This condition is treated by placing the affected finger in a straight position and maintaining it for some time to let the conditio n heal. Button-hole deformity is a disorder which affects the joint of the middle finger.The finger bends in a fixed position in the direction of the palm. In addition the outermost finger tends to portray an excessive bending in the direction away from the palm. This disorder is caused by the rheumatoid arthritis infection. The swelling on the finger joints forming cysts is known as osteoarthritis of the hand causes painful swellings on affected the part of the hand (David, 2004). Ganglion is another disorder which presents itself in form of gelatinous swellings which appear on the back of the palm or wrist.They develop into firm shaped swellings which protrude above the surface of the skin. Even though they are painless, ganglia causes a lot of discomfort on the patient which limits efficient use of hands. Infection disorders may be related to bacterial and viral infections. Common bacterial infections on the hand cause abscess or swellings. These may occur on parts with injured c ells such as wounds and bites. Application of antibiotic prevents the possibilities of getting these kinds of infections. Infections of the soft pulp tissue of the fingertip are known as felon.This causes swelling leading to death of surrounding tissues. The common viral infection on hand results in Herpetic Whitlow which is caused by the infection of herpes which spreads to hands forming fluid-filled blisters on the skin of the fingers. This disorder however disappears with treatment of herpes infection. Osteoarthritis presents itself through the extension of the bones over the outermost joints. This leads to formation of painful swelling on the finger joints. Joints between the fingers are not affected by the condition.The affected joints may be misaligned forming a crooked hand. Erosive osteoarthritis forms a swelling around the affected tissues. Sometimes the bands of the fibrous tissue (tendons) along the palms may tighten forming a claw like hand. This is known as palmar fibro matosis. It is treated trough injection of corticosteroid into the tendons. Severe cases may require a corrective surgery. This condition has been found to have hereditary characteristics and in most cases it affects men over the age of 45 years (Taylor, 2008).Numbness on hand is caused by the cutting of supply of blood or compression of the nerves at the wrist due to the bending of the wrist. This mostly happens when one is sleeping. Numbness as a result of compression of the nerves is referred to as Carpal Turner Syndrome (David, 2004). One is advised to keep the hand straight to prevent the development of this condition. Concisely, most of the ailments of the hands lead to a restriction on the use of the affected hands. Seeking of proper medical attention is necessary to rectify any condition in time.

Corporation and Florida International University Essay

I am writing this letter regarding my request for funding to attend a business writing course at Florida International University. This course is only held once a year in our area and it will be on the 11 day of July ending on the 13 day of July 2013. The business writing course is the only course held of its kind and it is the most cost-effective professional development opportunity available to me this year. The writing course offers all the tools, techniques and concepts related to business writing, such as critical problem solving with employee communication skills, this course will be a major benefit and provide me with additional knowledge on skills I already possess; by teaching me how to write more clear, crisp and effective. The course will also guide me on how to dissect business documents so that our organizational initiatives will accelerate and performance should increase within Smith International, I will also gain more knowledge on the clarity, impact, and overall professionalism of on-the-job e-mails, letters, and reports which I deal with on a day-to-day basis. The course will be taught by Dr. James Johnson; a world renowned professor for Harvard University Business School, Dr.  Johnson has written several books and has lectured at more than 100 universities worldwide, his expertise and recognition in business writing has not gone unnoticed. Dr. James Johnson has been recognized for his work with U. S government organizations for his ability to critique an array of documents, his ability to analyze policies of privately sealed government documents. He has made his mark and comprehension on business corporations and governments all over the world. The business writing course that will be held at Florida International University will be a cost of ($250 value) this will include a business writing certification, recognizing the completion of the course, all the information printed on paper and presented, is free for all writing course participants, and can be shared with my colleagues who are not able to attend the course at this time. Thank you for considering this request for me to attend the business writing course.