CrimNet

5 November 2024

Current Issues in Criminal Justice (CICJ) provides detailed analysis of national and international issues by a range of outstanding contributors. It includes contemporary comments, with discussion at the cutting edge of the crime and justice debate, as well as reviews of recently released books.

CICJ accepts submissions on a rolling basis.

Editor: Professor Colin King, member of the Sydney Institute of Criminology

You can access current (Volume 36 (3), 2024) and previous issues of Current Issues in Criminal Justice here.

If you have a book suitable for review by CICJ, please email the books editor, Celine Van Golde at celine.vangolde@sydney.edu.au 

For more updates, follow CICJ on X here.

Financial crime is a global issue that has a significant impact on Australia’s society and economy. Related offences come in different forms (e.g. bribery, corruption, fraud, money laundering) and are committed by different actors, with various motivations. The different sectors involved range from small businesses to large banks and from the real estate to the art market.

Unsurprisingly, financial crime has been the subject of significant academic study for decades, as well as being an area of national and international concern for policymakers, regulators, and law enforcement. The aim of this symposium is to bring together different experts to discuss a wide variety of contemporary issues and challenges in this context.

Speakers

AUSTRAC – TBC.

Katie Benson, University of Manchester, UK – AML Reflections from the UK.

Yane Svetiev, University of Sydney – FATF MERs and Developing Countries.

Mitali Tyagi, APG – The Infrastructure of the FATF System.

Liz Campbell, Monash University – Legal Professional Privilege and Corporate Liability.

David Chaikin, University of Sydney – Lawyers and Tranche 2.

Jonathan Clough, Monash University – Topic TBC.

Derwent Coshott – The Risk-Based Approach (Cayman Islands developments).

Penny Crofts, University of Technology Sydney – Corporate Financial Crime and Euphemism.

Olivia Dixon, University of Sydney – AML and Lawyers.

Louis de Koker, La Trobe University – Risk and the FATF’s Risk-Based Approach.

Susanna Ford, Arnold Bloch Leibler – Foreign Bribery.

Radha Ivory, University of Queensland – Corporate Criminal Liability Reforms.

Doron Goldbarsht, Macquarie University – Personal Liability of Directors.

Hannah Harris, Macquarie University – The Forest-Finance Nexus: Addressing the Connection between Forest Crime and Financial Crime.

Anton Moiseienko, Australian National University – AML Developments.

Rachel Southworth, Bank of Queensland (provisionally confirmed).

Megan Styles, Monash University – Asset Forfeiture.

Date: Friday 29 November, 2024

Time: 9am – 6pm
Venue: Law Foyer, Level 2, New Law Building, University of Sydney

Register here.

ANROWS is hosting a series of webinars on the ways of working and ways of knowing that are outlined in The Australian National Research Agenda to End Violence against Women and Children (ANRA) 2023–2028. The next webinar is focused on Indigenous methodologies. The aim of this webinar is to help attendees build greater understanding of Indigenous research methodologies and how these approaches can inform the work they do.

In this webinar, a panel of experts will explore:

• Power and positionality

• Decolonising methodologies

• Connections and partnerships

• Strengths-based approaches

• Cultural safety

There will also be a Q&A segment at the end of the event where attendees can ask the panellists questions.

This webinar will be of interest to anyone involved or interested in research practices, including researchers, funders, practitioners, service providers and data custodians

Event details

Date: Wednesday 6 November

Time (AEDT): 12.00pm – 1.00pm 

Location: Online via Zoom

Cost: Free

For more information: head to our event page

For enquiries, please email: events@anrows.org.au

Please register here.

Presenters:

·Dr. Yuhao Kang – The University of Texas at Austin

Title: Assessing Subjective Safety Perceptions in Stockholm with Artificial Intelligence: Opportunities and Challenges

Abstract: The emergence of large-scale street view images and cutting-edge AI approaches has offered promising opportunities for promoting urban planning and policing decision-making. Dr. Kang will showcase how integrating street view images and AI can deepen our understanding of human subjective safety perceptions in response to the built environment.

•Dr. Riley Tucker - The University of Chicago

Title: 'Eyes' on the Street: Using Computer Vision AI to get the Gist of Neighborhood Environmental Design

Abstract: This study uses computer vision AI to label geocoded Google Streetview images to test hypotheses from the crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED) framework. Results show that visual 'gist' features such as aesthetic preference and transparency are measurable across neighborhoods and correlate with territorial behavior and crime.

•Student panel: Cheyenne Hodgen – University of California, Irvine

Title: Measuring Change in the Built Environment with Machine Learning Strategies

Abstract: Historical google street view and machine learning models provide a unique way to study changes in the built environment on a large scale and over long periods of time. This work evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of this method in measuring property development in San Diego, California between 2008 and 2023.

•Maya Moritz – University of Pennsylvania

Title: Prompt Engineering to Annotate Place-Based Changes

Abstract: Annotated place-based data with measures of neighborhood characteristics are scarce as well as time-intensive and costly to produce. For an analysis of the built environment around murals in Philadelphia, I compare human annotator output to ChatGPT annotations of street images with varying prompting techniques to estimate the cost-quality trade-off.

Please register here.

Discussions about poverty are often marred by pervasive myths that lead us to blame impoverished individuals for their own circumstances.

In this episode Juliette Marchant talks to Jeanette Kennett and Dr. Allan McCay about the corrosive effects of these poverty myths upon social policy, political discourse and the criminal justice system. Is there potential for reform in a political and legal system that is often criticised for its lack of empathy?

Listen here.

Special Issue: International Journal of Cultural Property 2025
Guest Editors: Kristopher Wilson, Rhys Aston, and Unaisi Narawa

The governance and regulation of cultural property, at both domestic and international
levels, continues to be shaped by colonial frameworks. For decades, Indigenous
peoples have navigated imposed systems in order to reclaim, reestablish and reaffirm
their cultural property (and their rights to it). These systems are marked not only by
power imbalances and the structural exclusion of Indigenous worldviews, but also by
fragmentation and inconsistent legal standards. Despite this, Indigenous peoples
continue to strongly demand, and advocate for, meaningful recognition and protection
of their cultural property and heritage. In light of this, there remains a need for
scholarly, activist, and creative contributions that critique these shortcomings and
envision pathways toward a more inclusive and just approach to cultural property.
Despite attempts to define it and the extensive history of attempts to build protective
frameworks, there remains no universally accepted definition of cultural property.

Within this elusive definition lies the need to further consider the definition of
Indigenous cultural property and/or objects. Cultural objects, beyond the Indigenous
context, are defined in instruments such as the 1995 UNIDROIT Convention on Stolen
of Illegally Exported Cultural Objects as those ‘which on religious or secular grounds,
are of importance for archaeology, prehistory, history, literature, art, or science’ and
additionally fall within one of the enumerated categories in the annex. The traditional
categorisation of cultural heritage in this way, while broad and seemingly
comprehensive, can sit uncomfortably with the diversity of Indigenous world views and
their understanding of their own cultural, legal and spiritual expressions, which tend to
adopt a more holistic and interconnected understanding of the role of cultural objects.

This special issue seeks to amplify the voices of those who are critically examining the
ongoing challenges of cultural misappropriation, the erosion of cultural rights, and the
disruption of cultural continuity alongside the successful advocacy and work of
Indigenous scholars and communities in reasserting and reclaiming their rights to
cultural property. This issue aims to explore the tensions and opportunities that arise
at the intersection of Indigenous worldviews and Western legal frameworks, with a
particular emphasis on the following interconnected themes and questions.

Submissions may take the form of Articles (of 6000-9000 words) and Case Notes or
accounts of cultural property and repatriation disputes and successes, whether
resolved legally or via political or diplomatic means (2000-6000 words).

How to Submit:
If you would like to contribute to this special edition, please submit an abstract of
between 400-500 words to the guest editors via email by 2 December 2024:

kris.wilson@westernsydney.edu.au raston@waikato.ac.nz
unaisi.narawa@waikato.ac.nz

Important Dates:
2 December 2024: Proposals/Abstracts submitted
20 December 2024: Guest Editors select abstracts and notify Authors. Guest Editors invite Authors of selected abstracts to prepare for submission of article for peer review

30 April 2025: Completed drafts submitted for review
May-June 2025: Out to review
July 2025: Guest Editors contact Authors with the outcome of the review process
Aug-Sept 2025: Authors submit revised articles
Oct-Nov 2025: Final copy-editing and preparation for publication.

In this report, we investigate the effects of the Pathways to Prevention Project on the onset of youth offending. We find persuasive evidence for the impact of an enriched preschool program, the communication program, in reducing by more than 50 percent the number of young people becoming involved in court-adjudicated youth crime by age 17. We find equally strong evidence that comprehensive family support increased the efficacy and sense of empowerment of parents receiving family support. No children offended in the communication
program if their parents also received family support, but family support on its own did not reduce youth crime.

The rate of youth offending between 2008 and 2016 in the Pathways region was at least 20 percent lower than in other Queensland regions at the same low socio‑economic level, consistent with (but not proving) the hypothesis that the Pathways Project reduced youth crime at the aggregate community level.

Read here.

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