The purpose of this study was to review state and federal court cases from 1982 through February 1998 in which tenured public school teachers were terminated for incompetence. This study provided a current analysis of judicial opinions of teacher incompetence as a follow-up to Shackleford's (1982) study in which she reviewed state and federal termination cases from 1958 through 1981. Four research questions guided the study based on the examination of 107 court cases. The study provided a current judicial definition regarding the term "incompetency" and also provided a legal frame of reference from which one could imply teacher incompetence. The following conclusions were derived from the analysis of court cases examined in this study. 1. The term "teacher incompetency" does not have a decisive judicial definition. Consequently, teachers may be terminated for multiple reasons of incompetency. 2. Courts have indicated that teachers should not be terminated for arbitrary or capricious reasons, but for just and reasonable cause. 3. The foremost purpose of teacher evaluation is remediation, not termination. Courts have indicated that teachers should be provided adequate time to 'find a solution to a problem. 4. Teachers must be provided adequate notice of the intent to terminate with a sufficiently detailed statement to inform the teacher of the allegations and charges so the teacher can prepare an adequate defense. 5. Teachers have a due process right to a fair hearing in which school officials must be able to exhibit a preponderance of evidence that the teacher is incompetent. 6. During hearings, teachers must be given an opportunity to crossexamine witnesses, testify, and present testimony of other witnesses and other relevant evidence. 7. A school board's termination of teachers for incompetence will not be sustained if a teacher's rights, guaranteed by the United States Constitution or state laws, are violated. 8. Teacher incompetency must be measured by the same standards required of others performing the same or similar duties. / Ph. D.

This study examined federal court cases related to the use of social media websites (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn) in various employment practices (e.g., selection, promotion, employee monitoring, layoffs). Court cases were identified using various online databases in an attempt to create an exhaustive list of cases to be used to better understand the role that social media has played in organizational settings and the legal implications of its use. The results of this study show that there were a significant number of cases involving termination and Facebook, and organizations prevailed in court significantly more than the defendant did. The results of this study provide organizations, employees, and applicants with a better understanding of how organizational social media use has been perceived in the court of law, thereby allowing people and employers to make better decisions regarding social media use.

"Public opinion finds its way into the justice system and finally to the decision making platform of the courts through various channels. These include public opinion polls, legislative debates, writings of jurists, social pressures, political situations and referendum on legal issues. Regarding the death penalty, the role of public opinion becomes more debatable because as Kakooza explains, there is a difficulty of addressing death penalty issues as values, national aspirations and conditions of social intercourse vary from society to society. The death penalty touches life, which is the most important of all human rights. It, therefore, remains debatable as to whether it is the courts or the people that may decide the legality of criminal sanctions like the death penalty. Protection of judicial independence conflicts with the need for legitimacy, given that courts are occupied by un-elected judges. While sticking to legalistic and official positions, courts must keep in touch with the public since they need the latter's approval for decisions to be respected and implemented. It is also not clear whether, and if so, to what extent, courts may rely upon public opinion in making decisions, thus the importance of assessing the role it sould play and coming out with a way forward. ... Chapter one comprises the background of the study, statement of the problem, significance of the study, aims and objectives of the study, literature review, methodology and limitations of the study. Chapter two is a discussion of the role public opinion ought to play in court decisions in general, and decisions on the legality of the death penatly in particular. Chapter three is an analysis of the actual influence of public opinion on court decisions on the legality of the death penalty. It also has a comparison of court practice in Uganda and South Africa and includes a critique. Chapter four is a presentation of arguments for and against the role of pulic opinion in court decisions. Chapter five contains conclusions from the research findings and recommendations on how public opinion should be treated in court decisions generally, and the legality of the death penalty in particular." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2006. / Prepared under the supervision of Dr. Raymond A. Atuguba at the Faculty of Law, University of Ghana, Legon / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

The aim of the study was to research how the assessment of a reasonable standard of living for elderly varies in courts and municipal guidelines. The study is based upon empirical material obtained from four Swedish courts and four municipalities, which were distributed evenly over the country. The most relevant and imperative findings were that there in fact seems to be somewhat of a nuisance regarding what a reasonable standard of living means, which was distinguishable in the read through and analysis of municipal guidelines and court cases. The right to a reasonable standard of living in Sweden is legislated in Socialtjänstlagen (2001:453). There it is stated that assistance and aid from social services shall ensure individuals a reasonable standard of living, however it is not specified how or by what means. As a result of this imprecise definition, municipalities are entrusted to interpret what a reasonable standard of living means within their own local governed area which subsequently leads to administrative guidelines that social workers are expected to follow. These also tend to vary between the different municipalities. Circumstances like these mean that the possibilities for elderly to ensure a reasonable standard of living in some regard depends on where they live in Sweden. Further understanding was also gained from how Swedish courts interpret the concept of a reasonable standard of living in cases where either the elderly or the municipalities decide to appeal a decision. We found common factors that appeared in the assessment to either deny or approve aid or assistance to the elder. However the imprecise definition of what a reasonable standard of living encompasses still remained, leading to court instances still judging differently in six out of eight cases. From these findings we could, inter alia, further determine that elders’ right to a reasonable standard of living are uncertain and can vary depending on the vast range of interpretations.

Criminality related to organized crime and criminal networks, with gun violence, bombings, drug trafficking and money laundering, is a growing problem in Sweden. Many of these crimes are made possible through the network's links to legitimate businesses and the use of enablers - a field of research which has been historically underwhelming - but that is now starting to spark the interest of researchers and politicians alike. This thesis explores the phenomenon of these enablers in organized crime and criminal networks. The data consisted of a large sample of Swedish court documents that contain the verdicts derived from the encrypted chat services Anom, Encrochat and SkyECC. The aim of this thesis was to investigate the connections between individuals involved in organized crime and legitimate businesses. The results showed that 42 percent of the analysed cases contained enablers. A majority of the crimes that involved one or more enablers also involved narcotics, and that the legitimate businesses linked to the enablers were companies operating in professions such as the transportation sector, auto shops, exchange offices, law enforcement, storage or moving. Professional drivers were the most frequently prosecuted persons in the convictions, followed by business owners. Common themes for how the enablers presented in the material were related to the drug trafficking process and storing process. The results tell us that the use of enablers seem to be a relatively common aspect of organized crime operations and that it is, as previous research suggests, likely a problem that will only grow.

La collaboration et le contenu généré par les usagers, aussi appelé « Web 2. 0 », sont des phénomènes nouveaux, qui bâtissent sur l'ouverture et le foisonnement d'Internet. Les environnements numériques qui emploient ces moyens mettent à contribution la communauté qui gravite autour d'une présence virtuelle afin d'en enrichir l’expérience. Suivant une approche constructiviste, nous explorons commnent la collaboration peut servir les usagers d'une banque de donnée de jugements en accès libre par Internet, comme le site de l'Institut canadien d'information juridique (www.CanLIT.org). La collaboration s'articule grâce à un gabarit d'analyse que nous nommons «Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration». Il comporte deux classes d'objets, les usagers et les documents, qui interagissent selon quatre relations : les liens documentaires, les échanges entre usagers, l'écriture (de l'usager vers le document) et la consommation (du document vers l'usager). Le Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration met en lumière les modalités de la collaboration comme mécanisme de création de contenu dans un contexte numérique, au profit d'une classe de documents. Suite à une analyse les modalités de la jurisprudence comme système documentaire et d'un exposé illustratif des besoins des usagers de la société civile, le Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration est employé pour explorer les mécanismes à retenir pour enrichir le contenu d'un système diffusant des jugements par Internet. / User generated content and collaboration, also called « Web 2.0 », offer new possibilities in the context of a thriving and open Internet. Digital environments that employ these production mecanisms allow user communities to enrich a virtual space. Using a constructivist approach, we explore how collaboration can serve the users of an open access database of court rulings, namely the Canadian Legal Information Institute's website (www.CanLU.org). Collaboration is set within a framework that we name the « Collaboration Framework ». There are two classes of objects, users and documents, that interact following four relationships: links between documents, exchanges between users, writing (from users to documents) and consumption (from documents to users). In turn, we can better understand how collaboration functions, given a specific class of documents. Following an analysis of court rulings as a system of documents and an illustration of user needs in civil society, the Collaboration Framework is applied to an open access database of court rulings in order to determine how users can enrich the system's content.

La collaboration et le contenu généré par les usagers, aussi appelé « Web 2. 0 », sont des phénomènes nouveaux, qui bâtissent sur l'ouverture et le foisonnement d'Internet. Les environnements numériques qui emploient ces moyens mettent à contribution la communauté qui gravite autour d'une présence virtuelle afin d'en enrichir l’expérience. Suivant une approche constructiviste, nous explorons commnent la collaboration peut servir les usagers d'une banque de donnée de jugements en accès libre par Internet, comme le site de l'Institut canadien d'information juridique (www.CanLIT.org). La collaboration s'articule grâce à un gabarit d'analyse que nous nommons «Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration». Il comporte deux classes d'objets, les usagers et les documents, qui interagissent selon quatre relations : les liens documentaires, les échanges entre usagers, l'écriture (de l'usager vers le document) et la consommation (du document vers l'usager). Le Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration met en lumière les modalités de la collaboration comme mécanisme de création de contenu dans un contexte numérique, au profit d'une classe de documents. Suite à une analyse les modalités de la jurisprudence comme système documentaire et d'un exposé illustratif des besoins des usagers de la société civile, le Cadre de diffusion de la collaboration est employé pour explorer les mécanismes à retenir pour enrichir le contenu d'un système diffusant des jugements par Internet. / User generated content and collaboration, also called « Web 2.0 », offer new possibilities in the context of a thriving and open Internet. Digital environments that employ these production mecanisms allow user communities to enrich a virtual space. Using a constructivist approach, we explore how collaboration can serve the users of an open access database of court rulings, namely the Canadian Legal Information Institute's website (www.CanLU.org). Collaboration is set within a framework that we name the « Collaboration Framework ». There are two classes of objects, users and documents, that interact following four relationships: links between documents, exchanges between users, writing (from users to documents) and consumption (from documents to users). In turn, we can better understand how collaboration functions, given a specific class of documents. Following an analysis of court rulings as a system of documents and an illustration of user needs in civil society, the Collaboration Framework is applied to an open access database of court rulings in order to determine how users can enrich the system's content.

"The judiciary in Zimbabwe used to be viewed as a progressive bench recognised for its activism, particularly its purposive approach in interpreting the Bill of Rights to ensure protection of human rights. It was one of the best Commonwealth judiciaries, which was inspired by international standards in interpreting human rights and at the same time contributed to the origination of normative standards through its decisions. Although Zimbabwe is a dualist system, the judiciary accepted and drew inspiration from international human rights treaties. The Supreme Court (SC) under Chief Justice (CJ) Gubbay (the Gubbay bench) made several progressive pronouncements that favoured the promotion and protection of human rights. In tandem with its tradition of judicial independence, the judiciary interpreted draconian legislation in favour of human rights often striking down the offensive clauses in legislation. Indeed the perception towards the judiciary by the common person was that of a protector of human rights. One landmark human rights decision on the Land Reform Programme (LRP) stated that farm invasions were unlawful and an affront to section 16 of the Constitution. The SC ordered the executive to take necessary measures to ensure that invasions were sanctioned. It further requested the executive to furnish a plan of action for the LRP. The execuitve did not welcome this ruling and the SC judges wre hounded out of office in a clear culmination of judiciary-executive tension. A new bench came in under CJ Chidyausiku (the Chidyausiku bench). This bench made several rulings that took away individual property rights without justification. In a clear shift of jurisprudential ideology, the current bench has not engaged in activism resulting in less, if not no, protection of human rights. The disparity in the jurisprudence is evident in other cases. The current bench seems to have abrogated its mandate to protect human rights. This study is thus prompted to investigate why the different benches in Zimbabwe have produced totally variant jurisprudence, particularly in light of the fact that the judiciary is operating under the same laws and is appointed under the same procedures as before. ... Chapter 1 sets out the focus and content of the study. Chapter 2 gives a national framework for human rights protection in Zimbabwe. This looks at the structure of courts in Zimbabwe. Special emphasis is placed on the SC as the court that has the prime mandate of protecting human rights. Constitutional guarantees for the independence of the judiciary and the Bill of Rights, among others, is analysed. Chapter 3 deals with human rights jurisprudence of the SC benches. The chapter focuses on approach of the benches to human rights protection. It examines the approach to procedural and technicalities that often hinder human rights litigation and protection such as standing, delay, interpretation, compliance with court orders and use of international instruments. Chapter 4 focuses on the experiences from Uganda and analyses the approach of the Ugandan courts. Chapter 5 consists of best practices from the two jurisdictions, conclusion and recommendations for the Zimbabwean judiciary." -- Introduction. / Thesis (LLM (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa)) -- University of Pretoria, 2005. / Prepared under the supervision of Professor Frederick Jjuuko at Human Rights and Peace Centre, Faculty of Law, Makerere University in Uganda / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/academic_pro/llm1/dissertations.html / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

The dissertation aims to examine the phenomenon of systemic corruption in the Czech public procurement environment and to propose a theoretical concept that would help to identify the causes and risks of this phenomenon. In parallel, the dissertation elaborates on the basis for proposing an effective anti-corruption policy that would address the underlying systemic causes. Methodologically, the dissertation builds on the analysis of public procurement by the Office for the Protection of Competition and the Supreme Audit Office, on the court case analysis and media discourse and also on interviews with respondents from the Czech public administration, academia, non-profit sector, and investigative bodies.

For more than half a century Amos Milton Musser was a conspicuous figure in the social, religious, and business life of Utah.Amos Milton Musser, the second son and fourth child of Samuel and Anna Barr Musser, was born in Donegal Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, May 20, 1830. When he was four years old, his father died. after three years of widowhood, his mother remarried, but her husband, Abraham Bitner, soon died, leaving her with two additional children.During her second widowhood, times were so hard that Mrs. Bitner had to ask for help in supporting her children. John Neff, the husband of her sister Mary, accepted the responsibility of guardianship for them. It was through him that the family became affiliated with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, in 1846. The families went on to Utah, but Amos Milton chose to remain behind and work. During the summer of 1851 he joined his mother in Salt Lake City, having been baptized into the Church at Kanesville before starting across the plains.