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We reviewed U.S. federal and state sexual harassment court cases involving a prior workplace romance between the plaintiff and alleged harasser. Results of our content analysis show that, unlike employees’ decisions, judges’ decisions can be predicted from legal but not ethically salient extralegal case features. Hence, when compared to prior research, our study reveals the following discrepancy: judges follow a traditional legal model, whereas employees follow an ethical model when making decisions about romance‐harassment cases. Our study also reveals that the mere presence (versus absence) of a prior romance reduces the likelihood of a plaintiff’s success in a harassment case. We discuss implications for management practice and research from the perspective of legal and ethical decision making.

The study aims to examine the effect of detective experience on the likelihood of clearing a homicide, while controlling for additional extralegal and case/investigative characteristics.

This study uses homicide and policing data collected from case files in a mid-sized US city. Detective experience is measured in multiple ways. Analytical models include extralegal variables, case characteristics, and proxies of investigative quality as controls. The study uses logistic regression with a dichotomous clearance outcome.

The results suggest a robust and significant inverse relationship between the years spent as a homicide detective and the likelihood of case closure. However, years of experience with the department overall has a significant and positive relationship to clearance. Investigation-related variables and case characteristics contribute more to model explanatory power than extralegal factors.

The potential role of experience has not been fully explored, with contradictory findings over time. This work builds on previous research to highlight the potential role of experience in clearing cases, while questioning previous assumptions tied to the belief that more experience improves investigative outcomes.

The purpose of the paper is to investigate how judges and the general population formulate judgments on legal cases, considering both legal and extralegal factors, with a focus on the significance of the defendant’s sex.

The first experiment aimed to determine if non-lawyers’ judgments are affected by the defendant’s sex, using brief excerpts from indictments with the defendant’s sex interchanged. Study 2 aimed to verify if this effect applies to future lawyers, suggesting a peculiar approval granted by men to women displaying illegal sexual behaviour towards young men.

The findings showed that the sex of the offender only influenced judgments in sexual offences, with male participants being more lenient towards female offenders.

The originality/value of the paper lies in its examination of the influence of the defendant’s sex on judgments made by both judges and the general population, specifically focussing on non-lawyers’ judgments. While previous studies have shown that judges tend to be more lenient towards women in certain cases, this paper adds novelty by investigating whether a similar effect is observed among non-lawyers. Moreover, the research sheds light on the relevance of the defendant's sex in cases of sexual offences and identifies a gender-specific leniency towards female offenders, particularly among male participants. The study also explores how this effect might extend to future lawyers, providing insights into societal attitudes regarding illegal sexual behaviour involving women and young men. Overall, the paper contributes valuable information to the understanding of how sex-based biases can influence legal judgments and decision-making processes.

To provide an empirical analysis of what influences police use of field citations (tickets) against citizens in nontraffic and traffic encounters.

The research was conducted using systematic social observations of police‐citizen encounters in Cincinnati, Ohio, from April 1997 to 1998. Multiple logistic regression models were used to examine the effects of legal and extralegal factors on the dependant variable (receipt of a citation) versus an officer doing nothing or arresting a citizen in nontraffic and traffic encounters.

Officers appear to be more likely to issue citations, as opposed to doing nothing formal or making an arrest, in traffic encounters. The extant literature's focus on citation issuance being more relevant to police behavior in traffic encounters as opposed to other routine encounters may be appropriate. When the decision rests between issuing a citation or making a full‐custody arrest in traffic encounters, white officers are more likely to arrest than their black counterparts, and black suspects were significantly more likely than Caucasians to be arrested than cited. Race of the officer or the suspect exhibited no significant effect in any of the other models estimated.

The study utilized data collected on police‐citizen interactions from one police agency in one jurisdiction, and the data do not come from a study designed primarily to examine citation outcomes or traffic encounters.

This study would be useful to researchers examining police use of citations, officer behavior in traffic and nontraffic encounters, quantifying law in police‐citizen encounters, and race‐based policing.

This study provides a comprehensive review of the literature, and an empirical analysis, regarding officer decision making as it pertains to the issuing of tickets relative to other police actions (i.e. arrest) in traffic and nontraffic situations.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships between moral disengagement, individual differences (i.e. need for cognition (NFC), faith in intuition, legal authoritarianism) and responses to vigilantism.

US university students were surveyed.

NFC reduced support for vigilante justice while legal authoritarianism increased support for vigilante justice. Both relationships are mediated by moral disengagement, which also increases support for vigilante justice.

The present study provides a starting point for further research on individual differences and responses to vigilantism.

Results expand on the understanding of the function of individual differences in a morally charged decision-making task. Content has implications for academics and legal practitioners.

Vigilante justice is embedded within American culture. However, vigilantism is currently illegal, and recent instances of what might be considered vigilante justice (e.g. George Zimmerman, David Barajas) have highlighted the controversy surrounding such extralegal violence. Little research has focussed on the moral quandary posed by vigilantism.

The purpose of this paper is to examine public perception of factors relevant in sentencing decision making for juvenile school shooters with a history of familial abuse, peer victimization, and school intervention.

Through the use of school shooting vignettes, 298 college-aged participants were randomly assigned to one of eight experimental conditions which differed based on the inclusion of the independent variables.

Results revealed no significant differences among the groups on the sentencing recommendations (i.e. psychiatric placement and incarceration). However, correlational analyses indicated that participants’ generally perceived they were influenced by the perpetrator’s history of peer victimization and the level of intervention offered by school personnel when the shooter was bullied. Further regression analyses suggested that participant characteristics such as race, gender, and prior experiences with bullying were among the most powerful predictors of agreement with sentencing recommendations.

Implications of the current findings raise questions as to the influence of peer victimization in civil and criminal court proceedings and its associated impact on the juvenile justice system, the educational system, and society’s desire for justice.

This study ambitiously ventures into exploring and understanding the relevant sociological, academic, and legal factors in addressing acts of school violence.

This paper summarizes the findings of a research project aimed at benchmarking the environmental sustainability practices of the top 500 Mexican companies.

The paper surveyed the firms with regard to various aspects of their adoption of environmental sustainability practices, including who or what prompted adoption, future adoption plans, decision-making responsibility, and internal/external challenges. The survey also explored how the adoption of environmental sustainability practices relates to the competitiveness of these firms.

The results suggest that Mexican companies are very active in the various areas of business where environmental sustainability is relevant. Not surprisingly, however, the Mexican companies are seen to be at an early stage of development along the sustainability “learning curve”.

The sample consisted of 103 self-selected firms representing the six primary business sectors in the Mexican economy. Because the manufacturing sector is significantly overrepresented in the sample and because of its importance in addressing issues of environmental sustainability, when appropriate, specific results for this sector are reported and contrasted to the overall sample.

The vast majority of these firms see adopting environmental sustainability practices as being profitable and think this will be even more important in the future.

Improving the environmental performance of business firms through the adoption of sustainability practices is compatible with competitiveness and improved financial performance. In Mexico, one might expect that the same would be true, but only anecdotal evidence was heretofore available.

Currently, the academic understanding of religious accommodation in the workplace is skewed toward a consideration of legal decision making. The purpose of this paper is to move beyond these legal considerations and provide a fresh perspective on antecedents of religious accommodation decisions when managerial discretion is high. To this end, the authors present a model that incorporates psychological and relational processes.

This research draws on a variety of theoretical perspectives from psychology, organizational behavior and human resource management to theorize a descriptive model of managerial decision-making regarding religious accommodation requests.

The authors develop a conceptual framework and research agenda for examining front-line decision-makers’ responses to employees’ religious accommodation requests. The focus is on characteristics of the decision maker, the requester and the request that can influence the perceived sincerity of a request and the perceived accommodation cost.

The proposed model moves beyond US-based legal perspectives of religious accommodation and facilitates the identification of novel theoretical perspectives for better understanding accommodation decisions.

Twenty-first century managers are faced with a wide variety of religious accommodation requests. Identification of underlying mechanisms through which these decisions are made facilitates effective interventions to build and sustain an inclusive culture.

This work is among the first efforts in the management literature to theorize about the process of religious accommodation decision making. The authors address the paucity of academic research in this area by introducing perceptual drivers of religious accommodation decisions.

Perception research has demonstrated that people view stranger stalkers to be more persistent and dangerous than ex‐partner stalkers. Although these findings are consistent with the outcome of legal processes where stranger stalkers are more likely to be convicted, they contrast with the findings of national surveys and applied research where ex‐partner stalkers represent the most persistent and dangerous relational subtype. The aim of the current study is to further examine the influence of prior relationship on perceptions of stalking by considering the impact of additional contextual information regarding the breakdown of ex‐partners’ relationships for the first time.

In this vignette study 180 women were randomly assigned to one of seven conditions and asked to complete five 11‐point Likert scale items relating to another person's behaviour. The relationship between that person and themselves was manipulated across the seven conditions so that the person was described as either a stranger, an acquaintance, an ex‐partner or an ex‐partner with additional contextual information regarding the breakdown of the relationship.

Participants were less likely to perceive behaviour as stalking or as requiring police intervention, and were more likely to perceive themselves as responsible, when the other person was portrayed as an ex‐partner rather than a stranger. However, perceptions of ex‐partners differed considerably when contextual information regarding the breakdown of the relationship was provided.

The findings have important implications for victims of stalking and the legal system. Examining the influence of prior relationship on perceptions of stalking when additional contextual information is provided can be used to better inform potential victims so as to reduce the risk of serious harm. Additionally, the influence this information has on perceptions of ex‐partner stalkers may have implications for how the legal system understands and deals with ex‐partner stalking cases.

The findings have important implications for victims of stalking and the legal system. Examining the influence of prior relationship on perceptions of stalking when additional contextual information is provided can be used to better inform potential victims so as to reduce the risk of serious harm. Additionally, the influence this information has on perceptions of ex‐partner stalkers may have implications for how the legal system understands and deals with ex‐partner stalking cases.

Previous research has demonstrated that perceptions of stalking are influenced by the prior relationship between the stalker and the victim. This has implications for the conviction of stalkers and intervention for stalkers and victims. This research demonstrates that with limited contextual information outlining the reason for relationship breakdown the perceptions of stalking change. This finding may be of value to individuals who do not recognise they are at risk and to the legal system.

The purpose of this paper is to examine domestic violence calls for service data in one Florida county for a two-year period from July 2004 through July 2006.

Data for this study include information gathered on domestic violence calls for service during a two-year period (n=3,200). This secondary data were analyzed by logistic regression to determine statistically significant predictor variables.

This study found that severity of crime, presence of children, presence of an injunction, and victim injury increased the likelihood of an arrest. Victim race, location of call, victim alcohol use, and length of relationship did not affect likelihood of arrest.

Use of secondary data precluded examination of additional relevant variable information.

The research shows clear law violations and seriousness of the acts correlate to an increased likelihood of an arrest. Arrest research should inform police training and policy.

The research is consistent with other research that shows that law enforcement officers continue to play a significant role in responding to domestic violence crime and suggest that researchers should continue to study arrest practices. In this study, arrest was more likely when factors existed that may have indicated a more serious crime.

There is an ongoing need to examine agency-level response to domestic violence. This paper adds to the literature on the law enforcement response to domestic violence. The paper suggests areas for future research.