Legal Record Research Articles

Substance Use in Registered Nurses: Where Legal, Medical, and Personal Collide

Introduction Registered Nurses (RNs) who are reported by their employer, or interface with the criminal justice system due to substance use, will typically appear before a board of nursing. In some states, this appearance becomes a legal record with documentation available to the public. Objective The purpose of this study is to qualitatively analyze the court documents of RNs whose licenses were placed on probationary, suspended, or revoked statuses by the Indiana State Board of Nursing (ISBN). Methods A descriptive content analysis was conducted on 236 court documents associated with 51 RNs. The study presents the typical paths of RNs appearing before the ISBN. Results From the qualitative data, five themes emerged: (a) critical junctures experienced by RNs during the disciplinary process; (b) emerging groups who appear before the ISBN; (c) individual contexts versus standardized discipline; (d) deliberate diversion, deceit, and deception; and (e) significant threat to public safety and quality health care. Conclusion Understanding regulatory oversight of substance use in RNs in Indiana offers potential directions for targeted interventions. These include identifying periods of vulnerability and understanding the dynamics of appearances before the ISBN across time.

Forensic Photography: A Visual and Legal Record of Crime Scene

Based on priority forensic photography is a source of documenting crime scenes. Currently it enables to signify a crime scene with every significant pieces of location and evidences. Adding to forensic investigation, crime scene photography provides a true and precise record of original scene and evidences relevant to surroundings. Crime scene photograph can illustrate a crime scene easily than verbal description by an investigator as it freezes time and records the evidences. It records all type of crime scenes such as fingerprints, impressions, injuries or bruises on skin in assault cases, human identification, bloodied body and knife in murder case etc. Scientific photography skills and techniques such as UV, IR and Fluorescence light filters are practiced to discover and preserve the hidden information during investigation. It is an integral part of criminal investigation by providing proper documented focused photographs to present actual story of the scene in the courtroom.

The Trials and Significance of Nazi War Criminals and Collaborators in France

Following the trials of Nazi war criminals and collaborators that transpired immediately after World War II, decades passed before the trials of Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie and French collaborators Rene Bousquet and Maurice Papon. While the reason for the delayed trials differed in cause, the relevance of the trials is connected in their allowance for the resurrected testimony of survivors of German occupation and the subsequent holocaust. While the trials of Barbie, Bousquet, and Papon occurred long after the initial wave of post war convictions, their significance is compounded by the emergence of occupation and holocaust survivors that create a legal and historical record of the horrors of the Nazi regime and the function of French collaboration in its execution.

A post-colonial legal approach to the Chagos case and the (dis)application of land rights norms

AbstractOne way of understanding the exile of the Chagos Islanders and their inability to return to their ancestral land is through a reading of the case from a perspective of post-colonial legal scholarship. Chagossians have strong legal rights to land and remedies of compensation and return through a purposive application of the international legal definition of Indigenous, Magna Carta right to abode and international human rights law that could address their dispossession. Yet, the inability of those rights to be meaningfully applied has been constrained because of the post-colonial way they are legally interpreted, creating a legal vacuum in which basic fairness and substantive equality have been routinely compromised. Drawing attention to the continued legal denial of return in the context of decolonisation, ongoing colonialism and the rule of law makes sense of the legal record and explains the expulsion of the islanders despite the moral merits of return.

Guaranteeing what cannot be guaranteed. Defending and adapting bardic patronage in <em>Ag so an chomairce, a Chormaic</em> (ca. 1585) by Tadhg Dall Ó hUiginn

This paper offers a historicized close reading of Ag so an chomairce, a Chormaic ‘Here is the guarantee, Cormac’ (ca. 1585) by Tadhg Dall Ó hUiginn (ca. 1550–ca. 1591), a 27-quatrain appeal to loyalist Sligo lord Cormac Ó hEadhra to be the master-poet's guarantor under the legal mechanism of booking (a form of legal registration or recording of dependents or followers of a given lord). The paper argues that the poem richly repays close literary-critical attention of the kind not usually accorded bardic poetry, displaying a remarkable rhetorical and political artistry in its deeply traditional, yet simultaneously richly innovative, defense of the patronly relationship, the native nobility that upheld it, and the bardic institution itself, as all were under threat from the transformations wrought by the expanding Tudor state.

Writing the Legal Record: Law Reporters in Nineteenth-Century Kentucky by Kurt X. Metzmeier

Writing the Legal Record: Law Reporters in Nineteenth-Century Kentucky by Kurt X. Metzmeier

Empty Promises: Why Workplace Pension Law Doesn't Deliver Pensions by Elizabeth Shilton

Reviewed by: Empty Promises: Why Workplace Pension Law Doesn't Deliver Pensions by Elizabeth Shilton Kevin Skerrett Elizabeth Shilton, Empty Promises: Why Workplace Pension Law Doesn't Deliver Pensions (Montréal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press 2016) The June 2017 bankruptcy filing of Sears Canada and the consequent cuts to the pensions it owes to its retired employees briefly returned public attention to, among other problems, serious gaps in Canada's workplace-based pension system. When companies like Sears, or Nortel, go down, thousands of workers not only lose their jobs but also face deep cuts to their legally-promised (but often under-funded) pensions. Alongside these dramatic failures, even profitable companies like the "Detroit Three" auto-makers have been pulling the plug on the provision of secure, defined benefit (db) type pension plans in favour of defined contribution (dc) alternatives (often on a "two tier" basis). Even many public sector employers have taken up pension restructuring as a key strategy for managing the impact of austerity budgets and revenue losses. Canadian capitalism in the early 21st century is resolving some of its contradictions on the backs of current and future retired workers. Elizabeth Shilton's Empty Promises provides a timely legal history of Canada's workplace pension plans that offers vital context for understanding these negative developments. As a long-time labour-side pension lawyer, her general conclusions will shock those in the labour movement still trying to make the remaining workplace pensions work. She describes "a system that has been declining for decades and may well be in its terminal phase.… Workplace pension plans should be declared a failure." (172–173) Shilton's path to this conclusion features a select history of the legal record on pensions – legislative, regulatory, contractual, and judicial – to tell an intensely political story. Though analytically incomplete in certain respects, this book should nonetheless provoke a deep rethinking of working-class strategies for meeting basic economic needs in later life. The book's first few chapters set out an early history of pension provision in Canada. By selecting a short list of typical early private sector plans, Shilton develops the primary thesis she threads throughout the text – that pension plans were "conceived and designed to meet the needs of employers." (15) Given that these earliest plans pre-dated organized trade unions by several decades, it is hardly surprising that their initiation and design was exclusively an employer affair. This meant that while they offered workers the appealing prospect of wage continuation after retirement, employer control transformed them into powerful tools to enforce workforce discipline. Plans at the Grand Trunk Railway (1874) and Bell Canada (1917) are profiled as having such a degree of employer discretion over payment that any individual – working or retired – could lose it if they stepped wrong, including by organizing: "Railway [End Page 273] employers … Grand Trunk among them, had a history of using pension sanctions as an anti-strike weapon. Striking employees might be denied pensions altogether, or receive reduced pensions, because the company refused to credit pre-strike service towards their pensions. Even retired employees actually receiving pensions might find their pensions affected if they failed to support the company during a strike." (21–22) But even among employees who behaved well, Shilton points out that extraordinary restrictions on eligibility – such as an age 50 with 20 years service "vesting" rule – made qualifying for the pension both difficult and rare. The result was a powerful employer tool of social control that cost employers very little. Shilton cites a 1938 study of pension coverage that concludes that while about 30 per cent of the labour force of that time worked for employers with a pension plan, only about half of that number were eligible to enroll (frequently white collar or management employees) and only a very small percentage of those who did would actually retire with a pension. The middle chapters of the book, tracing the post-World War II consolidation of the pension system we are familiar with today, provides further support for the author's central argument of continuing employer control. Even when the emerging trade unions gained legal recognition and succeeded in making...

A Post-Colonial Legal Approach to the Chagos Case and the (Dis)application of Land Rights Norms

One way of understanding the exile of the Chagos Islanders and their inability to return to their ancestral land is through a reading of the case from a perspective of post-colonial legal scholarship. Chagossians have strong legal rights to land and remedies of compensation and return through a purposive application of the international legal definition of Indigenous, Magna Carta right to abode and international human rights law that could address their dispossession. Yet, the inability of those rights to be meaningfully applied has been constrained because of the post-colonial way they are legally interpreted, creating a legal vacuum in which basic fairness and substantive equality have been routinely compromised. Drawing attention to the continued legal denial of return in the context of decolonisation, ongoing colonialism and the rule of law makes sense of the legal record and explains the expulsion of the islanders despite the moral merits of return.

Our legal heritage at risk: rescuing private sector legal records

Clare Cowling (Director, Legal Records at Risk project, IALS) outlines the aims and objectives of the Legal Records at Risk (LRAR) project at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London. She suggests what categories of legal records are at risk and describes how the Legal Records at Risk project will mitigate this risk.

Openness, transparency and public participation in the governance of uranium mining in Greenland: a legal and political track record

ABSTRACTThis article examines the implementation of the principles of openness, transparency and public participation in the decision-making regarding the conditions for uranium mining in Greenland from a legal and political perspective. The time frame covers the period from the exploration for minerals before World War II to 2016–2017 when the current Greenlandic authorities prepared a licence for a project of extraction of rare earth elements and uranium in Kvanefjeld. It is shown that the issue of openness, transparency and public participation in Greenland is a longstanding issue and that the current governance does not permit public access to a draft environmental impact assessment report, impairing public participation in decision-making, and preventing the environmental consequences of these activities from being considered as a public concern. It is argued that sovereignty–its consolidation and the accession to it–has impacted the design of governance in Greenland and that the constraints put on the full implementation of the legal principles of openness, transparency and public participation in the governance of uranium mining in Greenland, amongst other factors, point to a current hybrid political and legal order in the context of a political agenda of independence.

Performance Testing Of Selected Types of Electronic Personal Dosimeters in X- and Gamma Radiation Fields.

Electronic personal dosimeters (EPDs) are increasingly being used alongside conventional thermoluminescent dosimeters to measure the dose of legal record in terms of personal dose equivalent. Therefore, it is of great importance to execute performance tests of these dosimeters in photon fields of various energies and at various angles of incidence. This testing is done in order to simulate the behavior of these dosimeters in realistic multidirectional polyenergetic ionizing radiation fields. Tests of accuracy, linearity, energy response, and angular response have been performed on 10 EPDs from multiple manufacturers. Various radiation qualities have been used in the energy range from 33 keV to 1.33 MeV and for angles of incidence 0° to 80°. This research proves that many of the EPDs tested performed according to the manufacturer's specifications and the requirements of the international standards regarding personal dosimetry.

Making midwifery work visible: The multiple purposes of documentation.

Midwives have a professional, ethical and legal obligation to effectively and thoroughly document the care provided to women and the decisions made within the partnership relationship. To appreciate the best approach to documenting midwifery care, it is important to first understand the purpose of midwifery documentation. The aim of this article is to explore the literature in relation to the purposes of midwifery documentation. A literature search was performed using the CINAHL and Pubmed databases. Hand searching of reference and citation lists was employed to deepen the literature pool. No research articles with a midwifery focus were found addressing the purpose of documentation. Broader searching of literature from other healthcare fields was drawn on to identify the contribution of record keeping to: partnership and continuity of care; communication between health professionals; improved standards of care; audits and clinical reviews; research and education; the visibility of midwifery work; the reflective practices of midwives; professional accountability; the legal record of care; the narrative record of experience for women. The purpose of midwifery documentation is complex and multi-factorial, involving much more than the recording of clinical and legal details of a woman's care. Midwifery documentation may potentially enhance the maternity care experience for women, support the role of the midwife, positively impact collaboration between health professionals, and contribute to organisational processes and research. Further research is needed to clarify how to address the documentation priorities of women and midwives, within the context of the maternity record.

Writing the Legal Record: Law Reporters in Nineteenth-Century Kentucky

Writing the Legal Record: Law Reporters in Nineteenth-Century Kentucky

An assessment of employer liability for workplace stress

PurposeThis study aims to examine workplace stress in a random sample of litigated cases heard in UK courts. The majority of claims related to clinical depression. The alleged causes of workplace stress most commonly cited in the litigation included excessive workload, followed by poor management practices; organisational, economic or technical changes; aggressive management style; and bullying by co-workers.Design/methodology/approachThe term claimant is used to refer to the worker who made the original complaint of workplace stress, and the term defendant refers to the employing organisation defending the claim. In an attempt to establish the number and type of claims brought forward, the population of individual case records relating to workplace stress was accessed electronically from a variety of legal databases.FindingsThe presence of effective workplace stress management policies were important interventions that played a particularly significant role in avoiding legal action and reducing employees’ detrimental experiences. A significant finding was that 94 per cent of the cases were found in favour of the employer as the defendant, and the implications of this for managerial practice are suggested. This analysis of 75 cases between 1992-2014 will shed valuable light on the nature of workplace stress claims heard in the courts and the likelihood of the claimant employee’s success in such cases.Research limitations/implicationsFurther work could be undertaken to examine the extent to which the legal framework could be regarded as encouraging a compensation culture and placing excessive burdens on employing organisations. This paper assesses the scope of liability for workplace stress through an analysis of some of the legal claims made and evaluates whether these sorts of fears are justified.Practical implicationsThese court cases are real scenarios in which various organisations faced civil action arising from workplace stress claims. The main contribution that this research makes to the existing body of literature on the subject is to discern the different contexts that led to litigation in these cases.Social implicationsResearchers have reported on the negative consequences associated with workplace stress, both for individuals and organisations (Cooper and Marshall, 1976). It has been recognised that employers have a duty, which is in many cases enforceable by law, to ensure that employees do not become ill (Michie, 2002). The aim of this paper is to analyse the legal record on litigation since 1992 and discuss how the findings inform the wider literature.Originality/valueWorkplace stress claims have been described as the “next growth area” in claims for psychiatric illness (Mullany and Handford, 1997; Elvin, 2008; Horsey and Rackley, 2009). Hugh Collins stated “owing to the limitations of the statutory compensatory scheme in the UK […] private law has been used to expand the range of protection against illness […] in the workplace” (Collins, 2003). To understand how court decisions are changing, the development of this body of law needs to be traced (Ivancevich et al., 1985).

Got Clean Slate? New Study Suggests that Criminal Record Clearing May Increase Earnings

An estimated one in three American adults has a criminal record. While some records are for serious offenses, most are for arrests or relatively lowlevel misdemeanors. In an era of heightened security concerns, easily available data, and increased criminal background checks, these records act as a substantial barrier to gainful employment and other opportunities. Harvard sociologist Devah Pager describes people with criminal records as “marked” with a negative job credential. In response to this problem, lawyers have launched unmarking programs to help people take advantage of legal record clearing remedies. We studied a random sample of participants in one such program to analyze the impact of the record clearing intervention on employment outcomes. Using methods to control for selection bias and the effects of changes in the economy in our data, we found evidence that: (1) the record clearing intervention boosted participants’ employment rates and average real earnings, and (2) people sought record clearing remedies after a period of suppressed earnings. More research needs to be done to understand the durability of the positive impact and its effects in different local settings and labor markets, but these findings suggest that the record clearing intervention makes a meaningful difference in employment outcomes for people with criminal records. The findings also suggest the importance of early intervention to increase employment opportunities for people with criminal records. Such interventions might include more legal services, but they might also include record clearing by operation of law or another mechanism that does not put the onus of unmarking on the person with a criminal record.

An analysis of 3105 Medico Legal Cases at Tertiary Care Hospital, Rawalpindi.

Background and Objectives:Medico legal cases are essential component of medical practice and comprise most important constituent of emergencies. The reporting of such cases is imperative to recognize theirsocioeconomic burden on any country. The present study was conducted to scrutinize different categories of medico legal cases and characteristics of the victims at casualty department oftertiary care hospital Rawalpindi. The objective of the study was to find out the frequency ofvarious categories of medico legal cases and major characteristics ofvictims at tertiary care hospital, Rawalpindi.Methods:This was a cross-sectional study on 3105 registered cases in medico legal record of the casualty department of Benazir Bhutto hospital, Rawalpindi from January 2015 to December 2015. The hospital is located on the main road in densely populated central area of the city. The data wascollected on age, sex, month-wise distribution of various medico legal cases, weapon inflicting the injury, blunt trauma or physical assault, firearm injuries and road traffic accidents. The data thus obtained was analyzed using SPSS; observations were presented in tables and graphs.Results:Out of all 3105 registered medico legal cases, reported cases caused by Road Traffic Accident 1230 (40%) followed by blunt injury or physical assault 966 (32%) cases, 19% by sharp weapons, 5% by poisoning, and 4% by firearm injuries. In our study out of 3105 cases, almost three quarter of victims (73%) were below 30 years of age, with a decreasing frequency beyond this age, males were predominantly inflicted 2516(81%) as compared to females 589 (19%). The reported road traffic accidents cases from urban areas were high (74%) as compared to those from rural locality (37%). In cases of blunt trauma, sharp weapon injuries and firearm injuries, there was a huge preponderance of victims from rural areas (65%), (62%) and 61% respectively, with urban cases constituting less.Conclusion:Road traffic injuries are one of the foremost causes of medico legal cases followed by blunt trauma and sharp weapon injuries. The emerging medico legal cases are neglected epidemic in most of the developing countries comprising a considerable public health problem.

ADMINISTRATIVE LITIGATION AT THE FTC: EFFECTIVE TOOL FOR DEVELOPING THE LAW OR RUBBER STAMP?

This article provides the most comprehensive study to date of the Federal Trade Commission's Part 3 process. A unique and defining tool, Part 3 allows the FTC to challenge alleged section 5 violations in-house through administrative litigation. Highlighting the agency's expertise, Congress gave the FTC that authority in 1914 to develop antitrust and later consumer-protection law. Although the Commission has used its Part 3 authority to good effect, especially in some recent competition matters, the process is controversial on due-process grounds. After it finds “reason to believe” that a violation exists and authorizes staff to litigate before an independent Administrative Law Judge, the Commission reviews the ALJ's decision de novo. The result, some critics argue, is a foregone conclusion. Rather than advance the law, they contend, Part 3 frees the Commission to reach its favored result. Maligned in some quarters as a “kangaroo court” in which the FTC alleges and later summarily confirms section 5 violations, the key question is whether administrative litigation effectively fulfills the role Congress set out for it. To resolve the debate, we need a clearer picture of how Part 3 operates. Does the FTC rubber stamp its prior determinations, invariably siding with complaint counsel? Or does it change course at the appeal stage and, if so, how often? And, when it does find a section 5 violation on appeal, how often does the FTC nevertheless prune counts and allegations, suggesting that it scrutinizes the factual and legal record before it? Do the answers change with the political constitution of the Commission, such as when a Democratic majority votes out a Part 3 complaint, but a Republican Commission hears the appeal? How often does the Commission's composition change between voting out and later deciding a Part 3 matter, and might the answer resolve the due-process issue? And does the FTC fare better at the U.S. Courts of Appeal if it affirmed or reversed the ALJ? Until now, relatively little empirical work has scrutinized administrative litigation at the FTC. This study tracks every Part 3 case that produced a Commission Decision on or after January 20, 1977. It captures all 145 antitrust and consumer-protection matters falling within that period, tracking their development through initial vote at the “reason to believe” stage, disposition before the ALJ, appeal before the Commission, and petition for review at the U.S. Court of Appeals and beyond. The emerging statistics are illuminative. In hearing an appeal in the last 10 years, the FTC has never rejected an action that it had previously authorized complaint counsel to bring in Part 3. At first blush, that fact might suggest a preordained appellate process. But that phenomenon dissipates when one looks at a larger time horizon, suggesting that uniformity from initial vote to appeal is neither inevitable nor systemic. Indeed, it is possible that recent consistency may be a function of improved case selection, aided by effective factual, economic, and legal analysis by staff and the Commissioners before they authorize a complaint. Evaluating the ten matters voted out and affirmed by the Commission in the last decade lends some support to that proposition. Indeed, Part 3 has been an effective tool in developing complex antitrust questions. This article provides a host of new evidence with which to evaluate administrative litigation at the FTC. The article concludes by exploring some initial teaching points from the data.

401(K) Plans: DOL Could Take Steps to Improve Retirement Income Options for Plan Participants

What GAO Found: Workers relying in large part on their 401(k) plan in retirement may not always have a feasible way to make their savings last throughout retirement. Responses to GAO’s non-generalizable questionnaire from 11 401(k) plan record keepers — entities that manage participant account data and transactions for plans — showed that most plans covered by the questionnaire had not adopted products and services that could help participants turn their savings into a retirement income stream (referred to as lifetime income options in this report). Responses to the questionnaire represented more than 40 percent of all 401(k) assets and about a quarter of plans at the end of 2014. GAO found that of the plans covered by the questionnaire, about two-thirds did not offer a withdrawal option — payments from accounts, sometimes designed to last a lifetime — and about three-quarters did not offer an annuity — arrangements that can guarantee set payments for life. Concerns about legal risks and record keeper constraints may deter many plan sponsors — typically employers that provide 401(k) plans and establish investment and distribution options — from offering lifetime income options. The Department of Labor (DOL) issues regulations and guidance for plan sponsors and is responsible for educating and assisting them to help ensure the retirement security of workers. For example, DOL has prescribed steps plan sponsors can take to satisfy their fiduciary duties (i.e. act prudently and in the best interest of participants) when selecting an annuity provider for a 401(k) plan. However, according to industry stakeholders GAO interviewed, those steps are not often used because they include assessing “sufficient” information to “appropriately” conclude that the annuity provider will be financially able to pay future claims without definitions for those terms. Without clearer criteria to select an annuity provider, fear of liability may deter plan sponsors from offering annuities. Further, GAO found that a mix of lifetime income options to choose from is not usually available. DOL provides an incentive in the form of limited liability relief to plan sponsors who, among other things, provide participants at least three diversified investment options. However, no such incentive exists for plan sponsors offering a mix of lifetime income options. Without some degree of liability relief, plan sponsors may be reluctant to offer a diverse mix of lifetime income options to their participants. Lastly, stakeholders told GAO that record keepers may make only their own annuities available to the plans they service. DOL provides guidance on selecting service providers, but it does not encourage plan sponsors to seek choices from their service providers, which may prevent plans from having appropriate annuity options available to offer participants. Required minimum distributions (RMD) can offer a default for those who do not choose a lifetime income option by setting a minimum amount of taxable 401(k) income for those age 70 ½ or older, based on life expectancy. Some plan sponsors know how to administer RMDs, and some already choose to provide RMD payments calculated to last a lifetime. However, DOL’s guidance on default lifetime income is focused on a particular annuity type used only by a few plans. By issuing guidance encouraging plans to consider letting RMDs be the default distribution process for retiring participants, DOL may help create lifetime income for participants who do not choose an option. Why GAO Did This Study: As 401(k) plan participants reach retirement they face the challenge of making their savings last for an unknown lifespan, and many 401(k) plan sponsors do not offer options to help participants with this complex task. GAO was asked to review any related challenges and potential changes to help plan sponsors and participants. This report examines, among other things, what is known about the adoption of lifetime income options in 401(k) plans, barriers that deter plan sponsors from offering such options, and the defaults that exist for participants who do not choose a lifetime income option. GAO administered a non-generalizable questionnaire to record keepers, conducted a non-generalizable survey of 54 plan sponsors, and interviewed a range of stakeholders. What GAO Recommends: GAO makes seven recommendations to DOL, including that it clarify the criteria to be used by plan sponsors to select an annuity provider, consider providing limited liability relief for offering an appropriate mix of lifetime income options, issue guidance to encourage plan sponsors to select a record keeper that offers annuities from other providers, and consider providing RMD-based default lifetime income to retirees. DOL generally agreed, and described actions it would take to address the intent of the recommendations.

A case study of interpreter-mediated witness statement: police interpreting in South Korea

Interpreters play an important role in police interviewing witnesses from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. In the cases where interpreters lack professional attributes such as interpreting competence and impartiality, it is very likely that the interpreted evidence and statement will not be a faithful reproduction of original utterances. If attention is not paid to possible alterations by interpreters to the original utterances of the witness and duty of care is lacking in the procedure of obtaining statement from witnesses through such interpreters, the official legal record may not be an accurate one. Drawing on the data of a video-recorded interpreter-mediated police interview in South Korea, this paper examines issues arising from the lack of understanding of the role of interpreters, which may have implications for criminal proceedings. The findings indicate that in addition to interpreter training, more efficient police training in the adoption of best practice guidelines in interviewing through interpreters is required.

Legal Records at Risk: Does the Legal Profession Care about Preserving its Heritage? And What Could be Done to Rescue Private Sector Legal Records?

AbstractThis article is written by Clare Cowling, Director, Legal Records at Risk Project, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London. Her article explores the hypothesis that modern private sector legal records are more at risk of loss than their historical equivalents. There are many reasons for this, but one factor, detailed in this article, appears to be the indifference or reluctance of legal practitioners themselves. The LRAR project seeks to allay any concerns practitioners may have about confidentiality and to raise their awareness of the potential commercial and historic value of their legal records. It will do this by a combination of case studies, interviews with stakeholders and investigations into the current information management and archiving practices of institutions specialised to law. In so doing it will provide guidance and advice on the more cost-effective management and preservation of legal records so that the history of change to non-governmental legal services in the UK over the past century will be accurately documented.