Task 1. Read the text. 6 страница

pressure by police and the FBI on the gang and its members had to split up. When Arthur Barker was captured, Ma's hideout in Florida was revealed. The FBI's G-men surrounded the house and call on Ma Barker and her son Fred to surrender. «To hell with all of you», she replied and opened fire. The FBI used tear gas, but the gunfight continued until both Ma. Barker and her son were dead.

find which of the words in the text mean:

to affirm strongly being not guilty;

to pay a sum of money demanded by the law court, paid by or for a person accused of an offence, as security that he will appear for his trial, until which time

he is allowed to go free;

to steal a person in order to demand payment for his return;

money paid for the freeing of a person who has been kidnapped;

to come clean.

Billy the Kid (William Bonny), 1860 - 1881

Billy the Kid was a legend in the Wild West as a cattle rustler and murderer. Slim and fair, Billy was born in New York but soon moved to New Mexico. He was apprenticed to a blacksmith but found this boring, so he shot the smith and became a cowboy. At first he worked for John Chisholm, who was fighting a range war in the Pecos Valley. He quarrelled with Chisholm and joined a band of cattle rustlers, killing as many of Chisholm's men as he could in the process. Pat Garrett was elected sheriff to capture Billy the Kid. He did this, but Billy shot two deputies and escaped from his cell just before he was due to be hanged. He was caught by Garrett two months and five murders later and shot dead in a gunfight. He was said to have shot twenty-one men, but in fact he probably only killed three.

Find in the text the English equivalents for the words and expressions below.

скотокрад;

стать подмастерьем у кузнеца;

быть выбранным шерифом;

тюремная камера;

застрелить кого-либо в перестрелке.

Bonnie and Clyde (Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow), d.1934

In the days of the depression in America after 1929, these two young people made a great name for themselves robbing stores and committing murders quite casually and often for the sheer fun of it. Bonnie Parker was a waitress when she

met Clyde Barrow, and she ended up a legendary figure known for her love of red dresses, cigars and firearms. Working in the southern states of the USA they left behind a trail of destruction. On several occasions they were trapped by the police, but seemed to bear a charmed life and escaped even through a hail of bullets. On one occasion they held up a prison farm killing a guard and helping a friend to escape. Huge rewards were by then offered for their capture. Following a tip-off, the police finally ambushed Bonnie and Clyde at a crossroads and killed them in the gunfight that followed. In 1967 a film was made of their exploits, which resulted in the two becoming almost cult figures, and a pop song was written about them, which became a best-selling record.

. Find in the text the English equivalents for the expressions below.

убить кого-либо в перестрелке;

оставить за собой след разрушения;

секретная информация, предоставленная в качестве предупреждения;

быть пойманным полицией;

сделать себе громкое имя;

подвиг;

предложить вознаграждение за захват преступника;

только ради удовольствия;

ограбить магазин;

совершить убийство;

остановить и ограбить;

экономический кризис;

сбежать под градом пуль;

быть удачливым;

устроить кому-либо засаду.

- Butch Cassidy, 1866 - 1910 and the Sundance Kid, d.1910

Butch Cassidy, whose real name was Robert Leroy Parker, was the leader of a

gang of American outlaws called the Wild Bunch who operated mainly from a

secure hideout in Wyoming Territory called Hole in the Wall. Other members of the

gang were the Sundance Kid (real name Harry Longbaugh), Bill «News» Carver,

Ben Kilpatrick and Harvey Logan. The Wild Bunch rustled cattle, held up banks

and robbed trains, all with varied success. On one occasion they stole $40,000 in

notes that were so new that they had not been signed, and their clumsy attempts

to forge the signatures failed miserably. Having made things too hot for themselves

by robbing the Union Pacific railway rather too frequently, in 1902 Butch Cassidy

and the Sundance Kid moved to South America accompanied by pretty

, teacher Etta Place. This combination carried out a number of robberies,

army in 1910. However, rumours persist that either one or both men turned to the USA and lived on peacefully to die of old age. The film of their life and death,

managed to catch the flavour of criminal exploits almost perfectly.

Match each word or expression on the left with the correct definition on the right.

1. a bold or adventurous act

2. to take property from a person unlawfully

3. a person punished by being placed outside the protection of the law

4. a secret place where one cannot be found

5. to attack sb. suddenly from a hidden place

6. to make a copy of a signature in order to deceive

7. to steal cattle

8. to stop and rob

9. to cause a situation to become dangerous

Crippen, Dr. Hawley, 1882 - 1910

Crippen is famous as a murderer mainly because he was the first one to be caught by the use of wireless telegraphy. He was an American-born doctor who settled in London in 1900 with his wife Cora who had theatrical ambitions and used the stage name Belle Elmore. In 1910 Crippen's wife vanished in suspicious circumstances and when the house was searched her dismembered body was discovered buried in a cellar. She had been poisoned. Meanwhile Crippen had fled with his girlfriend Ethel Le Neve, who was disguised as a boy. They thought that they were safe once they boarded the liner Montrose for America, but the authorities used the newly invented wireless to pass on a warning to the ship's captain. Shortly afterwards «Mr Robinson» and his «son» were recognised and Crippen and Le Neve were arrested in New York and returned to Britain. Largely due to Crippen's insistence that she knew nothing of the crime, Ethel Le Neve was freed, but the mild, inoffensive looking little man was hanged at Pentonville prison on 23th November 1910. It was for his evidence given at the Crippen trial that Sir Bernard Spilsbury, the Home Office pathologist, first made a name.

Find in the text the synonyms for the expressions in brackets.

1. Those with (a strong desire to be successful) usually work hard.

2. The house was (examined carefully) in order to find the body.

3. He (used a strange appearance in order to hide) his looks, but he could not change his voice.

Kidd, Captain William, 1645-1701

A privateer was a private person (a civilian not in the navy) who was given a commission to attack the King's enemies at sea and traditionally there was always a thin line dividing privateering from piracy. In 1965 William Kidd, a Scotsman who had emigrated to Boston, Massachusetts, was given a commission by William III to arrest all pirates and also a commission to act as a privateer against the French. He fitted out the brig Adventure and in 1697 sailed to Madagascar, the lair of many pirates at that time. But instead of attacking the pirates, he joined forces with them and began capturing merchant ships and plundering local trade. He deserted his ship and went to New York, offering treasure to the governor and claiming to be able to explain his actions. However, he was arrested and sent to England for trial where he was hanged in 1701. About J 14.000 of treasure was recovered from his ship and from a hiding place near Long Island, though there is still supposed to be a lot of Captain Kidd's treasure waiting to be found.

Explain the meaning of the underlined words and expressions.

Luciano, Charles «Lucky» (Salvatore Luciana), 1897 -1962

«Lucky» Luciano, so called because he led a charmed life and avoided assassination, was one of the most powerful leaders of the Mafia in the USA. Having risen to be a trusted lieutenant of Joe Masseria («Joe the Boss»), he had him killed in 1931. This was the first step Luciano was to make in getting rid of the old guard of the Mafia, to make way for younger men like himself. In the reorganisation that followed Luciano became capo or head of one of the five New York Mafia «Families». He became the most powerful chieftain in the Mafia, and formed alliances with gangsters of other national groups such as the Jews and Irish-Americans. In 1936 he was sent to prison but paroled in 1945 because of his and the Mafia's secret work for the US government during the Second World War. Afterwards he was deported to Italy, from where he ran the European end of the Mafia's drugs operation.

Match each word and expression on the left with the correct definition on the right. a) to lead a charmed life

b) an assassination

c) a gangster

d) to send to prison

e) to parole

Mata Hari (born Gerda ZeUe), 1876 -1917

Mata Hari, who was executed (a) by a firing squad in France in October 1917, is probably the most famous spy of all time. She is renown for her beauty, her numerous military lovers, her provocative Oriental dancing, and, above all, her espionage. Yet in fact, she was not Oriental, or even a spy (b). Mata Hari was a stage name adopted by a plump middle-aged Dutch divorcee, named Mrs. Margaretha MacLeod, who had left her alcoholic Scottish husband in the Netherlands East Indies (not Indonesia) and opted to become a dancer in Europe.

The evidence (с) of her alleged (d) espionage on behalf of the German Kaiser is based merely on her being mistaken for a well-known German agent Clara Benedix, by the British in November 1916. In that month Mrs. Macleod was arrested in Falmouth, Cornwall, on board of the ship Hollandia while she was on her way to Holland. The police released her when they realized the mistake. Later she was arrested in France and charged with (e) having been in contact with German intelligence officers in Madrid (though she had never been there).

At her trial in Paris her lurid life-style was used to damning effect. It was only in 1963, when the secret files relating to her case released, that the legend was reassessed. Most historians now think that, far from being a spy, Mata Hari was simply an innocent scapegoat - shot because the French government wanted to cover up its military ineptitude by fabricating an all-powerful ring of German agents.

Complete the following sentences with the underlined words from the text.

1- There was not enough to prove him guilty.

2. He was for murdering his wife.

3. In your statement, are you that the accused man was seen at the

scene of the crime?

4. He was told to

on the enemy's movements. with murder.

Laws in Babylon

Task I. Give English equivalents for the following words and expressions. Consult the text after you complete the task

кровная месть; - состоять из; - устанавливать закон; - составлять документ; 3

налог; - налагать штраф; - расплата; - разборчивый, чёткий;

лжесвидетель; - наследство; - храм;

One of the most detailed ancient legal codes was drawn up in about 1758 B.C. by Hammurabi, a king of Babylonia. The entire code, consisting of 282 paragraphs, was carved into a great stone pillar, which was set up in a temple to the Babylonian god Marduk so that it could be read by every citizen.

The pillar, lost for centuries after the fall of Babylon in the 16th century B.C., was rediscovered by a French archaeologist in 1901 amid the ruins of the Persian ] city of Susa. Hammurabi's words were still legible. The pillar is now in the Louvre museum in Paris.

The laws laid down by Hammurabi were more extensive than any that had gone before. They covered crime, divorce and marriage, the rights of slave owners and slaves, the settlement of debts, inheritance and property contracts; there were even regulations about taxes and the prices of goods.

Punishments under the code were often harsh. Not only murderers but also thieves and false accusers faced the death penalty. And a child who hit his father: could expect to lose the hand that struck the blow.

Nevertheless, Hammurabi's laws represented an advance on earlier tribal customs, because the penalty could not be forfeit for an eye.

The code outlawed private blood feuds and banned the tradition by which a man could kidnap and keep the woman he wanted for his bride. In addition, the new laws took account of the circumstances of the offender as well as of the offence. So a lower-ranking citizen who lost a civil case would be fined less than an aristocrat in the same position - though he would also be awarded less if he won.

Task 2. Answer the questions.

1. Why do you think Hammurabi decided to have his laws carved into a pillar?

2. List the spheres of human life covered by Hammurabi's code. Explain the choice.

3. Why do you think people of different ranks were treated differently by Hammurabi's code?

Sunday Blues

Task 1. Read the text.

The so-called blue laws in the United States might better be called Sunday laws, because their intent has been to restrict or forbid business, trade, paid work, or other commercial activities on Sunday, the Sabbath of major Christian sects. In the mid-1980s blue laws had been repealed or simply ignored in many parts of the nation but continued to be observed in certain religious communities.

Secular arguments against blue laws are that they violate the constitutional guarantee of separation of church and state and favour one religion, Christianity. A secular argument supporting them is that everybody needs a day of rest each week. proscribing work on Sundays goes back at least to 4th-сеntuгу Rome under Constantine the Great, and the practice was strictly supported in the religion-oriented American colonies. The term blue law is said to have arisen from a list of Sabbath rales, printed on blue paper for residents of New-Haven, Connecticut, in 1781.

Task 2. Find in the text the words that mean the opposite. to unite; to pay attention to; minor; for; to allow.

Task 3. Find in the text the words that correspond to the following definitions. - to regulate, limit; to revoke a law; to maintain a condition, course or action without interruption; to comply with, infringe; to put outside the protection of the law; meaning, significance.

The Vampire of South Kensington

The acid-bath murder

In the basement of a house in South Kensington, John Haigh would conduct his "experiments": into a bath of sulphuric acid he would drop live mice and watch them as they slowly disintegrated. Here between 1944 and 1949 Haigh murdered at least four people and drank their blood before disposing of their bodies in the acid bath. His trial at Lewes Assizes in July 1949 attracted enormous publicity and his wax-work effigy is still looked for avidly in the Chamber of Horrors at Madame Tussaud's.

Haigh was born in 1909. His parents were both members of the Plymouth Brethren religious sect to whom all human pleasure was sinful and even the reading of newspapers frowned upon. John was brought up under the strictest discipline and often subjected to paternal punishment. He developed a strong sense of "self control" and recalled in later life. ' I remained superficially quiet while I was being punished., but inside I was a boiling cauldron. \ used to feel bitterly resentful but learnt not to show my feelings'. As a child he had frequently recurring nightmares, often involving blood and violence.

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He married in 1934 but soon he left his wife after serving his first prison sentence for fraud. During the following years he was in and out of prison on a series of petty thefts. In 1943 he settled at the Onslow Court Hotel, Queen's Gate, South Kensington, where he remained for the next six years.

Haigh committed his first murder in 1944 when he killed young Donald Mc Swann, whose father had previously employed him as a secretary and chauffeur. He met Donald at the Goat public house, Kensington High Street, and took him back to his Gloucester Road basement where he hit him on the head with a cosh. "Then I went out", said Haigh, "and fetched a drinking glass, "made an incision in his body with a penknife, and collected a glass of blood which I drank. He was dead within five minutes or so. I then put him in a forty-gallon tank into which I poured sulphuric acid. 1 later disposed of his remains down a manhole in the basement." Haigh subsequently murdered Donald's mother and father in exactly the same way.

A few months after killing Donald McSwann, Haigh met a young woman about thirty-five years of age on Hammersmith Bridge and invited her back to his "flat" in Gloucester Road. "She came with me to the basement where I duly knocked her on the head with a cosh and tapped her for blood. She, too, was disposed of in the acid bath.

Haigh also had a "workroom" in Leopold Road, Crawley. Here, too, he had an acid bath in which he dissolved several more victims.

In February 1949, Haigh invited a fellow guest at the Onslow Court Hotel, a Mrs Durand-Deacon, to visit his Crawley workroom. He shot her through the head, drank her blood and put her body in the acid tank. Accompanied by another hotel guest he went to the police to report Mrs Durand-Deacon missing. Following this report the police became suspicious of Haigh, and their investigations led to his Crawley workroom where they found traces of a human body that the acid had failed to obliterate, including a set of false teeth. They also found the handbag Mrs Durand-Deacon had been carrying on the night of the murder.

On his arrest, Haigh admitted to the murder but pleaded insanity. He was convicted, however, and hanged at Wandsworth Prison on 6 August 1949.

The site of Haigh's gruesome crimes can still be seen by those tourists intrepid enough to explore the back streets of London'd South Kensington.

Reading for gist and detail.

A. The text below looks at another kind of dilemma. What is it?

B. Answer questions 1-6, referring to the text as necessary.

1. What happened to Derek Heyson and his wife in 1985?

2. When and why were Elizabeth Heyson and Jens Ziring arrested?

3 What is Elithabet's current situation?

4. What is Zbring's current situation?

5. Why is he fighting extradition to the United States?

6. What does the European Court believe is a contravention of the Convention of Human Rights?

What would you advise the British Government to do? Would you response be different if: you were an American citizen? you were a British citizen? If you were a member of the British Government and you had to vote on this issue, which way would you vote?

Count up the votes, and find out what.the class decision is.

British Government in Moral Dilemma

One fateful night in 1985, in Lynchburg, Virginia, Derek Heyson and his wife, an elderly couple, were stabbed death in their own home. Such force had been used to carry out the brutal murder that both heads were almost severed from the bodies. Although no arrests were made, it was thought that the couple's daughter, Elizabeth, and her boyfriend, German Jen Zuring, might be involved. It was several months later, however, in June 1986, that they were arrested by chance on a charge of cheque fraud in the United Kingdom. By August of that year, the United States had requested extradition of the couple to stand trial in the US for the double murder of the Heysons. Their daughter accepted extradition, returned to the States in May 1987, and confessed to being an accessory to the crime, claiming that Zuring had actually committed the murders. She has since been sentenced to 90 years' imprisonment. Extradition to the US is being fought by Zuring's lawyers, as Zuring is hoping to be tried in the UK or Germany. Why? Because his punishment if convicted in either European country would be life imprisonment; in the United States he would face the electric chair.

So, what is the dilemma? In 1972 Britain signed an extradition treaty with the United States. However, European tradition upholds the Convention of Human Rights, which, it is maintained, the United States contravenes by its treatment of prisoners facing the death penalty. Note that it is the treatment of prisoners which is the problem, not the death penalty itself. Most prisoners sentenced to capital Punishment in the States wait an average six to eight years before the sentence is carried out. This delay is due to the appeals that take place after sentence has been Passed - appeals intended to eradicate any trace of doubt as to the guilt of the offender. The European Court maintains that the delays are only a "carrot you hold

out while you torture people, till you kill them." The European Court has, in fact, blocked the extradition of Jens Zuring under Article 3 of the Convention of Human Rights, which states that no human being should be made to suffer inhumane or degrading treatment.

Should the British Government disobey the European Court ruling and extradite Jens Zuring? Or should they break the extradition treaty of 1972 with the United States? Either way, their position is unenviable.

Corruption and Remedies against it

During a research recently carried out by TRANSCRIME on corruption in the 15 European Union countries, six main patterns of corruption and different patterns of criminal responses to corruption were outlined:

systematic corruption (Italy, France, Spain and Belgium);

emerging systematic corruption (Germany and Greece);

sporadic corruption (Ireland, Austria and Portugal);

Casual corruption (the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark and Sweden);

English corruption (United Kingdom);

managing others' corruption (Luxembourg).

With reference to legal responses the main criteria used for this analysis were:

a) the definition of the crime of corruption;

b) the distinction between passive and action corruption;

c) the definition of passive and active subjects involved in the crime of corruption; and

d) sanctions.

The results show that there is less homogeneity with respect to the definition of the crime of corruption. The differences in definition are related to the fact that corruption takes on different forms in the various European countries, depending on each cultural and social context. It is important to study the cultural background of the various countries in order to discover the constant elements of corruption and thus to adopt the most effective preventive measures. For instance, when referring to ""corruption prone environment" in Italy, we are talking about a phenomenon that is deeply rooted in the cultural tradition of Italian society, in the sense that corrupt activities are practised and accepted by normal citizens. The penal codes of the United Kingdom and Germany envisage various levels of corruption crimes (misdemeanours or felonies), according to the position held by the actor. Another distinction is related to the nature of the corruption act, in that it may be linked with, or contrary to the functional role of the actor. In the case of the passive receipt of a bribe by a public official in order to speed up a service for which he/she is competent, the penalty of a fine is envisaged. On the other hand,

a public official who authorises the issuance of a licence although this is not under

his/her competence, is committing an offence. In Austria (Article 304, paragraph 1) Denmark (Article 144), Finland (Article 40), Germany (paragraph 332), the Netherlands (Article 363) passive corruption involving abuse of the public function is punished with a higher penalty than in the case of corruption that does not involve the abuse of a public function.

Vocabulary notes remedy - 1) средство от болезни, лекарство; 2) средство, мера {против чего-либо); 3) средство судебной защиты, средство защиты права. pattern - модель; система. sporadic - единичный, случайный.

casual - 1) случайный; 2) непреднамеренный; 3) случайный, нерегулярный. criterion (Lat) - критерий; pi. criteria distinction - различие, отличие, разница homogeneity - однородность to be related - относиться, иметь отношение background - предпосылка, данные, объяснение, фон, истоки prone - склонный; prone to anger- вспыльчивый; Не is prone to prompt action. - Он склонен к быстрым действиям.

environment - окружающая обстановка; окружающая среда rooted - вкоренившийся, коренящийся penal - уголовный

the penal code - уголовный кодекс

to envisage - предусматривать, рассматривать

misdemeanour - судебно наказуемый проступок, преступление

felony - уголовное преступление

contrary to - противоположный

bribe - взятка

Words and Grammar

a) Write down the nouns formed from the following verbs:

to research - research to service-

to corrupt - to issue -

to respond - to penalize -

to outline- to fine-

to refer - to break-

to define- to notify-

to link-

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