police&crime essay 500words
Sharonhy
Lecture1slide.pdf
Welcome
CRM201 Policing and Crime Prevention
Lecture (1) September 2020
Overview for today
• Housekeeping
o Introductions/news
o Unit aims
o Contact info
o Lectures
o Assessment
o How to study the unit
• Crime prevention and opportunity
o Routine activities theory and the problem analysis triangle
o Crime pattern theory
o The rational choice perspective
o The 10 principles of crime opportunity
2
All available CRM201/
LLB201 LMS site &
Unit Guide
Introductions
A bit about me…!
o Interests – Transnational Crime, Terrorism, Historical Criminology, Strategic Culture, Intelligence Studies & South Asia. Lived & worked previously in Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Iran, Indonesia & Myanmar
o PhD (UNSW@ADFA), Master of Criminology, Master of Strategic Studies (ANU), Master Psychoanalytic studies, Grad.Dip (Islamic Studies), Bachelor of Social Science (Justice/Psychology)
o Most recent publications, Back to the '30s? Recurring Crises of Capitalism, Liberalism, and Democracy (ISBN 978-3-030-41585-3) released by PalgraveMacmillan September 2020 as well as a forthcoming chapter in the Cambridge Handbook of Forensic Psychology.
A bit about you…! Please get online on the forum or in class to share with your classmates on such things as…! Where are you from?
o From Singapore
o From a nearby country
o From further afield
o Introductions (either side) why you are studying Criminology..!
Studiosity: Student Information
Available to all students in 2019
What does Studiosity offer to you?
1. Get feedback on English writing for
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usually returned within 24 hours.
2. Live online assistance from subject
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Available Sunday to Friday, 1pm to
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Access Studiosity from within your LMS
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Live connect sessions can be up to 20
minutes.
Lecture (One)
Part 1) Re-thinking Crime theory &
Part 2) How do you know you’ve got a crime problem?
Unit aims
1. Learn about theories underpinning crime prevention
2. Understand relationship between analysing crime patterns and developing targeted prevention strategies
3. Learn about a range of theory-based strategies for preventing/controlling crime problems
4. Understand that crime prevention is more than just a policing issue
5. Become aware of some of the issues facing modern policing and difficulties maintaining prevention successes
Reading:
Chapter 1 from your text book – “Environmental criminology and crime analysis: situating the theory, analytic approach, and application”
Chapter 2 from your text book – “The rational choice perspective”
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How to study this unit
• The text book has been updated for this year – 2nd Edition (2017)
o E-Copy in the Murdoch library
• Other readings are available through MyUnitReadings link on LMS
• If you’re finding the reading is too much, consider forming a reading group with your peers **THIS IS A VERY GOOD IDEA – IT WILL MAKE YOUR LEARNING COLLABORATIVE, YOU WILL GET TO MEET OTHER STUDENTS AND MAYBE EVEN MAKE NEW FRIENDS – IT IS VERY VERY IMPORTANT YOU UNDERTAKE THE READINGS SO CAN KNOWLEDGEABLY PARTICIPATE IN CLASS
• Talk, discuss & debate **AGAIN THIS IS VITAL – IT IS ALSO INTERESTING AND PART OF THE ACADEMIC PROCESS IN REFINING YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND ARGUMENT
• Observe the world around you:- home, shopping centres, nightlife, e.g. ‘the self serve’ options at supermarkets’, gated communities, Crime prevention measures, What is and isn’t reported (WHAT IS IT LIKE WHERE YOU LIVE IN SINGAPORE OR WHERE YOU ARE FROM..!)
• Please pay attention to the information in the unit guide about
o Extensions
o Assignment submission, and
o Assessment structures
o Start your reading/literature search for the essay NOW
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Crime prevention theory for part (1)
• Opportunity theories of crime
o Routine activity theory (and the problem analysis triangle)
o Crime pattern theory
o Rational choice perspective
• 10 Principles of opportunity and crime
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Opportunity: in contrast with traditional criminology
• Until recently within criminology there had been a traditional focus on criminals and motivation
o Why are people criminals?
o Biological facts, society, upbringing, etc.
• This emphasizes personal and societal factors
o Beyond the reach of police and other front-line agencies
• The opportunity and role of environmental context are generally overlooked by these theories, which can’t explain
o Why offenders only offend sometimes?
o Why are there variations in offending over time and space?
9
Opportunity: in contrast with traditional criminology
• In this sense, most criminological theories are theories of criminality not theories of crime
o Focus is on how certain individuals or groups become involved in crime
• Ignores the question of why crime occurs where and when it does (and doesn’t) happen
o Can’t be answered by simply explaining why some people are more likely to be delinquent or criminal
o Must also explain how situational factors facilitate or encourage the actual commission of criminal acts
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Opportunity theories focus on Traditional theories focus on
Crime Criminality
Events Dispositions
Near (time/space) causes Distant causes
How crime occurs Why crime occurs
Situational context Individual factors
Opportunity vs. Tradition
“… no single cause of crime is sufficient to guarantee its occurrence; yet opportunity above all others is necessary and therefore has as much or more claim to being a ‘root cause’.” (Felson & Clarke, 1998)
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• Started as an explanation for predatory crime
• Physical convergence in space and time of 3 minimal elements
Theory (1) - Routine activities theory
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• The problem analysis triangle was derived from routine activity theory about how and why crime occurs at a specific time in a specific place **EXAM
http://www.popcenter.org/
The problem analysis triangle
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Motivated offenders
• Considered from the offender’s point of view
o Do they think the target is suitable and the guardian is absent?
o Motivated by
▪ Gain/need – e.g., poverty or a drug habit
▪ Society/experience/environment – e.g., peer pressure, lack of education
▪ Beliefs – e.g., that some crimes aren’t wrong
• Offenders can sometimes be controlled by Handlers
o Someone who knows the offender well and is in a position to exert some control over their actions
o Informal: Parents, siblings, teachers, friends, and spouses
o Formal: probation and parole officers
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Suitable targets/victims
• A person, an object, a place…
• Does not distinguish between the ‘target’ and the ‘victim’
o The victim may be totally absent from the crime – e.g., burglary victim
• Targets/victims can be controlled by Capable Guardians
o Informal: people protecting themselves, their own belongings or those of family, friends, and co-workers
o Formal: police and private security
o Inanimate: can also include security devices such as locks, alarms, and CCTV
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Offence place (time & space)
• A crime requires the co-occurrence in space and time of an offender and a target – this is the offence place
• Places can be controlled by Managers
o The owner or designee who has some responsibility for controlling behaviour in the specific location, e.g.
▪ Bus driver or teacher in a school
▪ Bar owners in licensed venues
▪ Building managers in apartment blocks
▪ Flight attendants on commercial airliners
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Using routine activities theory
• Effective problem solving requires understanding
o How offenders and targets come together in places (time and space)
o How offenders, targets, and places are not effectively controlled
▪ Handlers, guardians, and managers
• Analysis in this way identifies weaknesses in the problem analysis triangle
• This will point to targeted interventions designed to address the specific problem
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Theory (2) - Crime pattern theory
• Incidents cluster based on a number of factors
• Behaviours. Certain behaviours are common to problem incidents
o Making excessive noise, robbing people or businesses, driving under the
influence, crashing vehicles, dealing drugs, stealing cars
• Places. Certain places can be common to problem incidents
o A street corner, a house, a business, a park, a neighborhood, or a school
• Persons. Certain individuals or groups of people can be common to
problem incidents
o Could be either offenders or victims
o A youth gang, a lone person, a group of prostitutes, a group of chronic
inebriates, or a property owner
• Times. Certain times can be common to problem incidents
o Traffic rush hour, bar closing time, the holiday shopping season, or during an
annual festival 18
Crime pattern theory
• It is easier to commit crime in places you know and go to regularly, rather than making a special journey
o Cognitive awareness space
• These patterns also explain variations in victimisation over time and space
o Hour of the day
o Day of the week
o Month of the year
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Crime pattern theory in action
Analysis of burglary choice in Perth, Australia found
o Distance-decay generally influenced choice of offending suburbs
o Distance-decay was even more obvious for juvenile offenders
o When the river separated the burglar’s home suburb from another
suburb, the likelihood of offending decreased
o When the train line connected the burglar’s home suburb to
another suburb, the likelihood of offending increased
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Source. Clare et al (2009). Formal evaluation of the impact of barriers and connectors on residential burglars’ macro-level offending location choices. Australia and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 42(2), 139-158.
Theory (3) - rational choice perspective (Clarke)
• Decisions to offend are constrained by time, cognitive
ability and information
o Bounded rationality
o Within the context, to that person, it made sense, at the time
• “Perceptions” of the situation and of risks and rewards is
more important that actual circumstances
• Decisions vary by the different stages of the offense and
among different offenders
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That rational choice perspective (Clarke)
• Individuals who are not normally “criminals” may choose to
offend based on the perceived risks and rewards
• If offenders choose to commit crimes based on a number of
factors, then those factors can be altered to discourage
them from choosing to offend
• Crime – in many circumstances –
is not inevitable
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Ten principles of opportunity and crime
1. Opportunities play a role in causing all crime
2. Crime opportunities are highly specific
3. Crime opportunities are concentrated in time and space
4. Crime opportunities depend on every day movements
5. One crime produces another
6. Some products offer more tempting crime opportunities
7. Social and technological changes produce new crime opportunities Opportunities for crime can be reduced
8. Reducing opportunities does not usually displace crime
9. Focused opportunity reduction can produce wider declines in crime
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1. Opportunities play a role in causing all crime
• Children are most likely to be abused by people who have
access to them
• Increased homicide rates in the US are a consequence of
availability of handguns
• Apartment buildings without building managers have
increased risk of drug dealing and prostitution
• Employee reimbursement fraud is limited by requiring
original receipts and setting per diem rules
• Crowded poorly designed bars/clubs, poorly trading
practices, play an important role in generating violence (and
effective design helps prevent)
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3. Crime opportunities are concentrated in time and space
• Crime opportunities are non-randomly distributed across
time and space
o Many people/things aren’t suitable targets
o Many places are unsuitable locations for offending
o Even when locations are suitable, it might be time-dependent
o Controllers (handlers, guardians, managers) can’t be everywhere all the
time
o Motivated offenders can’t be everywhere all the time
• Dramatic differences are found from one address to another
even in a high crime area
• Crime shifts greatly by the hour and day of the week,
reflecting the opportunities to carry it out
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4. Crime opportunities depend on every day movements
• Offenders and targets shift according to routine activities (e.g. work, school, leisure)
o Some offenders seek crowds – pickpockets and bag snatchers
o Others require the absence of people – burglars visit houses in the day when the occupants are out at work or school
• Offenders offend in places they know about and can get to
o New roads and railway lines establish new crime risk
o Alley ways past houses out of sight from the street create opportunities
• The relative locations of things (nodes, paths, and edges) matter
o A high school next to a shopping centre creates shoplifting, vandalism, and truancy
o Adjacent schools might generate fights or bullying
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5. One crime produces another
• Embarking on one crime can unwittingly draw offenders into another
o Example 1. Residential Burglary →
o Weapons offences + assault + sexual assault →
o Selling/receiving stolen goods + credit card fraud →
o Violence when deciding how to divide the money between offenders
o Example 2. Small traffic infringement →
o Road rage →
o Dangerous / reckless driving + assault + homicide
o Example 3. Assault →
o Robbery + selling stolen goods →
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6. Some products offer more tempting crime opportunities
• Not all products are equally at risk for theft
• Products are more attractive to thieves when they are
Concealable – easier to remove, transport and dispose
Removable – you have to take it to steal it
Available – macro, meso, and micro level availability
Valuable – without value, it’s not worth stealing
Enjoyable – relates to disposability of items – greater demand
Disposable – stolen goods are generally converted into cash/drugs
• CRAVED items can change over time as a function of market forces (the life-cycle theory)
o Stable CRAVED – jewellery, gold, cash
o Variable CRAVED – small electronic goods, clothes
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7. Social and technological changes produce new crime opportunities
• Mass-produced consumer goods pass through a life-cycle
o Innovation – restricted, special small group of consumers
o Growth – products cheaper, easier to use, more common, desired
o Mass market – product becomes endemic
o Saturation – most people who want one, already have one
• Products are most vulnerable in their 'growth' and ‘mass market' stages, as demand for them is at its highest
• Most products will reach a 'saturation' stage where most people have them and they then are unlikely to be stolen
• Think about the types of items that are almost never stolen during burglaries
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8. Opportunities for crime can be reduced
• If this wasn’t true, no one would bother
o Locking cars/houses
o Keeping money in a safe place
o Telling young children to avoid strangers
o Watching the neighbour’s house when they’re away
• The opportunity reducing methods of situational crime prevention can be applied to all aspects of everyday life, but they must be tailored to specific situations
• The rest of the unit will cover some ways to do this
o Crime prevention through environmental design
o Situational crime prevention
o A range of targeted policing strategies, e.g., hot spot policing, evidence-based policing, problem-oriented policing, and intelligence-led policing
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9. Reducing opportunities does not usually displace crime
• In theory, there are five main ways that crime could be displaced
o Geographic displacement – different place
o Temporal displacement – different time
o Target displacement – different target
o Tactical displacement – different strategy used to commit same crime
o Type displacement – different type of crime
• The logic underlying these assumptions is flawed – it assumes offenders must commit crime, no matter what
o Ignores the role of opportunity!
• Wholesale displacement is very rare and many studies have found little if any crime displacement
o In no case was the amount of crime displaced equal to the crime prevented
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9. Reducing opportunities does not usually displace crime
• Example. Closing a drug market is unlikely to push it somewhere else, because this ignores the reason it started there in the first place
o Easy to reach by car by clients
o Easy to find and drive to from many areas in the city
o Near bus stops/public transport
o Near dealers’ homes and convenient for them
o Near a pub/shop for food and a betting shop for entertainment
• Nearby locations will either
o Not have these qualities or
o Already belong to another group selling drugs, who are unlikely to want to share
32
10. Focused opportunity reduction can produce wider declines in crime
• Prevention measures in one area can lead to a reduction in another nearby, a 'diffusion of benefits‘
o The benefits of targeted prevention can spread beyond the targets of the intervention
o CCTV cameras installed on selected busses in a fleet reduced vandalism to the whole fleet
o Red light cameras on some intersections reduced running lights across the city
o Books being tagged for theft in a library reduced theft of all library products, not just books
o Daily counting valuable items in a warehouse reduced theft of all items, not just the ones being counted
• This is because offenders might overestimate the reach of those measures
o Aware of the intervention, but unsure of the scope
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Conclusions – Crime Prevention and Opportunity
• Up until fairly recently opportunity had been neglected in criminology
• Personal and social variables are important but difficult for police to address
• Crime is a product of interactions between people and their environment
• Opportunity theory enhances prevention by focusing as much on time, space, targets, and guardians as on the offender
• Displacement rarely becomes a problem
• Crime opportunity deals with one of the most important and controllable contributing factors of crime, which is the decision to commit crime
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PART (2) - TODAY’S LECTURE
How do you know you’ve got a crime problem?
Readings:
(Required) Chapter 4 from your text book – ”Routine activity approach”
Chapter 11 from your text book – ”Problem-oriented policing”
35
Overview for Part (2)
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• What do we mean by problems
• Defining problems: CHEERS
• Problems: environment and behaviours
• Journey to crime, hot spots, and 80:20 again
• A bit about evaluation and why it’s good to rely on evidence
• Problems, problem types, and sharing findings
• Using the popcenter.org databases to find common solutions
• Recapping today and looking towards next week
Problem-oriented policing overview
• What is problem-oriented policing (POP)?
• History of POP
• Defining a problem
• Key elements of POP
• Why use POP today?
• Does it work?
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What is POP?
• A comprehensive framework for improving police capacity to perform their mission
o This framework underlies crime prevention strategy development
o Motivation: change the conditions that lead to crime
• Finding new/better ways to control crime, while still meeting community expectations for traditional police work
• Microscopic examination of discrete pieces of police business
• The intent is to develop new, innovative responses driven by the analysis
o Preventive in nature
o Not dependent on the criminal justice system
o Evaluated with rigour
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Goldstein’s idea
• The grandfather of POP, Herman Goldstein (1979), proposed police must adopt a 4-stage problem-solving approach (SARA)
1. Scan data to identify patterns in the incidents they routinely handle
2. Subject these patterns (aka problems) to in-depth Analysis of causes
3. Find novel ways Respond earlier in the causal chain to reduce the likelihood of these problems reoccurring in the future
4. Assess the impact of the interventions, and if they haven’t worked, start the process again
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What is a POP problem?
• Problems can be defined or described in many ways
o Offense type
o People involved (victims, offenders, controllers…)
o Location (time and/or space)
• The number of incidents required to constitute a problem should exceed some norm or expected occurrence rate
o A single incident might prompt a broader investigation
o Multiple incidents don’t necessarily constitute a problem
o The number should be both substantial and significant
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Specific solutions for specific problems
• At first glance, a broad category might seem like a specific problem
o E.g., Auto-crime
• Further analysis reveals how broad this issue really is…
o Stealing hubcaps for resale/collection
o Theft from motor vehicles
o Theft of motor vehicles
• Theft of motor vehicles for use in other criminal activity
• Stealing cars for chopping up
• Stealing cars for transport
• Stealing cars for resale
o Juvenile joyriding
• Each specific issue will have meaningful differences
o Age, experience of offenders
o Organization of the criminal activity
o Temporal and geographical variations
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Tightening the focus
• Initial POP focus – thefts from motor vehicles in the city centre
• Additional analysis – the problem was concentrated in car parks (83% of thefts)
• Additional analysis – cars in surface (accessible) lots were 6 times more likely to be victimized compared to those in parking garages
• Project focus – improve security in surface parking lots
o Better lighting
o Improved fencing
o More supervision by attendants
• No likely return in trying to reduce theft from cars in secure parking lots, as the levels were already very low
• Tightening the focus increases the probability of success and uses resources effectively
42
Why use POP?
• Scalable
o It applies to problems with varying levels of complexity, from a single problem address to a community-wide problem
• Flexible
o It applies to a variety of substantive problem types, from minor quality of life issues to serious offenses
• Applicable
o Though it has roots in opportunity theory, it is useful to the day-to-day work of police officers on the street
• Doable
o Police officers and others can begin using these principles immediately
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Focus on problems not events
• Using POP as an underlying framework
o Find meaningful clustering of events into problems
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Events
Problems
CHEERS to defining a problem
“A problem is a recurring set of related harmful events in a community that members of the public expect the police to address”
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CHEERS to defining a problem
“A problem is a recurring set of similar harmful events in a community that members of the public expect the police to address”
• The CHEERS test
o Community – who is the community is affected?
o Harmful – what are the harms created by the problem?
o Expectation – what are the expectations for the response?
o Events – what types of event contribute to the problem?
o Recurring – how often do these events recur?
o Similarity – how are the events similar?
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recurring harmful events community expect
similar
CHEERS test elements – 1 Community
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• To be a POP-problem, members of the public must experience the harmful events
• These include
o Individuals
o Businesses
o Government agencies
• Only some – not all or most – community members need to experience the problem
CHEERS test elements – 2 Harmful
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• People or institutions must suffer harm
o Property loss or damage
o Injury or death
o Serious mental anguish
o Undermining the capacity of the police
• Illegality is not a defining characteristic of a problem
o Police sometimes have to investigate legal behaviour that is causing harm, e.g., noise complaints from legitimate business
CHEERS test elements – 3 Expectation
49
• Some members of the community must expect the police to address the causes of the harm
• It doesn’t have to be a lot of people and the reason for police involvement must be evident
o Citizen calls
o Community meetings
o Media coverage
• The police shouldn’t accept the public’s definition of the problem at face value
o May be mistaken about the underlying causes
CHEERS test elements – 4 Events
50
• You must be able to describe the type of event that makes up the problem
• For example
o A burglary of a home
o One person hitting another
o Two people exchanging money and sex
• Most events are brief
CHEERS test elements – 5 Recurring
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• These events must recur
o Just like in health, these can be acute or chronic
• Acute troubles
o Appear suddenly, e.g., a spate of vehicle break-ins in a suburb
o Can sometimes dissipate quickly, even without intervention
o If they persist, they can become chronic
• Chronic problems
o Persist over a long period of time, e.g., a prostitution stroll located along a street for many years
o Without intervention they will persist
CHEERS test elements – 6 Similarities
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• The recurring events must have something in common
o Same offender
o Same (type of) victim
o Same time/space
o Same tools (weapons) involved
• Common crime classifications (ANZSOC Index, ABS) are not helpful
o Remember the auto-theft example from earlier
• More information about common features is needed
Non-randomness
CHEERS helps distinguish POP problems from other troubles
53
• Other types of troubles that may draw police attention aren’t problems according to this POP-use of the term
• Single events
o These aren’t POP-problems without a reasonable prospect of a repeat
o Without re-occurrence, nothing can be prevented
• Neighbourhoods (‘areas’ people think are problems)
o These are usually areas containing a number of CHEERS-test problems
o Be specific in your interventions
o Don’t assume similar problems because of geographical proximity
• Status conditions – things people don’t like
o Kids wagging school, bored teenagers, homeless people don’t meet the CHEERS criteria in their own right
o Lack the characteristics of ‘harm’ and ‘events’
Know what kind of problem you have
54
• A wide range of problems meet the CHEERS test
• Classification helps identify which of these are similar problems
o Helps separate out superficial similarities that are really different types of problem
o Makes it possible to compare with other relevant problems that have already been addressed
o Helps identify important features for examination
• Classifying problems can be done using two criteria
o Environment
o Behaviour
The problem environment
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• Environments regulate
o The targets available
o The activities people can engage in
o Who controls the location
• Specifying an environment allows comparisons of environments with and without the problem
• Environments have owners who can be important for solving the problem
o The owner of the problem
• 11 distinct environments for most common police problems
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Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Locations where people dwell
• Most are fixed but some are mobile
• E.g., houses, apartments, hotel rooms, and camper vans
57
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Places where people go to have a good time
• E.g., bars, nightclubs, restaurants, movie theatres, playgrounds, marinas, and parks
58
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Locations of white-collar work, little face-to-face interaction between workers and the public, often with restricted access
• E.g., government and business facilities
59
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Walk-in or drive-up customer traffic
• Involve monetary transactions
• E.g., shops, banks
60
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Locations for processing goods
• Minimal cash transactions and little public access
• E.g., factories, warehouses, package-sorting facilities
61
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Locations for growing crops and raising animals
62
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Places of learning or study
• E.g., universities, schools, libraries, day care centres, and places of worship
63
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Places where people go when something is wrong
• E.g., courts, prisons, police stations, hospitals, drug treatment centres
64
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Routes connecting all other environments
• E.g., roads, highways, foot-paths, bike trails, parking facilities
65
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Locations for the mass movement of people
• E.g., busses, bus stations, bus stops, aeroplanes, airports, trains, train stations, ferries, ferry terminals
66
Environment Description of environment
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Areas without consistent or regular designated uses
• Different to parks – haven’t been designated for recreation
• E.g., abandoned buildings, construction sites
The problem behaviour
67
• Behaviour is the second dimension for classifying a problem
• Helps pinpoint important aspects of
o Harm
o Intent
o Offender-target relationships
• 6 distinct types of behaviour involved with the most common police problems
68
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Offender is clearly distinct from the victim
• Victim objects to the offender’s actions
• Most common crimes are of this type
• E.g., robbery, child abuse, burglary, theft
69
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Parties involved knowingly and willingly interact
• Typically involves some form of transaction
• E.g., drug sales, prostitution, and stolen goods sales
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Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Violent interactions
• Involving roughly coequal people
• Some pre-existing relationships
• E.g., conflicts around pubs
71
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Offenders are distinguishable from victims
• Victims spread over a number of individuals
• Harms are not serious – annoying, unsightly, noisy, or disturbing
• E.g., loud parties, petty vandalism
• Can be context- specific (i.e., graffiti isn’t always vandalism)
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Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• The offender and the victim are the same person or the offender had no intent to harm the victim
• E.g., suicide attempts, drug overdoses, and vehicle crashes
73
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
• Unwarranted demands on police services
• E.g., False reporting, repeat calls for issues citizens could address on their own
74
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Putting it all together with a couple of examples
75
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Glass-bottle injuries around pubs
×
76
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Dealing with repeat fraudulent calls of gang members threats at a convenience store
×
77
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Stores selling alcohol to minors
×
78
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Street corner drug sales×
79
Environment
Behaviours
Predatory Consensual Conflicts Incivilities Endanger- ment
Misuse of police
Residential
Recreational
Offices
Retail
Industrial
Agricultural
Education
Human service
Public ways
Transport
Open/transitional
Street corner drug sales×× Compared to robbery-retaliatory shooting because of problems between drug dealers
Study the journey to crime
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• So the CHEERS test has been passed and the problem has been classified
• Next step is to study the journey to crime…
Source: http://www.popcenter.org/learning/60steps/index.cfm?stepNum=16
How do offenders find suitable targets?
81
• 3 main ways
o Through personal knowledge of the victim (opportunity)
o Through work
o Through overlapping activity spaces
• Remember crime pattern theory and nodes, paths, and edges
o Offenders go where they know
o Potentially a slight ‘buffer’ zone
• Study movement of victims and offenders
o Study journey to crime
o Temporal and geographic variations
Hot spots – clustering in space
82
Source: http://www.esri.com/news/arcuser/0405/graphics/crimestat_1_lg.gif
Crime hot spots generated from vandalism data for Lincoln, Nebraska
Hot spots are shown in bright red and located in downtown Lincoln, an area with a large population
Cold spots, or areas of low crime, are shown in dark blue and are located in suburban areas
• BOCSAR crime tool
o http://crimetool.bocsar.nsw.gov.au/bocsar/
• Crime mapping in the US
o http://www.crimemapping.com/map.aspx
• Crime mapping in the UK
o https://www.police.uk
• Overall Crime cases and crime rate Singapore
o https://data.gov.sg/dataset/overall-crime-cases-crime-rate
Hot spots – clustering in space
83
Know how hot spots develop
84
• We know what they look like, but how do they develop?
• Three kinds of crime hot spot places
o Crime generators
o Crime attractors
o Crime enablers
• Places can also be crime neutral
o Tend to experience relatively few crimes
o Crimes that do occur are relatively unpatterned
o Don’t attract offenders or targets and adequate controllers in place
o Can be useful comparisons for crime hot spots – unpick the differences
Crime generators
85
• Places where large numbers of people are attracted for legitimate reasons
• Provide large numbers of opportunities for offenders to coincide in time and space with potential targets
• Examples
o Shopping centres
o Transport hubs
o Festivals
o Sporting events
Crime attractors
86
• Places with many criminal opportunities that are well known to offenders
• Motivated offenders are drawn to these places
• Start off as local knowledge but reputation spreads and popularity increases
• Examples - prostitution and drug areas
Crime enablers
87
• Places where there is little regulation of behaviour
o Rules of conduct are either absent or not enforced
• Can result from places that have experienced an abrupt change in place management
• Example
o Previously monitored car park loses attendant
o Allows loitering near cars when previously wasn’t possible
o Increased thefts from vehicles
Crime neutral places…
88
• Places can also be crime neutral
o Tend to experience relatively few crimes
o Crimes that do occur are relatively unpatterned
o Don’t attract offenders or targets and adequate controllers in place
o Can be useful comparisons for crime hot spots – unpick the differences
Hotspots emerge when…
89
The number of targets increases
Hotspots emerge when…
90
The number of motivated offenders increases
Hotspots emerge when…
91
The level of control at the site declines
Remember the 80:20 rule
92
• Crime opportunities are concentrated in time and space
• The 80:20 Rule – a small number of things are responsible for a large proportion of outcomes
o The rule-of-thumb is important to target interventions
o The percentages change (80:20) depending on the problem
o Small numbers of offenders are responsible for many crimes
o Small numbers of victims suffer a large amount of victimisation
o Small numbers of places are the locations of many crimes
• In pure terms
o Repeat-location problems
o Repeat-offender problems
o Repeat-victim problems
• Example: data from building site thefts and burglaries
Events, problems, and problem types
93
Events
Problems
Events, problems, and problem types
94
Problem Type 1 Problem Type 2
Attempts to share POP approaches
95
• www.popcenter.org
• The Goldstein Awards
o Recognize innovative and effective problem-oriented policing (POP) projects that have achieved measurable success in resolving recurring specific crime, disorder or public safety problems faced by police and the community **Professor Goldstein passed away in early 2020
• The Tilley Awards
o Promotes best practice in tackling crime and anti-social behavior by recognizing initiatives that reduce crime over the long term, not just by making arrests, but by working with local agencies to tackle the root causes of the problems
Searching the databases
96
96
Sharing the outcomes
97
• The motivation for sharing outcomes, even those that aren’t peer-reviewed, is because it is beyond the capacity of any agency on their own to work out what helps and what makes things worse
• Randomized controlled trials aren’t always possible
o Sample sizes are too small
o Not possible to implement without significant organisational disruption
o By seeking to control too many elements of the situation, you may lose the face validity of the findings
• Sometimes better to combine the general findings from weaker experimental designs
o Insight into what does work
o Also what does not work
Conclusions from Part (2)
• A range of stages for determining if you’ve got a crime problem
o CHEERS
o Environment and behaviours
o Journey to crime
o Hot spots
o 80:20 clustering
• It’s good to share
o Evaluation (success and failures) help develop the knowledge base
o Explore available resources for your assignments…
98
