On Selecting Crimes for Hot Spot Evaluations

Gabrielle Maglizza; Matthew B Thompson; Jesse Parmar

Hot spot policing is a strategy whereby patrols target areas with a disproportionate amount of crime. This strategy has been shown to be effective in reducing crime in high density areas. There is disagreement, however, about the effectiveness of hot spot policing for particular crime types. Crime types have been shown to influence the results of interventions, but there is currently no standard practice for selecting crime types for analysis. Here we survey the current literature in order to evaluate police response, crime measurement, and crime type selection. We describe various factors in hot spot policing experiments that should be considered in relation to one another and suggest that policing departments ought to establish clear experimental aims prior to implementing a hot spot strategy. We also suggest that police response should appropriately reflect the established experimental goals, and that crime types should be chosen dependent on the type of police response chosen. Once crime types are chosen, a metric of criminal activity can be chosen based on the crimes being targeted. We conclude by describing three key considerations for hot spot policing interventions: (1) adequate collection of pre-treatment crime levels is essential for an accurate representation of an areas’ level of crime and the types of crime problems in a given area; (2) selected crime types should reflect the chosen patrol’s effectiveness; and (3) crime measurement metrices should correlate with its corresponding experimental aims, police response and selected crime types.

On Selecting Crimes for Hot Spot Evaluations

Files and links (1)

Abstract

Details

Metrics