Crime mapping is used by analysts in

law enforcement agencies A law enforcement agency (LEA) is any government agency responsible for law enforcement within a specific jurisdiction through the employment and deployment of law enforcement officers and their resources. The most common type of law enforcement ...

to map, visualize, and analyze crime incident patterns. It is a key component of crime analysis and the

CompStat CompStat (also written COMPSTAT) is a police management system created by the New York City Police Department in 1994 with assistance from the New York City Police Foundation. Today, variations of the system are used in police departments worldwid ...

policing strategy. Mapping crime, using

Geographic Information Systems A geographic information system (GIS) consists of integrated computer hardware and software that store, manage, analyze, edit, output, and visualize geographic data. Much of this often happens within a spatial database; however, this is not ...

(GIS), allows crime analysts to identify crime hot spots, along with other trends and patterns.

Overview

Using GIS, crime analysts can overlay other datasets such as

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

demographics Demography () is the statistical study of human populations: their size, composition (e.g., ethnic group, age), and how they change through the interplay of fertility (births), mortality (deaths), and migration. Demographic analysis examin ...

, locations of

pawn shops A pawnbroker is an individual that offers secured loans to people, with items of personal property used as collateral. A pawnbrokering business is called a pawnshop, and while many items can be pawned, pawnshops typically accept jewelry, ...

, schools, etc., to better understand the underlying causes of

crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definiti ...

and help

law enforcement Law enforcement is the activity of some members of the government or other social institutions who act in an organized manner to enforce the law by investigating, deterring, rehabilitating, or punishing people who violate the rules and norms gove ...

administrators to devise strategies to deal with the problem. GIS is also useful for law enforcement operations, such as allocating police officers and dispatching to

emergencies An emergency is an urgent, unexpected, and usually dangerous situation that poses an immediate risk to health, life, property, or environment and requires immediate action. Most emergencies require urgent intervention to prevent a worsening ...

. Underlying theories that help explain spatial behavior of criminals include environmental criminology, which was devised in the 1980s by Patricia and Paul Brantingham, routine activity theory, developed by Lawrence Cohen and Marcus Felson and originally published in 1979, and

rational choice theory Rational choice modeling refers to the use of decision theory (the theory of rational choice) as a set of guidelines to help understand economic and social behavior. The theory tries to approximate, predict, or mathematically model human behav ...

, developed by Ronald V. Clarke and Derek Cornish, originally published in 1986. In recent years, crime mapping and analysis has incorporated spatial data analysis techniques that add

statistical Statistics (from German language, German: ', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data. In applying statistics to a s ...

rigor and address inherent limitations of spatial data, including spatial

autocorrelation Autocorrelation, sometimes known as serial correlation in the discrete time case, measures the correlation of a signal with a delayed copy of itself. Essentially, it quantifies the similarity between observations of a random variable at differe ...

and spatial heterogeneity. Spatial data analysis helps one analyze crime data and better understand why and not just where crime is occurring. Research into computer-based crime mapping started in 1986, when the

National Institute of Justice The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) is the research, development, and evaluation agency of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ). NIJ, along with the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), Offic ...

(NIJ) funded a project in the

Chicago Police Department The Chicago Police Department (CPD) is the primary law enforcement agency of the city of Chicago, Illinois, United States, under the jurisdiction of the Chicago City Council. It is the second-largest Law enforcement in the United States#Local, ...

to explore crime mapping as an adjunct to

community policing Community policing is a philosophy and organizational strategy whereby law enforcement cooperates with community groups and citizens in producing safety and security. The theory underlying community policing is that it makes citizens more likely t ...

. That project was carried out by the CPD in conjunction with the Chicago Alliance for Neighborhood Safety, the

University of Illinois at Chicago The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is a public research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its campus is in the Near West Side community area, adjacent to the Chicago Loop. The second campus established under the Universi ...

, and

Northwestern University Northwestern University (NU) is a Private university, private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851 to serve the historic Northwest Territory, it is the oldest University charter, chartered university in ...

, reported on in the book, ''Mapping Crime in Its Community Setting: Event Geography Analysis''. The success of this project prompted NIJ to initiate the Drug Market Analysis Program (with the appropriate acronym D-MAP) in five cities, and the techniques these efforts developed led to the spread of crime mapping throughout the US and elsewhere, including the

New York City Police Department The City of New York Police Department, also referred to as New York City Police Department (NYPD), is the primary law enforcement agency within New York City. Established on May 23, 1845, the NYPD is the largest, and one of the oldest, munic ...

Applications

Crime analysts use crime mapping and analysis to help law enforcement management (e.g. the police chief) to make better decisions, target resources, and formulate strategies, as well as for tactical analysis (e.g. crime forecasting,

geographic profiling Geographic profiling is a criminal investigative methodology that analyzes the locations of a connected series of crimes to determine the most probable area of offender residence. By incorporating both qualitative and quantitative methods, it assis ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

does this through the

approach, though that way of thinking deals more with the short term. There are other, related approaches with terms including Information-led policing,

Intelligence-led policing Intelligence-led policing (ILP) is a policing model built around the assessment and management of risk.Willem de Lint, “Intelligence in Policing and Security: Reflections on Scholarship,” Policing & Society, Vol. 16, no. 1 (March 2006): 1-6. Int ...

Problem-oriented policing Problem-oriented policing (POP), coined by University of Wisconsin–Madison professor Herman Goldstein, is a policing strategy that involves the identification and analysis of specific crime and disorder problems, in order to develop effective r ...

, and

Community policing Community policing is a philosophy and organizational strategy whereby law enforcement cooperates with community groups and citizens in producing safety and security. The theory underlying community policing is that it makes citizens more likely t ...

. In some law enforcement agencies, crime analysts work in civilian positions, while in other agencies, crime analysts are sworn officers. From a research and

policy Policy is a deliberate system of guidelines to guide decisions and achieve rational outcomes. A policy is a statement of intent and is implemented as a procedure or protocol. Policies are generally adopted by a governance body within an or ...

perspective, crime mapping is used to understand patterns of

incarceration Imprisonment or incarceration is the restraint of a person's liberty for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is considered " false imprisonment". Impri ...

and

recidivism Recidivism (; from 'recurring', derived from 'again' and 'to fall') is the act of a person repeating an undesirable behavior after they have experienced negative consequences of that behavior, or have been trained to Extinction (psycholo ...

, help target resources and programs, evaluate

crime prevention Crime prevention refers to strategies and measures that seek to reduce the risk of crime occurring by intervening before a crime has been committed. It encompasses many approaches, including developmental, situational, community-based and crimin ...

or crime reduction programs (e.g. Project Safe Neighborhoods, Weed & Seed and as proposed in '' Fixing Broken Windows''), and further understanding of causes of crime.

Overview

Applications

See also

Programs and projects

Individuals

Public access

General

References

Further reading