Preventing repeat victimization: a systematic review

In any given year, most crimes occur against targets that have already been victimized. The crime prevention strategy deriving from this knowledge is that targeting repeat victimization provides a means of allocating crime prevention resources in an efficient and informed manner. This report presents the findings of a systematic review of 31 studies that evaluate efforts to prevent repeat victimization. Most of the evaluations focus on preventing residential burglary, but commercial burglary, domestic violence, and sexual victimization are also covered. The main conclusion is that the evidence shows that repeat victimization can be prevented and crime can be reduced. Over all the evaluations, crimes decreased by one-sixth in the prevention condition compared with the control condition. The decreases were greatest (up to one-fifth) for programmes that were designed to prevent repeat burglaries (residential and commercial). There were fewer evaluations of programmes designed to prevent repeat sexual victimization, but these did not seem to be effective in general. There are indications about what factors increase the success of prevention efforts. Appropriately tailored and implemented situational crime prevention measures, such as target hardening and neighbourhood watch, appear to be the most effective. Advice to victims, and education of victims, are less effective. They are often not prevention measures themselves and do not necessarily lead to the adoption of such measures. The effectiveness of these crime prevention measures increased as the degree of implementation increased. There were many problems of implementation, including poor tailoring of interventions to crime problems, difficulty of recruiting, training and retaining staff, breakdown in communications, data problems, and resistance to tactics by potential recipients or implementers

Predicting the future or summarising the past: Crime mapping as anticipation

Predicting the future or summarising the past: Crime mapping as anticipatio

Victimisation and re-victimisation risk, housing type and area: a study of interactions

It is often assumed that less ostensibly affluent homes (eg terreced housing) are more at risk than other types of housing (such as detached houses) of being burgled. The research reported here shows these patterns to be strongly influenced by the area in which houses are located..

Prospective hot-spotting: the future of crime mapping

Prospective hot-spotting: the future of crime mappin

Cost benefit analysis for crime science: making cost-benefit analysis useful through a portfolio of outcomes

Cost-benefit analysis is used increasingly in crime reduction and criminal justice evaluations yet remains a frustrating exercise that is easy to criticise and dismiss. Should the intangible costs of crime be included? Should local or national cost estimates be used? Are ‘saved’ police and criminal justice costs a benefit of prevented crime? Should anticipatory and diffused benefits plus displacement costs be included? Which benefit-cost ratios should be presented for which of a range of diverse audiences? How long does crime prevention last, and so how many years of benefit-returns should be assessed? In theory, such questions could lead to a frustratingly large, perhaps infinite, number of benefit-cost ratio outcomes. Yet most studies present a single benefit-cost ratio measure. This study proposes a limited portfolio of benefit-cost ratios to convey information to a range of audiences and promote transparency. The argument is illustrated by a case study of a burglary reduction scheme

Correlations between district crime rates, efficiency scores, slacks, inputs and outputs.

Correlations between district crime rates, efficiency scores, slacks, inputs and outputs.</p

S1 File -

We use bootstrap data envelopment analysis, adjusting for endogeneity, to examine police efficiency in detecting crime in Hong Kong. We address the following: (i) is there a correlation between the detection of crime and triad influence? (ii) does the level of triad influence affect the efficiency in translating inputs (police strength) into outputs (crime detection)? and (iii) how can the allocation of policing resources be adjusted to improve crime detection? We find that nighty-eight percent of Hong Kong police districts in our sample were found to be inefficient in the detection of crime. Variation was found across districts regarding the detection of violent, property and other crimes. Most inefficiencies and potential improvements in the detection of crime were found in the categories violent and other crimes. We demonstrate how less efficient police districts can modify police resourcing decisions to better detect certain crime types while maintaining current levels of resourcing. Finally, we highlight how the method we outline improves efficiency estimation by adjusting for endogeneity and measuring the conditional efficiency of each district (i.e. the efficiency of crime detection taking the instrumental variables (e.g. influence of triads) into consideration). The use of frontier models to assist in evaluating policing performance can lead to improved efficiency, transparency, and accountability in law enforcement, ultimately resulting in better public safety outcomes and publicly funded resource allocation.</div

Descriptive statistics of the 18 police districts (2007–2017).

Descriptive statistics of the 18 police districts (2007–2017).</p

Illustration of the PPF.

We use bootstrap data envelopment analysis, adjusting for endogeneity, to examine police efficiency in detecting crime in Hong Kong. We address the following: (i) is there a correlation between the detection of crime and triad influence? (ii) does the level of triad influence affect the efficiency in translating inputs (police strength) into outputs (crime detection)? and (iii) how can the allocation of policing resources be adjusted to improve crime detection? We find that nighty-eight percent of Hong Kong police districts in our sample were found to be inefficient in the detection of crime. Variation was found across districts regarding the detection of violent, property and other crimes. Most inefficiencies and potential improvements in the detection of crime were found in the categories violent and other crimes. We demonstrate how less efficient police districts can modify police resourcing decisions to better detect certain crime types while maintaining current levels of resourcing. Finally, we highlight how the method we outline improves efficiency estimation by adjusting for endogeneity and measuring the conditional efficiency of each district (i.e. the efficiency of crime detection taking the instrumental variables (e.g. influence of triads) into consideration). The use of frontier models to assist in evaluating policing performance can lead to improved efficiency, transparency, and accountability in law enforcement, ultimately resulting in better public safety outcomes and publicly funded resource allocation.</div

DEA-BCC slack results for each input and output for the DMUs.

DEA-BCC slack results for each input and output for the DMUs.</p