Among scholars, there is a discussion regarding whether types of places, or facilities, function as crime generators or whether the association between some categories of facilities and higher rates of offending is the result of a small proportion of all facilities within a given category, or problem places. This study seeks to further inform this debate by exploring whether policy changes that alter the social functioning of a category of facilities, specifically bars and taverns, modifies the spatial association with crime. Using routine activities theory as a framework, this study builds on previous research by exploring the association between alcohol-serving establishments and violent crimes, specifically assaults, following the implementation of a smoke-free law. Using data from a pair of adjoining communities in Iowa, findings indicate the frequency of reported assaults on blocks with bars as well as on adjoining blocks declined following the implementation of a law prohibiting smoking tobacco products within bars and taverns. Implications for policies and future research are discussed.

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The article provides a systematic historical and legal analysis of normative legal acts, starting with the first written references dated to the 15th – 16th centuries, as well as the subsequent stages, providing for responsibility for a criminal formation organized on an ethnic basis. The study in retrospect allowed the author to trace the dynamics of the development of the legislative position on the considered legal phenomenon, which was reflected in the adoption of certain legal norms of anti-criminal orientation. The crime indicators in the territory of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region for five years are examined, the structure of crimes committed by organized ethnic criminal groups, which has undergone significant changes, is studied. Special attention is paid to the issue of the emergence and subsequent evolution of criminal formations created on an ethnic basis, which occurred under the influence of various social processes. An attempt was made to give an objective assessment of the degree of effectiveness of the criminal law measures aimed at combating organized crime. The author offers to improve the current legislation on combating crime.

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