Objective. Using Poisson-based negative binomial regression, we estimate the effect of neighborhood factors on homicides in two cities (San Antonio, Texas and San Diego, California) that have large Mexican-origin populations. Methods. Three independent data sources (official homicide police reports, medical examiner records, and the U.S. Census) are used to construct the dependent homicide, and independent neighborhood, variables. Census tracts represent the unit of analysis, which serve as a proxy for neighborhoods. Given the spatial nature of the data, spatial estimation procedures were also modeled. Results. Spatial proximity to violence, neighborhood disadvantage, and affluence (in San Antonio) consistently buffered homicide across neighborhoods, even in heavily populated Latino neighborhoods. Conclusions. Spatial embeddedness and neighborhood characteristics are important for improving our understanding about ethnic neighborhood variations in levels of violence. Comparative approaches across places, namely, Latinodominated cities, can yield considerable insight into how the local context intersects race/ethnicity and violent crime.A considerable amount of recent research has focused on race-specific violent crime rates at different levels of aggregation (Peterson and Krivo, 2005). These studies have shown support for the importance of estimating the effects of social and economic factors on homicide (see LaFree, O'Brien, and Baumer, 2006;Wadsworth and Kubrin, 2004). Not surprisingly, these studies consistently find that measures of economic disadvantage are a strong predictor of violent crime across white and black locales. Researchers now n Direct correspondence to Ramiro Martinez, Jr.,
a b s t r a c tIt has long been acknowledged that police officers have substantial levels of discretion in their day-to-day activities. There is a well developed body of literature that considers how this discretion is exercised across a broad array of situations including the decision to arrest, use force, and grant citizen requests for official action. Using both social disorganization and conflict theories as conceptual models, the purpose of this study was to determine if neighborhood characteristics affect police reporting behavior across a wide cross-section of reported call types. The findings indicated that reporting behavior widely varies across crime types with a greater percentage of more serious crimes translated into official crime. Neighborhood characteristics did affect reporting practices, but surprisingly only for more serious forms of disorder where discretion was perceived to be less. The findings lent support for both social disorganization and conflict theories. Theoretical implications are discussed.© 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. IntroductionQuestions about when and how police use discretion have been a pressing concern among scholars for decades. A large body of literature seeks to explain discretionary decision-making by police, particularly regarding the use of force and decision to arrest. Less empirical consideration has focused on how police use discretion when recording citizen reported calls for service into official crime, despite the broad effect this decision has on victims and communities.
a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f oWhen Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in August 2005, it greatly disrupted both the physical and social structures of that community. One consequence of the hurricane was the displacement of large numbers of New Orleans residents to other cities, including Houston, San Antonio, and Phoenix. There has been media speculation that such a grand-scale population displacement led to increased crime in communities that were recipient of large numbers of displaced New Orleans residents. This study was a case study of three cities with somewhat different experiences with Katrina's diaspora. Time series analysis was used to examine the pre-and post-Katrina trends in six Part I offenses (murder, robbery, aggravated assault, rape, burglary, and auto theft) to assess any impact of such large-scale population shifts on crime in host communities. Contrary to much popular speculation, only modest effects were found on crime. Social disorganization theory was used to frame both the analysis and the interpretation of these results.
Guided by social disorganization theory, this article examines the influence of neighborhood characteristics on intragroup and intergroup robbery, net of spatial proximity in a predominantly native-born Latino/Mexican-origin city-San Antonio, Texas. From census tract and official police robbery data, the findings indicate that intragroup robbery is more common than intergroup robbery. Multivariate results show that variation in black intra-group robbery lies primarily in highly disadvantaged neighborhoods; whereas variation in Latino intergroup robbery is found in neighborhoods with more disadvantage, racial/ethnic heterogeneity, recent immigrants, and blacks. Residential instability persistently influences all robbery types. Disaggregating robberies by race and ethnicity reveals the importance of examining Latinos as offenders and victims. The case of San Antonio serves as a harbinger of conditions that may exist in the growing number of majority-Latino cities-and suggests the need to investigate crime experiences that move beyond studying racial dichotomies of violence.
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