A leading sociological theory of crime is the "routine activities" approach (Cohen and Felson, 1979). The premise of this ecological theory is that criminal events result from likely offenders, suitable targets, and the absence of capable guardians against crime converging nonrandom4 in time and space. Yet prior research has been unable to employ spatial data, relying instead on individual-and household-level data, to test that basic premise. This analysis supports the premise with spatial data on 323,979 calls to police over all 115,000 addresses and intersections in Minneapolis over 1 year. Relatively few %ot spots" produce most calls to Police (50% of calls in 3 % ofplaces) and calls reportingpredatory crimes (all robberies at 2.2% of places, all rapes at 1.2% of places, and all auto thefs at 2.7% of places), because crime is both rare (only 3.6% of the city could have had a robbery with no repeat addresses) and concentrated, although the magnitude of concentration varies by offense type. These distributions all deviate signijicantly, and with ample magnitude, from the simple Poisson model of chance, which raises basic questions about the criminogenic nature of places, as distinct from neighborhoods or collectivities.Is crime distributed randomly in space? There is much evidence that it is not. Yet there are many who suggest that it is. In a leading treatise on police innovations, for example, Skolnick and Bayley (1986: 1) observe that "we feel trapped in an environment that is like a madhouse of unpredictable violence and Quixotic threat." People victimized by crime near their homes

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Increasing evidence shows great diversity in the effects of the criminal sanction. Legal punishment either reduces, increases, or has no effect on future crimes, depending on the type of offenders, offenses, social settings, and levels of analysis. A theory of “defiance” helps explain the conditions under which punishment increases crime. Procedural justice (fairness or legitimacy) of experienced punishment is essential for the acknowledgment of shame, which conditions deterrence; punishment perceived as unjust can lead to unacknowledged shame and defiant pride that increases future crime. Both “specific” defiance by individuals and “general” defiance by collectivities results from punishment perceived as unfair or excessive, unless deterrent effects counterbalance defiance and render the net effect of sanctions irrelevant. By implication, crime might be reduced more by police and courts treating all citizens with fairness and respect than by increasing punishments. A variety of research designs can be used to test, refine, or reject the theory.

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In a reanalysis of the Milwaukee Domestic Violence Experiment, we examine whether the use of fair procedures on the part of police officers called to the scene of a domestic assault inhibits subsequent assault. Consistent with expectations, we found that procedural justice did suppress subsequent violence, even in the face of adverse outcomes. When police acted in a procedurally fair manner when arresting assault suspects, the rate of subsequent domestic violence was significantly lower than when they did not. Moreover, suspects who were arrested and perceived that they were treated in a procedurally fair manner had subsequent assault rates that were as low as those suspects given a more favorable outcome (warned and then released without arrest). The suppression effect of procedural justice did not depend on the personal characteristics of suspects.

Evidence-based policing is a method of making decisions about "what works" in policing: which practices and strategies accomplish police missions most cost-effectively. In contrast to basing decisions on theory, assumptions, tradition, or convention, an evidence-based approach continuously tests hypotheses with empirical research findings. While research on all aspects of policing grew substantially in the late twentieth century, the application of research to police practice intensified in the early twentyfirst century, especially for three tasks that make up the "triple-T" strategy of policing: targeting, testing, and tracking. Evidence-based targeting requires systematic ranking and comparison of levels of harm associated with various places, times, people, and situations that policing can lawfully address. Evidence-based testing helps assure that police neither increase crime nor waste money. Tracking whether police are doing what police leaders decide should be done may grow most rapidly in coming years by the use of GPS records of where police go and body-worn video records of what happens in encounters with citizens. Can research help improve democratic policing? For over four decades, numerous colleagues and I have struggled to answer that question. When we began, policing was done very differently from how it is

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