Just enough police presence: Reducing crime and disorderly behavior by optimizing patrol time in crime hot spots

Koper, Christopher S.

doi:10.1080/07418829500096231

Cited by 283 publications

(234 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…As we reviewed earlier, the evidence does seem to suggest strongly that more police presence reduces crime, but the dosage-response curve question and its effect on risk perception is largely missing (but see Koper 1995). There is some research which suggests that when police are abruptly not present, crime rates increase (Andenaes 1974;Deangelo and Hansen 2014;Di Tella and Schargrodsky 2004;Heaton 2010;Sherman and Eck 2002;Shi 2009).…”

Section: Quantifying the Certainty Of Apprehensionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A small trial of this comparison by Police Constables and PCSOs on foot patrol was recently conducted in central Birmingham, England (Williams 2016), and another in the Police Service of Northern Ireland (Goddard and Ariel 2014), but larger trials including motor vehicle patrols are also needed. No other direction for improved precision in preventive policing strategy seems more important than, in effect, randomly assigning the different levels of patrol duration identified non-experimentally as the Koper Curve (Koper 1995). The implication from this study is to deploy randomly assigned comparisons of different numbers of visits to two or more groups of hot spots while holding total minutes of patrol constant.…”

Section: Implications For Policing Policymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As far as we can tell, there are few studies that have explicitly and directly tested the dosages of risk thresholds and its effect on the decision to commit crime (but cf. Braga and Bond 2008;Koper 1995). Even the broader literature on how much police presence affects perceptions of apprehension risk is scant (see Nagin 2013b; Wikström et al 2011).…”

Section: Quantifying the Certainty Of Apprehensionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Given the resources constraints and the distance between the hot spots, each hot spot was assigned to receive three separate one-PCSO patrol visit per day, or 780 visits per hot spot over 12 months. Each visit was required to last 15 minutes, based on prior evidence about how to maximize residual deterrent effects after PCSOs left the scene as demonstrated by the Koper Curve (Koper 1995;Telep et al 2012). Throughout the experimental period, the assignment of PCSOs to the hot spots was on a rotating basis, so that PCSOs patrolled different combinations of the 34 treatment hot spots rather than being limited to a few hot spots for all patrols.…”

Section: Treatment Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…How many officers does the force need (Wilson and Weiss 2012)? What is the optimal length of time for each visit of police to a hot spot (Koper 1995)? What is the right staffing model (Bittner 1990)?…”

Section: Implications For Policing Policymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

“Soft” policing at hot spots—do police community support officers work? A randomized controlled trial

2016

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Objectives To determine whether crime-reduction effects of increased police patrols in hot spots are dependent on the Bhard^threat of immediate physical arrest, or whether Bsoft^patrols by civilian (but uniformed) police staff with few arrest powers and no weapons can also reduce crime. We also sought to assess whether the number of discrete patrol visits to a hot spot was more or less important than the total minutes of police presence across all visits, and whether effects based on counts of crime would be consistent with effects on a Crime Harm Index outcome. Methods We randomly assigned 72 hot spots into 34 treatment units and 38 controls. Treatment consisted of increases in foot patrol by uniformed, unarmed, Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) who carry no weapons and hold few arrest powers beyond those of ordinary citizens. GPS-trackers on every PCSO and Constable in the city yielded precise measurements of all patrol time in all hot spots. Standardized mean differences (Cohen's d), OLS regression model, and Weighted Displacement Quotient are used to assess main effects, to model the interaction effect of GPS data with treatment, and to measure the diffusion-of-benefits of the intervention, respectively. Outcomes included counts of incidents as well as the Cambridge Crime Harm Index. Results As intended, patrol visits and minutes by Police Constables were equal across the treatment and control groups. The sole difference in policing between the treatments groups was in visits to the hot spots by PCSOs, in both the mean daily frequency of discrete visits (T = 4.65, C = 2.66; p ≤ .001) and total minutes across all visits (T = 37.41, J Exp Criminol (2016) 12:277-317 DOI 10.1007/s11292-016-9260-

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Section: Quantifying the Certainty Of Apprehensionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implications For Policing Policymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Quantifying the Certainty Of Apprehensionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Treatment Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implications For Policing Policymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

“Soft” policing at hot spots—do police community support officers work? A randomized controlled trial

2016

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Hot Spots Policing

Telep¹,

Weisburd²

2015

The Encyclopedia of Crime and Punishment

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Hot spots policing involves police focusing more resources on small units of geography (e.g., addresses, street blocks, small groups of street blocks) with high levels of criminal activity. The tactics police use at these crime hot spots can vary, but often involve some combination of increasing patrol presence and problem solving. There are a large number of rigorous evaluations of hot spots policing suggesting that the approach can be effective in reducing crime and disorder without simply displacing crime to areas nearby.

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Protocol for a systematic review: Community‐oriented policing's impact on interpersonal violent crime in developing countries

Higginson

Mazerolle

Davis

et al. 2013

Campbell Systematic Reviews

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Just enough police presence: Reducing crime and disorderly behavior by optimizing patrol time in crime hot spots

Cited by 283 publications

References 12 publications

“Soft” policing at hot spots—do police community support officers work? A randomized controlled trial

“Soft” policing at hot spots—do police community support officers work? A randomized controlled trial

Hot Spots Policing

Protocol for a systematic review: Community‐oriented policing's impact on interpersonal violent crime in developing countries

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