Understanding site selection of illegal border crossings into a fenced protected area: a rational choice approach

Abstract

This study investigates illegal border crossings by rhino poachers into a fenced reserve in South Africa, comparing journeys to and after crime using a rational choice approach. Using various regression models, our analysis indicates poachers prefer to enter and exit the reserve near high rhino densities, while high road densities outside the reserve increase the odds of an illegal entry. The results also show that half of the incursions occurred at a single location, leading us to describe the special circumstances of this outlier. The study lays a foundation for understanding the location choices poachers make and presents a methodology that can be replicated in other reserves.

Uncovering the nuances of criminal motivations andmodus operandiin the Russian Far East: A wildlife crime case study

“…Quantitative methods remain an important tool in wildlife crime studies. Customs seizure trends (Petrossian et al, 2016;Van Uhm, 2016), the effect international wildlife commodity bans have on poaching (Lemieux and Clarke, 2009), poacher preferences for illegal border crossings into protected areas (Van Doormaal et al, 2018), modeling the most efficient wildlife patrol regimes in protected areas (Fang et al, 2017), and modeling enforcement and compliance in conservation (Keane et al, 2008) have all been studied quantitatively. However, qualitative methods provide a means to both complement and increase the robustness of existing natural science knowledge (Drury et al, 2011;Moreto, 2016) and to concentrate emphasis on the contextual factors and details of crime commission.…”

Applying Crime Pattern Theory and Risk Terrain Modeling to Examine Environmental Crime in Cambodia

“…Previous research has also shown that poachers typically offend near edges like park boundaries (Watson et al, 2013), thus the boundaries for this study were operationalized as proximity. Because known or high target densities, for both flora (Young et al, 2011) and fauna (Critchlow et al, 2015; Rashidi et al, 2016; van Doormaal et al, 2018), have been shown to correlate with future illegal activity, animal sightings, previous flora incidents, and previous fauna incidents were all operationalized as density. Finally, conservation posts were operationalized as proximity because previous empirical research has shown that illegal activity often occurs in close distance to these locations (Jenks et al, 2012; Maingi et al, 2012; Rashidi et al, 2016).…”

“…An investigation of elephant poaching in Kenya found that elephant population density was a significant predictor in poaching behaviors, which could be due to having a greater “harvest” relative to the effort involved (Rashidi et al, 2016). In a study by van Doormaal and colleagues (2018), rhinoceros poaching in the northeastern part of South Africa was more likely to occur in areas of higher rhinoceros’ density. However, high-density targets may only increase the likelihood of certain poaching activities over others.…”

“…There have only been a handful of criminological studies that have examined the spatial correlates of environmental crime (see e.g., Kurland et al, 2018; van Doormaal et al, 2018; Weekers et al, 2019). Yet within the broader conservation sciences literature, there have been several studies that have spatially assessed the distribution and correlates of environmental crime.…”

“…Empirical findings, however, are mixed. Examining primate densities in Taï National Park, a PA in Côte d’Ivoire, N’Goran and colleagues (2012) found a positive correlation between the density of primates and the distance to the tourist site within the park, while van Doormaal and associates (2018) found that the presence of private facilitates and tourist lodges did not deter illegal border crossings for rhinoceros hunting in South Africa.…”