Uniform Crime Reports as Organizational Outcomes: Three Time Series Experiments

Establishing the statistical relationship between population size and UCR crime rate: Its impact and implications

“…Many argued against comparing or ranking jurisdictions in this way (Brantingham & Brantingham, 1994;Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2001;McCleary, Nienstedt, & Erven, 1982). In fact, in the very front of Crime in the United States, the FBI included a section entitled Crime Factors in which the agency warned against comparing crime rates and ranking cities (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2001, p. iv).…”

Racial Encroachment and the Formal Control of Space: Minority Group-Threat and Misdemeanor Arrests in Urban Communities

“…Rosenfeld & Decker, 1999), and they may be susceptible to organizational incentive structures that favor their production (e.g. Fagan, West, & Holland, 2003;McCleary, Nienstedt, & Erven, 1982). Both conditions would decrease the amount of expected discretion officers might otherwise use when faced with the opportunity to make drug arrests.…”

Contacts between the Police and the Public: Three Tests of Convergent Validity

“…The vast majority of criticisms directed at the two primary measures of crime and victimization in the USA, the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) and NCVS, have focused primarily on measures of actual rates of victimization. Limited research has been conducted on the organizational influences on crime and arrest data for the UCR (McCleary, Neinstedt, & Erven, 1982;Sherman & Glick, 1984), while the NCVS has been scrutinized for its sampling procedures and the validity threats inherent in survey data.…”

“…There are numerous organizational influences on the outcome of UCR data (McCleary et al, 1982) and its utility for comparison between jurisdictions is at best questionable (Sherman & Glick, 1984). On the other hand, the UCR aggregate arrest data have been relatively stable over time suggesting the data are reliable.…”