Assessing the evidence base of a police service patrol portfolio

Abstract

Financial pressures on police forces are driving a re-evaluation of the legitimacy, effectiveness, and value for money of law enforcement services and activities. Evidence-based policing—using the best available research and analysis to help guide police practice—has been seen as an important tool in this era of austerity and accountability, but how is it to be accomplished? This study provides one demonstration of how such an effort might begin—by applying a large body of police research to assess a range of practices in one police service in the UK. Such evidence assessments are valuable strategic approaches in the absence of evaluations, when agencies are faced with choices about what programmes to retain or cut. This study is the first in the UK or the USA to apply the Evidence-Based Policing Matrix systematically to assess crime control effectiveness across a range of a police department's patrol strategies. Evidence-based policing in an age of reform and austerity