Levels Of Violent Crime Research Articles

Violent Crime, Mobility Decisions, and Neighborhood Racial/Ethnic Transition

Numerous studies have observed a positive cross-sectional relationship between the size of racial/ethnic minority groups and crime and posited that this relationship is entirely due to a causal effect of minorities on crime rates. We posit that at least some of this relationship might be due to the opposite effect: neighborhood crime increases the number of racial/ethnic minorities. This study employs a sample that allows nesting housing units within census tracts in a number of cities to test the effect of violent crime rates on residential mobility. We find that racial/ethnic transformation occurs due to two effects: first, white households are more likely to exit neighborhoods with higher rates of violent crime than are African American households. Second, whites are significantly less likely to move into a housing unit in a tract with more violent crime, particularly if this violent crime rate is increasing. On the other hand, African American and Latino households are more likely to enter neighborhoods with higher levels of violent crime. And Latinos are particularly likely to enter neighborhoods experiencing an increasing level of violent crime over the previous four years.

THE PHILADELPHIA FOOT PATROL EXPERIMENT: A RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL OF POLICE PATROL EFFECTIVENESS IN VIOLENT CRIME HOTSPOTS*

Originating with the Newark, NJ, foot patrol experiment, research has found police foot patrols improve community perception of the police and reduce fear of crime, but they are generally unable to reduce the incidence of crime. Previous tests of foot patrol have, however, suffered from statistical and measurement issues and have not fully explored the potential dynamics of deterrence within microspatial settings. In this article, we report on the efforts of more than 200 foot patrol officers during the summer of 2009 in Philadelphia. Geographic information systems (GIS) analysis was the basis for a randomized controlled trial of police effectiveness across 60 violent crime hotspots. The results identified a significant reduction in the level of treatment area violent crime after 12 weeks. A linear regression model with separate slopes fitted for treatment and control groups clarified the relationship even more. Even after accounting for natural regression to the mean, target areas in the top 40 percent on pretreatment violent crime counts had significantly less violent crime during the operational period. Target areas outperformed the control sites by 23 percent, resulting in a total net effect (once displacement was considered) of 53 violent crimes prevented. The results suggest that targeted foot patrols in violent crime hotspots can significantly reduce violent crime levels as long as a threshold level of violence exists initially. The findings contribute to a growing body of evidence on the contribution of hotspots and place-based policing to the reduction of crime, and especially violent crime, which is a significant public health threat in the United States. We suggest that intensive foot patrol efforts in violent hotspots may achieve deterrence at a microspatial level, primarily by increasing the certainty of disruption, apprehension, and arrest. The theoretical and practical implications for violence reduction are discussed.

Encruzilhadas da participação popular na modernização das políticas públicas: Uma análise do CONSEP em Brumadinho (MG)

This paper analyzes the as a sphere of dialogue between Police and community and, consequently, a new organization of traditionally hierarchical structures through the insertion of the citizen into the management of public policies. The matter of popular participation in public policies emerged as a focus of analysis in Brazilian social sciences, especially after the resignation of city councils, seeking to approximate public policy managers and citizens. In the specific case of public security, the motivation for the engagement of citizens in public policies acquires a more incisive connotation due to the growth of violent crime levels in the country. The present article offers a case study of the Council of Public Security in Brumadinho, a city in the Metropolitan Area of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais. This case presents relevant elements for the understading of the complex interaction between social and public actors as well as their implications for the construction of public policies. In this way, it is possible to simultaneously discuss the challenges of popular participation and the new arrangement of the public structures, traditionally responsible for managing public security policies.

Supporting Indirectly Traumatized Populations: The Need to Assess Secondary Traumatic Stress for Helping Professionals in DSM--V

Since the 1980s, concern has increased about how a challenging work environment consisting of a traumatized population of victims of violence and crime affects those professionals (including social workers, mental health workers, psychologists, nurses, and psychiatrists) who try to help these individuals. Data indicate that these helping professionals tend to develop occupational stress symptoms when they assist victims in managing their trauma or posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Boscarino, Figley, & Adams, 2004; Bride, 2007; Bride, Jones, & MacMaster, 2007). Working with traumatized clients or patients not only threatens the emotional balance of helping professionals, it may also cause these caregivers to suffer overwhelming negative feelings (Collins & Long, 2003; Halloran & Linton, 2000; Herman, 1992). Specifically, secondary traumatic stress (STS) symptoms have been viewed as the inevitable consequence of supporting victims of violence and crime (Bride, 2004; Figley, 1983, 1999). The symptoms of STS, which parallel those that appear in people directly exposed to trauma, include intrusive imagery related to the clients' traumatic disclosures, avoidant responses, physiological arousal, emotional numbing, distressing emotions, physiological somatic problems, hypervigilance, and functional impairment (Brady, Guy, Poelstra, & Fletcher-Brokaw, 1999; Chrestman, 1999; Dutton & Rubenstein, 1995; Figley, 2002; Pearhnau & Maclan, 1995). Helping professionals get STS either from their knowledge about a traumatic event or from their efforts to support traumatized or suffering people (Brown & O'Brien, 1998; Epstein & Silvern, 1990; Figley, 1995; Iliffe & Steed, 2000). STS has been measured by the Compassion Fatigue Self-Test (Figley, 1995) and the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale (Bride, Robinson, Yegidis, & Figley, 2004). One essential factor in making STS a priority is societal. Statistics show that the United States continues to suffer from issues of violence and crime, although serious violent crime levels have declined in recent years (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2006; Dye & Roth, 1990; Lindhorst, Nurius, & Macy, 2005; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1996). Helping professionals in social service agencies, clinics, and hospitals have a higher probability of meeting traumatized populations, such as victims of violence and crime. For example, Bride (2007), who conducted an STS study of 282 social workers in a southern state, found that nearly all (97.8 percent) of the social workers he questioned indicated that their client population experienced trauma; most (88.9 percent) indicated that their work with clients addressed issues related to those client traumas. Bride's (2007) study revealed that 70.2 percent of the social workers had exhibited at least one STS symptom m the previous week, and 55.0 percent met the criteria for at least one of the core STS symptoms (intrusion, avoidance, and arousal). Another national STS study of 515 mental health workers (Ting, Jacobson, Sanders, Bride, & Harrington, 2005) found that over half (53.3 percent) acknowledged the effects of secondary trauma on their personal and professional lives. Both societal issues and the problem of turnover of helping professionals within the workplace raise concern that STS be addressed. Previous studies indicate that those helping professionals with STS symptoms tend to leave their jobs more frequently than those without STS (Beaton & Murphy, 1995). With the loss of experienced staff, social agencies, clinics, and hospitals will no longer be able to support or protect traumatized victims of violence and crime. Finally, because the symptoms of STS (intrusion, avoidance, and arousal) mimic those of PTSD, it would be reasonable for DSM-V to assess STS as it will PTSD. STS is almost identical to PTSD, except that STS applies to people who have been affected by the trauma of others (Figley, 2002). …

Motives for migration of South African doctors to Australia since 1948

To determine why more than 2000 doctors have migrated from South Africa to Australia since 1948. South African-trained doctors living in Australia and the spouses or adult children of deceased practitioners who had emigrated from South Africa were contacted by email between August 2008 and February 2009. The sample of doctors was gathered and expanded by an email "snowball" technique and through advertising in alumni and professional journals and newsletters. A questionnaire was emailed to 653 contacts. Primary reason given for migration. Responses were received from 469 of the 653 email contacts (72%), from a population of about 2200 South African doctors in Australia. Of the 469 respondents, 434 (93%) had been motivated to emigrate by a wish to leave South Africa, rather than by Australian inducements. The primary reason for emigration before 1990 was opposition to apartheid (142/205 [69%]); the primary reason for emigration after 1990 was the level of violent crime (including "safety" issues) (116/264 [44%]). Most South African doctors who migrated to Australia were impelled to emigrate by South African issues, rather than attracted by Australia.

Girls in the ’Hood: How Safety Affects the Life Chances of Low-Income Girls

Adolescents growing up in high-poverty neighborhoods are at risk for a range of negative outcomes. Girls face specific threats because of their gender—omnipresent harassment, pressure for early sexual initiation, pervasive intimate partner violence, and high risk of sexual assault.This article uses mixed-methods data from the Three-City Study of Moving to Opportunity (MTO) to explore how moving to lower-poverty neighborhoods may have influenced adolescent girls’ life chances. MTO families moved to neighborhoods with lower levels of violent crime overall, but MTO girls also experienced a substantial reduction in the “female fear,” Gordon and Riger’s term for the fear of sexual harassment, coercion, and rape. The authors argue that this change is a plausible explanation for the notable improvements in MTO girls’ well-being.

Violent Crime, Residential Instability and Mobility: Does the Relationship Differ in Minority Neighborhoods?

This study examines the reciprocal relationship between violent crime and residential stability in neighborhoods. We test whether the form of stability matters by comparing two different measures of stability: a traditional index of residential stability and a novel approach focusing specifically on the stability of homeowners. We also examine whether the racial/ethnic composition of the neighborhood in which this stability occurs affects the instability—violent crime relationship. To test the simultaneous relationship between residential mobility and crime we estimate a dual multivariate latent curve model of the change in the violent crime rate and the change in the rate of home sales while controlling for neighborhood socioeconomic and demographic characteristics using data from Los Angeles between 1992 and 1997. Results indicate that the initial level of violent crime increases the trajectory of residential instability in subsequent years, whether the instability is measured as homeowner turnover specifically, or based on an index of all residents. However, the effect of instability on violent crime is only apparent when measuring instability based on an index of general residential turnover and not when including the presence of owners in this measure, or when measuring it based on homeowner turnover. We consistently find that stable highly Latino communities exhibit a protective effect against violence.

Project Safe Neighborhoods and Violent Crime Trends in US Cities: Assessing Violent Crime Impact

Since the mid-1990s, a number of initiatives intended to address gang, gun and drug-related violence have arisen and demonstrated promise in reducing levels of violent crime. These initiatives have employed some combination of focused deterrence and problem-solving processes. These strategies formed the basis for Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a national program implemented by the Department of Justice and coordinated by US Attorneys’ Offices. This paper is an initial attempt to assess the potential impact of the nationally implemented PSN initiative through an analysis of violent crime trends in all US cities with a population of 100,000 or above. While a number of site specific studies exist examining the potential impact of locally implemented PSN programs, to date no national-level study has examined whether PSN may have had an impact on violent crime trends. Cities included in the current study are distinguished on the basis of whether they were considered a treatment city by the PSN task force and by the level of implementation dosage of the PSN program. This allowed a comparison of 82 treatment cities and 170 non-treatment cities as well as a variable of dosage level. Hierarchical Generalized Linear Models (HGLM) were developed that controlled for other factors that may have affected the level of violent crime across the sample of cities. The results suggested that PSN treatment cities in higher dosage contexts experienced statistically significant, though modest, declines in violent crime whereas non-target cities and low dosage contexts experienced no significant changes in violent crime during the same period. The limitations of this initial analysis are noted but the evidence seems to suggest that the multi-agency, focused deterrence, problem solving approach holds promise for reducing levels of violent crime. At a minimum, these findings call for continued programmatic experimentation with data-driven, highly focused, deterrence-based violence reduction strategies.

Organizational Approaches to Drug Law Enforcement by Local Police Departments in the United States: Specialized Drug Units and Participation in Multi-Agency Drug Task Forces

This paper examines the factors associated with the decision of local police departments in the United States to operate specialized drug units or to participate in multi-jurisdictional drug task forces. Combining data from the Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) Survey, the 2000 Census, and the Uniform Crime Report, we use both bivariate and multivariate methods to conduct the analysis. The findings indicate that county-level agencies, those with other formalized drug control efforts, high levels of violent crime, high degrees of task specialization and formalization, and high proportions of the resident population accounted for by renters were more likely to operate drug units, participate in multi-agency drug task forces, and allocate more officers per capita to these efforts.

Territorialities in Scotland: perceptions of young people in Glasgow

This paper presents the results of an exploratory, small-scale qualitative research enquiry into the perceptions and experiences of young people in communities afflicted by deprivation in Glasgow, Scotland's largest city. The context within which we address this focus contains a culture reputed to involve sectarianism, territoriality and gangs. Glasgow has a reputation for being a ‘hard place’. The official crime statistics are consistent with comparatively high levels of violent crime impacting upon this culture. We adopted semi-structured interviews in order to explore young people's perspectives as well as those working with them in youth venues. Most of the data collection took place in ‘youth centres’ close to the two stadiums of the major Scottish football clubs, namely Rangers and Celtic. Social capital theory is incorporated into the analysis of the results. The findings suggest that territoriality is the dominant parameter shaping their experience of and perceptions regarding neighbourhood areas, a conclusion endorsed by recent research about religious intermarriage.

Continuity of adolescent and early adult partner violence victimisation: association with witnessing violent crime in adolescence

Background:Although exposure to peer and family violence is a documented risk factor for adolescent dating violence, less is known about the relationship between violent crime exposure and dating violence victimisation.Methods:Participants...

Segregation, Racial Structure, and Neighborhood Violent Crime

Drawing on structural racism and urban disadvantage approaches, this article posits a broad influence of citywide racial residential segregation on levels of violent crime across all urban neighborhoods regardless of their racial/ethnic composition. Multilevel models based on data from the National Neighborhood Crime Study for 7,622 neighborhoods in 79 cities throughout the United States reveal that segregation is positively associated with violent crime for white and various types of nonwhite neighborhoods. Nonetheless, there is a lack of parity in violence across these types of communities reflecting the larger racialized social system in which whites are able to use their privileged position to reside in the most advantaged neighborhoods, while African-Americans and Latinos live in the most disadvantaged urban communities and therefore bear the brunt of urban criminal violence.

Race, Residence, and Violent Crime: A Structure of Inequality

There is a great deal of variation in levels of violent crime across communities of different colors in urban neighborhoods throughout the United States. This variation is seen in rates of violence that are much higher in predominantly minority neighborhoods, especially those comprised of blacks, compared to predominantly white neighborhoods. This Article addresses the question of how to account for stark differences in criminal violence across communities of varying colors. We draw on arguments set forth by race and ethnic scholars in the social sciences who contend that the social organization of U.S. society is structured to produce and reinforce a racial order where whites are privileged over other groups. This racialized order is evident in

Rethinking State, Civil Society and Citizen Participation. The Case of the Colombian Paramilitaries

Throughout Latin America, processes of democratization have coincided with increasing levels of violent crime, the privatization of justice and security, and widespread support for heavy-handed policing. The Colombian paramilitaries are perhaps the most notorious case of brutal violence committed against civilians with general support from both state and society. The article explores the surprising amalgam of actors of which the paramilitaries are comprised. It illustrates the way in which their development was shrouded in and facilitated by legal ambiguity, and distinguish their war tactic of targeting the civilians from the guerrilla’s strategy. Finally, it discusses the political success of the paramilitaries in terms of their land and wealth consolidation, their insertion into the political science, and their legal demobilization. It is suggested to conceive paramilitary violence not merely as havoc wrecked in the margins of the state, but as a central component of contemporary governance.

Drugs Prices and Systemic Violence: An Empirical Study

This study proposes an empirical analysis of the relation between the prices of illegal drugs and the use of violence to administrate the markets of illegal drugs. The study hypothesizes that the prices of illegal drugs affect the level of violent crime, since changes in profitability of the drugs’ markets affect the offenders’ expected utility of using violence to operate in these markets. An increase (or decrease) in prices would raise (or reduce) the offenders’ expected utility of making use of violence, for instance, to solve disputes over drugs, to conquer more market shares, to defend ones own market share, in short to make use of systemic violence (Goldstein, P.J. Journal of Drug Issues, 39:143–179, 1985). The study will analyze the relation between the dynamics of cocaine and heroin’s prices and systemic violence in the United States of America and in Europe over two decades. The correlational and inferential analyses do support the hypothesis for certain offenders’ profiles and certain murders’ circumstances.

Institutions, Anomie, and Violent Crime: Clarifying and Elaborating Institutional-Anomie Theory

A limited but accumulating body of research and theoretical commentary offers support for core claims of the “institutional-anomie theory” of crime (IAT) and points to areas needing further development. In this paper, which focuses on violent crime, we clarify the concept of social institutions, elaborate the cultural component of IAT, derive implications for individual behavior, summarize empirical applications, and propose directions for future research. Drawing on Talcott Parsons, we distinguish the “subjective” and “objective” dimensions of institutional dynamics and discuss their interrelationship. We elaborate on the theory’s cultural component with reference to Durkheim’s distinction between “moral” and “egoistic” individualism and propose that a version of the egoistic type characterizes societies in which the economy dominates the institutional structure, anomie is rampant, and levels of violent crime are high. We also offer a heuristic model of IAT that integrates macro- and individual levels of analysis. Finally, we discuss briefly issues for the further theoretical elaboration of this macro-social perspective on violent crime. Specifically, we call attention to the important tasks of explaining the emergence of economic dominance in the institutional balance of power and of formulating an institutional account for distinctive punishment practices, such as the advent of mass incarceration in the United States.

Institutions, Anomie, and Violent Crime: Clarifying and Elaborating Institutional-Anomie Theory

A limited but accumulating body of research and theoretical commentary offers support for core claims of the “institutional-anomie theory” of crime (IAT) and points to areas needing further development. In this paper, which focuses on violent crime, we clarify the concept of social institutions, elaborate the cultural component of IAT, derive implications for individual behavior, summarize empirical applications, and propose directions for future research. Drawing on Talcott Parsons, we distinguish the “subjective” and “objective” dimensions of institutional dynamics and discuss their interrelationship. We elaborate on the theory’s cultural component with reference to Durkheim’s distinction between “moral” and “egoistic” individualism and propose that a version of the egoistic type characterizes societies in which the economy dominates the institutional structure, anomie is rampant, and levels of violent crime are high. We also offer a heuristic model of IAT that integrates macro- and individual levels of analysis. Finally, we discuss briefly issues for the further theoretical elaboration of this macro-social perspective on violent crime. Specifically, we call attention to the important tasks of explaining the emergence of economic dominance in the institutional balance of power and of formulating an institutional account for distinctive punishment practices, such as the advent of mass incarceration in the United States.

Assessing the County-Level Structural Covariates of Police Homicides

Largely paralleling research on general homicides, research on the structural covariates of murders of police has been carried out at various levels of areal aggregation. However, although the general homicide research has been extended to counties in the United States, research on murders of police has yet to follow suit. To begin to fill this gap, this study extends research on the structural covariates of police homicides to the county level. Controlling for the number of law enforcement officers at risk, we find that police were more likely to be murdered in economically depressed counties and in counties with larger percentages of African Americans, persons aged 25 to 34, and nonsheriff agencies. Police homicide risk was significantly lower in urbanized counties and in counties located in the Northeast, whereas the South was no riskier than the West or Midwest. Murders of police were unrelated to population mobility, divorce, and levels of violent crime.

Violent Crime in South Africa: Historical Perspectives

This paper tries to set out an agenda for historical research into the origins of unusually high violent crime levels in South Africa. It argues that there have been few attempts to link historical research on crime explicitly to the contemporary crisis. The paper reviews some of the more recent attempts at an explanation for our levels of violent crime but finds them generally lacking in historical depth. The apartheid legacy paradigm, while essential to the discussion, is inadequate for a number of reasons. Specific indigenous cultural and social practices need to be incorporated more systematically into future research. I argue that two areas of the discussion on crime need urgent historical attention: inequality and youth socialisation. I also suggest that historians need to do much more comparative work with countries that have experienced similar political and economic trajectories in order to understand which dimensions of our criminal legacy are specific to South Africa.

Urban Violence in Colonial Africa: A Case for South African Exceptionalism

In an attempt to move beyond the parochial character of the otherwise rich historiography of urban South Africa, this article compares the level of violent crime, gang conflict and vigilantism in the segregated townships and mining compounds surrounding South African cities, particularly Johannesburg, in the period to 1960, with that of African neighbourhoods in colonial cities elsewhere on the continent. The evidence suggests that concepts of South African exceptionalism need to take account of the extraordinary degree of urban violence that distinguished South Africa from its colonial contemporaries. A brutalising mining environment, combined with racial ordinances that criminalised Africans and coloureds and exposed vast numbers of men to prison and prison gangs, produced a culture of urban violence unique in colonial Africa.