Prevention Works

Crime Response or Crime Prevention?

It has been more than 27 years since Dr. George Kelling co-authored (with James Q. Wilson) the groundbreaking crime prevention article "Broken Windows" in The Atlantic Monthly.

Simply stated the “Broken Windows” theory of crime prevention says fix the small problems, don’t ignore them, and the big problems will take care of themselves. When the window of a school or other building is broken through vandalism, unless that window is repaired right away it will spawn more vandalism in a downward spiral that can impact whole communities. This theory is often behind the so-called “zero tolerance” of petty crimes and “quality-of-life” crackdowns by political and law enforcement leaders in communities large and small.

In a recent speech, Dr. Kelling elaborated on current crime prevention measures and practices. For example, he cited the use of police in patrol cars rather than “walking a beat” as a practice that does a great job of responding to crime, but a less effective one of preventing the next crime. He also points out the differences in police response and resource application in a shooting that leaves a victim dead as opposed to one where a victim survives. In this example, the homicide case may receive the resources of 3 or 4 investigators, whereas a shooting where the victim survives receives, perhaps, 1 investigator. He says this underscores a reactive policy rather than a crime prevention policy. A shooting survivor may be the beneficiary of a skilled surgeon, a quick responding EMT, or the lousy aim of the shooter. A shooting that does no harm may get a report filed, but no investigation. Dr. Kelling holds that each of these incidents has similar weight in the crime prevention hierarchy, but receives inequitable attention from the police. He states that much of current police protocol is devoted to solving the case, not preventing the next crime.

One jurisdiction (Maryland) arrests the victims of shootings if they were 1) on parole or probation at the time of the shooting, and 2) can be shown to have been involved in criminal conduct (carrying drugs, possessing a handgun, committing a robbery) at the time of their shooting. The goal of this policy is to prevent future crimes and retaliatory shootings.

Is the “Broken Windows” theory showing its age or is it an effective modern tool for crime prevention? Post a comment below to be heard.

The Best Bang for the Surveillance Camera Buck

Researchers at the Urban Institute are taking a hard look at law enforcement’s use of surveillance cameras. In a study to be released at the end of the year, researchers are looking at three cities’ use of the cameras. In Baltimore, MD, the recent conviction of a woman accused of assault and handgun violations was achieved, in large measure, through the valuable footage provided by police surveillance cameras.

The Baltimore video reveals that it is not just the recording of static images that won the conviction, but, actually, the actions of the trained and skilled police officers who staffed the cameras and the monitoring studio. Although the conviction is a victory for proponents of surveillance cameras in police work, some continue to debate the value of surveillance cameras when weighed against the costs of equipment and deployment and perceived incursions into the privacy of citizens.

The Urban Institute study is looking at how cities are deploying and using the cameras to investigate and prosecute suspects. Baltimore, one of the cities under study, is monitoring the cameras’ images nearly 24-7, using police officers and retired personnel as real-time observers. These experienced, skilled officers are able to 1) recognize a crime (e.g., a drug transaction) from the images on the screen and 2) communicate immediately to officers on patrol to capture or track down fleeing suspects. On occasion, the observing officers have even directed the on patrol officers on the route to use to apprehend suspects. The city prosecutor is reaping the benefits of good positive identifications of suspects, which translate into sounder criminal cases for that office. The Baltimore City Police Department thinks of the surveillance cameras in all aspects of their policing and not as a stand-alone resource. They envision the technology as an enhancement and an extension of their police services, not as a replacement for patrols or crime prevention. Preliminarily, the researchers have been impressed by the impact they are seeing from the use of the cameras in Baltimore.

Two other cities in the study are using the cameras but are not integrating them in police work as extensively as they are being used Baltimore. In their early analysis, the researchers are finding that the cities that further invest resources (technology, money, staff power) into their initial investment on surveillance cameras are getting the best crime prevention and law enforcement bang for their buck.

While the report, once published, will shed light on the cost/benefit question and ideal implementation strategies police departments might follow, I don’t think it will stop the debate that surrounds the surveillance camera strategy. What do you think? Click on the comments link below and let us hear from you.

Stay Safe Even When the News is Good

The FBI has recently released its 2008 Crime in the United States report, and it brings good news! The FBI reports that violent crimes are down for the second consecutive year. Among violent crimes, murders and non-negligent manslaughters declined 3.9 percent; aggravated assaults are down 2.5 percent, and forcible rapes dropped by 1.6 percent. Forcible rapes specifically, are at the lowest rate they have been in the past 20 years.

While this is great news, we must keep in mind that crime prevention is just as important now as ever. In order to continue to keep crime statistics dropping, we should all be aware that crime prevention is crucial to keeping our children, loved ones, and communities safe.

It is important to note that while violent crime rates have gone down, other crime rates have risen. According to the FBI, the largest number arrests made in 2008 were for drug abuse violations. Other crimes that also rose in 2008 were burglaries and larceny-thefts. Keeping in mind that since crime rates are always subject to change, learning what you can do to prevent crime is vital to continue to keep crime rates dropping. After all, we all want to stay safe in our neighborhoods, right?

If you’re new to crime prevention or don’t know where to start, October, Crime Prevention Month, is the perfect time to dive in. All month long, crime prevention will be celebrated in communities across the nation. A number of communities will be participating in Celebrate Safe Communities, the kickoff to Crime Prevention Month, when local communities organize safety-focused events. These events can range from safety education fairs to trash pick-up days; it all depends on the needs of each community. If you feel inspired to organize a safety event in your neighborhood, register your event here.

You may think crime prevention is something that should be left up to law enforcement; however, you can play a big part too and should not leave the burden on law enforcement’s shoulders. Crime prevention starts with you. Each and every one of us can make a difference to keep our communities safer. Throughout time, crime has remained a constant in our world that threatens the very lives we live. Now is the time to start transforming our neighborhoods, communities, states, and the nation into a safe place to live. How will you make a difference?

Find out how you can get involved by visiting www.ncpc.org

The Ultimate Price—and Responsibility

The National Crime Prevention Council mourns the loss of four police officers in the shooting tragedy that unfolded recently in Oakland, CA.  Sergeants Mark Dunakin, Erv Romans, Daniel Sakai, and Officer John Hege were lost in the line of duty defending the safety of the people of Oakland, the safety that all of us, in communities across the country, depend on and, all too often, take for granted.  The loss of these officers was the most in one day since the September 11th attacks.

What caused this tragedy? Were there warning signs or other indicators that could have alerted us to the extreme danger the shooter represented?  Were there systems and practices in place that would have tipped us off to the possibility of a tragedy occurring?  The gunman, recently released from prison for violating a previous parole, was monitored by a parole officer whose caseload was 70 parolees, well above the American Parole and Probation Association’s recommended ratio of 50 cases per parole offer. Seven thousand parolees return to Alameda County, in which Oakland is situated, each year, all needing services, counseling, a job, and hope.

In the United States, more than 5.1 million adult men and women are supervised in the community, either on probation or parole. Every year more than 700,000 previously incarcerated persons return to their communities. The situation is exacerbated by the often unproductive time spent by inmates when they are behind bars, the drain on communities while its inhabitants are incarcerated, and the inability of communities and systems to re-integrate ex-offenders upon their eventual return.

"California's parole population is now so large and its parole agents are so overburdened that parolees who represent a serious public safety threat are not watched closely," a National Institute of Justice-funded report released last year, and quoted in the Oakland Tribune, states. "And those who wish to go straight cannot get the help they need."

Some people knew that the gunman had recently obtained a gun (in violation of his parole), but did nothing with that information. Crime prevention is not the responsibility of law enforcement, or corrections, or the National Crime Prevention Council alone. It takes a community working together to keep itself safe.

This time of mourning must also be a time of learning.

The Benefits of CCTV

While wandering in an underground parking deck in a large city—because I had forgotten where I parked my car—I soon realized that I must be under camera surveillance.

An estimated 30 million surveillance cameras are in use in the United States. Even images of the recent miraculous water landing of a commercial airliner in the Hudson River were captured by at least two security cameras. Cameras are affixed at our borders to detect illegal immigrants, and placed in our airports, schools, and on our street corners. 

A quick perusal of Google News reveals scores of stories recently where law enforcement utilized the surveillance tool to identify criminals and pursue prosecution. But that’s where the story gets muddled.

Questions are only now emerging after the widespread deployment of these cameras. A recent report by the University of California, Berkeley, comprehensively examined the performance of San Francisco’s surveillance camera program. It found no effect on deterrent or conviction rates for violent crime, but did report a significant deterrent effect on property crime near camera installations. The report states that crime rates remained the same; it was just displaced to other parts of the city that did not have the cameras. Similar studies and reports, anecdotal and academic, are moving to the same conclusion. An evaluation in Philadelphia cites uneven crime reduction performance of the cameras. One in the UK shows effectiveness with vehicle break-ins, but modest or no crime reduction benefits in other categories.

Cities that have the cameras or are considering them are now questioning if they are worth the expense. Suspects are rarely seen in ironclad identifying images and “chain of custody” challenges to the handling of the images are often successful.

In our current economic situation we should be certain that crime prevention measures are not discarded on the basis of cost alone.  We should ensure that security cameras are thoroughly evaluated before they are discounted.

Dating: A New Crime Prevention Strategy?

A new report has found that teens in serious dating relationships are less likely to commit crime than peers who date casually. But before we ask our crime prevention officers to become matchmakers, let’s examine why those relationships may reduce crime. The authors of the study believe the key reason is the connection and sense of responsibility to another person that develops in a committed dating relationship. In these romantic relationships, young people can develop empathy and concern for their significant other’s well-being. They have a sense of generosity and a desire to help and support that other person. Young people are also prompted to think about the effects of their actions on others.

It is these attributes, then, not merely the presence of a girlfriend or boyfriend, that serve as a deterrent for committing crime. The good news for crime prevention practitioners is that these qualities are not just nurtured by committed dating relationships. They can be developed when youth have committed relationships with family members, mentors, teachers, coaches, faith leaders, and other caring adults in their lives. In your work with young people, continue to provide opportunities for youth to connect with others in positive ways through sports, clubs, job training programs, volunteering, or tutoring or mentorship programs. Make a list of what opportunities for youth exist in your community, and keep it handy. You never know when you may be able to match a young person with a great opportunity.

Baltimore Takes a New Approach to Gun Crime

Getting guns out of the hands of criminals is just one way to prevent crime, but the city of Baltimore, MD, may be on to something.

The city has established a gun registry that operates much like a sex-offender registry. Once convicted of a gun-related crime, criminals must register their name, address, phone number, and aliases with police and give them a current photograph of themselves. Community leaders and patrol officers are informed where the registrants live, as one goal of the program is to deter illegal gun possession and to prevent recidivism. Offenders must also check in every six months for the next three years. The penalties for failure to comply are severe: up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

According to an article by WBAL-TV, of 325 people required to register so far this year, only one has been rearrested on charges of illegally possessing a gun. Three others have been charged with not registering.

Baltimore was badly in need of this imaginative measure. According to a U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives report cited by WBAL-TV, Baltimore is a crossroads for gun trafficking. Moreover, statistics provided by Baltimore city police to WBAL-TV showed that more than 50 percent of murder suspects had previous gun crime convictions.

What is your city doing to prevent gun crime and, more importantly, prevent gun crime recidivism? Do you have any ideas about what cities should be doing?

The $100 Billion Dollar Man?

The $100 billion man. No, he’s not a new superhero with bionic limbs who can run through walls and is more powerful than a locomotive. The $100 billion man is the personification of the annual cost of absentee fathers to American society. That was the conclusion of a 2008 report written by Christopher Einolf and the late Steven Nock for the National Fatherhood Initiative.

When the cost of government programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit, Temporary Aid to Needy Families, child support enforcement, food and nutrition programs (Food Stamps and school lunch programs), housing programs, Medicaid, and state-run children’s health insurance plans are calculated, the total comes to nearly $100 billion. And the authors maintain that that is a conservative estimate! The authors also don’t mention anything about the possible cost of crime in that $100 billion price tag. But since this is a crime prevention blog, the real question of the day is: Does the absence of fathers lead to higher crime rates? And if it does, what should we do about it?

The answer? We don’t have just one. For every report or study stating that the children of absentee fathers are some undetermined percentage more likely to be involved in criminal activity, there’s one that says that that’s only one of a constellation of variables that contribute to someone choosing a path of crime.

Researchers from the Florida Family Council found that 72 percent of the juvenile offenders interviewed said they came from homes where their mother and father are not married. But what does that mean when currently 40 percent of births in the United States are to households without a married father of the baby? For every doom-and-gloomer on the national plight brought on by absentee fathers, there is an equal and opposite position that the situation of single mothers raising children is not the tragedy that is often depicted in the media. Feminist and investigative reporter Trish Wilson has written numerous online articles stating that the woes attributed to absent fathers are more myth than fact, lending credence to the old maxim that falsehood can be out the door before truth gets its shoes on. The one arena researchers have focused on is the children of incarcerated parents. There it appears that the absence of a parent due to parental incarceration (mostly fathers) has negative effects on children and increases the risk for children engaging in delinquent behavior, trying alcohol or drugs, and joining a gang (Howell and Egley, 2005). Other research shows two things: (1) it is the quality of the father-child relationship that has a positive effect on child outcomes rather than the quantity of time spent or the proximity of the father to the child, and (2) a quality surrogate role model or mentor can be a positive factor in predicting favorable child outcomes.

An independent evaluation (Grossman and Tierney, 1998) of the Big Brother, Big Sister Mentoring Program found that mentees who met with their mentors regularly for about one year were 46 percent less likely than their peers to start using illegal drugs and 27 percent less likely to start drinking, among other findings. A child’s ability to adapt relies heavily on good family relationships, or surrogate relationships with adults who are significantly invested in the life and well-being of the child. Positive adult role models, either within or outside of the family, teach or guide young people as they develop their skills and talents. Through their actions, these caring adults show young people how to respond to challenges in positive ways. Young people trust that these role models and mentors will help them manage difficult situations.

So what can we do? We could mentor. One place to start is mentoring.org.

And I don’t think it’ll cost us $100 billion.
Any other ideas? Please write back with your comments.

Turning the Corner on Recidivism?

For most of the decade, the rote stats on recidivism have been, to wit: (1) 700,000 individuals will be released from prison each year, (2) within three years, 66 percent them will be rearrested, and (3) 50 percent of them will return to prison. But some recent publications may herald some good news.

A recidivism study out of the University of Nevada, Reno, suggests that Nevada is doing much better, coming in at tenth best in the nation with a recidivism rate of 29 percent. Arizona is best in the United States with a rate of only 24 percent. What contributes to these gains? District Attorney Arthur Mallory of Churchill County, NV, hypothesizes that "pleasant prisons" may be a factor in other states where recidivism rates are so high. I guess prisons in Nevada aren’t that "pleasant."

Other observers point to inroads and innovations in community corrections and probation supervision as the reason for downturns in recidivism. A recent Pew Center on the States Public Safety Policy Brief hails the gains in reducing recidivism and increasing public safety made by states and communities through the use of community corrections, alternative sanctions to prison, and innovative funding decisions. The informative eight-page report summarizes the progress that community corrections acts have made since the first one was enacted in 1973 in Minnesota. Community corrections acts (which are called a variety of names) formalize a relationship between the state and its jurisdictions to provide alternatives to prison sentences and the high costs of incarceration while maintaining public safety and serving offenders in their communities. In 2007, states paid $47 billion in prison costs and most future projections are for ever-increasing costs. Community corrections can be more effective in the rehabilitation of offenders and use state dollars more efficiently than expensive incarceration. Community corrections can include electronic monitoring, local counseling and treatment, and incentives in sentence, probation, and community service reductions, if probationers comply and perform well. Tougher sanctions are imposed when they don’t.

The usual leaders, Kansas and Arizona, are showing the way in innovative policies that redistribute dollars earmarked for prison costs to community-based agencies that provide quality community corrections support to clients. Agencies are no longer paid per client, but are remunerated based on the performance of the clients in maintaining the straight and narrow (level or reduced probation violations and crimes). These initiatives appear to demonstrate how states and counties can reduce public costs while providing for their citizens, reducing recidivism, and maintaining public safety.

Crime Prevention Tips for Businesses Big and Small

The Federal Bureau of Investigation released statistics last week that showed a minor increase in the number of reported bank robberies for the fourth quarter of 2007. The FBI’s figures show that there were 1,561 robberies of financial institutions between October and December of last year—31 more robberies than occurred in the previous quarter. The overall trend in robberies in general was down, however, according to the FBI’s 2007 Preliminary Annual Uniform Crime Report.

Whether you work in a financial institution or some neighborhood business, and whether crime rates are up or down, it’s in everyone’s interest to protect their business from crime. Here are a few steps you can take.

• Greet people who enter your business—personal contact can deter crimes.
• Target hardening—make sure that security measures, such as lights, alarms, and security personnel, are not only in place but are clearly visible and activated.
• Light it up—keep all areas used by patrons well-lighted to deter criminal activity. Make sure that the main activities within your business can be clearly viewed from the street. Check the parking lot for good lighting and unobstructed views.
• If your business has a safe, be sure it is fireproof and securely anchored. Remember to change the combination when an employee who had access to it is no longer employed by your business.
• Share crime prevention tips with patrons by posting them in your store.
• Use the three concepts of Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) to deter criminals’ interest. These are natural surveillance, natural access control, and territorial reinforcement. Keep bushes and shrubs trimmed so that you can see trouble before it walks in the door. Deter vandalism and show pride in your community with "thorny" plants and vines.
• Get involved with Business Watch and encourage other local businesses to do the same.
• Know what to do in case of an emergency. Fire exits and evacuation routes should be clearly marked. Fire extinguishers and medical kits should be well-stocked and checked regularly. Plan drills so that all employees know what to do in case of an emergency. Have different emergency plans in place for different types of emergencies.
• Learn how to be a good witness. Take note of gender, ethnicity, age, height, weight, hair color and length, and description of clothes and shoes.
• If you are ever the victim of a robbery, comply. Give up your money or your merchandise—don’t give up your life.

For more information on creating a safer workplace, check out NCPC’s A Safe Workplace Is Everybody’s Business.