Police Allocation in the Presence of Crime Spillover (From Crime Spillover, P 97-118, 1981, Simon Hakim and George F Rengert, ed. - See NCJ-85381)

• NCJ Number: 85386
• Author(s): R S Fabrikant
• Date Published: 1981
• Length: 22 pages
• Sale Source: Sage Publications, Inc
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

The results of the simulation developed indicate that without the internalization of crime displacements, a nonoptimal allocation of police patrols will result.

Abstract

Crime displacement creates positive or negative externalities that result in a decrease or increase in the offense rate in particular communities. If these externalities are not considered by the law enforcement agency in determining an optimal allocation of police manpower, then the outcome will be nonoptimal. This study analyzes, using a systems simulation approach based on Howard (1960), a dynamic optimization program which economizes on data and results in an optimal solution to the allocation problem. The first part of the presentation describes the three basic steps included in the optimization procedure. The first step, termed cost determination, is an evaluation of expected costs of offenses, given various behavioral assumptions about criminal movement among communities. The second step, policy determination, considers the responses of criminals to the new police allocation. Once this step is completed, a new expected cost of offenses is ascertained and compared to the previous one. If it is less, an improvement has been made and a new optimal allocation of police is attempted. If it is not, the previous allocation is maintained. The empirical estimation of the response functions included in the optimization procedure is then presented. The problems associated with the crime data and the empirical testing of the response functions are described. This is followed by the specification of the functional forms and the results of estimating these equations using data from Los Angeles. Finally, a simulation of the actual optimization procedure is conducted. The results of this simulation support the hypothesis that unless crime displacement is considered, a nonoptimal allocation of police patrols is obtained. Tabular data, mathematical equations, 26 references, and 8 notes are provided. (Author summary modified)