Police Protection and the Spatial Concentration of Crime: Evidence From Los Angeles

• NCJ Number: 204658
• Author(s): Calvin McNeil
• Date Published: May 2000
• Length: 31 pages
• Sale Source: San Diego State University
• Publication Format: Document (Online)
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: *This document is currently unavailable from NCJRS. Downloaded March 17, 2004.

Annotation

This study examined whether an exogenous increase in police protection in one city leads to a significant increase in crime in neighboring cities.

Abstract

Based on a literature review, the study hypothesized that an increase in police protection in one city would cause an increase in the crime rates of neighboring cities. The study collected data on crime rates, police protection, and the socioeconomic characteristics of 75 cities located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area for the years 1980 to 1994. Data on crime rates and the number of police officers were obtained from the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports. The two measures of crime rate in each city were total crimes per capita and property crimes per capita. Police protection was measured as the number of police officers per capita. Data for the socioeconomic characteristics of each city pertained to population density, age, income, and unemployment. The data analyses indicate that an increase in local police protection leads to a significant reduction in the overall crime rate and the property crime rate in the cities sampled in this study. Specifically, a 1-percent increase in the number of police officers per capita led to an approximate 0.25-percent reduction in the total crime rate and a 0.24-percent reduction in the property crime rate. Further, the findings support the hypothesis that mobile criminals will seek targets based on the level of police protection. Specifically, the study found that a 1-percent increase in police protection per capita in one city correlated with approximately a 0.13-percent increase in the overall crime rate in a neighboring city and a 0.18-percent increase in the property crime rate. These findings suggest that a regional, rather than purely local, crime prevention strategy will be more effective in reducing overall crime rates. Rather than reducing overall crime rates, local increases in police protection simply displace crime to other areas as mobile criminals select softer targets. 5 tables and 25 references