NCJ Number
145020
Date Published
1993
Length
7 pages
Annotation
The South Australia Police Department developed the Crime Mapping System in order to assist in the planning and evaluation of crime prevention initiatives.
Abstract
In addition to representing the geographical distribution of crime, the Crime Mapping System was designed to chart selected census information to compare crime patterns with sociodemographic patterns. Standardized crime rates can be displayed in areas of relevance to both the police and the public. The State Attorney General plans to provide crime and census maps to project officers attached to the community- based crime prevention program -- Together Against Crime -- so that they can plan and monitor appropriate local activities. While some officers doubted the utility of the Crime Mapping System, in the past two years, applications have been discovered for the system in a wide range of situations. Data manipulation has successfully derived new information from old information and represented it in new formats. A training video to acquaint police officers with the system's capabilities used five realistic police situations to demonstrate its technical features and the application of its outputs to various police problems. 1 figure, 1 note, and 1 reference