NCJ Number
131898
Journal
Policing and Society Volume: 1 Issue: 1 Dated: (1990) Pages: 23-38
Date Published
1990
Length
16 pages
Annotation
To determine whether police are failing to provide sufficient evidence to prosecute suspects arrested for felonies, a study of 25 Los Angeles County police departments was conducted to determine any variation in robbery and burglary case attrition rates among these departments, how much of the variation can be explained by crime characteristics and police expenditures, and the relationship between police policies and practices and case attrition when statistically controlling for the identified factors.
Abstract
The findings suggest that case-attrition research and policies may be based on some questionable assumptions. For the two categories of crime studied, robbery and burglary, some departments convicted twice the number of their arrestees as others. Community crime rates and the money and resources departments can devote to each arrest emerged as factors, but purely demographic differences between communities appeared to account for little, if any, variation in case attrition. Reforms aimed at improving communications between police and prosecutors have made little difference in attrition rates among the 25 departments studied. 1 appendix and 18 references (Author abstract modified)