Hot Spot Policing: A Study of Place-Based Strategies for Crime Prevention

Abstract

Hot spot policing is a popular policing strategy that addresses crime by assigning limited police resources to areas where crimes are more highly concentrated. We evaluate this strategy using a game theoretic approach. The main argument against focusing police resources on hot spots is that it would simply displace criminal activity from one area to another. We provide new insights on the nature of the displacement e¤ect with useful implications for the econometric analysis of crime-reduction e¤ects of police reallocation.We also propose alternative place-based policies that display attractive properties in terms of geographic spillovers of crime reduction via optimal police reallocation.JEL codes: D7, K4, R1,

When are mixed equilibria relevant?

“…Social scientists may benefit from similar thinking. For example, 'hot spot' dispatch of law enforcement resources (e.g., Lazzati and Menichini, 2016) is a generalized matching pennies population game, and our work suggests how adaptive dynamics could supplement equilibrium analysis.…”

Transitioning from pandemic to normalcy: what police departments can learn from the rank-and-file

“…These findings indicate that police organizations purport to be willing and able to pivot with ever-changing demands of the pandemic era. The pandemic may therefore offer an opportunity for police policymakers to consider innovations such as problem-oriented policing, directed patrol and foot patrol as costeffective means for addressing crime that also improve police legitimacy and/or perceptions of procedural justice (Groff et al, 2015;Koper et al, 2013;Koper et al, 2021;Lazzati and Menichini, 2016;Ratcliffe et al, 2011;Rosenfield et al, 2014;Sherman and Weisburd, 1995). Such sciencebased strategies would allow agencies to identify crime or disorder problems within their jurisdictions and better target limited resources.…”

Expected Returns to Crime and Crime Location

“…Evidence from both criminology and economics on the policing of crime hot spots, often based on randomised controlled trials, suggests such targeted policing as a viable policing strategy (see, e.g., Braga, Weisburd, Waring, Green Mazerolle, Spelman, and Grajewski (1999); Braga and Bond (2008); Weisburd, Morris, and Gro↵ (2009); Ratcli↵e, Taniguchi, Gro↵, and Wood (2011); Lazzati and Menichini (2016); Ariel, Sherman, and Newton (2020)). However, more limited redeployment of police forces and patrolling have been found to have either no e↵ect (Blanes i Vidal and Mastrobuoni (2018); Blattman, Ortega, Green, and Tobon (2021)) or sometimes large negative e↵ects on crime, e.g., using quasi experimental variations in police force deployment Weisburd (2021) find that a reduction of police force by 10% increases crime by 7%.…”