Lone Actor Terrorists: A Residence-to-Crime Approach

Bouhana, N; Marchment, Zoe; Gill, Paul

doi:10.1080/09546553.2018.1481050

Cited by 25 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Bouhana, et al () report the striking similarity between extreme right wing terrorists and other ideologically driven lone actor terrorists in their background and preparatory behaviors, confirming an operational premise and finding within the TRAP‐18 that it generalizes across ideologies (Meloy & Gill, ). Further, Marchment, et al () studied the geographical hunting patterns of lone actor terrorists and found them to engage in spatial decision‐making similar to other criminals. Terrorist violence risk assessment, however, is not necessarily improved by the addition to an instrument of more and more variables arguably associated with such violence (Pressman & Flockton, ); a more parsimonious instrument, on the other hand, may be both scientifically reliable and more practically useful for counterterrorism efforts to prevent such acts of targeted violence.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualizing the relationship among indicators for lone actor terrorist attacks: Multidimensional scaling and the TRAP‐18

Goodwill

Meloy

2019

Behavioral Sci & The Law

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This validation study analyses data from a sample of North American terrorist attackers (n = 33) and non‐attackers (n = 23) through the lens of the Terrorist Radicalization Assessment Protocol (TRAP‐18; Meloy, 2017) utilizing a multivariate statistical approach – multidimensional scaling – to visualize potential clustering (co‐occurrence) of risk factors. Rarely done in terrorism research, the results plotted in two‐dimensional space show the clustering and co‐occurrence of most of the eight proximal warning behaviors among the attackers, but not among the non‐attackers, and less of a clustering and association of distal characteristics, but their presence in both attackers and non‐attackers. These findings provide further empirical support for the rational‐theoretical model of the TRAP‐18, a structured professional judgment instrument for threat assessment of lone actor terrorists. It advances the quantitative analysis of operationally relevant and behaviorally observable indicators for use by law enforcement and counterterrorism professionals and their consultants. Findings are discussed in relation to other research on pre‐offense behaviors of lone actor terrorists, and recommendations are made for both operational use and further research.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualizing the relationship among indicators for lone actor terrorist attacks: Multidimensional scaling and the TRAP‐18

Goodwill

Meloy

2019

Behavioral Sci & The Law

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“…Clarke and Newman () argued that terrorists will strike iconic targets , which is a function of their ideology motivating them to attack (see also Becker, ; Drake, ). Evidence indicates that terrorists, in fact, often favor iconic and/or symbolic targets (Gruenewald et al., ; Marchment, Bouhana, & Gill, ). As noted, however, more than 80% of mass shootings in the United States are unrelated to politics and are instead motivated by grievances versus specific persons, or by a quest for infamy (Capellan, ; Osborne & Capellan, ; Silva, ).…”

Section: Scp Terrorism and Preventing Or Reducing Public Mass Violencementioning

confidence: 99%

Investigating the applicability of situational crime prevention to the public mass violence context

Freilich

Chermak

Klein

2019

Criminology & Public Policy

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for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. In addition, we thank the guest editors and the other participants at the April 2019 National Science Foundation-sponsored workshop on mass violence at George Mason University for their helpful critiques of an earlier daft. Finally, we thank the peer reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions.Research Summary: In this article, we argue that situational crime prevention (SCP) strategies can be used to prevent public mass violence, as well as to mitigate the harms caused from those attacks that still occur. We draw from the SCP perspective generally, and its application to terrorism particularly, as well as from the public mass violence literature. We focus on the pillars of opportunity that include target selection, weapon selection, tools used, and conditions that facilitate public mass violence attacks.Policy Implications: We conclude that SCP's EVIL DONE risk assessment template could be refined for the public mass violence context. We argue that the exposed, occupied, nearer, and easy dimensions, along with a newly created personal grievance dimension, could be used to identify more at-risk settings that should receive more situational interventions to prevent these attacks. We similarly conclude that SCP's other pillars could be used to prevent these attacks. We outline specific hard and soft interventions that could thwart these attacks. Importantly, we use examples to illustrate that SCP's strategies could effectively mitigate the harms caused by public mass violence attacks that do occur. We also set forth research strategies to test our claims. K E Y W O R D Senvironmental criminology, mass shootings, preventing mass violence, situational crime prevention, terrorism

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“…McGarrell, Freilich, and Chermak () suggested that an ILP approach to counterterrorism is relevant as, first, these events are rarely spontaneous and often involve a lengthy planning stage, and second, terrorism is often a local problem. In fact, Marchment, Bouhana, and Gill () demonstrated the distance‐decay effect in a sample of lone‐actor terrorists when examining the residence‐to‐attack journeys of this type of offender. Hence, the lone‐actor terrorist threat is theoretically detectable given the appropriate intelligence.…”

Section: Policy Implicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analyzing person‐exposure patterns in lone‐actor terrorism

Clemmow

Marchment

Gill

2019

Criminology & Public Policy

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Research Summary:The lone-actor terrorist population can be extremely heterogeneous and difficult to detect. Intelligence is vital to countering this threat. We devise a typology of person-exposure patterns (PEPs) that could serve as a framework for intelligence gathering and threat assessment. We use cluster analysis and a risk analysis framework (RAF) to identify relations among three components: propensity, situation, and network.The results of the analysis reveal four PEPs: solitary, susceptible, situational, and selection. The solitary PEP lacks common indicators of a propensity to pursue terrorist action. The susceptible PEP reveals cognitive susceptibility, manifesting as mental illness, to be a key factor in the emergence of a terrorist propensity. The situational PEP demonstrates how situational stressors may act as warnings of acceleration toward violent action. Lastly, the selection PEP demonstrates higher frequencies of leakage and antecedent violent behaviors.Policy Implications: Our findings have two key policy implications. First, given the multifinality of terrorism risk indicators, we suggest a move toward a structuredprofessional judgement approach to the risk analysis of lone-actor terrorists. Second, we present the PEP typology as a framework for intelligence gathering. Existing frameworks are predominantly focused on mobilization 452 CLEMMOW ET AL.indicators. We suggest expanding data collection to include propensity and situational indicators, as operationalized here, and using the PEP typology to inform decisions about the emergence of the motivation to commit an attack. To do so, it is necessary to pursue a multiagency approach to intelligence gathering.

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Lone Actor Terrorists: A Residence-to-Crime Approach

Cited by 25 publications

References 37 publications

Visualizing the relationship among indicators for lone actor terrorist attacks: Multidimensional scaling and the TRAP‐18

Visualizing the relationship among indicators for lone actor terrorist attacks: Multidimensional scaling and the TRAP‐18

Investigating the applicability of situational crime prevention to the public mass violence context

Analyzing person‐exposure patterns in lone‐actor terrorism

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