1. Police in America
Chapter Nine
The Police and
Crime
McGraw-Hill
© 2013 McGraw-Hill Companies. All Rights Reserved.

2. The Police and Crime

Crime Control Strategies
 Proactive versus Reactive
• Proactive: Anticrime strategies initiated by the police
themselves, not citizens requesting service
• Reactive: Anticrime strategies used by police when
responding to a civilian’s request for service
 General versus Specific
• Directed at the community at large vs. directed at particular
crimes, places, offenders, or victims
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


Particular crimes
Specific places
Specific offenders
Specific victims
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3. Crime Control Assumptions


Citizens are co-producers of police services
Police and other social institutions are
interdependent
 Communities, families, schools, labor markets,
workplaces, other criminal justice programs

Measuring effectiveness requires meaningful
definitions and reliable data
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4. Preventing Crime
 Routine patrol is primary crime prevention
activity
 Specialized crime prevention units
 Meet with citizens to discuss crime prevention
options
 Work alongside neighborhood groups
 Educating youth about crime, drugs, and
gangs
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5. Apprehending Criminals
 Second major crime-fighting responsibility
of police officers
 Citizen Reporting of Crime
– Citizens act as “gatekeepers” of the criminal
justice system
– Patrol officers rarely discover crimes in
progress
– Some victims do not report crimes because
they do not think the crime is important
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6. Reporting and Unfounding Crimes
“Unfounding” a Crime: Failure of a police
officer to complete an official crime
report when a citizen reports a crime.
 Reasons for Unfounding a Crime

 Citizens do not understand the criminal law
 Insufficient evidence
 Abuse of officer’s discretion
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7. Criminal Investigation

Myths About Detective Work




Work is exciting and dangerous
Detectives are heroic, courageous and skillful
These myths create unreasonable public expectations
about the ability of police to control crime
The Organization of Detective Work
 Located in separate unit of department
 Considered a high-status assignment to be a
detective
 Offers great opportunity to control one’s work and
exercise initiative
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8. The Investigation Process

The Preliminary Investigation

1. Identify and arrest suspects
2. Provide aid to victims
3. Secure crime scene and prevent
loss of evidence
 4. Collect relevant physical
evidence
 5. Prepare preliminary report




Arrest Discretion
 Interview witnesses
 Canvass crime scene
 Discuss the case with patrol
officers
 Interview suspects
 Check records and NCIC files

 Based on the following factors:
3. Victim request of arrest
Reality of Detective Work
 Not glamorous or exciting
1. Strength of evidence
2. Seriousness of crime
Follow-Up Investigations
 Superficial, routine, non-productive

Case Screening
4. Victim and suspect are strangers
 Based on seriousness of crime and existence
of evidence
5. Suspect is hostile
“ Case solvability factors”
 Caseload varies: nominal, workable, and
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actual

9. Measuring the Effectiveness of
Criminal Investigations

The Clearance Rate




Traditional measure of success in a criminal investigation
Only 21% of all reported Index crimes are cleared Nationally
Unreliable since it is based on only reported crimes and data
can be manipulated
Defining an Arrest
 Legally arrested: deprived of rights by legal authority
 Behaviorally arrested: asked by police officer to stop, told they
are under arrest, or physically restrained by officer
 Subjectively arrested: when an individual believes he/she is not
free to go
 Officially arrested: when officer makes an official report of arrest
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10. Success and Failure in Solving
Crimes
 Three main case solvability factors:
 Case Structural Factors
• Related to the crime committed
 Organizational Factors
• Lack of resources does not keep clearance rates
low
 Environmental Factors
• Characteristics of the community the police work in
• Officers have no control over these factors
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11. Success and Failure in Solving
Crimes Continued
 Officer Productivity


Some officers make more arrests than others
Quality of arrests differs as well: many arrests
do not lead to a conviction
 The Problem
of Case Attrition
 Only ½ of felony arrests result in conviction
 Detectives and officers typically express little
interest in why this happens and how to fix it
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12. The Use of Eyewitness Identification,
Criminalistics, and DNA in Investigations

Eyewitness Identification
 Typically unreliable due to problems with human
perception and memory

Criminalistics
 Technical specialists in crime lab analyze evidence,
etc.

DNA
 All DNA samples forwarded to the FBI and put into
the National DNA Indexing System
• Stores forensic data and convicted offender index data
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13. Improving Criminal Investigations
 Changes in community policing
 Structural changes
• Headquarters changed to beats and precincts
• Assigning investigators to particular areas
 Procedural changes
• Greater intergovernmental communication
• Assistance from other criminal justice orgs.
 Functional changes
• Role and responsibility changes for investigators
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14. Special Investigative Techniques

Undercover Police
Work
 Deliberate deception
that may promote a
habit of lying
 Befriending criminals
• May erode the
standards of policing
 Less supervision

Informants
 Used especially in
victimless crimes
 Criminals who
possess special
knowledge
 Potential problems
because police must
give something in
return for access to
that information
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15. Policing Drugs

Drug Enforcement Strategies
 Supply reduction strategy
•
•
•
•
Buy and bust
“Trading up”
Long-term undercover work
Drug crackdown: intensive enforcement effort
 Demand reduction strategy
• Drug education programs

Minorities and the War on Drugs
 African Americans arrested more frequently than
whites, although usage is about the same

Demand Reduction: The D.A.R.E Program
 Operating in 70 percent of all public school systems
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16. Policing Gangs and Gang-Related
Crime
 Gang Suppression
 The police gang unit: specialized unit
 Has at least one sworn officer whose job it is
to engage in gang control effort
 Gang Prevention: G.R.E.A.T. Program



Gang Resistance Education and Training
Operates in all 50 states
Study showed that it was not very effective at
preventing students from joining gangs
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17. Policing Career Criminals
 Career Criminals: People believed to be
committing a high rate of offenses
 Repeat Offender Programs
 Targeting suspected high-rate offenders for
surveillance and arrest
 Targeting those with outstanding warrants
 Case-enhancement programs to provide
information about offendor histories
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18. Policing Guns and Gun Crimes



Victims are most likely to be African American,
American Indian and Hispanic
Men are twice as likely to be victims compared
to women
Gun Suppression
 Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN)
 Kansas City Gun Experiment
• Targeted a high-crime precinct with problem-oriented
policing and directed patrol
• As a result, gun crimes fell 49%
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19. Policing Hate Crime
 Hate Crime
– bias motivated crimes
 The Scope and Nature of Hate Crime

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50.8% racial bias
18.4% religious bias
16.6% sexual orientation bias
13.2% ethnic/national origin bias
Five main characteristics of Hate Crimes
• Higher level of assaults against persons than crimes generally
• More violent
• Attacks preceded by series of confrontations that escalate in
severity
• More likely to be committed be group perpetrators
• Likely to be committed by someone the victim knows
 Police Response to Hate Crime
 Creation of specialized bias crime units
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20. Policing Terrorism

The Scope and Nature of Terrorism
 Terrorism: “The unlawful use of force or violence
against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a
government, the civilian population, or any segment
thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives.”

Domestic Terrorism
 Planned and carried out by Americans on American
soil

Foreign Terrorism
 Terrorist activities coordinated and perpetrated by
foreign persons or countries against the U.S.
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21. Responding to Terrorism
 In the wake of September 11
 Department of Homeland Security created
 Increasing number of U.S. Coast Guard and
Customs Service personnel
 FBI Office of Intelligence
 FBI Counterterrorism Watch
 Local police first to respond in a terrorist event
• But issues between federal law enforcement
agencies and local police arise due to refusal to
share critical information
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