By Ryan Cotter

This study, the seventh in the recidivism series, examines the relationship between length of incarceration and recidivism. In 2020, the Commission published its initial comprehensive study on length of incarceration and recidivism. In that study, which examined offenders released in 2005, the Commission found that federal offenders receiving sentences of more than 60 months were less likely to recidivate compared to a similar group of offenders receiving shorter sentences. This study replicates the prior analysis, however, it examines a more current cohort of federal offenders released in 2010. This study examines the relationship between length of incarceration and recidivism, specifically exploring three potential relationships that may exist: incarceration as having a deterrent effect, a criminogenic effect, or no effect on recidivism.

Washington, DC: United States Sentencing Commission, 2022. 56p.

By Elizabeth. Groff and Travis Taniguchi

According to the FBI, there were over 1.5 million burglaries in the U.S. in 2016, with almost 70% residential (FBI, 2017a). Combined, the victims of burglary suffered over $3.6 billion in lost property (about $2,400/burglary). Yet, only about 13% of burglaries reported to the police were cleared (FBI, 2017b). While more prevalent than violent crime, burglary rarely generates attention and headlines. Yet, the sense of violation and vulnerability typical of residential burglary victims is considerable, and so prevention would seem the best solution. The Near Repeat Phenomenon The biggest challenge facing crime prevention in policing is the need to correctly anticipate where and when crime will occur (Pease & Laycock, 1999). Hot spots policing focuses on the locations where crimes occur frequently, though knowing when they will occur can help law enforcement effectively deploy personnel. Repeat victimization occurs when the same target is victimized again. However, the “Near Repeat” (NR) phenomenon (Morgan, 2001) is when those that live near to a burglary victim are victimized soon after; in other words, when one home is burglarized, for a particular time period afterwards, homes nearby are at an elevated risk of burglary. Empirical research has clearly confirmed the existence of NR burglary patterns. The exact spatial and temporal extent of increased risk varies; however, we know the increased risk level that occurs after a burglary is temporary, suggesting police must act quickly to maximize the potential for reaping crime prevention benefits.

Washington, DC: Police Foundation, 2018. 14p.

By Carol Bevis and Julia Brown Nutter

The replacement of easily accessible streets with streets of the cul-de-sac or dead end design appears to be a promising strategy for the prevention of residential crime.

Minneapolis: Minnesota Crime Prevention Center, 1978. 43p.

By Sally Harvey

This literature review summarises the findings of international studies of what works in police practice to reduce residential burglary, drawing largely on the outcomes of research in the UK, the US and Australia. Residential burglary is one of the most common crimes, of great concern to the general public as reflected in crime victim surveys, and regarded as a major problem by police forces studied in the literature. Internationally there has been an increasing adoption of proactive policing with considerable research effort aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of crime prevention approaches. As part of this evaluative effort, the question ‘what works?’ has been applied to initiatives to reduce residential burglary.

Wellington, NZ: Ministry of Justice, 2005. 114p.

This guide begins by describing the problem of illicit public sexual activity and the factors that contribute to it. It then identifies a series of questions to help you analyze your local problem. Finally, it reviews responses to the problem, and what is known about them from evaluative research and police practice. Public sexual activity includes a range of behaviors, such as solitary nude sunbathing, flashing, streaking, solitary or mutual masturbation, fellatio, and vaginal or anal intercourse.

Read more at the Center for Problem Oriented Policing

This guide begins by describing the problem of home invasion robbery and reviewing factors that increase its risks. It then identifies a series of questions to help you analyze your local home invasion robbery problem. Finally, it reviews responses to the problem and what is known about these from evaluative research and police practice. Home invasion robbery is but one aspect of the larger set of problems related to residential and violent crime. This guide is limited to addressing the particular harms created by home invasion robbery.

Read more at the Center for Problem Oriented Policing

This guide addresses effective responses to the problem of graffiti—the wide range of markings, etchings, and paintings that deface public or private property. In recent decades, graffiti has become an extensive problem, spreading from the largest cities to other locales. Despite the common association of graffiti with gangs, graffiti is widely found in jurisdictions of all sizes, and graffiti offenders are by no means limited to gangs.

Read more at the Center for Problem Oriented Policing

By Kim Shayo Buchanan, Hilary Rau, Kerry Mulligan, Tracie Keesee, and Phillip Atiba Goff

Whether a group is dedicated to racism (a “hate group”), or advocates the overthrow of elected governments (a “paramilitary gang”), or both—no police officer or law enforcement agency should support or affiliate with it. Officers who support or affiliate with hate groups and paramilitary gangs undermine the mission of their law enforcement agency by allying themselves with lawbreakers and by undermining the department’s efforts to ensure equitable policing and earn community trust. These guidelines aim to assist law enforcement to 1) identify, discipline, and remove officers who intentionally affiliate with hate groups or paramilitary gangs, and 2) adopt institutional values, policies, and rules that will allow for no mistake about the department’s position: it is not appropriate for a law enforcement agency or a police officer to support or affiliate with hate groups or paramilitary gangs. We recommend that law enforcement agencies (“LEAs”) adopt the rules and best practices set out below, and make them public.

West Hollywood, CA: Center for Policing Equity, 2022. 24p.

By James R. Gillham

This book evaluates the newest efforts and initiative aimed at preventing burglary, discusses their merits and short- comings, and suggests how improvements might be incorporated in burglary prevention programs.

New York: Springer Verlag, 1991. 203p.

Edited by Ronald Clarke and Tim Hope

This book contains the papers given at a workshop organised by the Home Office (England and Wales) on the subject of residential burglary. This is a topic of much public concern, and I welcome the Home Office initiative in mounting the workshop. The contributors were all researchers and criminologists who have made a special study of burglary, and their brief was to consider the implications of their work for policy. As a policeman, I find their work of particular interest and relevance at this time when police performance, as traditionally measured by the clear-up rate, is not keeping pace with the increase in the numbers of burglaries coming to police attention. The finding that increases in burglary are more reflective of the public's reporting habits than of any significant rise in the actual level of burglary helps with perspective but offers little comfort to policemen. The 600/0 increase in the official statistics since 1970 is accompanied by a proportionate increase in police work in visiting victims, searching scenes of crime, writing crime reports, and completing other documentation. In some forces the point has been reached where available detective time is so taken up by the volume of visits and reports that there is little remaining for actual investigation. But because of the random and opportunist nature of burglary, it cannot be said with any confidence that increasing investigative capacity would make a significant and lasting impact on the overall burglary figures.

Netherlands: Boston: Kluwer-Nijhoff Pub., 1984. 271p.

By Andromachi Tseloni, Rebecca Thompson and Nick Tilley

This work provides an overview of the scope of the problem and what can be done about it, drawing on extensive research evidence from projects funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Secondary Data Analysis Initiative (SDAI), and other sources. It reports detailed findings about which interventions are most effective for different population groups and how these measures can be implemented. It includes burglary prevention advice for homeowners, law enforcement and other public agencies, and makes recommendations for future research. In addition to being relevant to concerned citizens, police, policy-makers and crime prevention practitioners, this book will also be of interest to researchers in criminology and criminal justice particularly those working on security and crime prevention, as well as urban planning and public policy.

Cham: Springer, 2018. 308p.

By Roger Matthews

Prostitution has become an extremely topical issue in recent years and attention has focused both on the situation of female prostitutes and the adequacy of existing forms of regulation. Prostitution, Politics & Policy brings together the main debates and issues associated with prostitution in order to examine the range of policy options that are available.

Governments in different parts of the world have been struggling to develop constructive policies to deal with prostitution – as, for example, the British Home Office recently instigated a £1.5 million programme to help address the perceived problems of prostitution. In the context of this struggle, and amidst the publication of various policy documents, <EM>Prostitution, Politics & Policy develops a fresh approach to understanding this issue, while presenting a range of what are seen as progressive and radical policy proposals. Much of the debate around prostitution has been polarized between liberals – who want prostitution decriminalized, normalized and humanized – and conservatives – who have argued that prostitution should be abolished. But, drawing on a wide range of international literature, and providing an overview that is both accessible to students and relevant to policy makers and practitioners, Roger Matthews proposes a form of radical realism that is irreducible to either of these two positions.

Milton Park, Abingdon, UK: Routledge-Cavendish, 2008. 176p.

By Serguei Cheloukhine

This Brief provides an in-depth look at crime and corruption in Russian Law Enforcement, in the fifteen years since the 2009 police reforms. It focuses on corruption and organized crime at various levels of public services and law enforcement, how these organized crime networks operate, and how to enhance police integrity and legitimacy in this context.

It begins with a short overview of the history of law enforcement in the Soviet and Post-Soviet context, and the scope of organized crime on the operations of local businesses, public services, and bureaucratic offices. It provides an in depth examination of how organized crime developed in this context, to fill a void between the supply and demand of various goods and services. Based on an in-depth survey of police integrity and corruption in Russia, it provides key insights into how countries in a transition to democracy can maintain and enhance legitimacy of their police force.

Cham: Springer, 2017. 84p.

By Steve Herbert

Policing Space is a fascinating firsthand account of how the Los Angeles Police Department attempts to control its vast, heterogeneous territory. As such, the book offers a rare, ground-level look at the relationship between the control of space and the exercise of power. Author Steve Herbert spent eight months observing one patrol division of the LAPD on the job. A compelling story in itself, his fieldwork with the officers in the Wilshire Division affords readers a close view of the complex factors at play in how the police define and control territory, how they make and mark space.

Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. 208p.

Edited by Mike Stephens and Saul Becker

British policing faces major decisions about its future direction. Should it promote itself as a police force, dedicated to the attack on crime and public disorder, or should it adopt the mantle of police service, devoted to providing reassurance, flexibility to community wishes, and care? These are the critical decisions that the police face. The choice made will have implications for all citizens in our society. Together, a panel of eminent contributors examine the issues involved in this choice. They push the debate forward and show how complex are the interconnections between care and control within British policing. The implications are far-reaching and will influence not only the quality of policing but also the quality of life for all of us.

Houndmills, Basingstoke, UK:Palgrave Macmillan, 1994. 256p.

Edited by Gorazd Meško, Charles B. Fields, Branko Lobnikar and Andrej Sotlar

Policing in Central and Eastern Europe has changed greatly since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Some Central and Eastern European countries are constituent members of the European Union, while others have been trying to harmonize with the EU and international requirements for a more democratic policing and developments in accordance with Western European and international policing standards, especially in regard to issues of legality and legitimacy. This timely volume examines developments in the last two decade to learn the nature of these changes within Central and Eastern Europe, and their impact on police culture, as well as on society as a whole.

For the twenty countries covered, this systematic work provides: short country-based information on police organization and social control, crime and disorder trends in the last 20 years with an on policing, police training and police educational systems, changes in policing in the last 20 years, police and the media, present trends in policing (public and private, multilateral, plural policing), policing urban and rural communities, recent research trends in research on policing – specificities of research on police and policing (researchers and the police, inclusion of police researchers in policy making and police practice) and future developments in policing.

Cham: Springer, 2013. 332p.

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By Tim Newburn

This new edition of the Handbook of Policing updates and expands the highly successful first edition, and now includes a completely new chapter on policing and forensics. It provides a comprehensive but highly readable overview of policing in the UK, and is an essential reference point combining the expertise of leading academic experts on policing and policing practitioners themselves.

Cullompton, Devon, UK: Willan Publishing, 1994. 904p.

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By Graham Denyer Willis

Shows how in Sao Paulo, Brazil, killing and the arbitration of normal killing in the name of social order are actually conducted by two groups the police and organized crime both operating according to parallel logics of murder.

Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2015. 216p

Edited by Vicente Riccio and Wesley G. Skogan

In Brazil, where crime is closely associated with social inequality and failure of the criminal justice system, the police are considered by most to be corrupt, inefficient, and violent, especially when occupying poor areas, and they lack the widespread legitimacy enjoyed by police forces in many nations in the northern hemisphere. This text covers hot-button issues like urban pacification squads, gangs, and drugs, as well as practical topics such as policy, dual civil and military models, and gender relations.

The latest volume in the renowned Advances in Police Theory and Practice Series, Police and Society in Brazil fills a gap in the English literature about policing in a nation that currently ranks sixth in number of homicides. It is a must-read for criminal justice practitioners, as well as students of international policing.

New York: Routledge, 2017. 206p.

By Jeremy West

Nonrandom selection into police encounters typically complicates evaluations of law enforcement discrimination. This study overcomes selection concerns by examining automobile crash investigations, for which officer dispatch is demonstrably independent of drivers’ race. I find State Police officers issue significantly more traffic citations to drivers whose race differs from their own. This bias is evident for both moving and nonmoving violations, the latter indicating a preference for discriminatory leniency towards same-race individuals. I show this treatment is unmitigated by socioeconomic factors: officers cite other-race drivers more frequently regardless of their age, gender, vehicle value, or characteristics of the local community.

Santa Cruz, CA: Economics Department, University of California at Santa Cruz , 2018. 37p.