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2 Crime
Analysis Defined

T his chapter provides an overview of the key definitions and concepts in the
field of crime analysis. It begins with the definition of crime analysis and then
describes the crime analysis process, covering the various types of crime analysis as
they are practiced in police agencies around the world.

_______________________________ Definition of Crime Analysis

Over the past 20 years, many scholars have developed definitions of crime analysis.
These include the following:

Crime analysis refers to the set of systematic, analytical processes that provide
timely, pertinent information about crime patterns and crime trend corre-
lations. It is primarily a tactical tool. Patrol reports and crime records furnish
data about crime scenes, weapons, modus operandi, stolen or getaway vehicles,
and suspects. Analyzing and comparing data on file with those on current cases
can give patrol officers important information on activities in their beat areas.
This includes developing crime patterns, stolen property descriptions, and
suspect identities. Using this information, patrols can better deploy resources.
(Emig, Heck, & Kravitz, 1980, p. v)

[Crime Analysis is a] set of systematic, analytical processes directed at pro-

viding timely and pertinent information relative to crime patterns and trend
correlations to assist the operational and administrative personnel in planning
the deployment of resources for the prevention and suppression of criminal
activities, aiding the investigative process, and increasing apprehensions and
the clearance of cases. Within this context, Crime Analysis supports a number
of department functions including patrol deployment, special operations,
and tactical units, investigations, planning and research, crime prevention,
and administrative services (budgeting and program planning). (Gottlieb,
Arenberg, & Singh, 1994, p. 13)

5
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6——INTRODUCTION

Crime analysis is a detail-oriented discipline wherein the analyst endeavors

to seek the truth of a given situation utilizing methods and the right informa-
tion to confirm the truth so that an effective plan can be formulated. (Vellani
& Nahoun, 2001, p. 8)

Although these definitions differ in specifics, they share several common compo-
nents: All agree that crime analysis supports the mission of the police agency, utilizes
systematic methods and information, and provides information to a range of audi-
ences. The following definition, which will be used for the purposes of this book,
distills these elements into a simpler form:

Crime analysis is the systematic study of crime and disorder problems as

well as other police-related issues—including sociodemographic, spatial, and
temporal factors—to assist the police in criminal apprehension, crime and
disorder reduction, crime prevention, and evaluation.

Clarification of each aspect of this definition helps to demonstrate the various

elements of crime analysis. Generally, to study means to inquire into, investigate,
examine closely, and/or scrutinize information. Crime analysis, then, is the focused
and systematic examination of crime and disorder problems as well as other police-
related issues. Crime analysis is not haphazard or anecdotal; rather, it involves
the application of social science data collection procedures, analytic methods, and
statistical techniques.
More specifically, crime analysis employs both qualitative and quantitative data
and methods. Crime analysts use qualitative data and methods when they examine
nonnumerical data for the purpose of discovering underlying meanings and pat-
terns of relationships. The qualitative methods specific to crime analysis include
field research (such as observing characteristics of locations) and content analysis
(such as examining police report narratives). Crime analysts use quantitative data
and methods when they conduct statistical analysis of numerical or categorical data.
Although much of the work in crime analysis is quantitative, crime analysts utilize
simple statistical methods, such as frequencies, percentages, means, and rates.
The central focus of crime analysis is the study of crime and disorder (e.g., noise
complaints, burglary alarms, suspicious activity), problems and information related
to the nature of incidents, offenders, and victims or targets of crime (targets are
inanimate objects, such as buildings or property). Crime analysts also study other
police-related issues, such as staffing needs and areas of police service. Even though
this discipline is called crime analysis, it actually includes much more than just the
examination of crime incidents.
Although many different characteristics of crime and disorder are relevant in
crime analysis, the three most important kinds of information that crime analysts
use are sociodemographic, spatial, and temporal. Sociodemographic information
consists of the personal characteristics of individuals and groups, such as sex, race,
income, age, and education. On an individual level, crime analysts use sociodemo-
graphic information to search for and identify crime suspects. On a broader level,
they use such information to determine the characteristics of groups and how they
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Crime Analysis Defined——7

relate to crime. For example, analysts may use sociodemographic information

to answer the question, “Is there a white male, 30–35 years of age, with brown hair
and brown eyes, suspect to link to a particular robbery?” or “Can demographic
characteristics explain why the people in one group are victimized more often than
people in another group in a particular area?”
The spatial nature of crime and other police-related issues is central to an under-
standing of the nature of a problem. In recent years, improvements in computer
technology and the availability of electronic data have facilitated a larger role for spa-
tial analysis in crime analysis. Visual displays of crime locations and their relation-
ship to other events and geographic features are essential to our understanding
of the nature of crime and disorder. (For in-depth discussion of this type of analysis,
called crime mapping, see Chapter 4.) Recent developments in criminological theory
have encouraged crime analysts to focus on geographic patterns of crime, examining
situations in which victims and offenders come together in time and space. (For
discussion of the importance of place in the analysis of crime, see Chapter 5.)
Finally, the temporal nature of crime, disorder, and other police-related issues
is a major component of crime analysis. Crime analysts conduct several levels of tem-
poral analysis, including (a) examination of long-term patterns in crime trends over
several years, the seasonal nature of crime, and patterns by month; (b) examination
of midlength patterns, such as patterns by day of week and time of day; and (c) exam-
ination of short-term patterns, such as patterns by days of the week, time of day, or
time between incidents within a particular crime series. Throughout this book, I pre-
sent discussion of specific analysis techniques used to examine the temporal nature
of crime.
The final part of the above definition—“to assist the police in criminal
apprehension, crime and disorder reduction, crime prevention, and evaluation”—
generally summarizes the goals of crime analysis. The first goal of crime analysis
is to support the operations of a police department. Without police, there would
be no crime analysis as it is defined here. It follows, then, that the second goal
of crime analysis is to assist in criminal apprehension, given that this is a funda-
mental goal of the police. For instance, a detective may be investigating a robbery
incident in which the perpetrator used a particular modus operandi (i.e., method
of the crime). A crime analyst might assist the detective by searching a database
of previous robberies for similar cases.
Another primary goal of the police is to prevent crime through methods
other than apprehension. Crime analysis assists with the identification and analysis
of crime and disorder problems as well as the development of crime prevention
responses to those problems. For example, members of a police department may
wish to conduct a residential burglary prevention campaign and would like to
target their resources in areas that have the largest residential burglary problem.
A crime analyst can assist them by conducting a spatial analysis of residential
burglary, examining how, when, and where the burglaries occurred, and analyzing
what items were stolen. The analyst can then use this information to develop crime
prevention suggestions (such as closing and locking garage doors) for specific areas.
Many of the problems that police deal with or are asked to solve are not criminal
in nature; rather, they have more to do with quality of life and disorder. Some
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8——INTRODUCTION

Crime and Disorder Problems and Related Police Issues

(focusing on socio-demographic, spatial, and temporal factors)

Systematic Study
(quantitative and qualitative data and methods)

Criminal Crime Crime Evaluation

Apprehension Prevention and Disorder
Reduction

Figure 2.1 The Definition of Crime Analysis

examples include false burglary alarms, loud noise complaints, traffic control,
and neighbor disputes. Thus addressing and reducing disorder has become a police
objective and, by extension, a subject of crime analysis. Crime analysts can assist
police with these efforts by conducting research and analysis of disorder problems
such as traffic accidents, noise complaints, code violations, and trespass warnings to
provide officers with information they can use to address these issues before they
become more serious criminal problems.
The final goal of crime analysis is to assist with the evaluation of police efforts.
Such evaluation concerns two main areas: (a) the level of success of programs and ini-
tiatives implemented to control and prevent crime and disorder, and (b) how effec-
tively police organizations are run. In recent years, local police agencies have become
increasingly interested in determining whether various crime control and prevention
programs and initiatives they undertake are effective. For example, an evaluation
might could be conducted to determine the effectiveness of a 2-month burglary
surveillance or of a crime prevention program that has sought to implement “crime
prevention through environmental design” (CPTED) principles within several
apartment communities. Crime analysts also assist police departments in evaluat-
ing internal organizational procedures, such as resource allocation (i.e., how officers
are assigned to patrol areas), realignment of geographic boundaries, the forecasting
of staffing needs, and the development of performance measures. Police agencies
keep such procedures under constant scrutiny in order to ensure that the agencies are
running effectively.
The flowchart presented in Figure 2.1 clarifies the various components of the
definition of crime analysis used throughout this book. Crime analysis examines
crime and disorder problems as they occur as well as ongoing police-related issues
in order to assist police in criminal apprehension, crime prevention, crime and
disorder reduction, and evaluation.
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Crime Analysis Defined——9

Collection

Data
Collation Modification
Subcycle

Analysis

Dissemination

Feedback

Figure 2.2. The Crime Analysis Process

___________________________________________ The Crime Analysis Process

Figure 2.2 illustrates the crime analysis process, or the general way in which crime
analysis is practiced. The steps involved in this process are data collection, data
collation, analysis, dissemination of results, and incorporation of feedback from
users of the information (Gottlieb et al., 1994). The crime analysis process begins
with observations (data). Data come from many sources, including, in most cases,
from outside crime analysis. That is, crime analysts examine data observed and col-
lected by others, such as police officers, call-for-service dispatchers, community
service officers, census workers, and geographers.

Collection

The first step in the crime analysis process is the collection of data; this step is
closely connected to data storage. As noted above, this step occurs outside the direct
control of the crime analysis function. In most police agencies, officers and/or civil-
ian employees enter crime reports and other data into a computer system. Officers
may write reports in longhand that are then entered into the computer system
by data entry clerks, officers may input incident reports directly into a computer
system, or police dispatchers may write reports directly into the computer system.
The policies dictating data entry procedures, as well as the care taken by the indi-
viduals who execute the procedures, are crucial to crime analysis because they affect
both the quantity and the quality of the data and subsequent analysis.
Some of the data collected in police departments are not relevant for crime
analysis, so subsets of information are compiled for analysis purposes. For example,
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10——INTRODUCTION

police officers draw diagrams of car accidents for purposes of insurance claims and
other legal concerns. Crime analysts are generally not concerned with the exact
circumstances of each car accident; rather, they are concerned with compiling data
on the dates, times, locations, and nature of all accidents, as this information can
help them to understand this type of activity more generally.
In addition, the manner in which data are stored and the amount of data stored
are important in crime analysis. Data must be in an electronic format, collected
regularly (e.g., on a daily or weekly basis), and collected for a significant amount of
time to be useful for crime analysis. Paper copies of reports and other information
are not useful to crime analysts because data in this form are too time-consuming
and cumbersome to analyze. Information has to be coded into an electronic data-
base to be useful for crime analysis.
The time that elapses between the observation, or data collection, and the avail-
ability of data needs to be reasonably short if the data are to be useful for crime
analysis. For example, electronic crime report data that are not available until 6
months after reports are written are not useful. The amount of data stored also needs
to be adequate (e.g., multiple years) for crime analysts to have enough information
to conduct satisfactory analyses. For example, 2 months’ worth of data cannot pro-
vide a comprehensive picture of a burglary problem. Finally, it is also important for
crime analysts to have access to raw data. Many police computer systems only allow
retrieval of individual records and/or the creation of statistical reports on paper.
Crime analysts must be able to download electronic data into myriad software
programs to conduct analyses using the various techniques discussed in this book.
To summarize, the crime analysis data collection process requires the following:

1. The data must be collected accurately and consistently.

2. Only data appropriate for crime analysis should be compiled (i.e., some
characteristics important to crime analysis may not be collected because they
are not relevant for official or legal purposes).
3. The data must be collected in a timely manner (e.g., not 6 months after the
observations).
4. The data must be stored for an adequate amount of time to allow for
satisfactory analysis.
5. The data must be accessible in raw form to be queried and downloaded.

These requirements apply to any data used in crime analysis, including data obtained
from outside the police agency (e.g., geographic data and census information).

Collation

The main sources of the data (e.g., crime and calls for service) used in crime
analysis are general police data collection systems. These systems are generally
designed to capture and store data, but not necessarily to facilitate analysis. Because
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Crime Analysis Defined——11

of this, crime analysts often find it necessary to change the data purposefully before
they can use them for analysis. This can include selecting subsets of data, reformat-
ting and creating new variables, and performing quality control. Data collation
entails a number of different tasks, but it generally takes three forms:

1. Cleaning: the process of correcting mistakes and inconsistencies in the data

2. Geocoding: the process of bringing crime analysis data together with geographic
data so that they can be analyzed spatially (discussed in depth in Chapter 6)
3. Creation of new variables: the process of recoding or computing new vari-
ables from existing variables for more effective analysis (e.g., response time
and categories of crime)

Analysis

Analysis, which takes place after data are collected and prepared, includes the use
of many different statistical and visualization techniques, all of which are described
at length in Parts III, IV, and V of this book. Unfortunately, it is often the case that
a crime analyst is unaware of problems with the data (e.g., they do not measure
what needs to be studied or they have not been collected correctly) until the analy-
sis begins. When this occurs, the analyst must often return to the collection and col-
lation steps to improve and/or change the way data are collected, stored, or collated.
This practice, which is called the data modification subcycle, is intrinsic to the crime
analysis process.

Data Modification Subcycle

The arrows in Figure 2.2 illustrate how the data modification subcycle operates.
In this subprocess of crime analysis, data collection and collation are changed based
on the crime analysis process itself. The crime analysis process is not linear; it
moves from collection to collation to analysis, but what the analyst finds is that each
of these steps can inform the next step. For example, in cleaning the data during the
collation process, the analyst may gain insight into new ways data can be collected;
the requirements of the analysis may cause the analyst to make changes in both col-
lection and collation. The following are some specific examples of this interplay:

• An examination of the nature of loud parties in a particular area reveals that

call-for-service data contain only a “loud noise” call type, so the analyst can-
not distinguish reports of loud parties from reports of general loud noises.
The analyst must go back to the data collection step and create a new call type
labeled “loud party” for police officers and dispatchers to use.
• The chief of police requests that an analyst examine crime data for the past
10 years, but the data have been stored for only 5 years. The analyst conducts
an examination of the existing 5 years of crime data and recommends the
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12——INTRODUCTION

adoption of new policies for data storage that will allow for the preservation
of 10 years of data.
• Through analysis, a crime analyst determines that there are inconsistencies in
the crime location variable (e.g., addresses are assigned to incorrect police
beats); this leads to the development of a more comprehensive data cleaning
process.

Although issues such as those described above may not appear in every analysis
situation, an undeniable aspect of crime analysis is that analysts should never take
the data at face value, because unanticipated complications often arise and data on
new aspects of crime, disorder, and policing have not yet been collected. (For more
detailed discussion of a variety of these issues, see Chapter 6.) The data modifica-
tion subcycle is a key component of the crime analysis process; crime analysts spend
a significant amount of their time and resources addressing such issues.

Dissemination

Once the data analysis is completed, the crime analyst needs to communicate the
results to various types of audiences. The methods of disseminating crime analysis
results include paper reports and maps, presentations, e-mails, Internet documents,
and phone calls. The audiences for crime analysis information include police officers,
police management, citizens, students, other analysts, and the news media.
Analysts need to keep two important considerations in mind when communicat-
ing crime analysis results. First, the presentation should be tailored to the knowl-
edge of the particular audience. For example, for an audience of citizens, analysts
might need to clarify the definitions of various types of crimes (e.g., robbery vs. bur-
glary) before presenting analysis results. Second, the presentation of results should
convey only the most necessary information. Much of the work of crime analysis
takes place behind the scenes (e.g., collation of data), and the presentation of results
need not include information on all that work. In disseminating their findings,
crime analysts should include only information that is relevant to the topic or issue
at hand. For example, it is not necessary for an analyst to present every detail of an
analysis project when the project’s findings can easily be communicated through
one or two key points. Although it is important that analysts document their data
collection, collation, and analysis methods, in disseminating their results they should
present only the content most appropriate for their particular audiences.
In addition to assisting police departments, crime analysts can contribute to
the creation of knowledge about crime, disorder issues, and general police practices
through the dissemination of their analysis results to other analysts, researchers, and
police practitioners. Such results can inform police practices (e.g., enforcement or
prevention efforts) and crime analysis practices (e.g., duplication of successful data
collection methods and analytic techniques) as well as add to the general knowledge
about crime and other police-related issues (e.g., the nature of prostitution in rural
areas). This is not to say that one report from one crime analyst is likely to create all
the knowledge about a given topic; rather, the dissemination of crime analysis results
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Crime Analysis Defined——13

from numerous police agencies over time can begin to form a body of knowledge,
which is the goal of any social science.

Feedback

After disseminating the results of their analyses, crime analysts receive feedback
from the individuals to whom they provided the information. As in the data mod-
ification subcycle, feedback from the use of the products of an analysis can help to
inform the entire process further. Analysts may receive feedback about the quality
of particular analyses or reports, about the nature of the data analyzed, or about the
usefulness of their analyses for decision making.

Summary

To reiterate: The crime analysis process is not linear; it is cyclical in that each step
in the process can inform subsequent steps as the analyst gains insight and receives
feedback. Crime analysts spend much time and energy on the subcycle of data
modification; however, with improved policies, technologies, databases, training,
and examples of effective analysis, the process is constantly evolving. In each of the
types of crime analysis discussed in the next section, crime analysts follow the basic
process described above, although the specific data, methods, and purposes of their
analyses may differ.

_________________________________________________________ Types of Crime Analysis

The term crime analysis refers to a general concept and to a discipline practiced
in the policing community. This discipline is further broken down into subsets
of crime analysis that differ in purpose, scope, data, and analysis techniques. These
subsets range from data-rich, investigation-focused types of crime analysis to more
general and research-focused types, as described below.

Intelligence Analysis

The purposes of intelligence analysis are to identify networks of offenders and

criminal activity as well as to assist the police in apprehending those violators of the
law (Petersen, 1994). These networks are typically related to organized crime (“the
Mafia”), gangs, drug traffickers, prostitution rings, financial fraud rings, or combi-
nations of these criminal enterprises. Intelligence analysis is conducted within police
departments and is centrally concerned with criminal activity occurring within spe-
cific jurisdictions (e.g., city, county, or state borders); however, police departments
often work with neighboring jurisdictions and national officials concerning crimi-
nal activity in their local areas.
Much of the data examined in intelligence analysis is gathered by police through
surveillance, wiretapping, informants, and participant observation (i.e., undercover
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14——INTRODUCTION

work). The type of information examined is not limited to criminal information; it

may include the telephone conversations, travel information, financial/tax informa-
tion, and family and business relationships of those under investigation. By analyzing
these data, intelligence analysts seek to link information together, prioritize informa-
tion, identify relationships, and distinguish areas for further investigation. Intelligence
analysts work closely with police officers and are often officers themselves.

Criminal Investigative Analysis

In the 1970s and 1980s, what is now known as criminal investigative analysis
was usually referred to as criminal profiling. The frequent misuse of the term profil-
ing in the popular media since that time has led practitioners to change the term to
criminal investigative analysis. This type of analysis entails the process of construct-
ing “profiles” of offenders who have committed serious crimes. Criminal investiga-
tive analysts use the elements of the crimes these offenders have committed to infer
certain things about the offenders, including characteristics such as personality
type, social habits, and work habits. For example, a crime scene that is very bloody
and messy implies a different type of offender than does a crime scene where the
offender has cleaned up all the blood.
The primary purpose of criminal investigative analysis is to help criminal inves-
tigators identify and prioritize suspects by inferring the personal characteristics of
likely offenders. This very specific type of crime analysis is done primarily on the
national police level, as the crime patterns associated with serious crimes frequently
cross jurisdictional boundaries.
A subset of criminal investigative analysis is geographic profiling. In this type of
analysis, the geographic locations of an offender’s crimes (such as body dump sites or
encounter sites) are used to identify and prioritize areas where the offender is likely
to live (Rossmo, 2000). Once again, the goal is to identify and capture the offender.
Although intelligence analysis and criminal investigative analysis are both types of
crime analysis, the analytic techniques, products, and purposes associated with them
differ significantly from those associated with the three types discussed below. In
practice, intelligence analysis and criminal investigative analysis are seen almost as
separate disciplines; thus I have included the above information on these two types of
crime analysis for background purposes only. The remainder of this book focuses on
the three types described below: tactical, strategic, and administrative crime analysis.

Tactical Crime Analysis

Tactical crime analysis (TCA) may be defined as follows:

Tactical crime analysis is the study of recent criminal incidents and potential
criminal activity through the examination of characteristics such as how, when,
and where the activity has occurred to assist in pattern development, investigative
lead and suspect identification, and case clearance. (adapted from Boba, 2001)
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Crime Analysis Defined——15

TCA focuses on recent crimes and on specific information about the methods
of the crimes as well as the individuals and vehicles involved. The data analyzed
come from formal police reports, which include information on the characteristics
of crimes, such as method of entry, point of entry, suspect’s actions, type of victim,
and type of weapon used, as well as date, time, location, and type of location. The
types of crimes typically examined in TCA are those in which the offender does not
know the victim and those for which adequate information about the crime
(method of the crime) is available for analysis. These include, but are not limited
to, commercial and residential burglary, robbery, and sexual crime (e.g., rape, pub-
lic sexual indecency, and indecent exposure). TCA also examines field information
collected by patrol officers regarding potential criminal activity, such as suspicious
activity calls for service and criminal trespass warnings, along with information
on scars, tattoos, or other marks that police officers report about their contacts in
the field.
TCA has three goals: (a) to link crimes and thus identify patterns, (b) to identify
potential suspects of crimes or crime patterns, and (c) to link solved crimes to open
cases and thus help to clear or close cases. Because detectives and police officers
spend most of their time investigating individual cases, they often do not have time
to take a step back to identify patterns. TCA is the process of taking this step back;
by examining many crimes together, tactical crime analysts can identify patterns as
well as assist with linking patterns to potential offenders.

Strategic Crime Analysis

Strategic crime analysis (SCA) may be defined as follows:

Strategic crime analysis is the study of crime problems and other police-related
issues to determine long-term patterns of activity as well as to evaluate police
responses and organizational procedures. (adapted from Boba, 2001)

Because the scope of SCA involves long-term patterns of activity, the data and analy-
sis methods employed in this kind of analysis are primarily quantitative (although
in-depth analyses may also make use of qualitative data and methods). That is, strate-
gic crime analysts use various statistical methods to examine electronic databases
containing hundreds, thousands, and tens of thousands of records. These analysts
deal with variables such as date, time, location, and type of incident instead of with
qualitative data such as narrative descriptions of incidents.
The two primary purposes of SCA are (a) to assist in the identification and
examination of long-term crime problems and (b) to evaluate police responses
to problems and the organizational procedures of police agencies. Examination
of problems may include the analysis of crime rates, repeat victimization, hot spots,
and environmental characteristics that affect opportunities and incidents of crime.
The findings of strategic crime analysts’ research and evaluation of police respon-
ses to crime problems assist police agencies in assessing their effectiveness. The
examination of such police procedures as deployment and staffing or redistricting
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16——INTRODUCTION

of beats or precincts is also called operational analysis because it deals with the
operations of police agencies and not the nature of crime problems and patterns.1

Administrative Crime Analysis

Administrative crime analysis (ACA) may be defined as follows:

Administrative crime analysis is the presentation of interesting findings of

crime research and analysis based on legal, political, and practical concerns to
inform audiences within police administration, city government/council, and
citizens. (adapted from Boba, 2001)

ACA is different from tactical and strategic crime analysis in that it is concerned
with the presentation of findings rather than with pattern identification, statistical
analysis, or research. ACA is the process of selecting interesting and important find-
ings from previously conducted analyses and formatting that information appropri-
ately for specific audiences. Often the type of information presented represents only
the “tip of the iceberg” of the complete analysis and research. The purpose of the
analysis and the audience for its findings largely determine what is presented; in addi-
tion, the crime analyst must take into account legal (e.g., privacy and confidentiality),
political (e.g., union issues, election concerns), and practical (e.g., complexity and
length of the information) concerns.
The primary purpose of ACA is to inform audiences. As the audiences for crime
analysis information vary from one situation to the next, the type and quantity of
information selected for presentation also vary. Unlike tactical and strategic crime
analysis, the audience for which is usually line officers and line supervisors, ACA is
primarily intended for administrators and command staff, city government offi-
cials, news media, and citizens. The use of the Internet to disseminate information
on crime analysis provides an example of ACA. The audience for a police Internet
site includes citizens, police personnel, business owners, victims, criminals, and
news media outlets—essentially everyone—thus the type of information published
on such a site is selected and formatted with a wide array of consumers in mind.

Summary Points ______________________________________

This chapter has defined crime analysis, described the crime analysis process, and
described five different types of crime analysis. The following are the key points
addressed in this chapter:

• Scholars have defined crime analysis in many ways, but all of their definitions
share these elements: Crime analysis utilizes systematic methods and infor-
mation, supports the mission of the police agency, and provides information
to a wide range of audiences.
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Crime Analysis Defined——17

• Crime analysis is the systematic study of crime and disorder problems as

well as other police-related issues—including sociodemographic, spatial, and
temporal factors—to assist the police in criminal apprehension, crime and
disorder reduction, crime prevention, and evaluation.
• Crime analysis is not haphazard or anecdotal; rather, it involves the application
of data collection procedures, analytic methods, and statistical techniques.
• Crime analysis entails more than the study of criminal incidents; it includes
the examination of other information that is of concern to police, including
disorder activity and police operational information.
• Temporal, spatial (crime mapping), and sociodemographic factors are key
areas of focus in crime analysts’ examinations of crime, disorder, and other
police-related issues.
• The goals of crime analysis are to assist police in criminal apprehension,
crime and disorder reduction, crime prevention, and evaluation.
• The crime analysis process—that is, the general way in which crime analysis
is practiced—includes the steps of data collection, data collation, analysis, dis-
semination of results, and the receipt of feedback from users of the information.
• The data modification subcycle is a subprocess within the crime analysis
process in which the analyst makes changes in data collection and collation
procedures based on insights gained during the analysis.
• The term crime analysis refers to a general concept and to a discipline prac-
ticed in the policing community. The five major types of crime analysis—
intelligence analysis, criminal investigative analysis, tactical crime analysis,
strategic crime analysis, and administrative crime analysis—differ from one
another in purpose, scope, data, and analysis techniques.
• Tactical crime analysis is the study of recent criminal incidents and potential
criminal activity through the examination of characteristics such as how,
when, and where the activity has occurred to assist in pattern development,
investigative lead and suspect identification, and case clearance.
• Strategic crime analysis is the study of crime problems and other police-
related issues to determine long-term patterns of activity as well as to evalu-
ate police responses and organizational procedures.
• Administrative crime analysis is the presentation of interesting findings of crime
research and analysis based on legal, political, and practical concerns to inform
audiences within police administration, city government/council, and citizens.

_________________________________________________________ Exercises
Exercise 2.1

How is the crime analysis process (data collection, data collation, analysis,
dissemination, feedback) different from the scientific process (theory, hypothesis,
observation, empirical generalizations)? What might explain the differences between
the two?
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18——INTRODUCTION

Exercise 2.2

Compare and contrast how the five different types of crime analysis (intelligence
analysis, criminal investigative analysis, tactical crime analysis, strategic crime
analysis, and administrative crime analysis) can contribute to the field of policing
in general and to policing’s effectiveness in addressing crime and disorder.

Note ________________________________________________
1. In the past few years, crime analysis conducted as part of problem-oriented policing
has been distinguished from strategic crime analysis, with the former often referred to
as problem analysis. Problem analysis may be defined as “an approach/method/process con-
ducted within the police agency in which formal criminal justice theory, research methods,
and comprehensive data collection and analysis procedures are used in a systematic way to
conduct in-depth examination of, develop informed responses to, and evaluate crime and
disorder problems” (Boba, 2003, p. 2). Problem analysis is distinguished from strategic crime
analysis by its specific focus on identifying and understanding particular problems, assisting
police responses to the problems, and evaluating those police responses.