Police Do Not Lower Crime Rates?

[Pancho Villa]

Interesting study in criminology for anyone who has access to scholarly publications through your library or school:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...276.x/abstract

Relationships reflecting the view that police presence is essential for crime prevention and social order are examined for variation duration of police strike, city size, and offense category. Overall, analysis yields very limited support for the police presence argument, suggesting that strikes have neither a significant nor a systematic impact on rates of reported crime. Implications of findings for the formulation of police policy are discussed.

I have read abstracts for similar studies done abroad where crime rates spiked during a police strike, but that might be due to pernicious self-defense laws along with a general lack of an armed populace and a culture willing to take on the responsibility of defending yourself.

Anyway, with all the police stuff floating around recently, I thought I'd share. I'm a history buff and I always found it interesting that police as we know them today were a post-civil-war invention, and that the US got by just fine (in fact, if reports are correct, it got by better than its European counterparts, which *did* have proto-police of a sort, and lots of them,) without them. So I'm always on the lookout for data points about the effect of no police on places people tend to think police are vital (ie cities.)

This isn't a police bashing thread, but something I thought the board at large (including our police members) might find interesting.

[Byte Stryke]

In Before Cop Bashing Thread Closed!

[Pancho Villa]

Another data point of interest:

http://books.google.com/books?id=N5x...strike&f=false

Field and Stream, May 1976. A quick note on how Albiquerque, NM police went on strike in 1975 for a couple weeks and crime dropped to 0.

(I am going to bet that this data point did not help the police union's bargaining leverage.)

Albiquerque was, of course, not a huge city. Presumably in a well-armed populace of a large enough size, you will find a doofus willing to try his luck. But still - interesting.

Again, I'm not anti-cop, but I think that the status quo of large police departments being necessary for public safety ought to be examined, especially in these days when budgets are being strained and the future looks like much less money might be available to pay for even vital services, let alone the silly stuff cities love to waste money on.

[Elhuero]

pancho you really should register at glocktalk, I think you'd like it there.

[Irving]

I think it has to do with community size. A small community is closer knit and more determined to take care of their own. There is obviously more to that, but I'm short on time.

[BigMat]

Interesting thought.

I had more than a few muffled conversations in fire houses talking with guys about fire layoffs, and the consensus was, fire was in general, over staffed and over budgeted, and the city would not be significantly less safe with fewer personal and equipment if things were re-organized.

brush trucks instead of as many engines, centralized ladder trucks, more use of independent EMS for medical only calls, integration of inter-department mutual aid and volunteer support, etc. This is not to mention the use of private fire departments, which usually cost much less and don't show statistically significant inferior response times or results, just costs the person who's house burns down a lot if they don't pay for fire coverage...which was always less than the tax burden for the same service, but it was voluntary as opposed to taxes. Like West/South Metro Fire (I think these are private subscription based) here vs. Denver/Westminster Fire, same end results, one will just cost less.



I don't know enough about policing policy to be sure this applies as well, but its interesting to think about in an era when everything, and everyone will probably bear the brunt of budget cuts eventually, not just "liberal" professions and expenditures, like teachers and medicare.