Chapter 6: Interpreting the criminal environment

1. Chapter 6: Interpreting the criminal environment

2. Target selection • ‘I’ve been set a performance management plan. It is updated yearly.’ (intelligence manager) • ‘I make my own decisions. I target the worst offenders.’ (analyst) • Two New Zealand intelligence professionals, quoted from Ratcliffe, J.H. (2005) 'The effectiveness of police intelligence management: A New Zealand case study', Police Practice and Research, 6:5, pp. 435-451.

3. Cope’s seven key variables • Nature of offence (the legal category of the crime) • Location (space and place of crime) • Time of offence • Method of offence (modus operandi) • Target details • Victim characteristics • Physical and social circumstances of the offence

4. ViCAP • Violent Criminal Apprehension Program • After ten years, it was found that less than 10 per cent of homicides were reported to ViCAP • Original form had 189 questions

5. Threat assessments • National agencies such as SOCA, CISC and Europol use unclassified annual threat assessments to raise public awareness • Law-enforcement-sensitive versions used to inform law enforcement priorities and other relevant initiatives (legislation, regulation or policy)

6. Harm as a component of threat assessments • Harm – the adverse consequences of criminal activity • Metropolitan Police have four types: • Social • Negative physical, psychological or emotional consequences that cannot readily be expressed in cash terms (as in homicide and assault) • Economic • Negative effects on an individual, community, business, institution, government or country (in as theft, counterfeiting and fraud) • Political • Negative effects on the political stability of a community or institution (such as in corruption, loss of confidence in government or law enforcement) • Indirect • Secondary adverse consequences of criminal activities (such as environmental damage from clandestine drug labs)

7. Offender self-selection • Offender self-selection may be a more ethical approach to offender targeting • Existing criminal triggers are used to identify more serious offenders • Offenders bring police attention on themselves

8. Self-selection example • Traffic wardens in Huddersfield, Yorkshire compared cars illegally parked in disabled bays with nearby legally parked cars. Illegal cars were: • nearly 10 times more likely to be of immediate police interest • at least 10 times more likely to be owned by someone with a criminal record, and • more likely to be driven by someone with a history of traffic violations • See Chenery et al. 1999

9. Playing well with others • Problems: • Information sharing is a US priority after 9/11 but the organization of police departments militates against it • Small agencies rarely have the resources to address wider concerns • Memorandums of understanding are often convoluted and take time to organize and approve

10. Playing well with others • Potential solutions: • Informal networks spring up to work around bureaucratic hurdles • Joint task forces allow access to data from various agencies • Wide dissemination of products that are not case-sensitive can improve information sharing • Liaison officers can overcome some problems

11. Intelligence requirements • Structured mechanisms that can aid information collation, especially when analysts collaborate • Strategic Intelligence Requirements • Tactical Intelligence Requirements

12. Sheptycki’s organizational pathologies • Digital divide - caused by incompatible information systems between agencies • Linkage blindness - where crime series cross agency boundaries • Noise - low-quality information volume exacerbated by increased sharing • Intelligence overload - lack of analytical capacity in the crime intelligence system • Intelligence gaps - caused by criminals operating in the spaces between police agencies either hierarchically or geographically • Duplication - caused by separate agencies keeping the same information on isolated systems • Institutional friction - between agencies with different missions, structures • and methodologies • Intelligence hoarding and information silos - caused by retention of information until it is most beneficial to the information-holder • Defensive data concentration - concentration of resources in one area to address a short-term problem creates other organizational pathologies • Occupational subcultures - both intra-agency as well as interagency

13. Sharing information – 2005 forum ideas • Become intelligence-led • Police chiefs should work closely with analysts • Co-locate analysis and intelligence functions close to decision-makers • Articulate the analytical vision within the police department • Make the case for integrated analysis • Create integrated reporting mechanisms • Develop informal information exchange mechanisms • Consciously collect feedback and respond to criticisms • Create an analysis users group • Get over the whole security issue • Develop technology solutions but do not fixate on them • Be realistic about what can be achieved in your department

14. Nine analytical techniques in the NIM • Crime pattern analysis • Network analysis • Market profiles • Demographic/social trend analysis • Criminal business profiles • Target profile analysis • Operational intelligence assessment • Risk analysis • Results analysis

15. Strategic thinking • Aims for a more ‘holistic’ view of the criminal environment • Uses techniques rarely taught in analysis classes • Futures wheels • Competing hypothesis • Force-field analysis • Morphological analysis • Ishikawa diagrams • PESTEL(O) • SWOT analysis • Delphi analysis • Scenario generation (for descriptions and examples of these techniques, see Heldon 2004 and Quarmby 2004)

16. Futures work in crime analysis • For future work within a strategic intelligence environment to succeed, there must be: • An identifiable decision-making system to support; • A will to think ahead in both the intelligence system and the decision system to be supported; • A will to apply the results in both the intelligence system and the decision system to be supported • Neil Quarmby (2004: 128-129)