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Geographic Profiling What Your Address Term Paper

53). The technique has roots in various psychological concepts that examine how individuals make choices about behavior and the ways in which motivations are formed and molded. It also draws on a set of investigatory techniques broadly called environmental criminology. Environmental criminology looks at how physical space influences people to commit crimes, how what particular types of crimes are committed are related to the physical space in which they occur (for example, farming communities tend to be the site of different types of crimes than is the case in housing projects or suburban cul de sacs) and how the type of person who is likely to be victimized is also related to physical space (MacKay, 1999). Geographic profiling has moved a long way from the old tape-a-map-to-the-wall-and-stick-pushpins in it. Geographic profilers use highly specialized software systems that produce what are called "jeopardy surfaces" or "geoprofile," high detailed three-dimensional models of the most likely sites of residence for a criminal and helps law enforcement officials focus on a relatively narrow geographic area for their search (Canter, 2003, p. 48).

Kim Rossmo, a criminologist, is one of the most important theoreticians in the modeling programs and concepts behind geographic profiling and has created very precise formulae...

These equations are based on the idea that the sites of a crime can be used to define a buffer zone around the actual sites (essentially a peripheral zone around the crime sites) and that the likelihood of the criminal's residence is highest in this buffer zone and gets less and less likely the farther that one moves away from it. The underlying idea is that criminals such as serial murderers do not want to pick their victims from their own neighborhood but do not want to have to travel too far to commit their crimes either (Rossmo, 2000).
These techniques seem to be sound and practical ones for investigators to use. There are patterns to criminal behavior just as there are patterns to all other types of human behavior, and bringing to bear knowledge about how these patterns work can certainly be used to help solve crimes.

References

Brantingham, P.J., & Brantingham, P.L. (1984). Patterns in crime. New York: Macmillan.

Canter, D. (2003). Mapping Murder: The Secrets of Geographic Profiling. London: Virgin Publishing.

MacKay, R.E. (1999, December). Geographic profiling: A new tool for law enforcement. The Police Chief, pp. 51-59.

Rossmo, D.K. (2000). Geographic profiling. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.

Sources used in this document:
References

Brantingham, P.J., & Brantingham, P.L. (1984). Patterns in crime. New York: Macmillan.

Canter, D. (2003). Mapping Murder: The Secrets of Geographic Profiling. London: Virgin Publishing.

MacKay, R.E. (1999, December). Geographic profiling: A new tool for law enforcement. The Police Chief, pp. 51-59.

Rossmo, D.K. (2000). Geographic profiling. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
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