Random preventive patrol and policing effectiveness

Criminal Justice

Random Prevention Patrol

The purpose of this paper is to introduce and analyze the topic of criminal justice in America. Specifically, it will discuss random prevention patrol's effectiveness at deterring crime and apprehending offenders. Random patrol may alleviate some crime and give some of the public a general feeling of more security, but generally, random patrol has little to no affect on deterring crime and apprehending offenders. As the Kansas City Police Experiment shows, preventative patrol, geared to specific high-crime areas and crimes is much more effective in controlling crime and apprehending offenders.

While most police departments heavily utilize random or routine police patrols as part of their crime prevention techniques, several studies indicate these random patrols are actually ineffective in reducing crime and apprehending suspects. The most well-known study in this area is the Kansas City Preventative Patrol Experiment, conducted in 1971, with the results published in 1974. Authors Kelling, Pate, Dieckman, and Brown note, "This experiment, made possible by Police Foundation funding, employed a methodology which accurately determined that traditional routine preventive patrol had no significant impact either on the level of crime or the public's feeling of security" (Kelling, et al. vii). Routine patrol is ineffective, but what about random patrol? Many police officers believe random patrol works because crimes are randomly committed, and so, random patrols will more often catch random criminal acts.

Another set of authors note, "Even many police we know, who acknowledge that some areas are more dangerous that others often assume a random distribution of crime within areas. For them, the practical question is not whether crime is concentrated in space, but how much" (Sherman et al. 28). However, many studies indicate that crime is not random; in fact, there are a variety of factors, from the number of dwellings to the placement of the home or apartment, the appearance of the building or business, and even landscaping. The authors continue, "Some 40 years ago, Henry McKay himself made the unpublished discovery that even within high-crime Chicago neighborhoods entire blocks were free of offenders" (Sherman et al. 29). Thus, the idea that crimes are committed randomly does not hold merit, and neither does the idea of random police patrol. A year-long study conducted by the authors in Minneapolis found that a majority of both "inside" and "outside" crimes were committed in concentrated areas of the city, rather than random areas, and that once a crime was committed in a certain area, the incidence of a repeat crime was actually higher in that same area (Sherman et al. 39-41). In fact, routine police patrols are not as effective as most departments would like, and random patrols, because of the very nature of their approach, are even less reliable as a means of controlling crime.

Both random and routine patrols offer other problems that do not effectively decrease crime in the patrol areas. Random patrols are not specific enough to be largely effective, and routine patrols may simply drive persistent criminals to different locations. However, in specific crime areas where certain types of crime, such as prostitution, are concentrated, even random patrols could certainly uncover some activity if it is occurring, while routine patrols would surely shift the activity to another location. Thus, these types of patrols continue to be problematic, and do not address much of the criminal activity in a community. Routine patrols are too predictable, and random patrols clash with the random nature of the crimes themselves, creating such random patterns that the criminal and officer could conceivably never cross paths.

However, that does not mean that all types of random patrol cannot be effective in certain situations. Even though it has been proven that most crimes do not occur randomly, but in concentrated pockets of criminal activity, random patrols may be effective in some situations. Random patrols in these concentrated areas may uncover a crime being committed, and begin to cut down on the crime in that area. Random patrols could be effective in business communities, where most of the robberies take place during the hours the business is closed. In addition, they could be effective in super high-crime hot spots, such as the bar the authors describe in Minneapolis, which recorded an astounding number of assaults throughout the year; roughly 1 in 4 patrons would suffer an assault during the study (Sherman et al. 44). Thus, random patrols in a hot-spot area like this could help deter crime and apprehend offenders. However, chances are that the very nature of the random patrol would be so random that it would not encounter criminal activity, and so, it would be less effective than other forms of patrol.

Interestingly, most patrol officers disagree with the findings of these studies. Author Kelling and his colleagues write, "Three-fourths of those surveyed in the South Patrol Division [in Kansas City] more than moderately agreed that routine patrol was the most important function of the department" (Kelling, et al. 38). This is not only because they see their job function as vital to the department, but also because in their experience, they give the public a greater feeling of security, which is another primary aspect of their police work. However, the study showed this was actually not the case, despites the officers' beliefs, and that police forces need to take a new, fresh look at their patrolling options to develop new techniques for managing crime and apprehending offenders.

This also brings up the question of the number of officers in patrol cars, and what is the most effective number of officers. Most of the public (and police officers, as well), would think two-officer cars were the most effective in responding to crime and criminal activities, but a 1977 study in San Diego debunked that thought as well. Author David Kessler writes, "Among the more salient of these experimental findings were that one-officer cars were safer, had fewer citizen complaints, and were more efficient than two-officer cars" (Kessler 49). In addition, the study discovered that two one-officer police cars had faster response times to a crime scene than one, two-officer car had. The study concluded this was true because of the inordinate nature of competition that exists between the officers, thereby creating a sense of urgency to be the first officer on the scene (Kessler 61). This also seems contradictory to public and officer perceptions, but the studies were highly professional and geared to long-term, statistical results, and these results do not lie. Random patrols and two-officer cars do not make sense in modern policing, preventative patrols with one-officer cars are the best way to help deter crime and still give a sense of security to a community's citizens.