Measuring Marginal Crime Concentration: A New Solution to an Old Problem

Objectives: In his 2014 Sutherland address to the American Society of Criminology, David Weisburd demonstrated that the share of crime that is accounted for by the most crime-ridden street segments is notably high and strikingly similar across cities, an empirical regularity referred to as the “law of crime concentration.” In the large literature that has since proliferated, there remains considerable debate as to how crime concentration should be measured empirically. We suggest a measure of crime concentration that is simple, accurate and easily interpreted. Methods: Using data from three of the largest cities in the United States, we compare observed crime concentration to a counterfactual distribution of crimes generated by randomizing crimes to street segments. We show that this method avoids a key pitfall that causes a popular method of measuring crime concentration to considerably overstate the degree of crime concentration in a city. Results: While crime is significantly concentrated in a statistical sense and while some crimes are substantively concentrated among hot spots, the precise relationship is considerably weaker than has been documented in the empirical literature. Conclusions: The method we propose is simple and easily interpretable and compliments recent advances which use the Gini coefficient to measure crime concentration.

Crime count and crime harm in a post-socialist city: How does the law of crime concentration at places apply?

This article reports on a new empirical study evaluating crime concentration at places in a post-socialist city. We use principles of the law of crime concentration at places and the Cambridge Crime Harm Index to measure crime count and crime harm concentration at the level of street segments. The research found differences between crime concentration in a post-socialist city and crime concentration reported by recent studies from US or UK cities. Both crime and harm concentration are consistently less spatially clustered than expected by the theory in a post-socialist city. This finding has significance for both international criminology and national policing authorities, because the success of place-based policing is highly dependent on strong spatial clustering of crime. The study underlines the importance of experimental criminology and theory testing for the transfer of crime prevention approaches from their original contexts.

The geographic concentration of use of force incidents at subway stations mimics the law of crime concentration bandwidths: A research note

The Law of Crime Concentration states that a small percent of microplaces will account for large portions of crime. In this research, we demonstrate that police use of force incidents likewise occur at a small percentage of subway stations in Philadelphia, a category of ‘risky facilities’, where crime concentration is also expected. Those percentages mimic the bandwidths of the Law of Crime Concentration. We sketch pertinent data collection needs and future research questions that should be explored if a crime and place perspective is to play a role in understanding and informing policies geared toward reducing the extent to which police use force against the public.

Assessing the Spatial Concentration of Urban Crime: An Insight from Nigeria

Objective Research demonstrates that crime is concentrated. This finding is so consistent that David Weisburd refers to this as the “law of crime concentration at place”. However, most research on crime concentration has been conducted in the US or European cities and has used secondary data sources. In this study, we examine whether the law of crime concentration applies in the context of sub-Saharan Africa using primary data. Methods A crime victimization survey was used to collect data in the city of Kaduna (Nigeria). Using these data, the concentration of crime (breaking-and-entering and domestic theft) was examined at the household, street segment, and neighborhood levels. Specifically, variants of a Lorenz curve and the Gini index (GI) were used to examine whether crime concentrates at these different spatial scales and if such concentration reflects anything beyond the spatial distribution of opportunity for these types of offenses. Results Crime was found to concentrate at all spatial scales, and having accounted for expectation, given the distribution of opportunity, crime was most concentrated at the household level, closely followed by street segments. It was relatively less concentrated at the neighborhood level. Conclusion The current study extends previous research in a number of ways. It shows that the law of crime concentration at place applies in a very different context to most previous work. Unlike previous studies, we use primary data collected specifically to test the law, avoiding problems associated with the dark figure of crime. Moreover, the findings persist after accounting for crime opportunity.

Toward a test of the “Law of Crime Concentration” in Japanese cities: a geographical crime analysis in Tokyo and Osaka

This brief report aims to reveal crime concentration at the district level in Tokyo and Osaka, Japan, two cities characterized by low crime rates. Eight types of property crimes that occurred between 2008 and 2017 in Tokyo and Osaka and had been aggregated by the census enumeration district were analyzed using the Gini coefficient based on the Poisson-Gamma method. The results indicated three patterns. First, crime concentration was identified. Second, the degree of concentration depended upon crime type. Commercial burglary was the most concentrated crime type, and theft from vehicle and theft from vending machine were the most dispersed. Third, crime concentration patterns either remained stable or became more concentrated over time. Additionally, while theft of bicycle was found to display stable concentration levels over time, the concentration level of purse snatching was fluid. On the basis of the results, this report discusses the possibility of establishing the “Law of Crime Concentration” (LCC) in two Japanese cities.