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The COVID-19 pandemic triggered a series of social isolation measures that reduced the movement of people in public spaces. This condition created a natural experiment to test the theory of routine activities and its applicability in the study of graffiti. Continuing the monitoring carried out in the hypercenter of Belo Horizonte since 2011, this study assesses the impacts of restrictions on the movement of people on the amount of graffiti found in that location. It starts from the hypothesis that the social restriction measures reduced the number of capable guardians (surveillance), expanding the opportunities for the practice of graffiti tagging and, consequently, favoring its expansion. A survey of existing graffiti in the hypercenter was carried out in 2022, and its results were compared with previous surveys conducted in the study area in 2011, 2015, 2017, and 2019, allowing the hypothesis to be tested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this special issue, five articles demonstrate the impact of contemporary Environmental Criminology theory on the understanding of crime and the development of crime prevention practices in both urban and rural contexts. The articles exemplify the development of Environmental Criminology as a field that extends beyond crime in physical spaces to encompass offenses in cyberspace, illustrating the field's adaptability and relevance in an increasingly digital world. Authored by environmental criminologists from diverse disciplinary backgrounds, these articles offer a range of international perspectives, thereby contributing to the field of security while addressing broader social issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the dual pressures of repeated impacts from the pandemic and global economic downturn, the deterioration trend of social security is evident. In 2021 and 2022, the United Nations consecutively emphasized the centrality of reducing and preventing recidivism, aiming to foster research and practices in crime prevention. Developing and applying crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED) theory provides a viable approach to reducing crime. Utilizing the relevant literature on environmental design for crime prevention from the Web of Science Core Collection database and employing Cite Space software, this study systematically delineates the research trajectory of crime prevention through environmental design. The research uses bibliometrics and literature analysis methods to identify research hotspots and trends in the field. Building upon these findings, the study proposes that future research in CPTED should systematically explore the spatiotemporal heterogeneity of the impact of urban built and social environments on crime. It also advocates for in-depth investigations into the long-term causal relationship between environmental features and crime under the framework of CPTED. The study emphasizes the exploration of the local applicability of CPTED theory under conditions of multiculturalism and regional differences. This helps to propose crime prevention strategies for new social issues and crime patterns, thereby providing strong support for the sustainable development of cities.

Urban crime prevention remains a critical challenge intertwined with socioeconomic disparities. This study investigates the spatial nexus between urban deprivation and crime decline in Chicago from 2015 to 2022, addressing the question: How do changes in neighborhood deprivation relate to crime reduction patterns? Using comprehensive crime incident and census tract Area Deprivation Index (ADI) data, this study conducted exploratory spatial analysis, regression modeling, and local bivariate relationship analysis. The findings reveal persistent hotspots of concentrated deprivation on Chicago's south and west sides, alongside a general citywide crime decline. However, the current research uncovered significant spatial heterogeneity in both deprivation patterns and crime reduction, challenging the achievement of equitable public safety outcomes. Surprisingly, while crime incidents in 2015 and 2022 significantly predicted crime change, ADI scores were not statistically significant predictors in our regression model. Local bivariate analysis exposed diverse relationships between ADI changes and crime rate changes across neighborhoods, with 72.2% of census tracts showing no statistically significant relationship. This underscores the complexity of urban crime dynamics and the importance of local context in understanding these patterns. Our research contributes a nuanced understanding of the intricate relationship between urban deprivation and crime patterns, providing valuable insights for policymakers, law enforcement agencies, and urban planners. These findings highlight the need for integrated, long-term strategies that address both crime prevention and socioeconomic disparities, ultimately fostering safer, more equitable urban environments and informing evidence-based interventions tailored to specific neighborhood contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Air pollution poses severe risks to public health and the environment, with acts contributing to air contamination potentially constituting environmental crimes or public health offenses. This research examines the national legislations and international legal frameworks aimed at safeguarding atmospheric air quality and addressing air pollution-related offenses in Central Asian countries. Particular attention is given to legal provisions that establish emission standards, monitoring mechanisms, and punitive measures for violations. By exploring the genesis and implementation of these legal instruments, the research identifies potential gaps, inconsistencies, or weaknesses that may hinder the effective prosecution of environmental crimes associated with air pollution in the Central Asian region. This study contributes to the broader understanding of environmental criminology by examining the interplay between international norms, national legislations, and institutional structures in combating air pollution-related offenses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sport venue security continues to be an integral planning component of venue and event management, often relying on a best practices approach informed by principles of risk management. That approach is too narrow. The focus on limiting liability and risk related to person and property, both physical and intellectual, tends to be reactive in nature. Additionally, research detailing sport security has shown that, in some instances, the current approach can repress spectators' and citizens' civil liberties, and in turn, can act as a catalyst for strengthening the police state approach to safety and security thus undermining the fan experience and sense of community that sporting events are meant to generate. After reviewing some of the shortcomings associated with the current approach, the paper shifts direction focusing on a new paradigm for sports safety and security management that makes use of theories and concepts from environmental criminology. The approach seeks to preserve enjoyment and dignity both for fans attending the game and for the surrounding community while simultaneously maximizing safety and security. How the various theories work and how they apply to the game day sporting event safety and security context are addressed. Finally, the article discusses how the new paradigm will provide a clearer understanding of potential problems that are occurring or may occur in future game day contexts and how these problems can and should be addressed to ensure a more community-centered security management approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to provide insights regarding crime problems affecting the Australian and New Zealand (ANZ) retail sector, focusing primarily on the size and range of criminal behaviours. The research incorporated an online survey of retailers and police statistics. The study finds that the cost of retail crime increased by 28% over the last 4 years, against 25% growth in revenue. It also reveals that shoplifting remains the most significant and costly economic problem facing retailers, followed by employee theft. Additionally, fraud, notably in online channels, will remain a concern for the foreseeable future. We examine potential explanations and interpretations for retail crime through an environmental criminological lens. Increased research and involvement of researchers hold tremendous potential for reducing retail crime and preventing its growth in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on the causes of corruption has been preoccupied with the corrupt individual or the socio-political and economic contexts in which corruption occurs. This has resulted in macro-level counter-corruption approaches that focus on the root causes of corruption. In the last few decades, however, new Western criminological theories and approaches have been developing. Environmental criminology – and its family of theories – is one example of theories that provide a different perspective on crime prevention by focusing on the crime rather than the criminal. In this context, situational crime prevention (as part of environmental criminology) brings in micro-level preventive techniques, such as the immediate manipulation of the criminogenic situations, rather than focusing on the distant causes of crime. The Western literature on criminology abounds in successful experiences of the ability of situational crime prevention to prevent several types of crime, including white-collar crime. In the Arab world, nevertheless, there is a dearth of studies, if any, that apply situational crime prevention in terms of crime prevention. This paper furthers another area of research where it has been argued that criminology in the Arab world is still dominated by modern criminology theories where the individual criminal is the centre of attention. As a result, environmental criminology has notably been absent in the Arab criminological discourse. Taking Kuwait as an example of an Arab country, and embezzlement as a unit of analysis, this paper argues that situational crime prevention is also a promising crime prevention approach in the Arab world.

Copyright of Neue Kriminalpolitik is the property of Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In post-pandemic, climate-changing societies, the presence of urban greenspace assumes paramount functions, at the same time that socio-economic crises and shocks augment vulnerabilities and insecurities. The recent literature on environmental criminology argues that the geography of crime is not random, and that the presence of greenery, due to its impact on well-being and the environment, can have positive associations with feeling safe; although the opposite effect can occur if spaces are not properly designed or maintained. In this paper, the case study of Porto, Portugal, is presented; one of the municipalities with higher crime rates, that also pledged to double the available greenspace in the near future. As a way to support decision-making, the aim of this study was to present an overall exploratory diagnosis of how street crime patterns, of different typologies, spatially co-exist with greenspaces. Using a 10-year street crime dataset at the segment level, descriptive quantitative methods with the support of GIS have been applied to plot crime's spatial distribution over time, as well as the walking accessibility to greenspaces. The results confirm crime's geographical non-randomness, with distinct categories occupying specific locations, even though there was a consistently proportional distribution in the different distance bands. On the contrary, the cumulative effect of the proximity to greenspaces was variable. Almost half of the city's street crimes (46%) were within a 5 min walking distance of greenspaces, but they were much closer to smaller inner-city urban gardens, with higher densities of street crimes (hot spots), than to larger municipal parks, where lower densities (cold spots) were seen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our collective understanding of criminal mobility relies almost exclusively on journey-to-crime research, which focuses on the distances traveled by offenders from their homes to the location of their crimes. In this article, we ask whether the theoretical relevance and the methodological validity underlying the journey-to-crime measurement are sufficient for it to continue to be a leading influence in the field of environmental criminology. Based on a critical review of the foundations of journey-to-crime research, we argue that while the interest in the journey-to-crime measurement is understandable, there are better ways to assess criminal mobility. Some likely misleading implicit presuppositions and methodological biases are identified, and the manner in which they affect our comprehension of criminal mobility is discussed. We suggest that a better understanding of criminal mobility would come from complementing journey-to-crime with new and more refined measures. Implications for future studies are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: to identify the level of crime in urban greenspaces and their correclation with certain crime types.Methods: dialectical approach to cognition of social phenomena, allowing to analyze them in historical development and functioning in the context of the totality of objective and subjective factors, which predetermined the following research methods: formal-logical and sociological.Results: greenspaces play an important role in the urban landscape, with prior research suggesting that they are associated with numerous health and social benefits for residents. Despite this, research conflicts regarding the relationship between greenspaces and crime, with some studies finding these locations to be criminogenic and others finding them to be protective against local crime. This study examines this relationship in Portland, Oregon, considering different greenspace types as well as different crime types.Scientific novelty: this study presents a novel methodological adaption to measure crime concentration and specialization around discrete location types by integrating a street network buffer into the standard Location Quotient (LQ) metric. Results suggest that Portland’s greenspaces as a whole do not experience a concentration of crime; however, varying patterns emerge when examining different greenspace and crime types. This study identifies diverse crime concentrations in proximity to small parks, while finding other greenspace categories to be associated with crime-specific concentrations nearby. Others, still, have lower than expected counts of crime concentrating nearby, potentially demonstrating protective trends. These results highlight the importance of disaggregating both crime and location types to better understand the complex relationship between greenspaces and crime.Practical significance: the main provisions and conclusions of the article can be used in scientific, pedagogical and law enforcement activities when considering the issues related to minimizing crime on the territory of urban green spaces. The article was first published in English language by Criminology, Criminal Justice, Law & Society and The Western Society of Criminology Hosting by Scholastica. For more information please contact: CCJLS@WesternCriminology.orgFor original publication: Hodgen, Ch., & Wuschke, K. (2023). The Grass is Always Greener: Analyzing Crime Concentration and Specialization in Urban Greenspace Environs. Criminology, Criminal Justice, Law & Society, 24(1), 19–37.Publication URL: https://ccjls.scholasticahq.com/article/73940-the-grass-is-always-greener-analyzing-crime-concentration-andspecialization-in-urban-greenspace-environs

Urban crime prevention remains a critical challenge intertwined with socioeconomic disparities. This study investigates the spatial nexus between urban deprivation and crime decline in Chicago from 2015 to 2022, addressing the question: How do changes in neighborhood deprivation relate to crime reduction patterns? Using comprehensive crime incident and census tract Area Deprivation Index (ADI) data, this study conducted exploratory spatial analysis, regression modeling, and local bivariate relationship analysis. The findings reveal persistent hotspots of concentrated deprivation on Chicago’s south and west sides, alongside a general citywide crime decline. However, the current research uncovered significant spatial heterogeneity in both deprivation patterns and crime reduction, challenging the achievement of equitable public safety outcomes. Surprisingly, while crime incidents in 2015 and 2022 significantly predicted crime change, ADI scores were not statistically significant predictors in our regression model. Local bivariate analysis exposed diverse relationships between ADI changes and crime rate changes across neighborhoods, with 72.2% of census tracts showing no statistically significant relationship. This underscores the complexity of urban crime dynamics and the importance of local context in understanding these patterns. Our research contributes a nuanced understanding of the intricate relationship between urban deprivation and crime patterns, providing valuable insights for policymakers, law enforcement agencies, and urban planners. These findings highlight the need for integrated, long-term strategies that address both crime prevention and socioeconomic disparities, ultimately fostering safer, more equitable urban environments and informing evidence-based interventions tailored to specific neighborhood contexts.

Copyright of Colección is the property of Pontificia Universidad Catolica Argentina and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Urban crimes are not homogeneously distributed but exhibit spatial heterogeneity across a range of spatial scales. Meanwhile, while geographic space shapes human activities, it is also closely related to multiscale characteristics. Previous studies have explored the influence of underlying geographic space on crime occurrence from the mechanistic perspective, treating geographic space as a collection of points or lines, neglecting the multiscale nature of the spatial heterogeneity of crime and underlying geographic space. Therefore, inspired by the recent concept of "living structure" in geographic information science, this study applied a multiscale analysis method to explore the association between underlying geographic space and crime distribution. Firstly, the multiscale heterogeneity is described while simultaneously considering both the statistical and geometrical characteristics. Then, the spatial association rule mining approach is adopted to quantitatively measure the association between crime occurrence and geographic space at multiple scales. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed methods is evaluated by crime incidents in the city of Philadelphia. Experimental results show that crime heterogeneity is indeed closely related with the spatial scales. It is also proven that the influence of underlying geographic space on crime heterogeneity varies with the spatial scales. This study may enrich the methodology in crime pattern and crime explanation analysis, and it provides useful insights for effective crime prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the environmental criminology, which relates crime to environmental factors and argues that the environment is not a passive determinant of the onset, continuation or termination of crime, has been on the agenda of urban studies, the relationships between elements of the physical environment and crime have not yet been sufficiently studied through exploratory spatial statistics. In the light of crime theories such as Broken Windows Theory, Crime Pattern Theory and Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design approach, this study aims to define and understand crime patterns by producing crime maps, visualizing spatial distributions, and testing the relationship between recurrent crimes in space and physical environmental elements. With the field study carried out in Chicago, the spatial patterns and relationships between crime types and physical environment elements were analyzed using exploratory spatial statistical methods. All secondary data used in this research are open data and all analyses were carried out using Geographical Information Systems. Exploratory spatial data analyses using GIS are Average Nearest Neighbor, Optimized Hotspot Analysis, Spatial Autocorrelation (Global Moran's I) and Geographically Weighted Regression. The analyses conducted in this study provided supporting evidence for theories of crime. The findings revealed that crimes tend to occur in close proximity to one another and cluster in specific neighborhoods and regions. This spatial concentration of crime supports the notion that criminals choose their locations intentionally or randomly. Furthermore, the study established a direct relationship between physical environmental elements and crime. Various physical factors such as inadequate street lighting, vacant and abandoned buildings, and sanitation code complaints were found to significantly contribute to the occurrence of crimes. These findings confirm the hypothesis that the deterioration of the physical environment can influence and contribute to increased criminal activity. Overall, the results of this study align with established theories of crime and provide empirical evidence for the significance of the physical environment in shaping criminal behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Throughout most of the twentieth century, Western criminological thought was preoccupied by theories of modern criminology, which were concerned with the question of why individuals commit crime. Since the late 1970s, however, the Western world has experienced new reconfigurations in the crime control field, one of which is the transformation of Western criminological thought. New crime theories have emerged in which the focus has shifted from the 'criminal' to the 'criminal activity'. Despite their importance, these developments have had no impact on the criminological thought in the Arab world, which is, to this day, is dominated by Western theories of modern criminology. This paper has three purposes. First, it discusses the status quo of criminology in the Arab world. Second, it suggests plausible explanations that help understand the current status of criminology in this region. Third, it discusses the relevance of some criminological developments (notably crime theories and environmental criminology) in the Arab context. In that eventuality, it argues that the Western developments might bring insightful crime prevention lessons for the Arab world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizen security is an essential condition for the realization of people; in contribution to this, the objective of the article is to provide relevant information on the behavior of crime, analyzing the crimes of greater social connotation that occurred in the communes of the Metropolitan Region of Chile. The chosen method is a logistic model, which includes socioeconomic and demographic covariates of each commune, as well as spatial and temporal effects. In the case of the former, it highlights the importance of the population, infant mortality, permanent personal income, and poverty as factors that significantly increase the probability of committing crimes, especially robbery in all its forms. In this same order of ideas, school attendance and green areas reduce the occurrence of crimes. Crimes that stand out for their extreme violence, such as homicide and rape, occur with greater probability on Saturday and Sunday, besides on Friday, for the crimes of lesions and robbery with violence. This type of analysis is important because it allows identifying criminal patterns that crime can adopt, all aimed at focused and evidence-based crime prevention, to contain crime and, thus, favor human development, which that allows the individual and the community to realize their legitimate aspirations.

Environmental criminological research includes several perspectives that explain how characteristics of the environment can lead to crime. This study simultaneously integrated these different perspectives, including crime generators and attractors and environmental disorder indicators, to determine the most influential, salient, and consistent predictors of micro-level crime hot spots in Indianapolis, Indiana. Hot spot and control units were compared based on the presence of spatially joined crime generators and attractors and environmental disorder indicators recorded via remote systematic social observation using Google Street View. The results indicate that crime generators and attractors tend to vary in significance, influence, saliency, and consistency across crime types. Alternatively, the presence of decay in hot spots may be the most prominent and stable environmental feature. Environmental criminology has placed an increased focus on crime generators and attractors, though, it may be time to assess the theoretical and practical importance of other criminogenic environmental elements like decay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract With the advent of spatial analysis, the importance of analyzing crime patterns based on location has become more apparent. Previous studies have advanced our understanding of the factors associated with crime concentration in street networks. However, it has recently become possible to assess the factors associated with crime at even finer spatial scales of streetscapes, such as the existence of greenery or walls, owing to the availability of streetscape image data and progress in machine learning-based image analysis. Such place-scale environments can be both crime-producing and crime-preventing, depending on the composition of the streetscape environment. In this study, we attempted to assess the risk of crime occurrence through place-scale indicators using streetscape images and their interaction terms through binomial logistic regression modeling of the place-scale crime risk of theft from vehicles in the central part of Kyoto City, Japan. The results suggest that the effects of specific streetscape components on the risk of crime occurrence are certainly dependent on other components. For example, the association of the crime occurrence risk with the occupancy rate of vegetation in a streetscape image is positive when there are few buildings and walls, and vice versa. The findings of this study show the importance of considering the complex composition of visible streetscape components in assessing the place-scale risk of crime occurrence.

The criminological literature suggests that neighbourhood walkability might produce unintended consequences, namely that walkability is associated with higher crime rates because it affords potential offenders an abundance of weakly guarded targets. To address this proposition, we investigate linear and nonlinear effects of walkability using a sample of block groups located across nine US cities. Results from our negative binomial regression models show that an index of walkability is associated with higher crime rates and that these effects are robust across cities. We also estimate crime models that test the main effects of the four indicators which comprise the walkability index, because of the recognition that certain dimensions of walkability might have a greater impact on crime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to explain how crimes are carried out, and why at a particular place and time and against a specific target, crime studies increasingly harness theory from behavioural ecology, in particular Optimal Foraging Theory (OFT). However, an overview of their main findings does not exist. Given the growing focus on OFT as a behavioural framework for structuring crime research, in this article we review the extant OFT-inspired empirical crime research. Systematic search in Google Scholar and Web of Science yielded 32 crime studies, which were grouped into four categories according to their research topic. Empirical results largely support predictions made by OFT. However, there remains much potential for future OFT applications to crime research, in particular regarding the theoretical foundation of OFT in criminology, and through the application of contemporary extensions to OFT using specific tools developed for the study of animal foraging decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To highlight the increasing importance of environmental criminology in addressing environmental safety challenges in the digital age.Discussion. In the digital age, it is important to shape environmental consciousness and culture through the system of countering environmental crime. To achieve this goal, the foundations of environmental safety should be promoted by attracting new technologies from the digital world. Content analysis of electronic mass media showed that in some regions of the Russian Federation there are environmental crowdsourcing projects, network communities and virtual civil platforms as a corollary of offline (traditional) civil participation. The republics of the North Caucasus need to take into account the positive experience of key regions of Russia, for example, Moscow, in creating digital databases for environmental supervision. Crimes in the field of ecology should be singled out in an independent section of the Special Part of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation as a priority area of criminal law policy. The authors propose the improvement of the system of execution of punishments for committing crimes in the field of environmental protection by creating specialised correctional centres for the implementation of punishment against persons who have committed environmental crimes directed at their resocialization.Conclusion. Strengthening state control over the use of the digital space in the regions of the Russian Federation will be facilitated by the formation of environmental justice as an element of improving the general system of combating crime. The effectiveness of such an environmental protection countermeasure system also depends on the quality of research in the field of protecting the natural world, which increases the importance of environmental criminology in the digital age

In post-pandemic, climate-changing societies, the presence of urban greenspace assumes paramount functions, at the same time that socio-economic crises and shocks augment vulnerabilities and insecurities. The recent literature on environmental criminology argues that the geography of crime is not random, and that the presence of greenery, due to its impact on well-being and the environment, can have positive associations with feeling safe; although the opposite effect can occur if spaces are not properly designed or maintained. In this paper, the case study of Porto, Portugal, is presented; one of the municipalities with higher crime rates, that also pledged to double the available greenspace in the near future. As a way to support decision-making, the aim of this study was to present an overall exploratory diagnosis of how street crime patterns, of different typologies, spatially co-exist with greenspaces. Using a 10-year street crime dataset at the segment level, descriptive quantitative methods with the support of GIS have been applied to plot crime’s spatial distribution over time, as well as the walking accessibility to greenspaces. The results confirm crime’s geographical non-randomness, with distinct categories occupying specific locations, even though there was a consistently proportional distribution in the different distance bands. On the contrary, the cumulative effect of the proximity to greenspaces was variable. Almost half of the city’s street crimes (46%) were within a 5 min walking distance of greenspaces, but they were much closer to smaller inner-city urban gardens, with higher densities of street crimes (hot spots), than to larger municipal parks, where lower densities (cold spots) were seen.

Copyright of Revista Iberoamericana de Estudios de Desarrollo is the property of Revista Iberoamericana de Estudios de Desarrollo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Over the past 15 years, environmental criminologists have explored the application of agent-based models (ABMs) of crime events and various theoretical frameworks applied to understand them. Models have supported criminological theorising and, in some cases, been applied to make predictions about the impact of interventions devised to reduce crime. However, decision-making frameworks utilised in criminological ABMs have typically been implemented through traditional techniques such as condition-action rules. While these models have provided significant insights, they neglect a crucial component of theoretical accounts of offending, the notion that offenders are learning agents whose behavioural dynamics change over time and space. In response, this article presents an ABM of residential burglary in which offender agents utilise reinforcement learning (RL) to learn behaviours. This solution enables offender agents to learn from individual-level perceptions of the environment and, given these perceptions, develop behavioural responses that benefit themselves. The model includes conceptualisations of the Routine Activity Theory (RAT), Crime Pattern Theory (CPT) and a utility function, Target Attractiveness, which acts as a behavioural mould to nudge offender agents to learn behaviours in keeping with the Rational Choice Perspective (RCP). Trained behaviours are then tested by introducing crime prevention interventions into the model and examining the reactions of offender agents. In keeping with empirical studies of offending, experimental results demonstrate that offender agents utilising RL learn to offend at targets where rewards outweigh risks and effort, offend close to home, frequently victimise high-rewarding targets, and conversely learn to avoid offending in areas associated with high levels of risk and effort. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban crimes are not homogeneously distributed but exhibit spatial heterogeneity across a range of spatial scales. Meanwhile, while geographic space shapes human activities, it is also closely related to multiscale characteristics. Previous studies have explored the influence of underlying geographic space on crime occurrence from the mechanistic perspective, treating geographic space as a collection of points or lines, neglecting the multiscale nature of the spatial heterogeneity of crime and underlying geographic space. Therefore, inspired by the recent concept of “living structure” in geographic information science, this study applied a multiscale analysis method to explore the association between underlying geographic space and crime distribution. Firstly, the multiscale heterogeneity is described while simultaneously considering both the statistical and geometrical characteristics. Then, the spatial association rule mining approach is adopted to quantitatively measure the association between crime occurrence and geographic space at multiple scales. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed methods is evaluated by crime incidents in the city of Philadelphia. Experimental results show that crime heterogeneity is indeed closely related with the spatial scales. It is also proven that the influence of underlying geographic space on crime heterogeneity varies with the spatial scales. This study may enrich the methodology in crime pattern and crime explanation analysis, and it provides useful insights for effective crime prevention.

SPATIAL DETERMINANTS OF CRIME IN KRAKOW, 2017-2021 The article presents a spatial analysis of selected types of crimes committed in Krakow in 2017-2021. Spatial data on crimes from the Police registers, the numbers of which were presented in tabular form, and data on the distribution of municipal monitoring were used for the research. The first step was to determine the type of spatial distribution of criminal offenses using the Nearest Neighbour Analysis method. As a result of determining the type of distribution as a clustered distribution, a detailed identification of the places of the highest concentration of criminal events in the city was initiated. For this purpose, the method of kernel density estimation showing the distribution of intensity of criminal events was used. Analyzes showed the highest concentration of violent crimes in Krakow in 2017-2021 in the city center, while crimes against property was evenly distributed throughout the city, with the exception of its suburbs. The last stage was a detailed spatial analysis of places defined as “hot spots” in terms of their functional and spatial conditions and situational conditions conducive to or hindering the commission of crimes there. The analysis was made on the basis of the local inspection of “hot spots”. The obtained research results were compared to the criminological theories presented in the article and the results of research in this scope presented both in Poland and abroad.

This paper adapts three conceptual frameworks from Environmental Criminology – Routine Activity Theory, Rational Choice Theory, and Situational Crime Prevention – to create a Crime Prevention Toolkit that helps librarians analyze and manage criminal activity in contemporary academic libraries. The toolkit is applied to a case study of patron-laptop theft at an urban academic library to demonstrate its use in analyzing criminal activity and creating a crime-problem intervention. The intervention was rapidly successful at eliminating patron-property theft. There were no patron-laptop thefts of any kind in the library after implementation of the intervention, in contrast to 12 recorded laptop thefts the previous academic year. This is the first time a research-based, conceptual framework of three theories from Environmental Criminology has been used to analyze and manage criminal activity in an academic library. It is also the first time a patron-property theft intervention in an academic library has been demonstrated effective in an empirical inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the advent of spatial analysis, the importance of analyzing crime patterns based on location has become more apparent. Previous studies have advanced our understanding of the factors associated with crime concentration in street networks. However, it has recently become possible to assess the factors associated with crime at even finer spatial scales of streetscapes, such as the existence of greenery or walls, owing to the availability of streetscape image data and progress in machine learning-based image analysis. Such place-scale environments can be both crime-producing and crime-preventing, depending on the composition of the streetscape environment. In this study, we attempted to assess the risk of crime occurrence through place-scale indicators using streetscape images and their interaction terms through binomial logistic regression modeling of the place-scale crime risk of theft from vehicles in the central part of Kyoto City, Japan. The results suggest that the effects of specific streetscape components on the risk of crime occurrence are certainly dependent on other components. For example, the association of the crime occurrence risk with the occupancy rate of vegetation in a streetscape image is positive when there are few buildings and walls, and vice versa. The findings of this study show the importance of considering the complex composition of visible streetscape components in assessing the place-scale risk of crime occurrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The primary purpose of this paper is to test the applicability of environmental criminology in South Korea. Moreover, it explores effective strategies from a spatial planning perspective by taking control of diverse spatial planning factors. The study area is South Korea, and the base year is 2016. A spatial econometric model is built to analyze the relationship between the built environment and three crimes (theft, violence, and sexual assault). As a result, the best spatial regression models for violent crime rate and sexual assault rate are a spatial error model (SEM) and a spatial autoregressive model (SAC), respectively. The most prominent finding is that the regression results in the three crimes are slightly different. The broken windows effect was negligible for significant crimes in South Korea. The influence of regional disorders on the incidence of crimes was marginal. In the three crime types, mixed land use affected rising crime rates, which aligns with some previous studies that mixed land use increases the likelihood of crime incidences. In contrast with a series of relevant works, brighter nighttime light has not effectively decreased crimes in South Korea. In South Korea, closed-circuit television (CCTV) did not play a role in deterring crimes. Lastly, socio-economic characteristics were closely connected with crime rates in South Korea. The theft rate, violent crime rate, and sexual assault rate confirm the reliability of environmental criminology. Although this study has examined the likelihood of applying environmental criminology, further research and discussions are followed for concrete plans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stingless bees are commercialised in Brazil through the internet. Such trade has mixed populations and introduced species, allows the potential dissemination of hitchhiker symbionts and diseases, and mostly does not follow national legislation policies.At least 33 species of stingless bees have been exploited by e‐commerce; eight others were not confirmed. All transactions found are in the surface web and most sellers do not fulfil legal requirements. Such results suggest that there is little need of anonymity for sellers, a fact that strengthens conclusions on the recurrently reported lack of successful law enforcement against illegal wildlife trade in the country.Critical geographical zones in Brazil, where sellers of stingless beehives are concentrated, are primarily in the Atlantic Forest. Urgent policy measures and scientific evaluations are necessary for both conservation of bees and risk control of pathogens. The most promising strategy to avoid the threats regarding movement of bees is the education of stingless bee keepers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of environmental features in the dynamics of crime has been increasingly evidenced over the literature review. Models such as Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) point out how these variables can be manipulated to reduce crime opportunities and fear of crime. Particularly in Brazil, there is a lack of crime prevention reviews on this perspective. Therefore, this paper presents a review of people-environment research tools useful to public security agents and other relevant actors who use interventions in physical spaces in order to prevent crime. Highlights include the systematic observation, the interview, the walk around the site, the questionnaire and the analysis of traces, which were examined in terms of their advantages and disadvantages. Finally, how these methods can be applied in planning actions in public security and related segments are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a spatial analysis of selected types of crimes committed in Krakow in 2017-2021. Spatial data on crimes from the Police registers, the numbers of which were presented in tabular form, and data on the distribution of municipal monitoring were used for the research. The first step was to determine the type of spatial distribution of criminal offenses using the Nearest Neighbour Analysis method. As a result of determining the type of distribution as a clustered distribution, a detailed identification of the places of the highest concentration of criminal events in the city was initiated. For this purpose, the method of kernel density estimation showing the distribution of intensity of criminal events was used. Analyzes showed the highest concentration of violent crimes in Krakow in 2017-2021 in the city center, while crimes against property was evenly distributed throughout the city, with the exception of its suburbs. The last stage was a detailed spatial analysis of places defined as "hot spots" in terms of their functional and spatial conditions and situational conditions conducive to or hindering the commission of crimes there. The analysis was made on the basis of the local inspection of "hot spots". The obtained research results were compared to the criminological theories presented in the article and the results of research in this scope presented both in Poland and abroad. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite decades of research into social disorganization theory, criminologists have made little progress developing community programs that reduce crime. The lack of progress is due in part to faulty assumptions in the theory: that neighborhoods are important; that residents are the primary source of control; and that informal social controls are emergent. In this paper we propose an alternative: the neighborhoods out of places explanation (NOPE). NOPE starts with property parcels (i.e., proprietary places), rather than neighborhoods. It focuses on the power and legal authority of people and institutions that own property, rather than on residents. It posits that control is intentional and goal driven, rather than emergent. We refer to those who own and control as creators. This small group of elites shape city areas and residents must adapt to the environments that suppress or facilitate crime. We discuss how shifting our focus to creators provides important new implications for theory, research, and policy in criminology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many forms of supervision strategies traditionally utilized by probation and parole officers emphasize service brokerage, case management, and compliance. Conversely, there is a growing evidence-base that demonstrates how community corrections practices can be (and have been) improved through supervision frameworks of behavior change oriented around criminogenic needs. Toward this end, recent advances in penology have applied the tenets of environmental criminology theories to community corrections practices, seeking to identify and modify each individual's opportunity-based risks for reoffending. In this article, using data from an Australian experimental trial, we explore the utility of an "Environmental Corrections" approach to the supervision of domestic and family violence perpetrators serving probation and parole orders, an offending cohort with growing political and public pressures. Quantitative analyzes indicate that this opportunity-reduction supervision framework was effective in reducing recidivism among all offenders. Amongst probationers and parolees on community corrections orders for domestic and family violence offenses only, rates of reoffending were 15.41% lower for offenders at the treatment site compared to the control site, although this difference was not statistically significant. A thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with these clients highlights that through the Environmental Corrections trial, they learned strategies for identifying, avoiding, and resisting opportunities to reoffend. Combined, this evidence suggests that opportunity-reduction supervision tactics may hold promise for limiting recidivism amongst domestic and family violence perpetrators, although further research is required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many forms of supervision strategies traditionally utilized by probation and parole officers emphasize service brokerage, case management, and compliance. Conversely, there is a growing evidence-base that demonstrates how community corrections practices can be (and have been) improved through supervision frameworks of behavior change oriented around criminogenic needs. Toward this end, recent advances in penology have applied the tenets of environmental criminology theories to community corrections practices, seeking to identify and modify each individual’s opportunity-based risks for reoffending. In this article, using data from an Australian experimental trial, we explore the utility of an “Environmental Corrections” approach to the supervision of domestic and family violence perpetrators serving probation and parole orders, an offending cohort with growing political and public pressures. Quantitative analyzes indicate that this opportunity-reduction supervision framework was effective in reducing recidivism among all offenders. Amongst probationers and parolees on community corrections orders for domestic and family violence offenses only, rates of reoffending were 15.41% lower for offenders at the treatment site compared to the control site, although this difference was not statistically significant. A thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with these clients highlights that through the Environmental Corrections trial, they learned strategies for identifying, avoiding, and resisting opportunities to reoffend. Combined, this evidence suggests that opportunity-reduction supervision tactics may hold promise for limiting recidivism amongst domestic and family violence perpetrators, although further research is required.