Crime Analysis Unit

Crime Analysis Unit

Mission, Goals and Objectives of Crime Analysis Unit

Worldwide, analysts are variously described as crime analysts, intelligence analysts and criminal intelligence analysts. In the USA this has led to two quite distinct professions. In the UK, however, the terms have not been divisive and, together with common occupational standards and a limited, easily identifiable community; have led to an increasingly cohesive profession (Bynum, 2001). The majority of police analysts are deployed locally in basic command units. There are, further, increasing numbers of analysts employed regionally and in specialist departments, including special branch, road policing and major incident investigation units.

In order to assess which crime measure is most appropriate for an analysis, the statistical results from the use of crime counts, crime rates using residential populations, crime rates using dwelling counts (break and enter) and crime rates using ambient populations are compared using social disorganization and routine activity theory (Fisher, 2001). If the results from the ambient-based calculations are not qualitatively different from the crime counts and/or crime rate calculations using the more common residential-based populations, little utility is gained from the extra effort to obtain ambient population data. However, if the results are qualitatively different, past evaluations of criminological theory and policy may be called into question.

Role of Crime Analysis Unit within the Police Department

The stages of the cycle of the crime analysis unit are direction, collection, collation, evaluation, analysis, dissemination and back to direction, which is the tasking stage of the process and directly links to tasking and co-ordination as defined in the National Intelligence Model (NIM). Tasking and co-ordination is a decision-making mechanism for the management of policing business, both strategically and tactically (Leipnik, 2002). The mechanism uses the assessment of local policing issues to define priorities and to allocate resources. Collection covers the focused gathering of information from a wide variety of sources to support the tasking, and collation is the organization of that material so that it is secure and searchable and can be easily retrieved. These parts of the process, together with dissemination, are controlled by a nationally mandated Management of Police Information Code.

The analysis part of the crime analysis unit identifies the premises and draws conclusions and inferences from the information, making recommendations for further data collection, reduction opportunities or enforcement activity (Nordby, 1992). These findings are usually disseminated in written form, but may include a verbal briefing and may be supported by charts and maps. The outcome of the cycle may lead to further tasking in response to the findings and, as such, the cycle is a continuous process.

The basic premise on which crime analysis unit is based is unchanged and has been understood by policing for many years - that crime is not a random event and that people are predictable in their habits and behaviors. With this in mind, the most fundamental analytical technique is crime pattern analysis (Osbourne, 2003). This uses crime and incident data to identify patterns. These patterns may be trends - the changing ...