From the Editors

• Author: Timothy S. Bynum,Robert F. McManus
• Published date: 01 December 2002
• Date: 01 December 2002
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.3818/JRP.4.1.2002.6
• Subject Matter: From the Editors

Introduction • 5

Last spring the Justice Research and Statistics Association was contacted by the

National Research Council, Committee on Law and Justice, whose Committee

to Review Research on Police Policy and Practices had recently held a workshop

on data collection issues. The Council asked whether JRSA would be interested

in publishing papers presented at that meeting in this journal. Council members

had considered the option of publishing the papers as an independent workshop

report of their own, but they really wanted to be able to reach those researchers

most interested in the data/research methodology addressed in the papers. The

readership of Justice Research and Policy seemed to be a most appropriate audi-

ence in this regard.

Once we reviewed the papers we heartily agreed. We decided to publish the

papers as a unit in a single volume. Instead of the customary peer-review process,

we reviewed the papers internally with an eye toward making suggestions the au-

thors could use to refine their work. We would formally like to thank the Associate

Editors for reviewing the papers, and for their valuable input and rapid response.

This special issue of Justice Research and Policy, which comprises numbers

one and two of the fourth volume, contains nine articles, as well as an introduc-

tion by the committee chair. We are extremely grateful to the National Research

Council for giving us the opportunity to make this body of work available to our

readers. We hope you will learn from it and come away with a better understand-

ing of the problems and promises of working with police data.

*from the editors

Timothy S. Bynum

Robert F. McManus