When Crime Moves Where Does It Go? Analyzing the Spatial Correlates of Robbery Incidents Displaced by a Place-based Policing Intervention

• Author: David Hatten,Eric L. Piza
• DOI: 10.1177/00224278211016030
• Date: 01 February 2022
• Published date: 01 February 2022
• Subject Matter: Articles

Original Research Article

When Crime Moves

Where Does It Go?

Analyzing the Spatial

Correlates of Robbery

Incidents Displaced by

a Place-based Policing

Intervention

David Hatten

1

and Eric L. Piza

2

Abstract

Objective: Examine the place-based correlates of robbery activity displaced

by a foot-patrol intervention in Newark, NJ. We use constructs from Crime

Pattern and Social Disorganization theories to test hypotheses concerned

with associations between the structure of the environment and the

displacement of crime. Method: Robbery incidents were spatially joined to

street segments to study micro-lev el displacement processes. Predic tor

variables were operationalized using data from the Newark Police Depart-

ment and Infogroup USA. Generalized Linear models tested associations

between the characteristics of street segments and displaced robbery in the

1

Department of Criminal Justice, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Graduate Center,

The City University of New York, NY, USA

2

Department of Criminal Justice, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University

of New York, NY, USA

Corresponding Author:

David Hatten, Department of Criminal Justice, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City

University of New York, 524W. 59th St., New York, NY 10019, USA.

Email: dhatten@jjay.cuny.edu

Journal of Research in Crime and

Delinquency

ªThe Author(s) 2021

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DOI: 10.1177/00224278211016030

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2022, Vol. 59(1) 128–162

target area as comp ared to a control. Results: Environmental structure

is important to understan ding the settings of disp lacement, though this

varied between spatial and temporal displacement. Relationships between

displaced crime acti vity and model covaria tes did not always appea r in

expected directions. For example, bus stops predicted increa sed spatial

displacement while corner stores predicted decreased levels of temporal

displacement. Conclusions: While testing for displacement has become

commonplace in place-based policing interventions, less attention has been

paid to the micro-level factors that may facilitate the displacement of crime

events. Both bus stops and corner stores show consistent associations with

displaced crime activity, but the directions of these relationships suggest

more complex processes requiring further examination.

Introduction

Among police practitioners, there is a well-documented belief that, despite

their best efforts, crime will simply move to another area in response to

targeted crime prevention interventions (Guerette and Bowers 2009;

Weisburd et al. 2006). Despite this oft-held belief, much empirical research

reports that crime displacement is rare (Barr and Pease 1990; Clarke and

Weisburd 1994; Eck 1993; Gabor 1990; Guerette and Bowers 2009;

Hesseling 1994). However, a number of other studies indicate the absence

of displacement is far from guaranteed (Andresen and Malleson 2014;

Andresen and Shen 2019; Choo, Choi, and Sung 2010; Lawton, Taylor,

and Luongo 2005; Piza and O’Hara 2014; Piza et al. 2020; Ratcliffe et al.

2011; Waples, Gill, and Fisher 2009).

Complicating the study of displacement, a recent meta-analysis of hot

spots policing evaluations found that only 40 percent of all studies included

reporting displacement analysis results (Braga et al. 2019). Similarly,

Guerette and Bowers’s (2009) review of situational crime prevention

evaluations found potential spatial and temporal displacem ent was only

measured in 47 percent and 5 percent of cases, respectively. In total, 26 per-

cent reported displacement effects of some kind (Guerette and Bowers

2009), a sizable minority. This lack of reporting, when combined with a

publication bias toward successful policing interventions (Bowers et al.

2011) suggests a dark figure of displacement findings and has limited our

capacity to examine the crime displaceme nt phenomenon. More impor-

tantly, outside of the seminal spatial displacement and diffusion of crime

study in Jersey City, NJ (Weisburd et al. 2006) there has been limited

129

Hatten and Piza

empirical analysis with the sole focus on exami ning the mechanistic or

contextual influences that may help explain crime displacement.

There have been notable examples within the place-based policing eva-

luation literature, among them a cohort of foot-patrol centric interventions,

where disaggregated crime categories exhibited spatial and/or temporal

displacement (see Hodgkinson, Saville, and Andresen 2020; Lawton et al.

2005; Piza and O’Hara 2014; Ratcliffe et al. 2011). Of particular relevance

to the current study, Piza and O’Hara’s (2014) evaluation of Operation

Impact in Newark, NJ found evidence of significant spatial and temporal

displacement. Piza and O’Hara’s (2014) displacement findings stand out

within the overall place-based policing literature and provide an ideal test

case for examining the etiology of spatial and temporal crime displacement.

The current study builds upon Piza and O’Hara (2014) through an anal-

ysis of the micro-places comprising the Operation Impact target area, con-

trol area, and catchment zone (used to measure spatial displacement). In

doing so, we test the argument of Piza and O’Hara (2014) that the

place-based characteristics of the target area and catchment zone likely

facilitated displacement. To test this proposition, we measured the presence

of both features of the built environment informed by crime pattern theory

and household-level measures of common variables related to social

disorganization (poverty, residential, mobility, and home ownership). Mea-

sures were aggregated to the street-segment level, which builds upon pre-

vious measurement strategies that rely on larger aggregations (e.g., block

groups or census tracts), and interpolate down to the street segment. Find-

ings suggest that the spatial composition of micro-places is an important

contextual factor in understanding the settings of displacement, though our

models suggest a nuanced relationship between characteristics of the envi-

ronmental backcloth, social disorganization, and the occurrence of

displacement.

Review of Relevant Literature

Place-based Policing and Crime Displacement

While there are many potential forms of crime displacement (Eck 1993;

Repetto 1976), most empirical research stems from place-based police

intervention evaluations and focuses on spatial and temporal displacement

(Johnson, Guerette, and Bowers 2014). Spatial and temporal displacement

occurs when, because of police intervention, offenders change the location

or time at which they normally offend, respectively (Eck 1993). Place-based

130 Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 59(1)